Fall online class on personal essay

I'm delighted to teach again through the Provincetown Fine Arts Center. Workshop online begins September 21. 

http://web.fawc.org/24-pearl-street/writing-personal-essay-fall

And here’s a link to our discounts--

http://web.fawc.org/24-pearl-street/discounts

Knitting Pearls

I'm so delighted that Knitting Pearls, the follow up knitting anthology to Knitting Yarns will be out in November. What a line up! Jane Hamilton, Lily King, Steve Almond, Bill Roorbach, Ann Leary, Lee Woodruff, Jodi Picoult, Laura Lippman, Dani Shapiro, Jared Flood of Brooklyn Tweed and The Yarn Whisperer Clara Parkes--just to name a few. 

I've written often about the healing and transformative powers of knitting. To have other writers share their stories of how the magic of knitting brought them closer to a family member or kept loneliness at bay or taught them about love and life--well, it just makes me so happy. Knitting makes me happy. These writers make me happy. 

We are doing some readings from the anthology this fall. Some details are already up on my website, with more to follow. First up is Brattleboro VT the first weekend in October at the Literary Festival there. I'll be with Bill Roorbach talking knitting. Yes, Bill knits. And his essay "Sarah With an H" is really a knock out. 

Steve Almond and I will be at Porter Square Books in Boston. Laura Lippman and I will be at Loop Yarns in Philadelphia. And a whole mess of my knitting writers--Lily King, Melissa Coleman, and Bill Rootbach--will be in Portland Maine. I'll also be at the Miami Book Fair with Dennis LeHane in November for Providence Noir, but some knitters will join me there too for Knitting Pearls, including Cindy Chinelly. Her husband John Dufresne was in Knitting Yarns. 

Bring your knitting needles and join us?

Maybe I'll be finished with this blanket by the time Knitting Pearls is out;

Exciting news

Writers of all levels of experience:

Hester Kaplan, Taylor Polites and I are delighted to announce Goat Hill's Fall schedule of workshops and events. We are also offering one on one manuscript consultations. Details can be found here:

Indiana!

Made it! Thanks for all your fun posts with recommendations for food and sights along the way. Next up: fried chicken, Indiana style. 

Two state capitols down, one to go!

Two hours from Greensburg! I love a road trip. Especially one that will end in Indiana fried chicken. 

Yesterday's highlight was Easton PA, home of Crayola. 

But also home of one of the best cheeseburgers I've had the pleasure of eating. Two Rivers Brewery made it: cheese, bacon, and peanut butter dust!  And if that still doesn't do it for you, it was served with dick fat fries:

And you know, it was a brewery, so had to have a flight of beer:

From there it was on to Harrisburg, because if I'm within spitting distance of a state Capitol, I can't resist. I'm the weird kid who loved memorizing all 50, and I still take great pride in knowing them. I didn't take a picture, but it's a beauty with a green tile dome. 

Had to stop here en route: 

Today has been all about Ohio. A great day! I've loved Ohio since my TWA roommate from Fremont brought me home and fed me fried bologna (a first!) and took me to the Rutherford B. Hayes house. But oh, Ohio, your state Capitol is kind of odd looking? I read the history of its design and architecture, so I'm not alone in being surprised there's no dome. Still, I'm happy to have spent the day in the Buckeye State. No fried bologna this time. But there's that fried chicken waiting for me tonight in Indiana. And all the Hood cousins. My sadness from yesterday has turned bittersweet, and excitement is taking over!

Indiana Bound

Boy am I feeling emotional as I head into the Midwest. It's as if every family car trip of every summer of my youth is catching up with me. My father grew up in Greensburg Indiana, a town whose claim to fame--as he would proudly remind 

us--was the tree that grew out of the courthouse roof. We would pile into our station wagon and drive, seemingly forever. I did not grow up in a town where people went on vacation, so this trip seemed exotic, daring. Pillows and blankets in the way back. Eating deviled ham out of a can. The lemon smell of wet wipes. So much cigarette smoke. Special stops in niagra falls, Montreal, Hershey, Amish country. And once there it was cousins and aunts and uncles and great aunts and great uncles. It was corn everywhere I looked. It was Aunt Bo's pies and Aunt Mag's cakes. It was thunderstorms and bats swooping in the moonlight. Time passed. The station wagon became an impala. My brother did the driving, cool in his Wayfarer sunglasses. And then it was me driving, my brother dead, his little girl with us now. Finally I could stay up late drinking beer. We slept in the one motel near town. I bought handmade quilts and postcards of that tree coming out of the courthouse roof. When my father was in the hospital dying of lung cancer, his sisters Mag and Dot came to say goodbye. I have not been back to Greensburg since then. As my mother said about this trip, "I couldn't go without my Hood." But I am. Heading there to eat fried chicken and visit cousins and yes, that courthouse. As the highway through Pennsylvania gets eaten up, I find myself crying. For all I had. For all I've lost. For this road leading both backward and forward. 

Goodbye Bread Loaf 2015

I think I say this every time I leave Bread Loaf, but this year was the best ever. My wonderful non-fiction workshop. My Fellow Brando Skyhorse. All the incredible readings and lectures. If you're interested in hearing them, click here:

http://www.middlebury.edu/bread-loaf-conferences/bread_loaf_community/listen_to_lectures_and_readings

A lovely ride home, fueled by an egg sausage and cheese breakfast sandwich from the Rochester Cafe. It's hotter here than I like, all sticky and humid. But steak on the grill and tomatoes from the garden and corn on the cob make even the dog days bearable. And Lucia Berlin's story collection, A Manual for Cleaning Ladies, was waiting for me and I got to read Lydia Davis' Foreward while the potatoes cooked. (My favorite way to make them: boil baby Yukons until tender. Throw them on a dish rag and smash them flat. Let them cool, then put them on a baking sheet with olive oil and salt. Cook at 450 degrees for 30-35 minutes. You will thank me. ) 

Now, Bread Loaf exhausted, I'm finishing rereading Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay, the third in Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan trilogy. The fourth arrives September 2, which means it's no longer a trilogy but which makes me beyond happy. 

A final Bread Loaf picture, taken from my balcony at Maple this morning.