Interview with memoirist Rita Pomade

Memoirist Rita Pomade joins me today to chat about Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.  This is just one stop in a virtual book tour she's doing with WOW - Women on Writing - The Muffin! Full list of tour stops is below.

Bio:

Rita Pomade, a native New Yorker, first settled in Mexico before immigrating to Quebec.  During her time in Mexico, she taught English at the Iberoamericana University and wrote for Mexico This Month, a tourist magazine located in Mexico City. In later years, she returned to Mexico and wrote articles and book reviews for Mexconnect, an ezine devoted to Mexican culture. She also had a Dear Rita monthly column on handwriting analysis in the Chapala Review, a monthly English language magazine. In Montreal she taught English as a Second Language at Concordia University and McGill University. She is a two-time Moondance International Film Festival award winner, once for a film script about a homeless lady in Montreal, and then for a short story deemed film worthy about a child’s joy in exploring his creativity. Her work is represented in the Monologues Bank, a storehouse of monologues for actors in need of material for auditions, in several anthologies, and in literary reviews. Her travel biography, Seeker: A Sea Odyssey, was shortlisted by Concordia University for the Quebec Writers’ Federation best First Book Award for 2019.

Welcome, Rita. Please tell us about your current release.

Seeker: A Sea Odyssey is the story of a six-year voyage aboard the Santa Rita, a small yacht my husband and I built in Taiwan. Along with my two young sons, we explored parts of Asia, Africa, and Europe, dropping anchor in 22 countries. In those days we were one of very few Westerners who made the voyage through that part of the world. In the process, we barely survived a monsoon, encountered real-life pirates, and experienced cultures that profoundly changed us. Seeker: A Sea Odyssey was published by Guernica Editions under the Miroland in 2019.

What inspired you to write this book?

The seed for the memoir was planted thirty years after the journey. I was offered a chance to sail again. In deliberating about the proposition, I became aware of how extraordinary my journey had been, and how it molded and changed me. The passage of time gave a perspective that enriched the voyage I had taken so many years before.

Excerpt from Seeker: A Sea Odyssey:

The book’s prologue details the event that led up to the book’s realization.

P r o l o g u e

THE CALL

“Hey, Bernard, Roland phoned a short while ago. Something about

a friend of his with a yacht in Tunisia that he wants you to sell. He says to

 get in touch with him.”

We’re talking by Skype. Bernard, my ex-husband, lives in Mexico.

I’m in Montreal. We talk almost every day. Skype collapses distances

and there’s no sense that he’s away — just a feeling of expanded space

around me. It’s a good feeling. I show him the cats, go for a coffee, and

take a short phone call. He leaves the computer to grab a snack while

he waits for me to get off the phone. We have an easy relationship,

though it wasn’t always that way.

“Are you interested?” I continue when he’s back in his seat.

“I’m thinking about it,” he replies. “Roland’s already sent me an email.

The guy really wants to get rid of his yacht. She’s a 50-foot ketch and

well-equipped. He’s offering a big commission, but there’s no market

in Tunisia. Tahiti is the place. If the owner is willing, I’m in. Are you

 coming with me? We can do it again. Better this time. Rita?”

I feel the excitement in the way he says my name. Years ago we

sold the ketch he named Santa Rita, but he never lost his love of the

sea, and I am woven into the threads of that love. I’m intrigued by the

 idea, thrilled he wants to go on another voyage with me. In the

 eighties we sailed from Southeast Asia to Europe. Now I’d have a

 chance to explore the Pacific. The offer is tempting.

But I’m not sure. Back then we were dreamers, free-spirited and totally

self sufficient— or so we thought. The rawness of sea life brought out

our strengths, but it also heightened our weaknesses. In the end, I had to

go off on my own. He had to do the same. But those six years at sea

were the most extraordinary and influential years of my life, and I

could never have made the journey without Bernard. Together we

discovered a world we never knew existed.

I think about my creature comforts. How my stomach no longer turn

when I see a squall line move across the sky. How I don’t jerk awake

 every two hours for my turn at the helm. How I don’t have to hustle

for work from port to port or wonder if Bernard could ever love me as

 much as the Santa Rita. I’m happy with my space. Sometimes I lay

 awake at night and think about my good fortune. Yet — to sail again

 — to relive that adventure from a more stable and aware place . . .

My heart wants to say yes, but —

“I don’t know,” I tell Bernard. “Let me think about it.”

I write my childhood friend Gladys about Bernard’s proposal. She’s

 been living in Belgium since her twenties, but we’ve kept in

touch. She writes back saying: “Maybe this will help.”

 In the packet she’s sent me are the letters I mailed her through the

 six years of our adventure. I open the letters, touch the postmarks,

finger the stamps— each gesture a touchstone to memory.

What exciting story are you working on next?

I survived my birth but my mother almost didn’t. Her body identified me as something alien that had to be expelled. This was not conscious on her part. She had toxemia, and I was born in toxic waste, feet first, with the cord around my neck twice. My mother went blind for several months. She was told I had weakened her too much for her to have another child. Why did her body want to reject me? What was her story? What of her story do I carry? Did environment influence my development or was it partially programmed before my birth?  Did passed on trauma have something to do with my being selectively mute? My search for answers led me to epigenetices, a study that deals with memory carried in the genes, especially if there was trauma in the family history.  At eleven years old I had an experience that reset the way I experience the world, and at that point my book ends. The working title of this childhood memoir is Genesis.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

I was already on my way at six years old. Our first grade class was taken to the school library every few weeks to select a book and write a book report consisting of title, author, and why we liked or didn’t like the book. The books were uninteresting stories that I couldn’t relate to, so I didn’t read them after the first few. Instead I made up a title and an author and then wrote a sentence saying I liked or didn’t like the book. What’s odd is that the teacher never noticed, but I think that started my interest in writing.

Then in the fourth grade I couldn’t sleep through the night. I’d suddenly wake up and be restless, so I took pad and pencil to bed to do something when I woke up. The first night I woke up, I wrote a rhymed poem without any thought, and then fell fast asleep. I did that many times over until I had quite a packet of poems. Still, I didn’t think about being a writer.

In the sixth grade I wrote a poem for graduation. It was given to another child to recite as though it was hers. That’s when I made a conscious decision to be a writer. I wanted to expose that injustice, and others I had witnessed. I felt I didn’t have enough experience, and decided I would go into the world to seek experience so that I could write authentically. And I did.

Do you write full-time?

I don’t write every day, and yet I’m writing all the time. When I’m not seated at the computer, I’m often thinking about my writing. When I read other writers, I’m thinking about my writing. Even when I read the newspaper, my mind is picking up things I suddenly want to write about. And when people tell me things about their lives, I’m thinking what an interesting story that would make. On days I don’t I feel like writing, it’s usually that something is going on underneath, and I just trust that it will germinate and flower on a page.

I do have a ritual when I’m working on something I know I want to publish. It always starts with a warm up such as a bit of journal writing or a poem that comes to me. Then, before I leave the computer, I leave a thread of what I’ll be working on the next day so that I don’t start with a blank page.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

I do have a quirk though it’s not very interesting. If I get stuck on how I want to phrase something or words don’t come, I play a few games of spider solitaire. I don’t think about what I’m doing. My mind is blank as I place the cards. I’m completely removed from the writing. I usually do this while having a cup of coffee. Then, for some reason, my mind unglues, and I continue with the writing.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I loved two comic book characters when I was a child— Wonder Woman and Sheeba of the Jungle. I hoped to grow up and be a combination of the two women routing out injustice and saving the world. I day dreamed this life from my secret home deep in the jungle where I worked out and developed my skills. I assumed I’d get stronger and better at it as I grew older.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

Although I had been divorced from my husband for almost thirty years, as a result of my writing Seeker: A Sea Odyssey, we once again live together. Writing the memoir shifted perception and healed wounds.

Links:

Rite is on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram

Amazon.com | Barnes and Noble | Books-a-Million | Goodreads

Thanks for visiting today.

Readers, to learn more about Rita, feel free to visit her other tour stops:

June 29th @ The Muffin

What goes better in the morning than a muffin? Grab your coffee and join us in celebrating the launch of Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey. You can read an interview with the author and enter to win a copy of the book.https://muffin.wow-womenonwriting.com/

July 2nd @ Fiona Ingram's Blog
Visit Fiona's blog and you can read a guest post by the author about how she could have enriched her journey at sea.http://fionaingramauthor.blogspot.com/

July 5th @ CK Sorens' Blog
Visit Carrie's blog today and you can read her review of Rita Pomade's memoir Seeker.https://www.cksorens.com/blog

July 6th @ Create Write Now
Visit Mari L. McCarthy's blog where you can read author Rita Pomade's guest post about what she learned about herself through writing.https://www.createwritenow.com/

July 7th @ The Faerie Review
Make sure you visit Lily's blog and read a guest post by the author about cooking on a shoestring at sea.http://www.thefaeriereview.com/

July 8th @ Coffee with Lacey
Visit Lacey's blog today and read her review of Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.https://coffeewithlacey.com/

July 10th @ 12 Books
Visit Louise's blog and read her review of Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.https://12books.co.uk/

July 11th @ Bookworm Blog
Visit Anjanette's blog today and you can read her review of Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.http://bookworm66.wordpress.com/

July 12th @ It's Alanna Jean
Visit Alanna's blog today and you can read a guest post by author Rita Pomade about the ten best traits you need for living aboard a yacht.http://itsalannajean.com/

July 13th @ The New England Book Critic
Join Vickie as she reviews Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.http://www.thenewenglandbookcritic.com/

July 14th @ Bev. A Baird's Blog
Visit Bev's blog today and read her review of Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.https://beverleyabaird.wordpress.com/

July 15th @ Reviews and Interviews
Visit Lisa's blog today where she interviews author Rita Pomade about her book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.http://lisahaseltonsreviewsandinterviews.blogspot.com/

July 16th @ Author Anthony Avina's Blog
Visit Anthony's blog where he reviews Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.https://authoranthonyavinablog.com/

July 17th @ 12 Books
Visit Louise's blog and read author Rita Pomade's guest post discussing sailing myths.https://12books.co.uk/

July 18th @ Author Anthon Avina's Blog
Visit Anthony's blog today and read his interview with author Rita Pomade.https://www.authoranthonyavinablog.com

July 20th @ Bev. A Baird's Blog
Visit Bev's blog again and you can read author Rita Pomade's guest post featuring her advice on writing a memoir.https://beverleyabaird.wordpress.com/

July 21st @ Jill Sheet's Blog
Visit Jill's blog where you can read a guest post by author Rita Pomade about how her handwriting analysis skills made her a better writer.https://jillsheets.blogspot.com/

July 22nd @ A Storybook World
Visit Deirdra's blog today and you can checkout her spotlight of Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.http://www.astorybookworld.com/

July 23rd @ Choices
Visit Madeline's blog today and you can read a guest post by author Rita Pomade about the benefits of spending time abroad.http://madelinesharples.com/

July 24th @ Books, Beans and Botany
Visit Ashley's blog today where she reviews Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey.https://booksbeansandbotany.com/

July 24th @ Tiggy's Books
Visit Tiggy's blog today and read her review of Rita Pomade's book Seeker: A Sea Odyssey. She'll also be chatting a bit with the author!https://tiggysbooks.com/

July 26th @ CK Sorens Blog
Visit Carrie's blog today and you can read a guest post by author Rita Pomade about how she jumpstart her writing process.https://www.cksorens.com/blog

July 27th @ Memoir Writer's Journey
Visit Kathleen's blog today and read her review of Rita Pomade's book Seeker.https://www.krpooler.com/

July 28th @ Lady Unemployed
Visit Nicole's blog today where you can read a guest post by author Rita Pomade talking about stepping outside of one's comfort zone.http://www.ladyunemployed.com

July 31st @ Wild Hearted
Visit Ashley's blog where you can read a guest post by author Rita Pomade about why she jumped at the chance to go to sea.https://wild-hearted.com/

Interview with journalist turned wellness organizer Rachel Boehm

My special guest today is Rachel Boehm who is chatting with me about her memoir I Am NOT! .

You can visit her other tour stops, too, to learn more about Rachel and her writing.

Bio:

Rachel Boehm is an award-winning journalist, turned workplace wellness organizer and advocate. Her experiences with school and workplace bullying, fat shaming, disordered eating, perfectionism, and verbal and emotional abuse began at a young age and continued into her late-twenties. 

Embracing a survivor’s mindset, Boehm now views her journey as a calling to transform the way individuals and organizations view well-being, the beauty of the human body, metrics of success, and the fragility of time.

Boehm was raised in Austin, Texas. A love for the fine arts, film, and television took her to Southern California for undergraduate studies and to pursue a career in the industry.

A quarter-life crisis fueled by the tumultuous nature of the industry and a realization of society’s flawed definitions of beauty and success, sent her on a multi-year soul-searching quest. She traveled back to Austin, then on to the UAE, Syria, Jordan, Europe, and New York City, before accepting a graduate studies scholarship with American University in Journalism and Public Affairs. Following commencement, she moved to Northern Virginia.

This journey is detailed in her memoir I Am NOT! .

Please tell us about your current release.

I Am NOT! is a memoir and anecdotes chronicling struggles kids, teens, and adults increasingly face today: bullying at school and work, body shaming, disordered eating, perfectionism, stigma, and gender stereotypes. These issues, touched on through a series of vignettes, are set against a coming-of-age and growing-into-oneself journey.

What inspired you to write this book?

I feel strongly that everything happens for a reason. I believe I was given my journey so I could survive it and then share it. My hope is readers will discover that they can be their own hero. They can choose to and have the power to shed labels others have placed upon them and redefine themselves.

What exciting story are you working on next?

I have a few ideas in the works! I’m in a listening and observing phase, while focusing on the launch of I Am NOT! . It is likely the most important work I will ever put forward.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

Probably in high school, when one of my English teachers told me I was good enough to apply to a writing camp at Bryn Mawr. I won’t elaborate because this is a vignette in my book!

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

I don’t write full-time; writing is one of several side gigs I have. It’s a mode of expression that I fit in when compelled. I fit it in, in the nooks and crannies of my day. When I’m not writing I am working my full-time job in employee wellness, growing my wellness coaching practice and skincare business, working out, hanging with friends, or finding adventures—even simple local ones.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

Mostly a singer and actor. I had a photography phase, though!

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

Whatever it is you want to be or do, you can. The mere fact that you want to is enough to start.

Links:

Website | Instagram | Facebook | Publisher

Interview with memoirist Nancy L. Pressly

My special guest today is Nancy L. Pressly. She’s sharing a bit about her memoir, Unlocking: A Memoir of Family and Art.

Bio:

I grew up in small rural town north of New York City. After graduating from Goucher College, I lived in New York City where I received a master’s degree in Art History from Columbia University, worked at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and met my husband, also an art historian. I subsequently held curatorial positions at the Yale Center for British Art and the San Antonio Museum of Art, where I organized several important exhibitions, most notably the acclaimed Fuseli Circle in Rome: Early Romantic Art of the 1770s at Yale. I served for eight years as Assistant Director of the Museum Program at the National Endowment for the Arts during the Mapplethorpe controversary and the Culture Wars. After a semester as a visiting Senior Fellow at the Center for Advanced Studies in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art, I founded Nancy L. Pressly & Associates, a nationally recognized consulting firm specializing in strategic planning for some of the nation’s leading art museums. In the past five years, I have authored two books, Settling the South Carolina Backcountry (2016) and in Unlocking A Memoir of Family and Art to be published May 5, 2020. My husband and I live in Atlanta, Georgia, close to our son and two grandchildren. I love to travel, garden, and cook, and recently I took up pottery.

Welcome, Nancy. Please tell us about your current release.

Unlocking is not your typical memoir in that it looks at my life’s journey so far. It interweaves personal and professional stories, beginning with my childhood in a small rural town north of New York City as I slowly unravel family dynamics that had so long been obliterated from my memory. The memoir captures my life in the New York art world of the late 1960’s when I came into my own as a person and met my husband, a fellow graduate student, and we began our journey together as art historians. Throughout I discuss the importance of art and travel and how I look at and respond to art. Major themes include how I assumed the role of caretaker for my family, beginning with her husband’s near fatal illness early in our marriage; the challenges of being a working mother when the concept was still new; and how I finally overcame doubts about my professional worth and ambivalence about my more assertive side of my being that I kept partially repressed, allowing me to embrace a national leadership role in the museum world. It is also a story of resilience, determination, and optimism. Interwoven throughout is the importance of family bonds. The memoir is an intensely personal and honest account, notable for its candor, and I hope it leaves the reader with a deep appreciation for the power of empathy and the transformative power of art.

What inspired you to write this book?

While I was recovering from a near fatal illness, I discovered a treasure trove of family material in my attic, including citizenship papers, boxes of letters and old photographs, including one of my father’s brother, Max, who died at the age of eighteen, which I had never seen. As I looked at these photographs, some over a century old, I was astonished at the power of the image to unlock memories, to tell stories. I found myself overcome with emotion and suddenly felt a profound responsibility to try to create a narrative of my grandparents’ and parents’ lives before their stories were lost forever. For the next year I applied my skills as a researcher uncovering, in archives and historical documents, a significant amount of new information. I pieced together the facts and prepared a chronological outline with key events but did not venture further and try to write their story.

One day some eight years later, as I watched my grandchildren play in our backyard, I was filled with love and tenderness and gratitude for this gift. I was acutely aware of what a critically important role I was playing in their lives, as I helped my son, who was essentially a single parent, care for them. I thought about how random events or even comments can resonate deeply with a child, becoming an important part of what he or she takes forward into their adult life. I thought of how important my grandparents had been to me as a child and my mind wandered back to the photographs, I discovered eight years earlier. I realized there was unfinished business. I knew, in order to write my family’s story, I would have to summon the courage to dig deep into my own past, which had been locked away for so long behind a heavy veil of amnesia. It slowly dawned on me that I should write a memoir and incorporate my parents’ history into my story. This was my circuitous route to becoming a memoir writer, and it took me totally by surprise.

What exciting story are you working on next?

Being retired is an interesting state, so much more exciting than I ever envisioned. For me it has released a burst of creativity not only in writing but also in other things. A year ago, I took up pottery and throwing on the wheel and I absolutely love doing this. It is challenging but very satisfying when a beautiful pot emerges. So, for the moment my writing will be confined mainly to my Reflections page on my website, where I will write short essays on themes in the book including looking at art, travel, finding myself as a woman. Right now, I am writing a short essay on balancing our many roles as women whatever our age.

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

For me that’s a hard question because I have always written for my work whether it was as a curator and scholar or a strategic planner for art museums. My publications have been well received as much for their scholarly contribution as for their style. I have become a much better writer over the years and have been told I write with clarity and passion. My most recent book, prior to Unlocking, was Settling the South Carolina Book Country which focused on my husband ‘s family and the Scot-Irish settling Abbeville and Greenwood county between 1768 and 1850.

Photo credit:
Atlanta Portait Photography

Do you write full-time?

I’m retired. During the period I was writing my memoir I worked on it every day. It was very important to me and occupied my consciousness even when I wasn’t writing. But the reality was, despite the fact I am retired, I had other responsibilities. Family is a central theme in my book, and our lives have been complicated so there were constant interruptions. Our son is mainly a single parent; I help with the children sometimes daily and this involves phone calls that could interrupt the rhythm of writing and times when the thoughts came fast and furious and I would have to stop to pick up the kids from school. Additionally, my husband has serious health issues, and this could interrupt writing for a month at a time and certainly occupied my thoughts and emotions. I am extremely disciplined and energetic, so I found ways to continue to write but it certainly complicated thought processes on more than one occasion. I was absolutely committed to this book and thrilled that I found the courage and inspiration to undertake a memoir.

If so, what's your workday like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

I try to find a balance and keep my mind fresh. Exercise – I like to walk and do Pilates – was essential. I also enjoy gardening and cooking; both are important parts of my life.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

I am very messy; there are papers everywhere in my small home office. I am also intuitive and empathetic and honest as a person and these attributes became my voice. I don’t know if that is quirky but for some it might be.

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

In seventh grade I had a crush on my science teacher and wanted to become a geologist. I was always interested in science and psychology, but in college I discovered art history and there was no turning back after that.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

Writing a memoir was a complicated and moving experience and I found inspiration with the process, letting my own story slowly unfold. There was no outline; it evolved organically; major themes changed midway. It was so interesting to look at old photographs and try to decipher my parents and grandparents lives; to try to see and intuit meaning beneath the surface of the images as I so often had done as an art historian with works of art. Retrieval of memories was a slow journey. I had no idea where it would end up, but I trusted the journey and learned remarkable new things. No longer the analytic strategic planner or scholar prone to footnotes, I found inspiration in a new way of writing. It was liberating.

Links:

Website | Facebook

Thank you for being here today, Nancy!

Interview with writer Katie Nolan

Helping me kick off a new week is writer Katie Nolan. We’re chatting about her memoir, Confessions of a Hobo’s Daughter.

Welcome, Katie. Please tell us a little bit about yourself.

I was raised poor by a former maid and a former hobo. We lived in such a remote place in the Cascade mountains that, as my father stated, “the authorities would never think to look.” Originally, only an old logging road led up to the house where my parents settled, a house that was originally used as a goat shed and that had no indoor plumbing. I received my PhD in philosophy from SUNY Binghamton when I was fifty years old, and taught philosophy in Seattle until I retired. Recently, I experimented with off-the-grid living and taught myself how to build from pallets. I hug trees and have never met a 2x4 I didn't want to salvage. 

Please tell us about your current release.

Eight-plus years in the writing, Confessions of a Hobo's Daughter began as a re-telling of my father's story as a hobo and a fugitive, based upon stories he told me. Eventually, it seemed to demand a telling of my part in it, as his daughter. The story begins at home, a subsistence farm nestled on the west side of the Cascade mountains, where I grew up and where I helped my father with the farming. When I was a young woman, with Mt. St. Helens off in the distance, my father told me his terrible secret about how he once killed a man. He asked me to tell no one about that revelation, including my mother. I believe this strained my relationship with my mother and wondered whether keeping such a secret, even from my intimate relationships, contributed to them always ending in disaster.

I had come to a breaking point in my most recent long-term relationship, feeling particularly hurt when he refused to accept my gift of a pillow embroidered with, “Stay with me, the best is yet to come.” I was retiring to the Olympic Peninsula and he had no interest in joining me. With little planning, I bought a thirty-day train pass on Amtrak, taking my journals along, hoping to confront this past littered with failed relationships. Throughout this train trip, I gazed out the window wondering how my father had felt riding on the top of the train, a much more uncomfortable trip than the one I was on. I began to use my journals to write on the train, wrestling with my story and my father's story. I tried to meditate in my seat, discovering that it no longer brought a rather peaceful feeling but instead brought tears streaming down my cheeks. Embarrassed, I turned my face to the train windows, and gradually couldn't get myself to meditate, a scary moment because I thought meditation would solve all my problems. I didn't set out to write a book that would work as therapy, but eventually I did gain some insights that have helped me to move forward. As in my life, the book ends on a hopeful note, as my best friend Audrey encourages me to meditate in spite of the tears, and to pursue a connection with a fellow zen student and writer.

What inspired you to write this book?

I've always struggled with my father's past as a fugitive and as a hobo. Perhaps I wanted people to understand that so-called criminal behavior can be environmental, that is, we would respond similarly in that situation. Thus, I always wince upon hearing, “You've done the crime, you should do the time.”

In my father's case, he did kill a man but it was in self-defense. But who would believe it was self-defense when the man he killed was a prison guard? I wanted to honor my father's life and those men like him, who were caught in the terrible injustices of the Great Depression, during which men were imprisoned for having less than a dollar in their pocket via vagrancy laws. They were then put on chain gangs and delivered free labor, all the while beatings and “killing for sport” of prisoners by guards was condoned, or at least ignored.

I recall very few statements by others’ word for word, but I recall vividly my father stating, “The guards was killing us one by one.” Each night the men were crowded into a cage that looked just like the old-fashioned circus cages that were once used for transporting animals. I tried to capture this experience with the following passage, which begins with my father's bumming around buddy, Harry, shouting, “Let's go!”  My father had just killed the guard so they could make their escape.

Everyone in the cage who could still move came tumbling out. Those with gangrene from the long months of the chain cutting into their ankles looked on with disinterest. The rest began running down the dirt road, with me and Harry in the lead. When we heard the dogs coming after us, we ducked into the swamp. No one followed, believing the swamp, with its quicksand and adders would be sure death...When we could no longer hear the dogs, me and Harry sunk down in the mud.

Perhaps not surprisingly my father taught me that being happy was more worthy of our attention than living to make a buck. While I was reasonably content teaching philosophy, I felt like something was missing in my life. A friend mentioned that they thought with all my activism for social justice (stop police brutality, peace marches, environmental issues, taking students on trips to rebuild New Orleans), I had forgotten to live my life. I was struck by this, and it was certainly true that I had essentially worked the equivalent of two full-time jobs, rushing from teaching to sponsoring student clubs, to activist meetings, with little space between them. It was rare that I had an evening to myself. So retiring and dropping all of these activities so I could write the book, I think was inspired by my wanting to reverse that condition of “forgetting to live my life.” I honestly didn't realize at the time just how much the writing of the book would turn out to help me.

What exciting story are you working on next?

My present book, Confessions of a Hobo's Daughter, ends with multiple insights, including those regarding affairs of the heart, but one of the aha moments is that for some of us, meditation alone will not bring peace or enlightenment. Spiritual growth may also require a Western-style therapeutic approach. So my next book takes off from this. It is a travel/spiritual quest memoir, tentatively titled Path of Doubt, that includes my facing an uprising in Taiwan, living in a Tibetan monastery in Seattle, and facing my fear of snakes in Japan, all in an effort to work with Soto-shu and Rinzai zen masters. I pose the question to myself as to why I am stuck on the spiritual path and hope to find some answers to that question, and others, through continued research and by interviewing some spiritually realized masters and therapists.

In the book after that, tentatively titled Building Solitude, I wish to explore what it means to be a woman builder. I want to address how I became literally entranced with power tools, once I overcame my fear of them. I am intrigued by Bachelard's Poetics of Space, and I plan to interview women builders to inform my own phenomenology of building. I love to build in solitude and find great peace as I become one with the tools and materials. What does it mean for women to build? Why have I been drawn to building since I was a child?

When did you first consider yourself a writer?

When Hedgebrook awarded me a three-week writing retreat, based upon some gritty autobiographical poems I had written (now published as Zoot Suit Redux, an ibook that includes many WTO poems), I had some time and space to focus on writing for the first time. I couldn't believe I was accepted and I was so nurtured as a writer there! That made me believe I could write.

Do you write full-time? If so, what's your work day like? If not, what do you do other than write and how do you find time to write?

I don't write full-time. I work part-time jobs painting and plastering, a way to supplement my retirement income. I've also recently bought a tiny house, a fixer-upper, and spend a lot of time on repairs. That along with removing a quarter acre backyard of six foot blackberry bushes by hand has kept me pretty busy! I tend to write more in the winter, setting aside a couple hours each morning. But I do most of my writing in marathon sessions at writing retreats, and was able to finish this book at Hypatia-in-the-Woods, a marvelous cottage in the woods near Shelton, Washington, where writers are sponsored for various lengths of time by the organization.

What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?

I like to write in public spaces, including on the train, in coffee shops, and in diners during their slow times. I find it encouraging when folks at nearby tables ask me questions about what I’m writing, then show an interest in the topic.  So my thanks goes out to other customers at Farm’s Reach Cafe in Chimacum, Washington, who cheered me on.  Early on, while living off-the-grid, I wrote in my car with a long orange extension cord snaking out the window to an outdoor plug at a local community center. So thank you to Coyle Community Center for being so generous with your electricity!

As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?

I loved growing up on a farm, so naturally I wanted to be a farmer's wife and live out a “Cheaper by the Dozen” type of life. It was the 1950s so I couldn't imagine being the farmer! When no flourishing farmer came to court me, I changed to wanting to be a missionary nurse. Now, of course, I understand the colonizing attitude implicit in that idea. But the missionary nurse idea does still fit with the ongoing urge I've had since childhood to live simply in a hut in a forest. I really have no idea why that urge is there.

Anything additional you want to share with the readers?

Writing Confessions of a Hobo's Daughter pushed me to rethink my own ideas on prisons. Because I had filed away my father's story into a memory vault that was safely distant until I wrote the book, I hadn't fully confronted what it meant to put a ball and chain on a human being or to put someone in a cage. Strangely, given my father's history, I once stated to a prison abolition activist that “We still have to incarcerate people who have killed someone.” I'm startled to think how I had occluded the fact that my father had killed a man. Now, I believe that no human being should be put in a cage. 

Thanks for joining me today, Katie.