By Noriko Nakada It was December in 2016. In the warmth and light of Avenue 50 Studios in Highland Park, I attended my first, in-person Women Who Submit workshop. Our presenter, Sara Novik, attended via video conference to speak with us about writing and activism post-election. On that cold LA morning in those waning days …
by Thea Pueschel There are gates that some of us are born outside of. We may try to scale the barbed fence, but without guidance, we only wind up nicked and wounded. When I grew up in Orcutt, California, an unincorporated city in northern Santa Barbara County in the 80s and 90s, these barbed wired …
Continue reading “Breathe and Push: Hampshire Gates and Mentor Meanderings”
by Désirée Zamorano How do you deal with your emotional wounds? For me, as a writer, telling what I hope are emotionally engaging stories, doesn’t that mean the wounds need to be examined from all angles? Prodded, to see where the most tender parts are, and returned to, over and over again, even if the …
By Noriko Nakada The past Tuesday, I woke up at 2:30 am when my COVID test results came in. I was negative, but I couldn’t fall back asleep. I was thinking about the email from a parent questioning the social justice lens of my instruction. I was thinking about how my first-grader was worried about …
by Noriko Nakada Last year, I wrote this meditation on time for Breathe and Push, but now things are different. Life is still strange, and the world is still on fire. Within this global pandemic, there remains loads of uncertainty. Debate continues about masks and vaccines and what is safe and what is not. In …
by Anne Pellicciotto Writing my secrets has always been my secret. I’ve scribbled away, diligently, in the margins of my life and, by now, in my fifties, I have a fully completed manuscript. Though it’s never done, is it? To keep the creative spark alive, over the years, I’ve taken workshops, gone away to residencies, …
By Noriko Nakada Maybe you’ve heard, but in case you haven’t, Women Who Submit is celebrating 10 years! I mean, even Poets & Writers took notice of this badass organization and the women and nonbinary writers who are pushing against the patriarchy by supporting one another in our creative journeys. As part of our first …
Before I sprint back out, eager and unmasked to write that story, I want to remember we are still in this global pandemic. I’m going to take a minute and listen to Janet Jackson: “Let’s Wait Awhile.”
By Noriko Nakada The weekend after the inauguration, I woke up to flat Los Angeles light. I heaved a deep sigh into the fog that had settled in, and then urged myself from bed. Month nine of the pandemic meant getting up in the morning required a different sort of motivation. Still, I placed soles …
by S. Pearl Sharp “Somebody got to step up and testify for blessed livesjust so you remember the possible is real . . .” The public rage against 2020 is so strong, so virulent, that I almost feel like I’m committing a sacrilege to say that in 2020 I had a good year. As COVID became hourly breaking …
