I've been trying to get this post out into the world for the past week, but the jet lag I've been experiencing has been real. Even when I have been able to sleep at night, by midday my body keeps shutting down. There are two main philosophies of how you should handle jet lag: one says that you should fight the tiredness/wakfulness, the other says to go with the flow. I've been going with the flow, which frequently means having some extreme naptimes. That tiredness feels entirely earned coming home from the trip that I had this year at AWP in Washington DC, and then in NYC the week after that. Alternative title for this post: I went to AWP and Listened to Too Much Poetry and Now I Am Overcome
Here's a quick run-down of what I'll be doing at this year's AWP conference at Washington DC of all places. It's an exciting time to be in DC, since it's a chance for writers all over the county and the world to gather together to express our displeasure with the policies of the brand new, horrid administration. We won't just be reading and talking about writing, we'll be there to say NO in person, en masse. For two ways people are doing that check out AWP Writers Resist Trump and The Candlelight Vigil for Free Speech. And also, the books. For this year I even put together a small chapbook of outtakes from The Voyager Record. I'm calling it Voyager, Too because, obvs, it's about Voyager, too
I went with the fam and some of my in-laws to the protest organized by Pantsuit Nation Israel outside of the US Embassy here in Tel Aviv to coincide with the Women's March on Washington. I even got my picture taken a few times, one of which wound up in the news. All politics are really local here. I've visited the embassy a few times this year. I had been there, not too long before that protest against Trump, to vote. I also had been to the embassy in the last few months to get my passport renewed. I'm now in the possession of two completely unused passports: my American one, and my brand new Israeli one. Israelis might react to me becoming a citizen the way many Trump voters might look at n
