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Curious about what we spend our money on? Take a look at our 2008 operations budget:

$ 48 Cost of web space

$ 488 Legal filing fees associated with maintaining nonprofit status.

$ 120 Dirty Water Reading Series
$ 300 Marketing budget
$ 200 Miscellaneous expenses, including web consulting
$ 375 For a table at the American Writing Programs conference. (This year a gracious donor paid our way.)
$ 75 Membership in the Council of Literary Magazines and Presses
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$1,231 Total Budget vs $1,180 in 2008 donations ($800 from Fringe editors and $380 from readers)

Struggling would-be writer master class

Lesson one: define yourself

Compulsive - ‘If I don’t scribble down my insightful slices of wit/genius/woe right now my mind will literally implode in a sticky, angst-ridden mess.’

Dreamer – ‘I want to write, but I just don’t know what about...’

One-time wonder – Breaks through with a lifetime’s labour of love. They may only have one novel inside them, but they have the sense to make it a damn good one.

Memoir miserablist - Taints the literary world with details of their (possibly fabricated) abusive/difficult childhood and/or time in rehab. A self-righteous tone is essential. Ditto details of horrific depravity coupled with triumph of the human spirit.

Obsessive - Unlike the compulsive, the obsessive enjoys writing for its own sake. They have clocked up their 10,000 hours of genius-making time before puberty, whilst their peers were still lost in the follies of navel-gazing. Once their genius reaches its inevitable peak, they will be forced to publish under a myriad of jazzy pseudonyms so as not to flood the unsuspecting market.

Good poet – Expresses various elements of the human condition in an array of elegant and quietly affecting musings.

Bad poet – Believes that they are doing the above simply by omitting punctuation and capital letters.

Glory hound– Unavoidable. Gain respect by not pretending that your work is nothing more than a twee hobby for which you partake for your own amusement/therapeutic reasons. You’ve already rehearsed your interviews numerous times already – more reason to get it right whence that hallowed day arrives.

Be clear in your own mind as to which type of writer you are going to become and hope for the best. Your journey is sure to be long, arduous and largely unfulfilling, but that’s pretty much the point. There is absolutely no point in styling yourself as a writer if you can’t bitch about it every step of the way.

Not found your type? The full list can be found here.

Next week: Discover your 'process'...

California Dreamin?

Obama's victory wasn't the only landmark decision in last week's election. Here, guest contributor Kelley Calvert weighs in on the passing of Proposition 8 against gay marriage in California:

Standing before a crowd of thousands in Washington DC, the Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. told audiences 45 years ago: “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

In what seemed to be the completion of Martin Luther King’s dream, Barack Obama was elected president in a landslide victory. Standing before a crowd of over 200,000 people in Chicago, President-Elect Barack Obama told the nation, “If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.”

For millions of Californians, his words already rang untrue.

Though Barack Obama’s election has created a sense of euphoria and a belief that all things are possible for all people, the passing of Proposition 8 by a 52%-48% margin has cast a doubtful shadow over our national dream of equality.

When Martin Luther King, Jr. marched on Washington in 1963, his dream had gathered inertia, but it was far from being realized. The Supreme Court had made school segregation illegal nine years prior, but overt and violent racism was still a norm. In a 1958 Gallup poll, 94% of Americans disapproved of interracial marriage, a statistic showing the deep entrenchment of American Apartheid.

The President of the Confederacy during the Civil War, Jefferson Davis stated, "[Slavery] was established by decree of Almighty God...it is sanctioned in the Bible, in both Testaments, from Genesis to Revelation.” Fliers distributed by the Yes on 8 Campaign brazenly declare that, “God himself is the author of marriage. Its meaning is written in the very nature of man and woman.”

Just as religion was once used to justify slavery, it is now being used to argue that gay people do not deserve the same rights as everyone else. The New American Apartheid again suggests that one group of people is somehow lesser than another and “Separate but Equal” has found its modern manifestation in Civil Unions and Domestic Partnerships.

In an irony capable only in these times, the record minority turnout for elections which put Barack Obama in the White House served to perpetuate the persecution of another minority group. Exit polls show that Proposition 8 was supported by 70% of black voters.

The remnants of yellow ‘Yes on 8’ signs paid for by religious institutions that targeted and manipulated the black vote represent a massive failure of democracy. They represent not the triumph of tradition or God’s will, but the betrayal of the values upon which we Americans have built our country. In California, we realized the dream of Martin Luther King by a staggering percentage: 61.2% for Barack Obama. This historic occasion leads me to a simple question.

California, did you forget about us? Or, are we just not included in the American fairy tale that all men are created equal? Today, my well-meaning liberal friends assure me that, “We still have a long way to go on social issues,” and continue on their way, floating on Obama’s glory. Last night my fellow Californians voted to procure rights for farm animals. Yet, somehow, you have voted to take away rights from human beings?

How is this possible?

Yes, November 4th represents the culmination of a great dream and minorities all over the country are awakening today rightfully reinvigorated by the hope that equality has been realized. Nonetheless, millions of your separate but equal fellow citizens are awakening to a different dream, a nightmare that raises the exact question many Americans asked on the eve of September 11: Why do they hate us so much?

It certainly isn’t our freedom.

The greener grass

As I've expressed before, my job isn't particularly challenging. I don't have a whole lot to do, and the projects I'm assigned to do bore me. I'm writing (marketing materials), but not in the capacity I want to be writing (articles, columns, essays, books). My chief complaint isn't lack of time to write, but rather, lack of inspiration, energy, drive. Boredom breeds lethargy. Cubicles breed hopelessness. And so on.

A friend of mine, however, has the opposite problem. She, too, graduated from a MFA program last December. She found a job that allows her to write, and constantly. She gets paid to craft fun, creative short pieces about pop culture, TV, and politics. Unfortunately, her employers under-appreciate and under-value her work. The results? Long hours, constant criticism, and an environment that she describes as "toxic." Working 12 hours a day in a toxic environment doesn't leave her with much time for her own writing, let alone a social life. She enjoys the work, she says, but wonders if the job is worth it.

When we compare notes at the end of a long week, I can't help but wonder which one of us is worse/better off. Would I rather be too busy in a job that more closely resembles the career I envision for myself, or not busy enough in a job that allows me the time to write (if only I could motivate myself)? Which type of job would better serve my (our) writing?

Thoughts?

Procrastination, Pessimism, and Floral Design

This afternoon as my hands gently clipped the tape that wound around the petals of the bouquet's fifteen gerber daisies, it occurred to me I should have gone to buy the flowers myself. I had ordered a hand-tied bouquet from a Malaysian florist on the web at a bargain and gotten only what I paid for. The tape was not even plant tape but regular scotch, and around the stems the tape held the whole together, but suffocated it as result. After freeing the flowers' faces to open into outward embrace, I wished someone would snip the tape and carefully peel it from around the petals on my head.

I don't know why I spent an hour choosing the flowers to order and then another hour proving my identity since I'd used an American credit card to buy flowers on the other side of the globe. Then I spent a third hour removing the tape from the flowers and arranging them in a large green vase, ignoring the deadline for the Yale Series of Younger Poets only three days away. But no one has taped my laptop shut, nor webbed my fingers together so that I might only bang at the keys. I've got an excellent compilation that really would only require the teensiest bit of shuffling and last minute cuts. At least half the poems have been published in journals and zines, and almost all have been given the editorial eye by at least one poet I trust. They represent ten years of writing and reading and editing, but also represent well over a thousand dollars in previous contest fees and related expenses.

Most of my peers in writing workshops and at conferences have admitted frustration with unrequited appeals to be published. We're in good company if you like Coleridge or Plath, amongst many others. Besides identifying with melancholics, writers in moments of self-doubt console ourselves with stats bordering upon urban legends, such as that most manuscripts circulate for at least two years, some as much as eight, and then greatness is rewarded. We're told by writers who've "made it" and editors that if we keep trying, really good writing will find a home, but of course they would say that. The other option is too dismal for a floral-scented reading or workshop for which participants have paid. Yes, perhaps the writing is good enough, but like Blake or Dickinson we may never live to know it, or even worse, perhaps the work will never go anywhere, period--or worst, maybe despite all our desire and energy the writing just isn't that good.

This year I let the deadlines for fall contests lapse because I'd rather keep my petals closed than risk opening them once again to nothing, but I hate how whiny that sounds. The self-indulgent melancholy in this post creeps throughout with such thickness you'd have to clip through it with a weed eater. And would there be any point in clipping through it? The red and yellow fall bouquet on my coffee table is calling me a hypocrite to prefer suffocation wherein I hold the scissors, instead of relinquishing them to an editorial team that I'd trust as much as my Malaysian florist. Then again, I am probably less afraid of "putting pearls before swine" than of getting the one-rejection-too-many that makes me think I am just not a blooming poet at all.

Crowd Surfing with Obama

The optimism in the air in Boston this past week has been nearly palpable. What with Obama's victory Tuesday and the unseasonably warm November weather, there's a smile on nearly everyone's faces these days. It's a welcome reprieve from the doom and gloom of the economic crisis and the impending winter chill. Though there was much gleeful shouting, car horn beeping, and giddy bouncing on Tuesday night around 11pm, the most exuberance I've seen was at the Orpheum Theater Thursday night, when I went to see the Decemberists.

It was my second time seeing the Portland band, known for their eccentric stage antics and literary lyrics, live. The first time their set was punctuated with a giant whale puppet and members of the band diving into the audience at the Avalon to crowd surf. Many of their songs are more mythic tales than pop song, with tracks ranging from "O Valencia!" which tells the story of a star-struck romance in the vein of Romeo and Juliet, to "The Mariner's Revenge Song" in which a man finds justice in the belly of a whale. The group has an ode to the writer Myla Goldberg and in fact, lead singer Colin Meloy's sister is an acclaimed author herself.

This time, a life-sized cardboard cutout of Barack Obama stood in for the giant whale. The band sent the 2-D President Elect into the crowd, where he happily crowd surfed for a good part of the set. When the audience returned him to the stage, Meloy sent him back, saying "No, he belongs with the people." If that wasn't clue enough of the band's political stance, Meloy went on to expound how delighted and inspired he was by the election, and lead a call and response "Yes we can! Yes we DID!" chant. The real climax of the evening came during the last song of the night, "Sons and Daughters," the last song on the band's most recent studio album The Crane Wife. As they launched into the chorus "Here all the bombs fade away," they pulled up about 30 members of the audience and, as everyone sang along, I couldn't help but tear up a little bit. It was a fitting reminder of the relevance and resonance music can have in culture, and in our own personal lives.

It's been a great week, and I can only hope that this sense of possibility doesn't fade away.

Professionally Developed

Traditionally, when an administrator “asks” me to attend an outside professional-development training, I groan. Almost invariably, from the moment I walk into the local Howard Johnson/Best Western/Comfort Inn, slap the adhesive name badge on my breast, select from the continental breakfast buffet, and settle into my folding chair, these “workshops” become little more than a 6 –hour infomercial with the sole intention of selling us the latest book, learning kit, or software under the guise of imparting wisdom to a room of overworked, underpaid teachers who are already planning their escape during the “on your own” lunch break.

So, when my boss told me I had been registered for Walter Mayes’ “The Best New Young Adult Literature of The Decade” workshop, my reaction was much the same. But, since it didn’t seem I had much choice in the matter anyway, I figured, if nothing else, I’d get to sleep in, wear jeans, and leave a sub with my roomful of eleven year-olds on Halloween. If I was really lucky, I might even get a good list of new books to use for inspiring my students and my Fringe column. As it turns out, I got all of that, and a whole lot more.

The moment that 6 foot, 7 inch tall, former Jeopardy champion, Walter Mayes took the stage, I knew that this would not be a typical “training” session. As the Librarian and Media Specialist at The Girls' Middle School in Mountain View, California, Mayes is skilled in the art of engaging a dubious audience.

In addition to regaling us with stories of the liberal grandparents who instilled in him the love of all things literary, his experiences as a member of dozens of literary award committees, and anecdotes about trying to keep his library stocked with enough copies of the Twilight series (which he endearingly denounces as a “piece of crap”), Mayes provided exactly what we wanted: a list of the best new YA books, their appropriate audiences, and how to use them most effectively in our classrooms. Among his favorites? Gary Schmidt's The Wednesday Wars, Gordon Kormon's No More Dead Dogs, and Chris Lynch's Inexcusable.

Most importantly, though, he inspired us to turn the sour grapes of teaching literature to the unwilling into a sweet, sweet wine to intoxicate not only our students, but ourselves, with the love of reading.

Yesterday, I made a trip to the local bookstore, lightened my wallet, and weighted my tote-bag with 6 new books--the three mentioned above plus,Nancy Werlin's The Rules of Survival, Shaun Tan's The Arrival that I have only put down long enough to write this post.

So, for now, I’m off to do some reading. Be back next time with a look at Gary Schmidt’s The Wednesday Wars. In the meanwhile, listen to Walter read a clip from his book, Walter The Giant Storyteller's Giant Book of Giant Stories