writer

Laughing Through the Blood

September 11, 2024September 11, 2024 by RasmeniaNo Comments

I got the shopping cart for Xmas when I was 3 years old. Immediately, I began planning a shopping trip to 7-11. No, not a grocery store. Just as I would later insist as a stoned teenager craving a Super Big Gulp and risky nachos, it had to be the goddamn 7-11.The adults informed me I could not just wander off on a convenience store expedition on my own. This annoyed me. Stupid adults.Opportunity struck when I was left in the care of my Uncle Jay one afternoon. As soon as he turned his back, I grabbed my shopping cart and made a hasty exit. I still remember when he found me. Red-faced, panicked, and angry, my uncle pulled his car along the curb as I merrily strolled down the sidewalk, pushing my cart, with no idea how to get to 7-11 or anywhere else.“Get your ass in this car.”I got my ass in the car.Uncle Jay was 6’4” and...

That Shiny Newfangled Technology Can’t Do the Work for You

July 3, 2023August 29, 2024 by RasmeniaNo Comments

The venue reeks of cheap coffee. Creaks and groans of tables and chairs dragging on the hardwood floor echo, bouncing off the high ceiling. Barely audible beneath it all is the mumbling of socially awkward writers mingling in the early morning.The chipped folding tables are covered with cloths. Stacks of books and displays are propped up, tip over, then propped up again. Chatter and laughter rise in volume proportional to the increasing number of bodies.A quiet little man with a single stack of books stands next to his wife, who looks at no one and speaks to no one. He shows me his book. Shows me photos of himself with his book. Tells me how impressed people are with his work. And so on.This guy, my neighbor for the day, nods toward my carefully laid-out display of books. My short story trilogy, finally complete.“How long did these take you to write?”The way he asks this, it feels like a trick...

More Books to Add to Your 2022 Reading List

December 17, 2021June 7, 2024 by RasmeniaNo Comments

I don't know about you, but my to-read pile of books is absurdly out of hand. Every year, I manage to knock a hundred or so books from the stack. This makes no dent in that ever-growing behemoth. It does, however, mean that I discover a few gems each year. (A few duds, too, but I'm here to give love, not to disparage. Sorry.)Anyway, this isn't a goddamn recipe blog, so let's skip the boring story leading up to the reason why you're here and get to the goods.Please note that these are not necessarily books published in 2021, just books I read this year that made such an impact on me that I want other people to read them, too. Books by Authors Not New to Me, Who Still Managed to Surprise the Hell Out of Me:Look, this book was published in 1997 and takes place during peak AIDS crisis in San Francisco. Yet, it feels current and chillingly relevant....

Why I’m No Longer Mad at Boulder, Colorado

October 7, 2020June 7, 2024 by RasmeniaNo Comments

You can't go home again. That's what they say. Which is weird, because the truth is that you never really leave. Regardless of how many years or miles pass by, there's always a part of you trapped in that place. A splinter of home is forever lodged in your psyche.Home is a complicated thing. It isn't just a place. I'm not talking about those corny plaques that everyone's grandma has hanging in their kitchen that says something like, "Home isn't a place, it's a feeling." Or even worse, "Home is where the heart is." That's all too simple and trite. Especially if you've had many homes.One of those places wasn't my home at all. I never lived in Boulder, Colorado. And yet, I've long had a thorny relationship with the place.Curled up on the floor of my cramped bedroom in a little trailer park in Indiana, I drew one enormous picture after another of mountain scenes with my fat Crayola...

One of the Many Things I Learned from My Dog

May 7, 2020June 7, 2024 by RasmeniaNo Comments

Human beings have a weird tendency to project ridiculous ideals on themselves. Until someone or something sets them straight and they learn to embrace and live with who they really are. For me, it was my dog and a cherry tree. Yeah, a cherry tree. And my doggo.Several years ago, my husband Olivier and I bought a house out in the countryside. Like many people in the same situation, we wandered through the empty rooms seeing nothing as it actually was. We only saw everything as it could be. None of the rooms appeared empty. We were operating under a hallucination, each corner filled with our furniture. Our wall art, bric-a-brac, and books. From room to room, projecting ourselves into the blank spaces. Each of us meandering through our own personalized holodeck.Outside, we inhaled the scent wafting from the lavender bushes and craned our necks to gaze up at the tops of the tall pines in the front yard. We...

An Author’s Rite of Passage

March 5, 2020June 7, 2024 by RasmeniaNo Comments

I was selling some of my books at a local book fair when a cheerful woman walked over, scanned my table, waved her hand over my display then asked, "But do you self-publish these stories or did someone else publish them?""Both."With a squint and a head tilt, she asked me to elaborate. I explained that I publish some small books on my own, and they're a mix of things that have been published in various places and some that haven't.She nodded. "That's good."She clearly wasn't keen on self-published books. That's cool. I'm all for self-publishing, obviously, but don't disagree with her. Stories need to go through a gauntlet. So do their writers. I want control over everything, but I also crave the validation that comes from having my stories go through a gatekeeper. I like to mix it up. I don't want people telling me what to do. But I do want them to validate me. I want criticism and...