I’ve had a couple readers ask me what’s going on besides old books(!). So this post will be a bit more newsy. I’ve been deep into reading and writing other things (inc. the next Decoding Sylvia Plath book, which will be for her poem “Cut”), and writing for lots of blogs and online sites.
I’m very pleased to announce that my article, “Sylvia Plath’s #MeToo Stories,” has been published on the Ms. Magazine site. You can find it here. Also, I’m not sure if I mentioned it here, but AWP (Associated Writers Programs) Writer’s Notebook site posted my article, “Research Beyond the Archives” a few months ago.
On Sunday, February 25th, I’ll be donating some time to work the Open Your Heart Gala fundraiser taking place at Lucas Park Grille in St. Louis, from 5:30 – 9 pm. They work on behalf of legislation for animals. I will be doing free tarot readings for gala attendees in the first two hours. I hope you’ll come and see me for such a worthy cause.
And finally, on March 29th, I’ll be in Indianapolis, IN, speaking on Sylvia Plath and her mysticism at the Popular Culture Conference. I did this conference a few years back in Washington, DC, and those people are always fun.
I’ve been asked if I’ll be attending the Ted Hughes 2018 conference, and sadly, it doesn’t look like that one is going to happen for me this year. There is just not enough time and money to get everything done.
I’m reading an outstanding book right now (nearly finished), which I think should be Required Reading for the entire planet. It’s Brene Brown’s Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone. In a way that is warm, personal, and somehow not at all political, this book deftly addresses every stressful political point going on in the world today: Polarized parties and Trump, Race and Black Lives Matter, Feminism, Gun control, the Media and social networking, Hate, Extremism, Isolation and Fear, and so much more. I think of Brene Brown as a spiritual writer, even though she is a scientific researcher. She is just in the zone, I suppose. This book will challenge you on your beliefs, and it will make you think and possibly even change your mind about a few subjects. I promise.
I’ll try to be a bit more conversational in this blog going forward. I can’t quite completely embrace the social networking world as a major part of my schedule or personality. As Brown discusses, it’s an empty, shallow, false connection and it’s just too time-consuming for me. We all know that Facebook and Tweets can so easily take over an entire day if one is not careful. There is too much reading, writing, and connecting face to face with real people yet to do.