Today, when my friend told me she has breast cancer, I chuckled and said, “What do you mean?” I might have even been smiling.

“I mean, there’s a lump in my breast and the lump has cancer,” she repeated.

Then I got it.

I searched her face for distress and all I saw were her rosy cheeks, those same cheeks always flush with life.

“It’s weird. It’s up high, here, in a strange spot.”

I asked with my eyes, and then in a slow act of friendship, reached my hand toward her breast.

“There,” she said. “Right there.”

I felt around. Small, but yes. There, right there. Hard as stone.

I withdrew my hand.

After we finished our wine, we walked to a friend’s house near campus for a cookout. Mother, father, and two kids filled the kitchen. Together we rinsed the bell peppers, mushrooms, zucchini, and yellow squash. My friend made coleslaw and instructed me on how much pepper, garlic salt, onion salt, and cayenne to put on the beef. Then we started stabbing everything onto kabobs, refilling our wine glasses and moving out onto the porch. I watched her move, as I always do, and everything was crystal. Saline. Perfect.

This is my friend whose name means life. My friend whose very presence each year, as she comes back to the craft school for another visit, fills my heart with fresh energy and new ideas. She is also my friend who will make a choice to live and will do it.

When I got home, I did the only thing a woman does whose friend has breast cancer. I took a shower, raised an arm, and felt for lumps.

The Ultimate Customer

It’s 12:20pm and time for the lunch rush at the coffeehouse, usually a two or three person job (bare minimum) but it’s change-over weekend (between sessions) on campus and raining out, so my boss bugged out early and I’m all alone. I’ve been on the clock all of twenty minutes and that’s when the rush starts. Ninety minutes, $250 in sales, and fifteen sandwiches later, I seem to be in the clear for the lunch orders but the line’s building up again for drinks.

I’m still having fun but I’m crudely aware of the fact that I need to eat my own lunch, or put some sugar in my body quick, or else I’ll be bitch-barista in T-minus fifteen minutes and counting. And that’s when I hear it, a crackly edged voice like no other—some customer shouting at me from the middle of the line. My back is turned when the woman first starts talking, my hands busy pumping syrups for a blackberry-lime Italian soda.

“Excuse me. EXCUSE ME!” I hear her shout. The hair on the back of my neck stands up on end.

“Excuse me! Can I get an iced DECAF coffee?” Her voice again. This time, like nails on a chalkboard.

I sense a collective wave of chi-shock spread throughout the room and even before I turn to face the perpetrator, I’m counting to ten under my breath. No one, I mean no one, speaks in that tone in this coffeehouse. Not at the craft school. Not on this mountain. Not to our staff. Ever.

But when I turn around, all I see are the quick moves of a woman darting from the line, around the display case, and behind the counter. She leaps into my arms all laughter and green eyes, and that’s when I realize her joke.

It’s Amy Jacobs! A former core student at the craft school who I haven’t seen in two years. Our last occasion for a beer together after hours? When we both received our acceptance letters to graduate school, mine in Oregon and hers a full ride to a top Chicago art school plus an assistantship and stipend. She’s back on campus for two weeks and there is so much to catch up on!

The customers in line laugh with relief as they realize the rude woman is actually my friend and not rude at all, her face lit with nostalgia and her great, great smile just like I remember. Quickly, she hops back into the line so I can serve the waiting crowd, but when she gets to the counter again, she doesn’t even have to order. I remember her drink with pride: iced coffee with an inch and a quarter of room for cream, to go, please.

Post MFA Report

In my mind, I talk to my teachers. Claire, I say, I’m studying those literary magazines you told me to submit to and last night I heard a voice, started a new story. Jack, I’m putting together a packet for that journal you connected me with. Pete, it’s 2am and I’m drinking tea, relaxing and writing. Judy, I say, I’m using some kickass verbs and looking at the old horse story I sent you, mining it for details. Ellen, I say, I’m naming things (like the cecropia moth that’s set up camp on my porch door). John, I’m naming the fears and looking at them when I can. Sandra, I’m starting to open myself to writing as political, writing as momentum, writing as social change. Dorianne, I’m trying to stay in that moment and dig deeper, see what meditation can unearth and how time can expand on the page.

It’s only been two days, but so far so good. I’m reading 50 pages of day of a novel I’m critiquing (just the initial reading stage) and 4 submissions a day for a literary journal I’m guest editor at. I’m blogging about once a day and I’m writing a poem every other day to Cam. I’m staying up until 2 or 3am and getting at least an hour in of writing and an hour in of reading after all the other work is done. I’m getting 7 hours of sleep a night. I’m trying to smile even more at work. I’m leaving campus earlier after dinner and not answering the phone. I’m checking email only twice a day and never in the morning.

Like I said, there are fears. I could expound. But I’m don’t feel the need to make them any more real than they are. Before I left, Claire sat down at the post-graduation party with me and said, “Katey, I don’t want to ever hear that you’re not writing. It’s good life, the writing life, it really is. And you’re doing it. You can keep doing it. And don’t give up on that fiction. You got it kiddo, just keep going.”

And so it goes. One day at a time. Doing everything I can to keep writing. Trying to be patient, to remember that I still have to do things like work and cook and talk to friends—and I don’t have to resent these things because they take me away from the desk, rather, I need to live in these moments more thoroughly so that when I return to the desk, I can imagine as deeply as possible.

A Better Pic & Back in the Dojo

Ok, so I know I said I did the website updates yesterday, but THIS is important. I finally figured out how to change the file size of a Class of 2008 digital picture that a family friend took. Now, it’s small enough to upload on dial up and it still looks gorgeous. So check us out, front page of the website, all caps and gowns. Oh, happy day!

Now, back to business:

After we bow, Hanshi gives me a big-bear-hug-welcome onto the tatami, slaps me on the back, and says, “Congratulations! We’re really proud of you!” I smile, bow to the other karateka, and then we begin class.

When I left, two new white belts had just joined. Only one remains but he’s loyal, I can tell, and I’m glad for it. Lis is missing, though, and Sienna skipped out early, so once again it’s just me and the guys.

We begin with ippon kumite kata 1-5, where the principle is speed and power. These sets of movements are basically a fast and lethal response to an attack, administering five moves to the attacker’s one. They are also the first five directions of shino kata and moves that Robbie and I practiced at the Pacific residency last week. It feels good to warm up with something familiar and, while we only work the first five, there are 26 total ippons to learn.

Next, we learn taezu naru waza 1-4, where the principle is speed and fluidity. These are also a series of moves but they are done so quickly that five or six moves are complete in 2 seconds or less. The key to moving this way is flowing between the completion of one move and the start of another so that the action is seamless. Taezu naru waza are practiced in one continuous breath and there are 10 total that we can learn.

And since karate always provides me with a metaphor for life, here is tonight’s: The taezu naru waza are supposed to happen in an instant, like life passing you by. At first, this is overwhelming and it seems impossible to decipher how so many moves can be administered in two seconds flat. But, also like life, each taezu is comprised of tiny parts that can be isolated and broken down, examined for the sake of understanding. A movement here, another move there, the breath exhaling here, the conclusion there. In the end, you’ve accomplished something and even though there may be bumps along the way (the impact of each blow), it all runs in a seamless line in the end.

Day Whatever

Goodbye oh wi-fi world!

I'm sitting at PDX drinking my last Coffee People Coffee Velvet Hammer (to go, with soy, medium, less 1 shot).

Here are my website updates, including new sidebar links. CLICK HERE!

Day 15 & 16

Trying to post photos but am stuck on dial up tonight, with faulty wi-fi in the burbs of Portland. Flying all day tomorrow. More news as soon as I get my feet on the ground and/or high speed internet.

Day 15

As soon as my head hit the pillow last night, my mind's eye burst alive with their faces: My teachers. Those glorious mentors who have guided, taught, encouraged, and hugged me through the past two years of the MFA.

Most of us sniffled and cried our way through the 43 minute graduation ceremony. Sitting in a straight row on the vast stage, our chairs directly faced the audience. Customary to Pacific, the faculty sat in the very front row, guarded by greygowns on either side. Sitting in front of them in this final gesture was perhaps one of the most intimate experiences a student and teacher who have connected can have, and yet the event was so public. That, more than anything, was the most heartbreaking part.

I am ready to move on. This past residency was the most comfortable of the five I particpated in. I was relaxed, had little to no anxiety (imagine that!) and slept relatively well. There was no social drama. There were no sleepless nights. There was no heartbreak no heartache and nothing seemed to be impending. Which of course means it is in fact time to move on. Leave when it gets good, they say, or - as soon as you're comfortable in a place, the place can no longer serve you.

I've been thinking a lot about how I want to step into this new phase of my writing life and I'd like to say that I have it all worked out. The truth is, I think I'm going to have to go through a bit of trial and error before I can nail down a new schedule. The other fact is, I've been gone from work for two and a half weeks and I'll be returning to an overworked staff and probably a few extra shifts on top of my regular load to make up for my absence.

But I can say this much:

First, I want to unplug the phone when I write. And I will not check email, even as a break, during my designated writing time. Designated writing time is DIFFERENT than freelance writing and freelance editing time, where email is a necessary tool for the paid job. I'm not sure how I will separate thes two facets of my writing life jsut yet, but I know it needs to happen.

Second, I want to shift my primary writing hours to AFTER work, AFTER karate, and INTO the wee hours of the night and early morning. This suits me for the cooler temperatures of summer nights and for the insular quality of writing at night. With darkness all around me, the world can suddenly become me, my fingers, the keyboard, and the desk. I like the feeling because it invites a sort of intensity that feeds a deeper view into the page (for me, anyway).

Third, I do not want to write all morning before work, go to work, and work into the night. In other words, there are three things: writing, play, and work. The play is important because it involves engaging with the world--which is as much the duty of the writer as is sitting at the desk. Playing is something I've made little time for the past two years and it's something I forget to allow for in my life. I'm slowly getting better at playing more, though. I think what this means is that everyday will have work and writing and sleeping. And weekends can have play. (I don't know yet where the freelance work will fit into this, since I'll need to sleep later in the mornings from staying up so late.)

Fourth, I know I need to be sending out my work to literary journals and researching publication markets. This has nothing to do with my magazine work and everything to do with my thesis. When I started the residency, I thought I'd return home all charged up to keep rolling with the thesis by touching it up more, filling in holes and cutting the weaker points. Now I know that I need to send work out while I'm motivated. A vast majority of nonfiction books get a contract before they are finished. They are sold on a few sample chapters and solid pitch, perhaps a publishing record or a recommendation.

Fifth, I know I need to start meditating again. This is the thing I have the most resistance to (right down to the way sitting cross-legged hurts my knees). But I must. I'll change my posture so it doesn't hurt. And I'll start with just twenty minutes a day. I no longer have homework as an excuse. It's time to get back on the cushion, as meditation deeply has everything to do with living deeply, which has everything to do with writing deeply.

So...here goes!

Day 14

Graduation was fabulous! While I'm waiting to gather photos from that, check out this video on You Tube of the Graduating Class of June 2008 doing a spoof version of "Red River Valley" in response to last year's factuly spoof of STOMP.

Click HERE for live music footage.

Also, check out the Poets Vs. Prose writers volleyball match and accompanying commentary by clicking HERE.