Author Archive
Henge
I was three when my biological mother left me. I don’t remember her leaving. I don’t recall a feeling of loss. I remember a book from my childhood, Are you My Mother? A baby bird hopped between animals asking, “Are … Continue reading
Dear Marie Calloway
I’m no angel. Hold yourself with care. I’m old enough to be your mother. But I’m no one. Lidia Yuknavitch, Rachel Resnick, Cheryl Strayed, Chelsea G. Summers, Antonia Crane, Susie Bright, Kerry Cohen, Sue William Silverman, Ethel Rohan, and Dylan … Continue reading
A Christmas Cheer
Admittedly it’s uncouth or uncool, perhaps even tacky to write about my financial straits, but it’s bugging me I can’t afford to buy my son a Christmas gift this year. Do you ever want to give up? Well I do, … Continue reading
If I Were A Poor White Single Mother
I read something at Forbes today because several of my friends on Facebook had linked the article. Here it is. If I Were A Poor Black Kid. The author, Gene Marks, describes himself as a “short, balding, and mediocre public … Continue reading
First Impressions (Or A Letter to My English Composition Students) (Or “We’re Not Hesher.”)
Before we go any further discussing objective versus subjective descriptions or read essays by Heather Rogers and EB White or beat ourselves over the head with anymore comma splices or discuss how some of you begin a paragraph in past … Continue reading
Do You Know The Meth-od Man? It’s Three A.M.
A man nearly died on my driveway last night. He’d done a huge amount of some naracotic then wandered the trailer park before ending up at my house at three a.m. The man fell against the front of my house then knocked on the window. … Continue reading
I Believe I’ll Write My Way Out of This Hole
You know how you almost always have someone who’s got your back? That person, since I was three years old, was my grandmother, granny; Mama Bear is what I called her. Because I didn’t have a mama until I was ten, and then unfortunately, … Continue reading
Happy Birthday Lidia Yuknavitch
Yours is The Book generations of women will press to a beat beneath their left tit as they brave college classrooms the first time, or the next time, or the last time even; it’s with them between classes, between sentences, on … Continue reading
Dear Tracy Morgan
Dear Tracy Morgan, By now, everyone probably knows you stated during a recent stand-up routine in Nashville Tennesse you’d stab your son to death if he was gay. That was probably the worst of your homophobic tirade. I guess. You also said gays are pussies for whining so much about being bullied … Continue reading
Hardwired
The day is warm and windy in Republican country. I’m surrounded by churches and liquor stores, desert hugged by mountains. What does a person’s sexual preference have to do with his or her professional ability, his or her professional integrity? … Continue reading
Touching Kiefer Sutherland (1)
In 1989, I broke up with my first boyfriend. I touched Kiefer Sutherland. And I won the title of Miss Coors Extra Gold. My first boyfriend was older than me. He drove a Corvette, owned a house, owned a business. … Continue reading
Post Rapture
In graduate school, when I began a novel about Eva Braun, I had books all over the place about World War II, about Adolf Hitler, about Eva Braun, about Nazis, about concentration camps, about Holocaust survivors, and my seven-year-old son … Continue reading
Three (About the Body) Rough
When I was three, my mother left my father and me. When I was five, my father told me he was driving to Denver to pick up my brother. I didn’t know I had a brother. I knew I didn’t have a … Continue reading
Dear Donny Thane
Last night I sat under a fan staring at the TV wondering if this might be the night I slept longer than four hours, then over the sound of the fan and TV I heard my son crying down the hall in … Continue reading
Crabs
Today is Tuesday and I transmit from a trailer in a trailer park on the southeast of town. The sun shines. The wind has tapered down. Weather’s about to turn for the warmer. I love warm. And my trailer is awesome. Did I mention … Continue reading
14
My son’s first girlfriend was Alyssa Milano. He was three. She was twenty-seven. Alyssa was on the cover of Cosmopolitan Magazine that year and my son cut her out with his child-safe scissors then stuck her to the refrigerator with a couple of … Continue reading
The Greatest Gift of Your Life You Insist You Don’t Want
Thirteen years ago today, my son’s grandmother on his father’s side died. They never met. I hope she rests well. Crystal was a beautiful woman. I remember that. She intimidated me. She wasn’t mean. I was just young at the time. … Continue reading
Light
Jeff and I used to go to the gay clubs in Denver. I was a model then; Jeff was a model too. That was how we met. Anyway, we recognized each other right away. At clubs, we were brother and sister. Jeff was … Continue reading
Two
I saw the film, “Showgirls,” with a friend in 1995. We were alone in the theater. I loved the movie from the get go, my instant-fierce love. The film received terrible reviews though; everyone said how bad Elizabeth Berkley was as Nomi Malone. I’ve seen … Continue reading
One
My mother died March 20, 2011. Her name was Lydia Kathleen. She married my father when she was seventeen. At eighteen, Lydia Kathleen gave birth to me. My father tells me about the snowstorm in Durango that night. They were scared … Continue reading
Fluffer
The first erotic story I ever wrote published was in 1995. I called it “Private Investigation” and had Fox Mulder and Dana Scully in mind when I wrote it. They fucked on a mattress at a crime scene. Playgirl Magazine published it. … Continue reading
Cattle Call
Have you ever been to a cattle call? It’s like entering a writing contest. But I should explain a cattle call first. When I was a model I used to go to these things the industry referred to as a “cattle call,” … Continue reading
Doing Dishes
I dreamed once a person took a shit in the middle of a room and then left it there, and I just stood looking at it like, I’m supposed to clean this up? I used to live in this apartment complex where a guy … Continue reading
Not Vegas
So it’s Thursday everyone and I realized at 5:49 this morning I hadn’t written my column this week. Wow. Time flies. It’s Friday, 7:11 a.m., and I’ve still not finished my column. Slacker. Actually, I’ve got stuff happening and probably could have skipped this week, but … Continue reading
Poison
When I leave work traveling north on Highway 50 over the bridge I see the same billboard each day. “Heaven or Hell: Where Are You Going?” It’s a ridicules question. Hell is eighth grade. Or if you’re a writer, it’s having no time to write. … Continue reading
Impeded
Today is Sunday and I transmit from a cottage in Republican country after having suffered the worst of a terrible bout of flu. It’s early afternoon and already I’ve worn myself out doing laundry and a few other minor chores. I may not finish this … Continue reading
Higher
I’d like to write another story for Best Women’s Erotica; I’d like to publish that story in another edition of Best Women’s Erotica. Over the years, editors for the annual erotica collection have rejected my work once, shortlisted my work … Continue reading
In Response to Kirsty Logan’s “Youth Is All” Who Wrote In Response to Amber Sparks’ “Writing Under the Influence of Anxiety.”
Today is Monday. I transmit from a cottage in Republican country. I’m tired because I worked all day and now listen to a soft rock mix on I-Tunes because I’m forty-four but sometimes forget and have to ask my son, “How old am I?” If … Continue reading
Castles
Today the sun shines upon our cottage, the air outside is warming, and I canceled our cable television subscription. My son’s idea. ”Mom, why don’t we cancel cable?” Sure, yeah. Done. It’s all crap anyway. Television, gads, it’s Crack. The only thing I still love about cable television is True Blood, and … Continue reading
Quake
My Kiddo was sick today. At seven a.m. this morning he said, “Mama, will you stay home with me?” I called my boss and left a message then lied down with my son on his bed and rubbed his … Continue reading
Born Again
Everyone has talent. What is rare is the courage to follow the talent to the dark place where it leads. Erica Jong Since beginning my column here for PANK Magazine, I’ve received several messages on Facebook as well as several … Continue reading
Still Alive
When I was three, my mother abandoned me. She gave me up to become a stripper at the Clown’s Den in Denver, and then she became a hooker. When I was five, she went to prison for solicitation. That … Continue reading
Brittany Murphy, an Elegy in X
Amber Tamblyn wrote she died like a spider in the shower. Where does a soul go? Up the wall on eight legs, down the drain? My son asked me a long time ago not to kill spiders, so I scoop … Continue reading
Never My Love
Not so long ago my father called and left a voicemail message in which he expressed his displeasure with my answer tone. “I’d rather listen to someone fart,” he said. “Remove it or I won’t call anymore.” The song you … Continue reading
Wilderness
Yesterday I felt like I edged ever near a nervous breakdown. I had one of those in college, you know, a near-nervous-breakdown and began seeing a shrink and took meds, the whole thing. My primary fear, always, is I’ll become … Continue reading
Not the Slab; A Microscope
“If I had to give young writers advice, I would say don’t listen to writers talk about writing or themselves.” Lillian Hellman Whoops. I transmit from a cottage in Republican country. Today is Thursday. Outside the cold could sink deeper … Continue reading
Light in Your Eye
Nineteen years ago today, Freddie Mercury died, which is why I write tonight. It’s cold outside right now; cold is silver, like shining silver. I transmit from a cottage in Republican country. My son came home from school the other … Continue reading
A Ghost Story
I transmit from a cottage over a hundred years old. It’s late. The air has a silver essence. Rain presses leaves to the pavement. From his room upstairs, my son hears a ghost call his name; he hears it moving … Continue reading
Genesis
If I believe artists created God, does that make me an Atheist? I transmit from a cottage in Republican country. The sky is cloudless. Leaves drop like flies. We’re surrounded. My brother says our town is comprised mostly of churches … Continue reading