I wrote my first piece of fiction in the 4th grade; it was mimeographed and stapled and handed out (along with everyone else's in the class) by a teacher whose name I don't remember, who also took it upon herself to edit said stories. When I noticed she'd changed the entire ending to mine, I asked her why. She said it wasn't "cheerful" enough, and I thought, so what if I had the earth being invaded by aliens and for all intents and purposes destroyed? Who was she to say? Somebody, apparently, because for the next two decades I didn't write anything other than term papers and the occasional tragic journal entry. Ok, so I can't blame her entirely for my choice to then (instead of writing) seek meaning via a series of mind-numbing and traumatic corporate jobs, but it's nice to be able to point the finger at someone else once in a while, isn't it? Anyway, when I did finally start writing again, I still had doubts as to the level of my creative prowess, but I was clear that I couldn't sit behind one more dismal desk at one more soul-crushing corporate job, so I guess that's something. Fortunately it turns out I am sort of good at this writing thing, and I was accepted to graduate school at UC Irvine after a few years of attending writing workshops led by the fantastic novelist Lisa Glatt. Unfortunately, many of my experiences while getting my MFA were, academically and socially, eerily reminiscent of the 4th grade -- but that's a story for another time. I did, however, produce a collection of linked short stories during my tenure and even managed to publish several of them. More recently, I left the lovely LA basin and moved home to Portland, Oregon, where I started work on a memoir, a portion of which is excerpted in these pages. When I'm not waiting tables or reading gossip about celebrities, I'm really doing my best to finish it. Really.
