AWP Around the Corner
... and reading in Claremont this Saturday
Dear Poets,
I’ve been wanting to squeeze out another Substack in part to repost my past Associated Writing Program (AWP) guides before this year’s conference roars to its start next week. In this post I listed my best AWP tips/tricks and in this post I wax more philosophical about what AWP is for. It can be such a smorgasbord of offerings (sometimes changing by the hour): a reunion with literary friends, a networking opportunity, a three-day hiatus from ‘real life’ in which to bask in the fact that thousands of people have come together to immerse in All Things Literary. My best suggestion is to figure out what you’re there for and cultivate a program around this theme.
One year I leaned into learning more about YA/MG writing and focused on attending those panels. Another, I was thinking about how to break out as a freelancer and concentrated on this track. One AWP, I stumbled into an excellent travel writing panel and kept going with this mood because it sparked my imagination. Finding the right flavor for this year’s mix (stew? brew? cauldron?) is crucial because it will cultivate finding what you seek and (hopefully) keep the level of overwhelm in check.
If you’re there, I’d love to see you! I will be attending the Trio House Press reception on Thursday night which launches the 2026 authors. See below — March 5th (6:00-7:30) at the Renaissance Harborplace Hotel, Homeland Room, 5th floor.
I am very excited to be moderating and speaking at the panel I proposed: “Words from the Deep Dark Woods: Using Fairy Tales as Foil & Fuse” where I will be presenting alongside writers Emily Perez, Oliver de la Paz, Kate Bernheimer, and Jessica Q. Stark.
This will be on Friday morning, March 6th at 9:00, room 315, Level 300, Baltimore Convention Center. I will be the west coaster slugging coffee.
On Friday at noon, I will gladly take my place at the Trio House Press booth to sign books and (hopefully!) greet friends. This is always such a counterpoint experience — that shining hour of attention — which stands in high contrast to all of the unseen hours slogging away submitting to contests, editing work, wondering if any of it will ever see the light outside of my hard drive. But, for an hour, at Booth #1148, that’s where I’ll be.
If you’re local to L.A. and free on Saturday, I am excited to be reading with Prageeta Sharma in the always wonderful Fourth Saturdays series out at the Claremont Library. I will be introduced by my Trio House pressmate Samina Najmi who will be taking part in a later reading (below) at the Claremont Colleges.
If you can, stay for this reading and book fair, where my friend Genevieve Kaplan will be with her press, Toad Press!
Sharing with you:
If I wasn’t out in Claremont at my own reading, I’d gladly attend this event on Saturday afternoon at Loma Alta Park (the Altadena Library’s outpost while it remodels) from 2:00-4:00. “Rooted in Us: Celebrating Black Writers and the Legacy of S. Pearl Sharp.”
I was sorry to learn of Michael Silverblatt’s recent passing. His KCRW radio show, “Bookworm” was a Los Angeles staple. His laser-like focus and encyclopedic knowledge about writing, books, and the literary world was always impressive and I was glad whenever I caught his distinctive voice. “Michael Silverblatt, ‘genius’ host of KCRW literary show ‘Bookworm,’ dies at 73."“
I’m doubtful I’ll be able to post this with much notice, but I love the Center for Book Arts in New York where I took several classes when I lived in ‘the city’ eons ago. This fellowship deadline is Feb. 28th.
I post almost exclusively about poetry opportunities, but I’ve seen many poets make the leap to memoir — the two seem more allied than poetry/fiction, at least for most. Have never heard of this foundation, but they are offering grants to support the publication of nonfiction books. Deadline is 3/1.
I will end here since I want to get this out ASAP, but, as ever, please be in touch! I hope to see you at AWP if you’ll be there. Next year AWP heads to Chicago, where I’m so glad to have met many fine poets by teaching for University of Chicago’s Graham School this past year.
Personal Update
As ever, it is hard to know where to start but I will share two pieces of information. As mentioned in my last Substack, we have submitted our architecture plans and are now waiting on a series of approvals. This has moved us squarely into the next phase of finding a contractor. I want to give a shout out to an amazing (free) service offered by the Peddies, a couple who formed Brass Tacks. They have spent hours vetting contractors and orchestrating bids for those who want to rebuild. Contractors bid on our plans through their site and they then generously gave us a breakdown of who they thought was our best bet. They say they know when contractors are underbidding just to offer a low price or unrealistically padding categories. They have been amazing and this is (yet another) incredible act of generosity to Altadenans (by a couple who also lost their home).
We spent at least 8-10 hours over the past two weeks setting meetings with all of the builders who bid on our plans, in some cases doing an hour pre-meeting on Zoom and then meeting on our lot for nearly two hours. As I said to one, ‘it’s like you finish with one phase — learning about a new universe (nay galaxy!) of terms, ideas, concepts, costs (that was the architecture phase) — and then a new universe opens up. Now I am immersed in trying to understand the new regulations around fire hardening materials, setbacks, if more expense for a certain type of fire-retardant roof is worth it, which bid will include a designer (and what kind? to what extent?), who eschews landscaping and fence replacement, etc. etc. etc. It sincerely took me awhile to grasp why exactly each contractor was different. Weren’t the plans set by the architect so they were ‘merely’ executing them? What difference did it really make who we chose, I naively thought, other than scrutinizing their ratings for reputation, reliability, and communication?
It reminded me of all the work we put into choosing a law firm when, fundamentally, since they are all doing the same thing (representing us against SCE), it didn’t really seem to matter who we went with. People said ‘choose the person you feel comfortable with’ repeatedly but even that felt hard to understand. Comfortable how? As we made small talk before they launched into their spiel? Did this really matter v. how adept (as best I could perceive) they were at their job? I am starting to get it with contractors as I try to now do line-by-line comparisons (again, about things that I can’t wrap my mind around but need to try). It’s clear some are way more personable than others. But, again, does someone with more charisma really = a better built house? I’m hoping that we’ll close in soon and then we’ll be on to the next galaxy of choices (and decision fatigue). Rinse and repeat for the next few years. 😔
My other piece of news is we have to move! I’ll repeat this face here: 😔. We got into our current rental quickly after the fire and were grateful we found a place so soon. Our landperson (as I like to call her) wanted to help out a ‘fire family’ so instantly decided she would rent the small house she had just moved from over the holidays. Initially, she only wanted to do a short-term lease through March. At that time, I was confident we’d want a bigger place, so was unbothered. Within days, I realized how lucky we were to have any kind of lease at all and immediately began to worry she wouldn’t offer us an extension. When she finally told us (exactly a year ago at the end of February), she was happy to offer us a year-long lease starting April 1 she then mentioned she had decided to eventually sell the place, but we were so relieved we didn’t care about this faraway idea.
At that moment people were still frantically shifting from AirBnb to hotel to friends’ couches or stuffed into shared quarters with family. We would have agreed to anything just to keep some stability. She was so casual about her plan to sell we didn’t think much of it during this past year and quasi-hoped it might just go away. Then in December she asked if she could bring a Realtor through while we were out of town. Our hearts fell. The fallout from the fires is another ripple affect since her insurer dropped her, there seemed to be some weird mix up with our claim now mapping to this address and that affecting her rate. She said she was truly very sorry, but she can’t extend our lease, and we need to be out by March 31st.
This news has been… unsettling… to say the least, not yet physically as it will be, but emotionally, and I’ll venture even spiritually. She let us know not long after the one-year fire-a-versary and the sense of (again) truly not having a home of our own, a place we permanently belong, threw us all for a gigantic loop. When I complain about the ‘opportunity cost’ of this fire — to all aspects of our lives — this is another prime example of hours and days I’ve now spent over this past month scouring for a new place for us to live. (And, in truth, I think we’ve had it ‘easy’ since we haven’t had to shift and hustle the way most people have had to many, many times during this past year).
As I (endlessly, obsessively, tirelessly) now scroll Zillow and Redfin and Craigslist and Apartments.com it is clear there is real competition. Since most people ended up in more permanent housing around last March/April there are many others starting on another housing search cycle. (Local friends, if anyone knows of anything, glad to hear about it!) Despite kind-hearted friends insisting we could challenge our nonrenewal of lease, we are resigned and trying to put a positive spin on things in that we can finally get a bigger place and leave our cramped ‘cottage,’ as we have called it.
Everyone (with insurance that is) has a set amount of ALE (Additional Living Expense) money and now that we’re beginning to have an inkling of a timeline we feel slightly more comfortable about spending more on our next rental. Being in such a small place we did economize, though ‘paid,’ in other ways. Once the ALE money is up, it’s up, and once that moment comes we’ll have both rent and a mortgage payment to make (on our nonexistent house), so it’s a balance to both want to use it up and also not overspend in case the rebuild takes longer than planned — something most people present as inevitable.
We still have a few weeks, but I think about how after the work of finding a new place (that doesn’t depress us), never mind the actual getting of a new place (landperson fawning is real! we weren’t picked for a house in SoPas where people were practically posing in tableaux to show the owner they would be the ‘perfect fit’), there is the labor of packing, moving, finding new places for everything, changing our address on a million forms, learning a new neighborhood, and dare I say it, emotional work, to conceive of a new place as a home.
This might be the hardest thing to put into words — but that feeling — of arriving home after a long day, after an out-of-town trip, and having that ‘sink into it’ feeling of comfort, familiarity, ease — simply takes time to cultivate — anywhere. We began to have that in this (tiny) place and I dread the emotional upheaval of losing this, which felt hard won, and can only develop with time. Even when we eventually move into our ‘new house’ I think about seeking this feeling again — and how it might even be harder to build up once there. To drive up to our old address and see something else there entirely. Just the thought is mind-boggling.
That’s all of my news, but I’ll mention the general sense of relief (!) that I see floating in the Altadena air now that the Los Angeles County district attorney is opening an investigation into whether So Cal Edison (SCE) can be held criminally liable for the Eaton fire: “County prosecutors probing whether Edison should be criminally charged for Eaton fire.” Here is one key sentence from this article: “Despite the dangerous Santa Ana wind conditions on Jan. 7, 2025, Edison decided not to shut down the transmission lines running through Eaton Canyon.” And another choice tidbit: “On Wednesday, Edison announced that it earned a profit of $4.5 billion last year, up from $1.3 billion in 2024.” The furor towards SoCal Edison burns white-hot (a deliberate metaphor) and Altadenans are not going to be satisfied until someone (or more) is held accountable. This recent article: “Edison Will Reduce Executive Bonuses as a Result of the Eaton Fire” has done little to assuage anger.
Even more significantly, Attorney General Rob Bonta finally (!!) opened up an investigation: “California launches civil rights probe into botched evacuations in historically Black Altadena,” which is being framed as a civil rights issue. From the article: “‘My office will be investigating whether there was race, age, or disability discrimination in the emergency response in west Altadena,’ Bonta said.” And, as I have seen firsthand: “Black Altadena residents disproportionately experienced damage from the conflagration, researchers have found.” The video embedded in the article (link above) is worth watching.
West Altadena (where I lived) has historically been a Black community. Because Pasadena was so segregated (still is, IMHO) redlining kept Black families out of many areas — including east Altadena. Lake Avenue is consider the dividing line and west of Lake — where all but one of the 19 deaths occurred — has vociferously asked, since January 8th, why there were no timely alerts to our side of town nor firetrucks dispatched.
The notifications that east Altadena received (and more fire fighting help) is complex in ways that I can’t begin to go into here — it’s where the fire was barreling down — until it wasn’t. Many houses were lost east of Lake Ave, but not with the same density as in west Altadena, which was far more populated with elderly residents of color, many of whom bought houses decades ago and often passed them along to their families as a form of generational wealth. It is also far more working class.
I gladly joined the email list for the group Altadena for Accountability and want to do more with them. People are not going to stop feeling angry, wronged, and righteously outraged by their sense that the lesser socioeconomic status and ethnic makeup of west Altadena was one reason it did not receive the same resources. This terribly poignant article chronicles a timeline of 911 calls that did absolutely no good — particularly for elderly residents — and the fury that this side of town was abandoned. This article: “Anger overflows in west Altadena: Where is the accountability for 19 deaths, epic losses?” outlines this well. Another recent article speaks to the frustration that west Altadena feels and the attention needed to a community that has been disproprotionately harmed: “Black Altadena fire victims clash with Edison over compensation.”
There’s more to say, but I will save it for another time. One other aspect of being a fire survivor is not just tracking all the grants/funding opportunities/events available in person but the Zooms. Have I mentioned the Zooms?! 🤯 There are at least two per week — and in the past year sometimes there were more. They’re all good — well-intended, helpful, meant to educate. But it is another source of overload. There were a few recent ones about how to handle tax preparation this year vis-a-vis grants received, GoFundMe donations, and more. There was a full afternoon of Zooms about soil remediation last Sunday as part of a weekend workshop that included all day soil remediation workshops on Saturday. I would have gladly attended this but couldn’t because I was back at the Pasadena Convention Center for another "Rebuild Summit” (rows and rows of contractors trying to lure you into conversation with plastic giveaways + hourly panels and speakers).
Earlier this year I watched parts of another weekend-long Zoom rebuilding conference put on by the Eaton Fire Survivors Network (EFSN) that was excellent but now feel I ought to go back to rewatch certain sessions since I couldn’t absorb all the information at the time, nor was it then pertinent. This group also put on a ‘Spa for the Soul’ evening Zoom at the end of January which sounded corny, but was very good.
I’ve felt impressed of late with how many specialty groups are popping up to support fire survivors like this one — Recipes for Altadena — which is all about addressing the grief so many feel over losing both cookbooks and handwritten recipes. No, those heirlooms can never be restored but at least there is an attempt to face this grief and offer something else as solace. This organization — Project Keepsake — is also doing incredibly touching work, creating some kind of new keepsake for children who have lost precious items. They just had a display at Vromans showcasing the work they’ve done and a friend sent me pictures of the drawing they made for her son who lost the stuffed teddy bear she had made from her father’s clothing as an item of remembrance for him of his grandfather. I’m sure they would have a flood of new requests if they offered this for adults.
I hope to attend this ‘moving meditation’ tomorrow which includes a walk through Altadena for all affected. There is always something going on to commemorate the fire, to promote healing, and to try to salvage community spirit. Most days, counter to all the fury mentioned above, it does seem to be working. I just finished a series of free yoga classes for ‘fire survivors’ and know of at least two other series now starting. The classes were held at the Altadena Musicians studio space which opened to find ways to replace instruments for Altadena musicians and help rebuild music collections. They’re now putting on regular shows to fundraise for their cause.
Again, despite the pain and difficulty, it’s incredible how much people are offering and how much they are doing. Let me click send before it gets any later. My thanks for reading this far! Safe travels to everyone heading east. ✮⋆˙
I've found all my LA apartments on Trulia! You might also want to check out what's available in LA on Sabbatical Homes. Good luck!