Piece of advice overheard in a restaurant on Elmwood Ave. in Buffalo, N.Y., from a grandfather to his granddaughter, at a post-graduation lunch:

"Stay away from writers and artists. They only make money after they're dead."

Putting the End in Friend

Writers get rejected a lot. As far as I can tell, it's simply a fact you learn to get used to, and then you move on. Submit somewhere else. Write something new. Take up ice dancing or handicrafts, for the love of Pete, if only for the diversion.

You'd think that all that rejection would prepare a person for the tricky-to-navigate world of Facebook unfriending, but no. Yours vicariously recently has been cast out of several friends' lists, and at first I was hurt. Then confused. Then I forgot about it, and went to see Bridesmaids with one of my oldest, dearest, most hilarious friends, and realized these particular Deleters were people I only sort of knew. It would be super-awkward going to a movie with them. I wouldn't want our hands to accidentally touch in the popcorn tub.

But still. It's like a weird cyber break-up, sans confrontation. It's like the little notes I sometimes get back when I send my writing out to various publications. "We loved it! The language is evocative and haunting! But in no way is this right for us!"

Yes, right! Wait. What?

I set out to understand why this virtual shunning had happened. My research showed that "Unfriending Day" wasn't until Nov. 17. Hmm.

This article was similarly informative: a study found that most people are unfriended for inflammatory posts or mundane posts. And here's a nice little kicker for this new mom: “As soon as you have a baby, you become uninteresting,” noted one survey respondent.

Ouch. Or to paraphrase Ben Folds Five, Eff you, too.

Some light self-reflection reminded me of my unwritten rules: I try not to post about anything I wouldn't say loudly in public. That leaves out, at minimum: politics, religion, the best swear words, and the consistency of my baby's poop. (But if other people post on these topics? I will add my two cents. Loophole city, sweetheart.) It doesn't mean I don't swear, or think about religion, politics, and poop. I do. More often than I'd like, most days. But I just don't air my opinions in a loud voice, in public. It's the best gauge I can think of, when it comes to sharing and oversharing online.

So: what's left? Well, there's always food. Is food mundane? On occasion I will announce what I've just consumed/am about to consume/am thinking about consuming at an undetermined point in the future. Mayhaps this is related to my recent extra caloric intake (see: baby). Maybe I am simply a sinning glutton. Even food is political; again, happy to discuss this with you face to face, not so much online. (Because then there is a record. Which you will use against me when I rail against Americans' bad eating habits, Hoosiers especially, then go buy designer cupcakes at my favorite designer cupcakery. If our conversation's over dinner, I can always blame the wine, or your hearing.) I don't post about food that often, I swear. And one of the people who deleted me does. Or rather, did. Sniff.

Besides updating about my uninteresting life and baby, I often post about writing, books and education. Because you know what I like? Writing. And books. Also, education. One recent deleter is a writer and teacher, someone I'd met and admire. (Should I be writing in the past tense? It's not like this is death. More like the type of breakup where the other person suddenly stops talking to you.) This person had signed my books and my wall, and the unplugging stung a little. We still have a dozen mutual writer/teacher friends, and the witty repartee continues around the cyber water cooler. But this writer? Rejected. Was it a friend purge? Did I say the wrong thing? I'm too embarrassed and proud to ask.

There's always a chance you will see your Deleter in person after the deed is done. I recently attended an event where that very thing happened. It was less awkward than you might think, even though this was a Very Special Deleter, for I had been added and deleted, then re-added and re-deleted. That's right. Two times I was deemed "not friend material." Or in '80s movie terms, I must've had The Wrong Stuff, and All the Wrong Moves. Since our in-person encounter was perfectly cordial, and I still get very nice occasional email forwards, we will chalk up the double-delete to generational differences in the understanding and use of current social networking technology. That, or my online persona, and perhaps my very self, is a total asshole.

"How do you even know who deleted you?" my husband asked. "I don't pay attention."

"I hadn't seen posts from those people in awhile, so I went looking for them, and it said 'Add as a Friend.' I'd sometimes hide their posts because one said something borderline racist. Another updated nonstop about the most trivial things. I wondered if they were still posting borderline racist stuff or completely trivial things, so..."

"You're upset that someone you hid is no longer there?"

Yeah. Smart husband. I wanted to be the Deleter, not the Deleted. The dumper, not the dumpee. Dumpette. Backing up my dump truck of online friends with a beep-beep-beep, and out you go.

It feels silly, investing so much meaning in an action that likely took less than one second. Click. But that's just it: actions mean something, and friends do, too. They mean different things to different people.

Listen. Don't feel rejected, but I've gotta get back to the Book of Faces. I have 72 new photos of the baby to upload. But I will continue to exercise the utmost discretion and restraint. Not a single one of them involves poop. This time.

I had to stop watching Oprah after every episode provoked sobbing, even (especially) the "favorite things" *

Man alive, have I been posting a lot of man-with-guitar videos lately. Lest you think I'm not up on current events, I happen to be aware that today is the last broadcast of the Oprah Winfrey Show.

I haven't seen the episode yet, but I got this spoiler alert from a friend: BEES.


Just went on an online Oprah smorgasbord. The Onion's Oprah Viewers Patiently Awaiting Instructions, the one where Tom Cruise jumps on the couch, the one where Tom Cruise jumps on the couch and lightning bolts shoot from his hands into Oprah's body, the one where Tom Cruise calls Matt Lauer glib. Uh. Guess I got a little off course there.

It's tornado season here in the Unironic Midwest, and every distraction helps.

*Okay, maybe not sobbing. But seriously, the "favorite things" made me feel down, man. Why? As I might write on a student paper, "Explore this further." I will think very hard on this topic to formulate a reasonable response, in 3-5 pages (double-spaced). Yes, it has to be typed. No, I don't have a stapler.

Make a New Plan, Stan

I've been hearing a lot about May 21, which is just around the corner, the alleged Judgment Day. The Internet is a-buzzing like a hive of angry bees. Just to be clear, the world is not going to end on Saturday. I bet you three dollars.

What are you doing before the Rapture? I might head to the record shop for the new Paul Simon. Mine is a modest bucket list.



Says Simon in a recent interview: “If there's no one listening, is there any reason to write? Art can't exist unless there's someone to appreciate it."




When I was a child, my parents often played Simon & Garfunkel on the stereo at home, and we heard all the hits on AM radio while driving around town. Two of my favorite songs were "Slip Slidin' Away" and "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover." The latter I thought of as a kind of adventure song, which, in a way, it is: hopping on the bus (Gus) and making a new key (Lee) to evade that pesky lover. Hijinks! And rhyming. You just slip out the back, Jack.

In high school one year, I got Paul Simon's Concert in Central Park double CD as a Christmas present. Which I re-bought after the disc was stolen. There's a point during "The Obvious Child" where the song skips. "Why deny the ob-ob-obviousss child." I'd always thought I'd scratched the CD, but my new one does it in exactly the same place.

I love Paul Simon's writing. And his songs. Put the two together, and the effect is, well, rapturous.

Three dollars on the world not ending, you hear? I'm setting up PayPal momentarily.

Carpe Vita

May I?

May I please tell you that the month of May is for writing? For me, that is. It's not, like, a national event or anything. No gimmicks. No tricks. Just writing. And MAYbe occasionally shopping online for adorable baby clothing, but mostly writing. And emptying the spam folder, which includes missives from Lisa about Amazing Scholarship Opportunity. I know, I know, hilarious spam is old news. But still? It makes me laugh, daily. It makes me jot things down. It makes me pay attention. Pay attention. You MAY have already won valuable prizes and dollars US.

May I also share an excerpt from my novel, SLEEPING WOMAN? You may find it in the Dia de los Muertos anthology.



I just got my copy in the mail, and it's a very cool book with a variety of material centered on the loose theme of the Day of the Dead. To find out more about Day of the Dead, you may consult an encyclopedia, Wikipedia, or your local news outlet on or around Nov. 1.

Other excerpts from SLEEPING WOMAN have been published by Freight Stories and Cantaraville. You may find yourself enjoying those publications as much as I.

(In fact, I know you will. Go on, now. Git.)

Some random pieces of information that loosely cohere via association

My story White Hands, published by Zone 3 in their Fall 2008 issue, is now online. They've added lots of content to their website. Look for the issue with fiction/an interview with Michael Martone, U of Alabama professor, who is in Tuscaloosa, dealing with the aftermath of the tornadoes. He is OK, and is busy making sure everyone else is OK.


Stacks of paper are piling up here in the haushold. We choose to deal with it by listening to music. During this song, the baby stops what he's doing and gives me a very sweet smile. He's always liked a little Ray.



A peaceful song about less-than-peaceful times. But the baby doesn't know that. Not yet.

About White Hands: I wrote it in graduate school, and I remember my professor being less than impressed with my initial drafts. Unsatisfied is perhaps the better word. Of course it stung at the time, but I realized that having a reader like that is crucial. That is one way to grow: by learning how to be a little unsatisfied with your own work. It's a recurring theme in Although Of Course You End Up Being Yourself by David Lipsky, which chronicles his road trip interview with David Foster Wallace on the Infinite Jest book tour in the late '90s. That, and the dangers of becoming addicted to television. And the Internet. And what-all else you can imagine. The dangers of white noise, once again.

White noise from my inbox: "When your wipes case is this stylish, your diaper bag might actually get jealous."

The ludicrousness of this world, I tell you. (My diaper bag is plenty secure in its self.)

Sudden Flash Youth

Sudden Flash Youth: 65 Short-Short Stories

From Persea Books, now available for preorder. Includes my short piece "For Good," about Cece and Juan at the Indianapolis Museum of Art.

Contributors include Dave Eggers, Pamela Painter, Alice Walker, Ron Carlson, Naomi Shihab Nye, and more. It's edited by Christine Perkins-Hazuka and Tom Hazuka, and Mark Budman, who also edits Vestal Review (which published one of my flash fictions, He Waits, Wants, in Issue 30.)

Am I sounding convincingly casual? Because, really, I am doing some calisthenics of excitement over here, to be including in this book. Deep knee bends and such. Toe touches. Sudden Flash Youth ships in mid-June.

Musical Youth, if you've clicked the title of this post, is something else entirely. Can we hope for a comeback tour?

All we can do is hope, friends.

Your mission for the day

(From MAKE Magazine, out of Chicago.)

The magical UPS truck

...has delivered my copy of The Pale King, David Foster Wallace's last -- and unfinished -- novel. Sorry, other books. Putting you down for awhile. The foreword tells how editor Michael Pietsch worked on the book from drafts, notes, and how he interpreted Wallace's vision for the work.

On the subject of DFW, this article says more than I could, presently. Writer Maria Bustillos spent three days at the Ransom Center at the University of Texas at Austin, reading his papers, notes, and a sampling of his annotated books -- some 300 are included there.

I have a copy of this Wall Street Journal piece tucked away, too, in case the Internet ever explodes. "This is water, this is water."



It is an odd thing, missing someone you didn't know. That I'll never be able to send DFW a postcard, or receive one in return. (Imagined scenarios, part I.) That the imaginary postcard would be delivered by a new mailman, the old one reassigned to a new route without even a goodbye. No goodbye!

The UPS truck driver remains the same. Loud music, high socks, speedy. Grateful for my gratitude when he brings me books.

Thanks for the books, sirs. Both of you.