A few days ago I received an email telling me I’d been accepted into an excellent looking workshop/retreat, led by primo-supremo writer Dan Chaon. I’m floating a little right now, especially because this workshop takes place in Fairyland, aka the English Countryside. You can visit the website here: Word Theatre Writers’ Workshop & Retreat.

For a week in July I get to speed off to other climes for what I hope will be a rejuvenating writing experience. You can bet I’m over the moon about this one.

In other news, I had a phone interview on that same day for a dream job (aside from being a writer, this is perhaps one of the only other things I can imagine doing for the rest of my life). I don’t know how it went exactly–I lean between it went well and I destroyed my chances by babbling about it being a ‘dream job’ at the end. Sheesh. In any case, if I somehow am able to wow the forces that be and I actually get the job, it will be life changing. That’s about all I can say about it right now without freaking myself out again.

In less than three weeks now, we’re packing our bags and will be driving to Seattle. Most people reading this blog will know we decided to move, but just in case you didn’t, come Feb. 1, this girl will have evacuated the concrete land that is Dallas for a greener (literally) world. I really can’t wait. We’re leaving almost all our possessions behind and are starting over. A good friend of ours is renting us the bottom floor of her house. We’re ready to begin again, in the right place for both of us.

I’m also working on a story right now that must be finished before I go. I’d started it several weeks back, but now more than ever I have an impetus to finish it. On New Year’s Eve, a young woman who was very dear to several of my friends was murdered near her home in Austin. I didn’t really know her, but I knew who she was, and to know that violence is so close, so easy to ignore but always trembling beneath the surface, keeps working at me. So I’m writing this story, knowing she was murdered, trying to pull shards out of death and put them into some meaningful order. Very rarely can anything come of a death like this but pain and grief. I’m not sure what I expect to find in this story that says differently. The story is only trying to offer companionship to the ones who lose their lives, to ones who don’t get to speak back, who don’t get to smile or laugh and share with us again. Even if the words are only a whisper, I hope they can channel a reprieve from the chaos this loss brings.

This weekend I journeyed back to Seattle, the city that isn’t my city, the city that does not belong to me, yet I somehow belong to it. Even in the drizzly rain, the soggy, mud-strewn flyers littering the streets of Capitol Hill made sense–signaled to me my relation to this land. I only stayed there for six weeks in 2010, but going back felt more like going home–a real home, one that belongs to me, one that is tied more to who I am than where I’ve come from–than anywhere I’ve ever been.

I have to find my way back.

Dallas is a blur. It helps that it rained and is overcast today, and that I live in a fairly lush, walkable section of an otherwise vast land of concrete and infrastructure. But I know my time here must surely take me back there. It helps that I saw friends–real friends–people who write, who think, who understand, and who take me for what I am. My group here is slowly dispersing–with lives to be lived in California, North Carolina, Michigan…yet my feet tap in the muddy puddles of Dallas and wait, wait, wait, trying to avoid the cracks that would swallow me if I stopped long enough.

Something about standing on a water taxi, the wind slashing through my hair and the waves knifing into frothy white possibility beneath us; something about hiking up a fairyland road with nothing but ferns and dripping green trees arching over my head; something about stepping off a train and stumbling into a mass protest, the dirt, the sweat, the people thronging together to demand fairness… A coffee shop on every corner, a city where vegan isn’t a dirty word, and books, oh, the sweet scent of books that carries on the air.

Seattle. I’ve left you but will find you again.

Consider sponsoring me in the 2011 Clarion West Write-a-thon. I’m going for 1,000 words a day, five days a week, and I’ll smash your favorite color and bug into a terrifying monster in my current YA dark fantasy, Throwaways. C’mon! It’ll be like magic. And you know you want yourself immortalized in bug form.

Click here to access my page. Thanks! The money raised here goes to help new writers attend the Clarion West Writers Workshop, held in Seattle, Wash., every year.

For those vegans out there who waste away during the holiday season, I have a treat for you. This is my veganized version of the famous Carnation fudge recipe. It’s to die for.

Estimated Times

Preparation Time: 10 mins
Cooking Time: 6 mins
Cooling Time: 2 hrs refrigerating
Servings: 24 servings (2 pieces per serving)

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups organic granulated sugar
2/3 cup Silk Nog
2 tablespoons Earth Balance Natural Spread
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 cups Sweet & Sara Vegan Marshmallows
1 1/2 cups (9 oz.) Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels
1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts (optional but most awesome)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:
LINE 8-inch-square baking pan with foil.

COMBINE sugar, Silk Nog, Earth Balance, and salt in medium, heavy-duty saucepan. Bring to a full rolling boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Boil, stirring constantly, for 4 to 5 minutes. Remove from heat.

STIR in marshmallows, morsels, nuts and vanilla extract. Stir vigorously for 1 minute or until marshmallows are melted. Pour into prepared baking pan; refrigerate for 2 hours or until firm. Lift from pan; remove foil. Cut into 48 pieces.

I make this every holiday season and it blows people away every time. Let this be yours and help make some sad vegan spirits bright!