Back in business...

Well, I guess it's a good thing... having the site go down because there's too much traffic... but MAN! Nothing more frustrating than not being able to show you MY SHOES!


(Thanks, Miss Meghan!)


In all seriousness, I'll have a new site up soon, linked from the blog, with room for more Half/lives than the book is able to hold-- made of dead trees at it is.


In other news, I'm in Chattanooga for the Meacham conference... by which I mean I'm sitting on a king-sized bed at the Choo Choo, eating a Lupi's calzone (my absolute favorite) with ricotta and fresh basil. Because Mose can't hang in smoky after-reading bars... so I'm allowed to bail on such parties in favor of bad TV in the hotel room...


Every grey cloud...

In conversation with...

I was reminded today of why I write. At the mailbox.


Not because some fabulous acceptance arrived, or a check. I got a letter.


One of the best things about writing is that it brings us into a conversation with the people we most want to talk to. Our poems and our stories are a dialogue.


I remember once... my friend Keith Driver explained to me that he felt like he was having a conversation with Stevens. I nodded and pretended to understand what he meant by that, though at the time I honestly didn't. I wasn't reading enough, or thinking enough, to be participating in such a conversation. If Keith and Stevens were chatting over cocktails at a party, I was (at that age) the very drunk girl slumped in a corner behind a potted palm.


But now I get it. I'm listening now. To all kinds of writers. I'm talking to them, and hearing them respond to me in their work.


Sometimes, you get lucky, and you have a conversation with a writer you really really admire, and that writer is still alive, and the conversation slips from the page, from the world of words-- and into the world of things and people.


A few months back, this happened to me when I went to hear Lyn Hejinian read at Emory. Lyn is one of those people who really IS, as a person, the IS that she IS as a poet. A little girl at play, wise old woman, storyteller, physicist, painter, crazy-lady... to hear her and talk with her is one of the best experiences you can have.


After the reading, I got up the nerve to send Lyn my chapbook, and some other poems. She's been writing a cycle of dream poems for a long time, and I too have some dream--poems, and I wanted to share them with her.


Today I got a letter. An actual piece of paper, a small gift. One of those letters that makes you feel real, makes you feel like the person you hope you actually are. Lyn read my poems and responded to them, and I think understood me through them. In a sense, she finished the conversation that began when I first read her poems 6 years ago.


It felt like it was time to put on my coat and leave the party, having accomplished more than a person ever hopes to accomplish at a party.

Good Day, ATLANTA!!!

I just did my first ever TV spot, on the FOX morning show here in Atlanta. I'm still shaky from the weird adrenalin-boost I got.


Man, was I nervous!


I was there to show off my "Kosher for Passover" Easter basket... and to plug Half/Life too. I followed Deborah Tannen, author of "You're Wearing THAT!?" She was lovely.


Four minutes goes FAST!


In other news!!! I'm reading this week at Emory, Thursday night at 8, in the Harris Hall Parlor, with Sueyeun Juliette. This will be poetry, and I'm reading from Daphne & Jim...


Please come?

Oh, Reb!!!

You shouldn't have... but I'm honored you did!


Look what Reb Livingston has to say about my CHOOSE-YER-OWN-chapbook, Daphne and Jim.


Laurel Snyder is a poet who should not be ignored – not because we fear her stealing our friends, our husband, our very existence, no, no, that’s the paranoia getting the best of us. We should pay attention to Laurel Snyder’s poetry because it’s engaging and thrilling...


WOW!


Incidentally, THIS (cover above) is the book that inspired D&J. It was this book, which I read FOR CREDIT in the fourth grade, that I never forgot. The Mystery of Chimney Rock! Lord help the public schools, particularly the public schools in Baltimore City.


Now... just imagine if I'd read The Brothers Karamazov instead...

Atlanta Jewish Life...

Hey!


AJL, which is a very cool magazine, according to the critics, and not nearly so Jewish, or so regional as the title indicates...


Has just published a little essay I wrote about working on Half/Life...


Because of Leah Finklestein.


You should go check it out, if only because they glammed up this photo of me and it looks BIZARRE!!!!!

AWP was...

Wonderful!


But GOOD GOD, did I miss Mose and hubby.


I made a resolution to myself, last year when I found out I was pregnant (at the conference) that I'd be there this year, in Austin, drinking and hooting and having fun, and so I did. Because I want to be a mom who takes care of herself, and all that noise...


But I cried when I came home, crawled into bed, and cuddled my boy. I think in future, I'll "take care of myself" for individula evenings, and take Mose with me on anything longer than an overnight.


Things change you. Sometimes, you change. It's okay to change. This is a truth.


But that aside, the conference was great, and it was good to be in Austin, a city I love...


Special thanks to:


Reb, for walking me back to the Hilton when I really really needed to go... she "got it" and I can't thank her enough.


My apologies to:


Reb (again), for missing her pajama party. I had a 4 am wake-up call. I'm disappointed, particularly to have missed the spanking machine.


A few highlights:


Joe Massey moaning, and the garden party in general. Running into Bradley Paul. Zach Schomburg's reading, specifically his whale poem. The impromptu spin-the-bottle game that I left, just as it was getting started. Laura (Tony Robinson is a lucky guy)! Getting to chat with Marion Wrenn. Meeting Josh Edwards, Rob Arnold, Ander, Emma, and Megan (who are really really great people). Running around with Jordan. Rooming with Ali. And of course, just seeing all the best people I know... Jason, Danielle and Lara, Shanna, Richard, Dave, Charlie, Eduardo, Sandra and Ben, Chelsey, Dumanis. And so many more of you.


One of the best things about AWP is that it's a yearly chance to re-meet some folks I've known in other chapters of my life. I had a really fun time catching up, for instance, with Dumanis... someone I found disconcerting in Iowa, where most things were disconcerting for me. Now that I'm a little older, a little more secure (and both of us now with our drivers licenses) I feel like he's a whole new person.


Not that he's changed. Rather that I have.


AWP always feels like a reunion, a place for do-overs on so many interactions from my past. From high school, college, grad school, Breadloaf, etc. etc.


A pleasure.


Some interesting conversations were had at the Verb table, about audio. I have to mull. And these pictures (above) were taken on the roof of the Speakeasy... where Ali, Emma, Megan and I... had cocktails and big Texas skies after lunch.

Totally glam...

It crossed my mind today, as Emma was typing on the couch (we're both working on some contract labor here in Atlanta) and I was vacuuming with the babe-in-arm...


That I only post pictures of myself the way I like myself. Looking as "attractive" as I think I can be.


Not out of vanity, honestly, but rather out of natural human insecurity. The desire to appear attractive, interesting, writerly, whatever-it-is I'm shooting for.


But there are all those other moments in each day, the moments not worth mention, the moments that never get photographed. In cars. Or around the home. Often involving unflattering pajama pants an/or various states of unwash.


And now that I'm a mom, they're a lot more complicated. Involving spit-up, sour milk, and screaming a lot of the time.


These moments are important, matter, are as much a part of life (more so) than most. But... none too appealing.


In the name of honesty and full disclosure...


Emma took a picture of one such moment...


In other news, I'm off to Austin!!!! Mose is staying here, and I'm more than a little freaked out to be away from him.


There are 43 4 oz servings of breastmilk in my freezer, as I have been preparing for this trip a loooong time. Can you guess how many will be here when I return? closest guess wins a secret special surprise gift!

Check THIS out!!!

I'm in US News & World Report today!!!!


Laurel Snyder, 32, of Atlanta and the author of three forthcoming small-press books, writes a blog, contributes to a variety of Web magazines, does podcasts, and keeps up literary friendships through literary chat rooms. The Internet, she says, "is like one big cocktail party."


Did I say that???


I guess I must have... among other things.


Richard Nash, you probably owe me a beer...


AND, if you're someone who landed on this page because you read the article today, WELCOME!!! Now you should backchannel (email) me and introduce yourself.


Because we're all friends here in inter-land, the blogosphere, the magical world of pixels!


Right?

Sacred cows...

Are really easy targets. They're cows, for Chrissake!!!


It's easy to get attention for such behavior. Much harder to say something, about something, to someone.


I may not think Reese deserved her Oscar. But I think she deserves an award (or June Carter does) for:


"How you doing?"


"Oh, I'm just trying to matter."


Me too. Trying.


Laugh if you want to. I'm off to herd my cows.

Do you know me???

By which I mean...


If you DON'T REALLY know me, you should run over to VERSE and offer to be a reviewer for my chapbook, Daphne & Jim.


I'm not the sleazy kind of writer who expects to be reviewed by my friends, and it's totally fine if you hate the book and pan it... or if you decide you'd rather request something else, something besides my weirdo choose-yer-own-adventure poems...


But they're hunting reviewers right now, so you should run along over and get some free books, for goodness sake!!!


In other news, I need a pseudonym. Any thoughts? I'm leaning towards Maisy Ellis, after my grandpa and a cat I know...

Last night in the ATL...

My sister and I decided to go and see Brokeback Mountain last night, and on our way there, as we drove down Hosea Williams, toward Midtown Art Cinema, we saw weird BIG lights a few streets over, and crowds of people off in the distance, for blocks on end. Right in the middle of a neighborhood called Kirkwood.


Because I'm a nosey girl, I turned into the crowd, and inched the car as far as I could. Everywhere I looked there were people hanging out, sipping Hennessey, drinking forties. Women were dancing all sexy by their cars, mostly wearing really tight velour sweatsuits. Mostly with really nice bodies... Men were appreciating them.


"Wow, this block party looks like a music video!" I said... "What a cool neighborhood!"


I pulled over and asked a really nice, really large man what was going on. "What's going on?" I asked.


He smiled a nice smile, a big enough smile to crinkle his eyes behind his large sunglasses. "It's a Young Jah video,.".


We thought about parking and sticking around, watching the video, sipping some Hennessey. But my sister looked down at herself. She said, "I'm wearing CORDUROYS and a Chinese SILK SCARF. I'm not really dressed for a video shoot.


Neither was I, so we sadly turned and drove off to see Heath and Jake kiss. Which was exciting, but not quite AS exciting as getting into a video. Especially since we had to confront the fact that what we WERE dressed for was Midtown Art.


We all make choices.


In other news, after Brokeback Mountain, we found ourselves talking about the two main characters, and about how those characters resembled the two main characters in Lonesome Dove as well. But without the sexy boy-love. The contrast of the "fun go getter" and the "restrained and silent".


Who would you love to love, Call or Gus? Ennis or Jack?

A reason to go...

To Austin!


I mean, besides just hanging out, seeing friends, wearing pajamas, rooming with Ali, and eating lots of hot peppers...


And what is it?


I'm READING!!!