I grew up playing Go Fish with The Authors card deck. Adult survivors of a 1970s American childhood will surely remember it: the deck celebrated the white boy canon — Shakespeare, Twain, Hawthorne, Dickens, et cetera et cetera. Oh, and Louisa May Alcott, the lone female. Grrrr. That ugly phallocentric deck taught me all about… Read More Cards Against Patriarchy
Author’s note: This is a piece I wrote a couple of years ago as I was developing a workshop called Radical Embodiment. I came across it again recently and thought of it again today, as I watched the inauguration of Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and felt my body respond: releasing years of fear and… Read More Radical Embodiment
A few years ago I spent six months living in Los Angeles, the city I came of age in, the city I had been trying to get back to for more than two decades. I was there to finish a novel, a project that had been in the works for years, and a dear friend… Read More Dark green quiet.
I get this question a lot with the Avion — and now I’m getting it with the Silver Streak. No, it’s not an Airstream. But all of them drew on the same post-World War Two airplane design and technology — riveted aluminum, rounded edges for streamlined aerodynamics on the road. “Famous Aircraft Riveted Construction” They… Read More Is It an Airstream?
“Unable are the loved to die, for love is immortality.” Emily Dickinson Fiona’s Story
It’s December 2017. I’m at a windswept campground just north of the U.S.-Mexico border, about to travel to Baja California in a three-vehicle convoy of women I barely know. Lori hands me a walkie talkie so we can communicate while we’re driving. “I’m Big Bear. Oso Grande,” she says. “Cami is Little Bear, Osito.” She… Read More Call Me Jenny Quest
I’ll be the first to admit it: I seriously overpacked for my trip to Baja last winter. Anyone who’s ever taken an extended vacation to an unfamiliar (or even familiar!) place will totally understand this: “Oh, just one more pair of jeans. Oh, and that X, and that Y, and maybe both of those Zs….”… Read More Traveling Light: Downsizing for the Road
Two years ago I spent my first winter at the Fountain of Youth RV Park and Spa, in Niland, CA, down near the Salton Sea. One day woman came round to my campsite to admire my 1965 Avion and offered me a tour of her 1978 Silver Streak. I was charmed, to say the least.… Read More Hello world!
As I was scrounging around in my Scrivener archive today, I found this piece I wrote eons ago, in April 2018, as I was gearing up for the Heart of America tour. I’m not sure why I didn’t post it then. It seems even more relevant now that I’m back and have had six months… Read More Find Myself a City to Live In
SQUEEEEE! It’s official: I am the deliriously happy owner of this 1978 Silver Streak trailer! As with the Avion, this came to me through the kind of lucky coincidence that really suggests the hand of fate at work. In early February, I got a phone call out of the blue from Lois Codd, a lovely… Read More Home Sweet Home
