The Grim Realization
That this one seems all about me
Friends! I've decided I'm going to do my best to up the frequency of this newsletter to two instances a week, if I can manage it. One for the usual charming bloviations you've come to expect, and another primarily as a round-up of stuff other people are doing that catches my eye, announcements of things I've got going on, etc. I hope you don't mind. If subscribers start dropping like the leaves from my trees these days, I'll stop.
Poetry as Consolation
Next week, Tuesday the 19th, Noon Eastern. My good friend Holly Wren Spaulding runs the Poetry Forge, where she does wonderful online workshops. She has invited me as guest for her "Poetry as Consolation" series. You can get the details HERE. She invited me once before and it was a great time. If I recall it seemed more conversation than workshop but I could be wrong. It could be that I just talk too much when given a chance, I don’t know. I just know she does great work and I love to be part of it. We will be celebrating our mutual just-released books as part of this. For me, it is Descended.... and for Holly, it is this gorgeous handmade little chapbook called Fire. You can order it HERE. At least click that link and take a look because it is truly beautiful. It is something I love about poetry, and poets who get their work out just to get it OUT, and do it with so much care. If you can manage it, please consider joining us next Tuesday! I'm also pretty confident this isn't the last thing we are going to do together either, but still….
A poem to acknowledge that the land itself — along with the people whose language, culture and religion were born of it — is rarely acknowledged
Antonia shared this link to a piece by my friend CMarie Fuhrman in the comments of my last post and I love it and it is essential reading. A searing excerpt:
Let us acknowledge the land in the way subdividers do, with the blade of the bulldozer and with names like Forest Trails, Aspen Ridge, River Ranch, with words, the way the Government recognizes only Federally recognized tribes and has taught some Natives to recognize others only on paper, through blood quantum and CIB instead of commitment to rights and sovereignty. Let us recognize Land Acknowledgments that serve as consolation, another box checked on a list titled Due Diligences. The way wearing a Black Lives Matter t-shirt acknowledges white wokeness while the same whites shop at white lives businesses; acknowledgment as performative allyship.
Among so many other things she does, CMarie edits the nonfiction stuff for High Desert Journal, and published this piece of mine last year.
How to Be a Good Ancestor
I shared this piece I wrote for Grotto on Twitter the other day but I figure I’ll put it here too. It’s something I re-wrote two or three times, which is unusual. Ultimately I’m happy that I drilled it down to something personal, though I still don’t feel I quite hit the mark. It’s about giving up drinking alcohol and why I’ve made that choice.
A Few Words with Chris La Tray
I don’t recall if I ever mentioned the podcast I did with JR Woodward at Our Social Landscape a few weeks ago. Well, here it is again if you want to hear me ramble. JR does good work and is definitely worth checking out.
Cora Stickers!
I’m still happily supporting Cora for Montana! Only now my friend Nat who runs King Design made some stickers and sent them to me. If you want one, email me and I’ll send you a couple!
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Shameless Hussle
Thanks for hanging in there. Remember, you can still subscribe to this newsletter if you care to help me make this writing thing work as a living!
Or give it as a gift! FYI, this supply chain will never break….
You can also get One-Sentence Journal, still going strong more than three years later, HERE.
And the new one, Descended from a Travel-worn Satchel HERE.
And Finally….
Cheeto this morning. Who hasn’t stumbled into the day like this before?
Good for you, Chris. It's hard to beat the "alcohol is a scourge" drum without being a dick about it, but I think you managed it here. Thank you.
I love the good ancestor piece, and your choice. I think part of it is creating a space for people to imagine being social without lubrication. When it's all around you, it's hard to imagine yourself not participating, and it can help to see someone having fun without it.
Every single writing residency I've been at has seemed to rely heavily on drinking, sometimes with not-great consequences. I don't mean to say that in judgment at all; it's just something that seems to happen. It's nice to go to a cabin by yourself and slide away from the expectations one way or another.