Meagan Macvie's Blog

Books help me live better. This year more than any other year, they have been my coping strategy, entertainment, information resource, best friend, stretch goal, self-help, relationship support, psychologist…you get the idea. Reading opens my heart and mind. I’m grateful to all the authors who do the miracle work of birthing books.

For my fellow readers or those of you looking for a gift for that readerly person in you life, here’s an eclectic 12-book list of my especially noteworthy 2020 reads:

Soulswift by Megan Bannen – young adult fantasy with a strong female heroine, slow burn romance, and a religious struggle set in a gorgeously imagined world that felt real in all the ways that matter.The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin – first published in 1963, this book takes you into the beautiful heart of James Baldwin and is every bit as impactful and relevant today as it was originally. Baldwin considers the consequences of racial injustice within a larger rumination on what it means to be human.Forbidden by Beverly Jenkins – I’ve never been a fan of Westerns, but I loved Jenkins’ romances (this is the first of a series, and yes, I read them all) set in the Old West town of Virginia City, Nevada. Conflicted, sweet romance that captures historical details and teaches you Important Stuff while also melting your heart.This Vicious Cure by Emily Suvada – this was the final book in a young adult sci-fi trilogy about a gene hacker in a high-tech world on the brink of collapse, and oh boy, did I love all three! Driving plot, great characters, and a well-developed world. Yes, please! Can’t wait to see what Suvada writes next.The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K Le Guin – science fiction that takes on gender norms. Published twenty years ago, this read holds up surprisingly well. Le Guin immerses readers in such a strange and alien world. The book prompted me to think more deeply about gender and relationships, and really spoke to my experiences as a recent expat in a new country.How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi  – what I appreciated most about this non-fiction read was how Kendi weaves his own, deeply personal experience into his academic engagement with racial justice. The book gave me new language, helped me better understand how America arrived at the current political moment, and offered ways I can make a more positive difference in the world. I loved it.Vera Violet by Melissa Anne Peterson – raw portrayal of an American town on the brink of ruin, a White working-class family’s decent into poverty, and the kids who must face adulthood in the midst of addiction and insecurity. Based in the Pacific Northwest, the novel is brimming with the truth of lived experience. Peterson is fearless, her characters brutally well-crafted.Winterwood by Shea Ernshaw – haunting young adult romance about a girl rumored to be a witch who must find the truth about a mysterious boy in the dark, snowy woods. An atmospheric read perfect for a day inside by the fire.The Fall of Lord Drayson by Rachel Anderson– if you need a jaunty escape from dreary pandemic life, this sweet Regency romance is a fabulous and very funny distraction.The Heart of a Peach by Jess B. Moore– prepare to swoon for this sweet, small town love story set in the delightful southern town of Fox River, North Carolina. Fall for a fiddler in this slow-burn romance.The Names We Take by Trace Kerr – this young adult apocalyptic story is set in Spokane, WA features a nonconforming girl desperate to live as herself in a ravaged, unforgiving world. Devastating, yet hopeful read.A Duke by Default by Alyssa Cole– talk about a stereotype breaker! This read takes an uppity NYC socialite and throws her into a sword making apprenticeship with a sexy Scottish grump.  

The other day, I was video chatting with my walking buddy, Jo, about viruses and plagues—what else?—and I explained (with no shortage of passion) how if humanity is to be ended by pandemic, this whole get-put-on-a-ventilator-for-weeks-until-life-slowly-drains-out-of-you gets a giant Boo Hiss from me. The human race warrants a more proficient viral assassin, I said. Like maybe a heartstopper. Something fast, but not too gross.

I know bartering the mode of human annihilation isn’t a particularly uplifting conversation, but in 2020, debating viral killing methodologies feels more productive than say, discussing politics. I vehemently argued against any plague that a) causes people to bleed out from one or more orifices, b) explodes brains or internal organs, or c) melts skin.

I want to go quickly and easily, I told Jo, who kindly reminded me that viruses functionally require time to spread. Slow killing is in their best interest; thus, painless-and-quick is out of scope. Jo is very practical.

What a strange thing: that it’s advantageous for viruses to drag out death. Who designed this system? It’s cold-hearted. I mean, I don’t expect viruses to be compassionate or benevolent, but structuring a benefit to torturing victims is messed up.

Human beings remained blissfully unaware of viruses until nearly the twentieth century. In 1899, shortly after their discovery, a Dutch microbiologist named Martinus Beijerinck called viruses a “contagious living fluid,” which sounds like a freakish substance in a horror movie but is also spot on.

contagium vivum fluidum

Latin Term describing viruses that means “contagious living fluid.”
First Coined by Dutch Microbiologist Martinus Beijerinck

The origin of viruses is unclear. Some theorize that viruses existed before most other stuff and may even have led to the evolution of cellular life. Therefore, viruses could be our ancient ancestors. Great grandpa Covid?

Given all that humanity has done to wreck the earth, I imagine Covid as an angry old man hollering, “I brought you into this world, I can take you out!”

But no, coronavirus will likely not be the downfall of humans. At least not directly. Though I have noticed a collective human deterioration since the onset of our resident global pandemic (ahem, fights over toilet paper), this is perhaps more a soul-level debasement brought on by stress than biological decline. And to be fair, there have also been bright spots (Italians singing together).

I guess neither people nor viruses are all bad. For example, if viruses suddenly disappeared, we’d all perish in less than 48 hours. Thanks, BBC, for that uplifting factoid. More evidence that you can’t judge an entire life form based on a few (COVID-19, cholera, bubonic plague, smallpox, etc) bad experiences.

We might hate them right now, but we also need viruses. Here are a few things I learned after my talk with Jo:

One teaspoon of seawater contains like ten million viruses. When I think about swimming in the ocean now, I want to barf, but those millions in the sea aren’t actually bad for us.We have viruses to thank for reducing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.The herpes virus makes mice less susceptible to certain bacterial infections, like bubonic plague and listeria. Possibly, added immunity isn’t worth herpes, but still.

Maybe viruses are a mixed bag. Like people, we shouldn’t make sweeping judgments about the whole lot of them. But also like humans, some are more bad than others. I still can’t get over how certain viruses torment living creatures unhurriedly, agonizingly until death.

Of course, I’m not fond of people who do that, either, but viruses are living off other life forms, just doing their symbiotic thing. Humans who torture and murder other humans are destroying their own kind. That’s worse, right?

But wait! Scientists in 2008 discovered a virus that targets other viruses and another in 2011. They called this new thing a “virophage” or “virus eater,” which makes me think of Jeffery Dahmer or that movie Soylent Green.

The scientific importance of viruses that attack other viruses is completely lost on me, but I’m weirdly comforted by the thought that our human tendencies to brutalize one another might be a thing programmed into our cells rather than manifested during evolution. What if we come by these compulsions honestly, as predispositions from our most primeval ancestors?

Perhaps we didn’t bring into being our inclinations to hurt each other, but rather they were seeded in us from our very earliest expression. Before we were even human. Like our father’s big nose or our great-aunt’s impressive ability to wiggle her ears, maybe ruin by our own hands was coded into us back when we were just contagious living fluid.

Though the idea that we are prewired appeals because it provides us a level of absolution, I still cling to the belief that despite possibly sharing ancient DNA with viruses, humans with our big brains and evolved autonomic nervous systems can do better than viruses.

We can choose not to torture living things or eat our own kind. We can live in organized societies, nurture our young, and create miraculous things—like ice cream and blockchain. Surely, we can find a way to persist on a micro and macro level without self-annihilating.

My darkest pandemic thoughts lead me to the only thing that gives me hope: Humans can love. Not just those in our families or tribal groups. Everyone.

I moved last year with my family to The Netherlands. My life before in the US was pretty insular. But as an expat and through my work with A Human Workplace, I’ve been connecting with incredible, generous people from all over the world—people who don’t look or talk or think the same way I do and whose experiences and stories have challenged my thinking and expanded my heart.

All these amazing miracle creatures full of empathy and kindness and love. I want them to keep living. I don’t want anyone to be tormented or killed by a virus.

When I’m sitting alone, listening to my own breath sounds and wondering if I’m feeling Covid-related chest pressure or if my bra is just too tight, I consider my ability to love.

What even is it? What does it look like?

Maybe love is reading a book that will help me better understand other people. Maybe it’s not saying hurtful things when I’m feeling angry. Maybe it’s wearing a mask when I don’t feel like it, giving extra space to others, or not hugging people outside my household. Maybe it’s walking with a friend in nature or meeting up online instead of in person to discuss the nature of pandemics.

Whether you think love is real or a result of chemicals or a self-serving evolutionary behavior—none of that matters. Because what we call love is a unique superpower humans have that viruses don’t.

Will humanity endure? Maybe not. But if we want to improve our chances, loving each other is a good survival strategy.

When I was very young—maybe six?—I went with my dad to help remodel our church. Or maybe I was with my mom who was doing something at church while the remodel was happening, I don’t remember, but for an hour or so I wandered around unsupervised pestering dudes drywalling and painting future Sunday school classrooms.

The new classrooms were in the basement, and I remember walking
into the damp new room, concrete floored with a sliver of window set up high on
the classroom wall, which if you were looking in from the outside was barely
above the ground. Such is the way of basements.

A guy named Bob was mudding drywall. At first, I just sat in
the room watching. He was an odd, quiet man, but he’d always been kind and
patient with me. He had those glasses that automatically get dark in the sun,
and I remember that the light streaming in from the high-up window turned his
glasses half-dark.

At the time, my parents were really into selling Shaklee. I began explaining to Bob, as I had heard my mother and father do countless times, the merits of Shaklee’s cleaning solution. “You can wash anything with Basic H but there’s no poisony stuff in it,” I said. “You could drink it! I mean, you shouldn’t but you could.”

“I don’t know about that,” said Bob, slathering white putty where two pieces of sheetrock came together. “I use Amway L.O.C.”

“But Shaklee is better.” I felt he wasn’t getting it. “Shaklee is just more right.” In my mind, I could see the transparent container of blue-ish concentrated Basic H sitting in its familiar shelf in our laundry room, and I knew that my mom relied on it like a bottle of miracles to keep our house clean and germ-free. To keep me safe. “Why don’t you just try Basic H?”

“Don’t need to,” said Bob, concentrating on the wall. “I
like what I got.”

“How do you know Shaklee isn’t better?” I persisted, my
voice getting louder.

“My brother’s wife sells it to me,” said Bob, his back to me.
“And she says it’s the best stuff goin’.”

“No!” I was starting to tremble a little. “You can’t know it’s
best if you don’t know anything about Shaklee.”

Bob still hadn’t turned around. Blotches of sweat darkened the back of his brown cotton western shirt. My dad wore flannel shirts. “Maybe you ought to try Amway,” he said, using my own logic against me.

How could I know what things were best if I hadn’t tried them all? The question rolled around in my head while I silently watched Bob work. The way he smoothed the mud onto the wall and scraped away the excess reminded me of my mom frosting a cake. My mom, the one who cared for my every need. The smartest person I knew. Each morning she gave me my Shaklee vitamin C with my breakfast to keep me from getting sick.

Imagining the brown glass bottle filled me with a sense of
safety and well-being. Mom would never steer me wrong. How could I ever doubt
her? I felt reinvigorated. “My mom loves Shaklee!”

Bob stepped away from the wall and wiped a hanky across the
side of his sweaty face. “She does, does she?” He swiveled his big darkened lenses
toward me; I couldn’t see through them to his eyes. “Amway is the American Way.”
he said softly. “It’s Christian.”

“Shaklee is for Christians, too,” I argued, heart beating rapidly
as my throat tightened. “It’s for everybody!” Tears began to well, against my
will, and all I could think about was how I was letting my mom down. “It’s really
good,” I whispered.

“Why don’t you go find your mom,” said Bob gently.

I remember leaving, but that’s where the memory fades out. This
particular incident sticks with me because I couldn’t understand at the time
why I felt so shaken. Why had I gotten so angry?

Both Amway and Shaklee are multi-level marketing companies
founded in the 1950s that sell things like vitamins and detergents. Many would
say they’re barely above pyramid schemes, and both have had run-ins with the
FTC.

Why would a child feel so loyal to a company? Why would I have
felt so attacked when Bob voiced his loyalty to Amway?

Because nothing about the conversation was truly about
either brand. We didn’t explore the quality of the products or company business
practices. Our arguments weren’t rich in facts or even customer feedback, just
a bit of personal anecdote and some loose references to God and country.

So what was the conversation with Bob about?

Loyalty. Identity. Belonging. Shaklee was our brand. My family’s
brand.

This is where I feel we are as Americans in our political
discourse. We aren’t talking about governing outcomes or public policies or how
we get to where we want to go as a country. We aren’t talking about how modern democracy
is working or not working for us. What will our country look like in ten years?
Will our kids have a safe place to live, good jobs, and time to spend with
their families? Will the US remain competitive in the global marketplace?

Instead, we’re spreading memes and trash talking on Facebook.
We’re asking our friends and family if they are for us or against us.

Rather than reading content from reputable sources across
the political spectrum, many people are sharing articles they haven’t even read
but with headlines that fit their brand. Rather than having thoughtful,
informed, and respectful conversations, they throw out the latest line from their
favorite news channel to see whether you’ll agree or if you need to be reminded
which side is God’s side.

Are you loyal to Shaklee or Amway? Maybe that’s not the question
we should be asking.

 Originally published by 49 Writers. Photo by Clark Fair.

I was a teen in 1990s Soldotna, Alaska—the setting for my debut novel—so people often ask me if The Ocean in My Ears is a thinly disguised memoir. The short answer is no.

Sure, I was probably every bit as frustrating, angsty, and confused as Meri, my teen protagonist. She attends a high school that I worked hard to make seem real, writes poetry and journal entries that I painstakingly crafted to feel like this teen girl’s private thoughts, and she loves other fictional people with as much passion as I could conjure onto the page. However, Meri exists only there, on the page, moving from scene to scene in a world I made up.

So yeah. The Ocean in My Ears is fiction.

But the content is not exactly untrue. For starters, I wrote with a devotion to facts. I took great pains, for example, to align the whole book to the actual 1990-91 calendar (holidays, weekends, etc.) and coordinate the characters’ timelines accordingly. Pro tip: notecards helped me synchronize Meri’s life events with the school calendar and actual historic events.

I had rules, you see, the kind to which anyone writing historical fiction must adhere. In the beginning, I didn’t think of myself as writing “historical fiction,” and, honestly, when I first read the Kirkus Reviews categorization, I’ll admit to being slightly offended. Or maybe it was more a sheepish vexation the way a… ahem… mature person buying liquor feels when not asked for ID.

ME: Really? But I was in high school only… nevermind.

But I digress. We were discussing truth.

Yes, I did mine bits of my own experiences and use details from my life to build scenes and create a sense of realness. That’s what writers do. We make fake people and almost-real places, and we use whatever magic tricks we can to render a near-authentic experience. (I’m giving a class on my magic tricks, if you’re interested.)

True-to-life landscape descriptions are also kind of a big deal to me, and I generally kept places in the novel and other setting details accurate, though not if accuracy messed with or impeded the story. Like in real life, there were two Dairy Queens—one in Kenai and one ten miles away in Soldotna—which was unnecessarily complicated, so I fudged them into one. I sort of reinvented the high school, in part because the real Soldotna High School split into two different schools my senior year then later merged back into one.

Still, I worried over each decision to veer from precision (though admittedly, I took great pleasure in making up an alternate high school universe). I know how people who live in a place-used-in-fiction can be. Even in a novel, readers can get hung up on writing that “doesn’t get it right.”

Thus, I aspired both for a sense of truth and a uniquely imagined world inside the book. An elaborate fabrication that feels genuine, which made for a tough balancing act.

At the beginning, when I was writing small vignettes, I stuck closer to my own experiences. I mined both my past and my present for starting points. But slowly, the characters transformed into wholly their own people and drove the narrative. As an arc began to take shape, the story developed internal inertia. I gave my imagination full license to change earlier scenes and create new, entirely fictional material.

Any bits close to the truth of my own life that managed to hang in through revisions now serve as tiny touchstones, reminders that I did, in fact, author this story. For the most part, Meri’s experiences aren’t true to my own life. Not in a play-by-play way. But there is a kind of deep truth there. I definitely wasn’t Meri, but she is, in many ways, a girl I wish I would have been. She evolves over the course of the novel into a more reflective and introspective person, and she has an agency I never had. She confronts wrongs the way I should have, but didn’t.

Real-life teens often don’t understand their situations and experiences until much later—maybe not until full adulthood. But fiction isn’t real life. It operates differently. Fiction asks us to consider possibility. What if a teen did have a broader and deeper sense of her circumstances? What if this girl was stronger? How would a more empowered girl confront the things I couldn’t?

As a mother of a daughter, I’m still answering those questions in life. But in fiction, I was able to explore countless possible questions and answers. In The Ocean in My Ears, I could simultaneously consider what is, what was, and what could be.

Though set in the “historical past” of 1990, the issues tackled in the novel are relevant today. Meri confronts the same challenges many small town kids face, and while my own lived experiences are relics of the past, this novel’s mixture of fact and fiction is an elaborate fabrication for present-day readers.

[image error]I bet not a single family member, friend, or even social media contact is unaware that I wrote a book that’s coming out this fall from Portland State University’s Ooligan Press. There’s been plenty of social media hubbub.

My own story as a writer is one of achieving a dream. Mine is a story about trying/failing/trying/failing for many years. Mine is a story about insecurity and luck and self-doubt and education and privilege and a supportive community. Stories are complex. That’s why they’re cool.

Recap for those just emerging from under a rock: I started writing fiction in 2008, quit my job in 2009, completed an MFA in fiction in 2014, pitched my thesis manuscript (about 62,000 words) to Ooligan in 2016, and after heavy revision and editing (new manuscript is about 82,000 words), the published book will emerge into the world on November 7, 2017.

Writing as a creative act is exhilarating in the sense that the writer discovers along with her characters. Every sentence is a surprise. There is, of course, also the work and the slog, but for as much perseverance as writing requires, storymaking is a magical process.

Overall, being a writer is pretty marvelous. Being A Person Who Wrote A Book, however, is less so. What I mean is that now my efforts have moved away from creating word pictures and fake people–the things I most love.

Being A Person Who Wrote A Book requires engaging in social media, marketing, readings, and countless boring administrative tasks. Instead of talking animatedly with other writers about storymaking, I find myself obligatorily talking about The Book. Don’t get me wrong, I do still love the book. I just don’t want to talk about it all the time. The work of publishing is a bore.

[image error] What I want is to immerse myself in the writing and the being with other writers.

This summer I spent a week in a cabin near Lake Tahoe with three of my fav writing buddies. It was the best! At our third annual Potty Mouth Girls Writing Retreat, we read, talked about books, wrote, went on walks, wrote some more, ate delicious food, watched Stranger Things, and wrote more.

For the past few months, I’ve been working on becoming A Person Who Wrote A Book. But the retreat reminded me how much I love to write–how much I just want to be a writer hanging out with other writers.

[image error]I also attended two fabulous conferences this summer.

The first was the Pacific Northwest Writer’s Association Conference in July. I met a ton of cool writers there, attended educational workshops, and my book cover was a top 3 finalist in the book cover contest, so that was neat.

[image error]The second conference was the Willamette Writers Conference in August. One of my short stories won second place in their Kay Snow Writing Contest so I got to attend one day FOR FREE. I attended on a Saturday, and nearly lost my mind when I got to meet amazing actor and writer Stephen Tobolowsky, the keynote speaker.

I left the retreat and conferences on a high, full of creative writing energy, ready to dive deep into the magical process of storymaking.

But now I’m home.

Sitting in my office are to-dos, piling up and nagging at me. Send out pitches for YouTubers, draft a summary for an in-conversation event, create a book launch calendar, draft tweets for a Twitter Takeover event, blah blah blah.

No doubt, I’m extremely lucky to have a book coming out, and it’s ungrateful–unseemly!–for me to complain. Dreary admin tasks and social media work is what 21st century writers are required to do when publishing, and yes, I’m doing it.

I’ll keep doing it. For better or worse, I’ll become A Person Who Wrote A Book.

Did I mention that I have a new author website? I do thanks to the excellent Jodi Chromey. There’s stuff here about me and the book–look around!–and thanks to the talented Jo Arlow there’s a lovely shot of me and my dog, and if you look close, I’m sitting on a toilet.

A couple years ago, my dad, who is over six foot tall, began complaining about my toilets being too short. Does my dad live with me? No. Does he live in the same state as me? No. But he was very bothered when he’d come visit (annually, for a week or two) about my alleged porcelain short comings. “It’s not fair to your husband,” he would say. (My husband is also over six foot but has never mentioned being dissatisfied with our toilet height.)

I wasn’t sure how the toilets, which were standard put in fifteen years ago when we first moved into our home, were unfair to anyone. I liked the toilets fine, and as far as I could tell, so did my husband and daughter.

Dad did not.

That my father took issue with my bathroom appliances was no shock–he’s a generally critical fellow–and anyway, I’m never sure whether he’s actually disappointed in my stuff or simply voicing his disapproval of me. But I digress.

Last spring, I took a trip with my husband to the east coast. My parents kindly offered to stay at my house with our teen daughter and take care of our menagerie of animals. In the midst of my vacation fog on one of my many calls home, my mother said, “Don’t be upset, but your father’s replacing your toilets.”

My toilets? NO! I LIKE MY TOILETS. My. Toilets. my toilets!

“It’s fine,” I said. I didn’t want new toilets, but what could I do? I mean, my parents were staying at my house, graciously taking care of my child and many pets. How could I be upset? Dad purchased the new toilets and replaced them both himself.

When I returned home from the trip, our house was spotless (thanks to my sweet mom). The toilets sparkled, daring me not to love them.

I hated them immediately.

The interloper toilets were now at least six inches taller than my old (now beloved) toilets. The newbies had flush flushers. That is, to flush, you pushed one of two metal buttons inset into the lid. You depressed the one on the left for number 1 and the one on the right for number 2. Who wants to have to make a decision every time you finished your biz?

On the positive side, the lofty latrines were low flow, so better for the environs.

On the negative side, they were designed for giants. They reduced me to a child with dangling legs. The seats were plastic and pinched my thighs because my heels didn’t reach the floor and my own weight pressed my thigh meat into the flexing crack between plastic and icy porcelain. Week after week. They pinched. They bullied. I loathed them.

Everything wrong in my world I laid at the base of these toilets. Stress over revising my book, choosing a title, feeling out of control in the publishing process–I dumped all this crap…well, you know.

I reviled these toilets of pure evil. They had been foisted upon me against my will. And there it is: the real issue. The foisting. The feeling like even in my own home, I control nothing, not even my most private business. Maybe a time machine was what I needed, so I could go back and put everything back to how it was BBT. Before Big Toilets.

But the thing is, I didn’t really want to reinstall the old ones (which my husband had offer many times to do). The old toilets had been moldering for weeks out in the yard (yes, I’m classy like that) and besides, I didn’t want to hurt my dad’s feelings. Sure, I wanted my dad to stop criticizing me (and my old toilets), but that’s not the fault of the new toilets. Perhaps I just needed to, what is it they say? Pull up my big girl pants?

I decided to identify what truly bothered me about the new toilets, aside from the fact that they weren’t my idea, and my final list was surprisingly short:

The plastic seats sucked.

So, a few days later, my husband and I went to Home Depot and purchased better (not plastic) seats. He was kind enough to install them because I think at this point he just wanted me to get over the Great Toilet Debacle of 2016. The new seats don’t pinch my thighs, and I guess you could say that I feel like I’ve now “made the new toilets my own.”

When my photographer Jo came out to the house to take my author headshots, the toilets were still in my backyard. I tried to avoid that area, but after the formal shoot, I sat down on one and my dog tried to jump on my lap with her dirty feet. Jo snapped a few frames.

These toilet pics capture so many real things about my life. I’m prideful and stubborn and kind of a lazy slob (the toilets are STILL sitting by the shop). I hate my dad’s criticism and the way he takes up so much space, but I’m grateful that he cares about me and tries to show it in weird ways. I love my husband for installing the new seats, but mostly for being willing to put the old toilets back in if I wanted. I love my Mom for knowing that I would be upset about the tall toilets, and for cleaning my house to take the edge off.

I see all these things when I look at the toilet pics.

I also see an authentic moment outside with my sweet dog. I see myself laughing a real laugh and wearing my favorite boots. My heart is open, even to new toilets against my will. That is the me I want the world to see.

[image error]Earlier this week, I wrote about choosing a thank you card for my literary idol, Margaret Atwood. In the essay, I gushed about Atwood and the impact her work has had on me. After posting the essay, I wrote her a short, decorous note expressing thanks for the permission to use four lines of her poetry as the epigraph in my novel.

Will my card ever reach the actual hands of Atwood? Probably not. But that doesn’t matter to me. I wrote the essay and sent the card because those small acts of conveying gratitude were important to me.

In third grade I sent the POTUS a letter. I have no idea what I wrote, but after only a few weeks, I received a signed note and a photo of then-President Ronald Reagan riding his jet black horse. I was thrilled. I kept the president’s note and picture in a special box and showed them to anyone who would look. My politics may have shifted since third grade, but somewhere in the kept treasures from my youth, I still have that glorious picture and letter.

Two decades later, I began working in Washington State in the governor’s budget office. There, I learned a “correspondence office” was where state employees spent their days responding to the governor’s mail. I also learned there was such a thing as a “signature machine.”

[image error]The realization that elected officials didn’t personally respond to their mail, though kind of obvious, disappointed me. As a third-grader, I’d happily embraced the mythology that the president himself penned my letter. The idea that he’d sat down at his presidential desk, carefully read my words, and typed me a response on his whirring presidential typewriter made me feel like even though I was just a kid, I could influence the president.

The ugly business of surrogate letter writers and signing machines—realities for most public figures—could easily have caused me to feel disillusioned. To wonder, do letters from regular shmos to important muckety-mucks even matter? But the mere fact that the system isn’t as straightforward or simple as my child mind once thought, is no reason to hate or distrust it.

As an adult, I can accept that as a practical matter, even state governors can’t respond personally to the piles of mail they receive. Though only a small number of individual letters received by the governor’s office were regularly elevated to the actual hands of the governor, the issues raised in those letters were tracked, reported, and considered.

Those constituent letters had influence, especially collectively, and a response from the correspondence office still legitimately represented the governor. In addition, I would contend that the very act of writing—a discipline that typically yields a more organized and reasoned clarity of thought—had value for the senders.

I still believe that writing letters makes a difference—just in a slightly more complex way.

Similar to a government official, Margaret Atwood necessarily employs people to manage her business and respond to correspondence. Did she personally send the email granting me permission to use her work for my epigraph? No. But that neither diminishes the value of the permission, nor does it diminish the value of my responses to her, even if via proxies.

When I received the Atwood permission email, I was every bit as thrilled as I was in third grade to open that letter from the president. I responded to the email by writing an essay and thank you card because those small acts were within my control. They say something about who I am and the person I’m striving to be. Moreover, I believe respectful expressions like these matter.

Why am I explaining this? Because the world can be a jaded place. Because when we stop believing in good, we let bad win.

During this election season in particular, people have expressed disillusion. Some say they no longer believe in our officials, our governments, the electoral process, or in each other. Terrible words have been said by and about the presidential candidates. Friendships have ended. The level of negativity in the air is palpable.

I’m not arguing against being passionate about politics, nor am I downplaying the importance of the election or the serious words and actions that have caused such national fervor. Also, friendships naturally come and go, and sometimes the healthiest thing is to end one.

But let’s not forget that WE—collectively and individually—are this country. All of us who live here. Each of us. Not the oft-mentioned and vaguely defined THEM. I’m not saying we have to like each other or agree, and when we see cruelty we should absolutely call it out and actively try to stop it, and yes, people are flawed, sometimes deeply so, and are capable of terrible things.

But I haven’t lost faith in our citizens or country or public structures, imperfect though they all may be. We have faced dissent before, and found ways to come back together. I believe in We the People. Human beings. The possibility of choosing goodness.

I am arguing for civility. For the belief that though human interactions can be complicated, to err on the side of decency is a good thing, and that the effort to be courteous, even to people we don’t know and people we’ve only met online and people who dress strangely and people who cut us off and family members who profoundly grate on our nerves, is important. Even our smallest acts—a letter written on behalf of someone else or a letter written to a person who may never read it—have power.

This November, I will send a letter to Washington State’s Office of the Secretary of State in the form of a ballot. A small act, perhaps, but one that is critical to our democracy. I will cast my vote for the candidate who I feel best represents me, and regardless of the election outcome, I will respectfully carry on.

We can do this, fellow citizens.

I’ve been hunting for a thank-you card for Margaret Atwood for weeks now. This is such a big deal to me—getting the right card—that I’m about to lose my sh*t.

I’ll explain why about the card, but first, you understand why this is so huge, right?

I’m talking about THE Margaret Atwood. The Literary Goddess, Margaret Atwood. The one Poetry Foundation calls “one of Canada’s finest living writers.”

Whatever, Poetry Foundation. Atwood is one of the finest writers from ANYWHERE. EVER.

Atwood can write anything. She’s a poet, novelist, story writer, essayist, and literary critic. She’s authored more than forty books, won a zillion awards, and continues to tackle new, interesting projects, including a graphic novel and her most recent novel, Hag-Seed, a re-telling of Shakespeare’s The Tempest.

All this Atwood amazingness is, in part, why I can’t find anything good enough or right enough in my local card shop. Because how could a piece of cardstock—even high-end, embossed, self-consciously arty cardstock—ever adequately express my immense respect and admiration for this lovely human, let alone my gratitude?

I’ve never been the type to get celebrity crushes, being raised too much of a pragmatist. I wasn’t one of those ‘80’s kids who read Tiger Beat or obsessed about Kirk Cameron or put up posters of Patrick Swayze, and perhaps because I worked in politics for many years, hobnobbing with important people doesn’t faze me. But writers are kind of an exception.

Because books change lives, people!!!

Atwood’s The Edible Woman was one of the most impactful novels I read during my college years, and before that, her poetry. I was born on a cold day in Alaska in 1973, and the next year Atwood published her poetry collection, You Are Happy. I don’t own the collection, but twenty-three poems from You Are Happy are included in her Selected Poems 1965-1975, which I DO own. I don’t remember buying Selected—was it a gift?—I’ve just always had it. First published in 1976 it’s been around nearly as long as I have.

When I started writing poetry (awful, embarrassing stanzas about God and boys and being isolated), I read Atwood and wondered how she did it. How did she access that glorious and mysterious word magic? How do the five short stanzas in her title poem “You Are Happy” capture such a vastness?

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Me on the frozen beach in Kenai, Alaska.

That poem speaks directly to me, a rural Alaskan girl, in part because I know how it is to be surrounded by a frozen landscape like the one described in the poem. My mind has many times arrived at the clarity of the body facing off against physical elements. I have experienced piercing cold and seen first-hand nature’s beauty and brutality. I know vulnerability and smallness, have walked in meditative solitude through the natural world and have trembled from the fearful seclusion one often finds there.

In short, I connected with Atwood’s poetry. Her themes of survival, images of the body, and the implicit questions about what it means to be female reached inside me and shook me. Slowly, on the cusp of twenty years old, I began to wake from a dark, oblivious sleep. Atwood’s words, alongside those of Adrienne Rich and Sharon Olds and Marge Piercy and so many other great women poets, birthed me into the world of literature. Not surprisingly, I am also a writer. My first novel, set to be released in fall 2017, would not be what it is without Margaret Atwood.

In the card shop, I assess options. How do you pick out a card for a literary mother, a woman who doesn’t know you—shouldn’t know you—who you will likely never meet? I remind myself that this is a business transaction. I will not address the card Dearest Margaret, nor will I overuse the word “love.”

It is often hard to separate the work from the writer—to know one is not to know the other. I don’t actually know Margaret Atwood despite knowing her work, and the fact is, all my gooey feelings for her are mine to hold. Sobbing in a card shop is unseemly, yes, but more important, my charge is to laud and thank this esteemed writer not gush about my feelz. When I pen my message to The Margaret Atwood, it’s critical that I stay professional and avoid making an a$$ of myself.

I am currently working with Portland State University’s Ooligan Press on the final edits to my novel, but during the deep revision part of the process, facing the stark landscape of the page often seemed impossible. What was my novel trying to say? I became small and vulnerable and isolated. Who was I? What did I have to say? I trembled in fear. I meditated in solitude.

I returned to Selected, my origin poems, seeking Atwood’s advice, inspiration and direction, and eventually found what I needed in Atwood’s “Circe/Mud poems.” I considered and reconsidered what it means to grow up rural, to be a woman in this country, and to be a female sexual being. I finished revising, and changed the ending of the novel.

Fifteen of Atwood’s words—four lines—kept repeating in my head. I thought, How perfect these lines would be as the novel’s epigraph. But how could I make that happen? I’m nobody. This is my first book, and the novel is being published by a small university press. Who do I ask? How much would it cost?

Months went by as I worked up the courage to send an email asking for permission. I researched Atwood’s literary agents (there are many). I emailed my publisher to get the information I needed to fill out the rights permission form that, as it turned out, was for the wrong agency, so my first email landed in the wrong literary lap. That woman, however, was kind and directed me to the correct agent and after a quick redraft, I sent off my request.

I tried to put the request out of my mind. The industry’s wheels turn slowly. I didn’t expect to hear back for months, but after only a week—the equivalent of a publishing nano-second—I thought maybe I had emailed the wrong person, so I sent another email to a different contact at the agency. (Don’t do this.) Despite that lapse in judgment, the following email popped up on my phone only days later:

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I had to read the message several times, because I couldn’t believe it was real. ATWOOD WAS GIVING ME PERMISSION TO USE HER GORGEOUS LINES IN MY NOVEL. I started crying, of course, because I was—am still—overwhelmed. Atwood required no payment, only attribution.

I don’t deserve this honor—have done nothing to warrant Atwood’s generosity—but I am moved beyond expression by her kindness. How grateful I am to Atwood. How grateful to be part of a literary community where a writer like Atwood allows a person like me to use her words. Her words remind me to be brave and hungry for this life, and also to be giving. I will remember to be generous, especially to those, like me, who are still finding their way.

This is also why I keep searching for the perfect card for Margaret Atwood, even though I’m certain I won’t  find it. There are so many things I wish I could say to her. I want to thank her for shaking me and waking me up and keeping me company in the lonely darkness of creating. I want to share the vastness she helped me traverse and my fears overcome and the feeling of words—her words—giving me the courage to own my body and my voice. These things occupy the limitless expanse of my heart and could never fit inside a card.

I was all dreamy over Ooligan Press after pitching my book at the 2016 Write to Publish Conference. Then this happened…

Ooligan’s amazing Acquisitions Editors, Molly and Bess, emailed in March that they were excited about Conspiring to be Meri and wanted to pitch the novel to their executive committee. I had no idea what that meant, but took it as a forward step in the [very very slow and painful] publishing process.

I wasn’t invited to attend the pitch and aside from being asked to send a long version of my bio, there was nothing for me to do, so I tried to put the whole [very very slow and painful] publishing process out of my mind.

The pitch was scheduled for Monday, April 4. That day I’d randomly agreed to take part in a local reading event, so I spent the morning practicing and preparing my reading selection in my friend Grace’s kitchen while she made macaroons.

[image error]Mostly though, I was preparing myself for Ooligan to say no. This included taking a lot of screen shots of inspirational rejection quotes. I kept imagining the executive pitch as a boardroom of serious people sipping ice water from clear plastic cups while discussing the flaws of my manuscript. These imaginary Water Sippers were mostly surly old men in suits who said things like, “Bah!” and “Great Scott!”

By noon, I’d convinced myself the deal was a bust. I even psyched myself up for having to turn them down, believing if they did offer to accept the book, it would be contingent on changing the time period from 1990 to present day and removing all swearing and sexual references.

[image error]None of that happened. Shortly before 2 p.m. I received an email entitled, “Ooligan votes to acquire Conspiring to be Meri.”

I still don’t know much about the actual executive pitch, but the bit I do know came from a blog post by an Ooligan committee participant. Reading his experience was, for me, surreal and somewhat unsettling.

The manuscript he was talking about in his post was MY BOOK–the story of my heart! Then there was this line: “there were many who were opposed” to acquiring.

[image error]My mind flashed to the scowling boardroom Water Sippers shaking their heads, “This book is rubbish!”

I wondered about those naysayers and their reasons, even after the email arrived with the thrilling news that Ooligan’s executive committee had voted collectively to acquire my novel.

Still, the deal wasn’t official.

The next step in the [very very slow and painful] publishing process was signing the contract and since I don’t have an agent, this part was MEGA STRESSFUL. Luckily, I have several stellar writer friends familiar with contracts and publishing who generously advised me through the process (THANK YOU Carrie M., Suzanne S., Scott N., and Lisa H.). I quickly learned what a fair contract should contain (great insights available at Authors Guild website) and used the information to negotiate terms with Ooligan’s wonderful publisher, Abbey.

We agreed to contract terms on April 21, the day Prince died. I was wearing all black that day and thinking about how Prince influenced music and challenged the world. I guess that’s what most artists aspire to do–to express and provoke, and to engage with people in a meaningful way.[image error]

A month after I signed the contract, a most awesome thing happened. I received my developmental edit note from my project team via talented project manager, Hayley. This was an indescribable moment, you guys. The team had taken so much care with the novel, reading and discussing and compiling fifteen pages of smart, insightful feedback. I actually cried. For all of you yet-to-be-published writers out there, I wish this same loveliness for you.

Publishing with a university press is no path to riches, that goes without saying, but this opportunity to work with and learn from Portland State University’s Ooligan Press is priceless to me. Seriously. I’m not being cheesy. The thing is, Ooligan isn’t just publishing my book. They’re giving me a chance to share a story that’s important to me–a story about community and girlhood in Alaska in the 1990s. My hope is that the story provokes a larger discussion about community and girlhood in contemporary rural America. This conversation is what matters to me.

Thank you, Ooligan Press, for believing in my story.

Currently, I’m in the midst of revising, which is a heavy lift, and I worry that my output won’t measure up to the quality of the project team’s input. But here’s the thing: all my stupid worries haven’t helped me AT ALL during this [very very slow and painful] publishing process. There are no surly men in suits sitting in a boardroom ridiculing my writing, and even if there were, giving them my energy isn’t helping me.

Writing and publishing = super hard work. Everyone knows that. My job is the same as it has always been: to focus on the work. The art. The story. This is true for all of us, no matter where we are in the process. 

XO,

Meagan

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My friend Karen and I road-tripped to Portland last month. We stayed in a skanky-ish hotel, and what we saved on lodging we spent on food. Totally worth it. We also went to Ooligan Press‘ Write to Publish conference at Portland State University.

Here’s what I learned: 1.) I suck at driving in Portland, 2.) everything at Andina is delicious, and 3.) Ooligan may publish my novel.

Andina is this Peruvian restaurant where Karen and I had dinner the first night. Every bite you eat there is mouth magic, so probably it’s run by fairies. While at Andina, Karen and I sat next to this super cute couple. The guy looked like Bradley Cooper, and we struck up a genteel convo about Dudeior photo shoots while consuming this:

 

The next day was the conference. Karen and I got all wrist-banded up and went to some very cool sessions. I learned tons about comic writing, querying and pitching. Then we ate more food.

In the afternoon, I pitched my novel speed-dating-style to REAL editors at Ooligan. Totally thrilled when they asked me to send a proposal!!  Probably because I came equip with these flashy business cards.

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On the way home, we at more delicious food at BURGERVILLE. I wish I had one of those burgers right now. Mmm. Delicious burgers.

I sent off my proposal (which included the first 60 pages of my young adult novel, Conspiring to be Meri) to Ooligan Press later that week and only days later, Ooligan’s fine acquisitions editors accepted my proposal and ASKED TO READ THE WHOLE NOVEL.

Then I freaked out for about 48 hours.

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After said freak out, I emailed the novel. The Ooligan editors are reading it now, and I am patiently impatiently waiting to hear back.

While we wait, let’s gaze at these glorious ladies from the Writing for Comic Books panel (my favorite session), and imagine how cool it would be to write a comic book.

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