1/ I just picked up a script and had to stand in line behind a couple of loudmouth dudes (I’ll let you guess what they looked like) making fun of people in our community who feel unsafe because of ICE / Trump. The guy getting his script got to the part where he had to pay and couldn’t. Put his pal

A high school kid just said to their friend “Yo, 8h grade was my prime,” as the two of them walked past our driveway.

I hope you have a sacred and beautiful Indigenous Peoples Day 🫶🏾✨

Every week is a good week to read banned books. Every week is a good week to NOT attempt control of others’ thoughts, feelings, art consumption. You get to decide which books YOU read and which books YOUR children are allowed to read. You don’t get to decide which books MY can children read.

My homie!!!! 😍💃🏾😍💃🏾😍💃🏾😍💃🏾

SATURDAY! Children's Lit Fest with @samara-cole-doyon.bsky.social & and Kalee Gwarjanski & @painternik.bsky.social & crafts & snacks! Sept. 6 10-noon (+sensory-friendly storytime at 9) Community Life Center 401 Bridge St. Sept. 4-7, stop by the Ropes Mansion Garden for a Story Walk! salemlitfest.org

Today I woke up super early, got ready, and drove 2 hours for a book event. A book event which takes place next week. That’s how my ✨executive functioning✨ program is running rn 🫠 Anyway, catch me at the Salem Lit Fest next Saturday 💃🏾

Things that make me feel grounded or regulated again after a big upset: 1) Non-judgmental, affirming listening. 2) Journaling (listening to and affirming myself). 3) Being outside & in a safe, familiar place when the air is dry / cool. 4) Snuggles. 5) Music, audiobooks, a podcast by an educated

Hi. American slavery was an absolute abomination, and the global descendants of enslaved people absolutely deserve reparations. Have whatever kind of day you need to have 🥰

Reminder: A lot of what people think they know about you is projection. To “understand” or interpret you, to “see” you at all, to make space for you in their world, others wash you in shades of their own limited palette. You exceed their capacity to understand.

Is it normal to find yourself shaking and sobbing until your eyes are swollen half-shut because of a beautifully written passage about love, loss, and grief in a book? Or am I actually insane? Thanks in advance for your insight 💃🏾

Honestly, even if you merely like (or generously tolerate!) an author, this is a lovely thing to do for books and bookstores and bookfriends and bookculture. ♥️ Requesting that your local library order it goes a long way too (especially with lesser-known authors most library don't have on auto-buy).

Getting some work done via phone because my laptop is busted, organizing all my to-do lists (home management / family / personal, professional writing, my actual paying job, etc) when I reach into the wad of curls gathered on top of my head and find a pen. Slept on it all night. Classic 🫠

Children's Lit Fest returns to Salem Saturday, September 6, featuring storytimes with @samara-cole-doyon.bsky.social & Kalee Gwarjanski & @painternik.bsky.social plus crafts and snacks! September 4-7, stop by the Ropes Mansion Garden for a Story Walk! Swipe through for all the details.

🫠

Sometimes I get caught up in the chaos tornado that has been my entire existence for so long I forget we have high bush blueberries we can simply. . .harvest this time of year.

I ended yesterday by finally watching Sinners for the first time. I didn’t watch a single trailer, read a single review, or engage in any real conversation about it, previously. I wanted to watch it with fresh eyes. And I’m still trying to process. . .all of it. But I have a few thoughts:

I started yesterday sitting on the concrete steps back steps to the backyard, watching my son run between the trees and through the grass, crying. Just overwhelmed and heartbroken about too many personal things to name. Personal in an individual way, and

TW: Genocide. Hundreds of thousands of Haitians suddenly losing legal status in the US so they can be deported reminds me of the Parsley Massacre. Which reminds me of the vice grip in which Western policies have choked Haiti since her independence in 1804. Which reminds me of the extreme brutality

I used to think of writing as a very insulated and isolated act. Individual. My thoughts. My words. My work. My credit. OR someone else’s work. But always a particular person or a couple participate people to credit. Individual contributions. But after working with multiple editors, attending

If birthright citizenship doesn’t stand, how does any citizenship aside from naturalization stand? If it’s not merit, if it’s not earned, it’s luck of the draw. And it’s *almost like* (heavy sarcasm) they’re OK with that as long as brown people are the unlucky ones. Per usual. Per their design.

A love letter to complainers, to whiners, to poets, profits, artists, to those who live in the margins or look at the margins and refuse to pretend oppression is paradise, to those who give voice to the uncomfortable truths and empower others to do the same: Thank you. From the marrow in my bones

What if the purest expression of your honest heart, your authentic voice, your art, your gifts, automatically make space for themselves in this world because the world desperately needs those things? Because your expression of what is holy and real is part of the wholeness of Everything?

I woke up with so much heaviness. When will we grow tired of exporting such immense suffering, violence, grief? When will it end?

Ideas for supporting Black creative voices on Juneteenth and on every damn day: 1) Like, follow, share. Even people whose ideas aren’t always pleasant or comfortable, even if they’re not scratching your back, too, and especially if this person doesn’t have a lot of visibility and interaction

It’s Juneteenth. No, I will not be doing that for you today. Thanks ✨😘

🎉

What if there is no “plot” to lose because your story is character-driven and all your rambling and grasping and reaching is the point?

Brisk walks, gentle exercise, music and audiobooks for chores and car rides, tasty and nourishing food, laughter, snuggles, fresh air, water, knitting in waiting rooms, jotting down lines of poetry, self compassion and understanding. And you? How do you care for you?

The lilacs and the hawthorn blossoms and the fresh cut grass all smell so sweet and so perfect together it’s almost too much to take in 💓

It’s 3:15 am. I’ve been awake for close to an hour, explaining to the talk show host in my head why I’m no good at memoir and how regurgitating facts keeps us from being honest in that deeper way writers need to be if we’re really doing the work. I hate this show. How do I turn it off? 😭

It’s always such a treat to find new stray grays popping out of my long, dark brown tresses. Feels like I’m finally achieving that elusive Bog Witch vibe I’ve been striving for 🧙🏾‍♀️💚

I just started Nine Perfect Strangers. It’s going to take about 5 years for me to get through a season, because where is the time? But also, I wish I had a support group for unpacking all this ish. It’s like church camp meets crunchy work treat. Help 🫠

1/ When and how and why someone chooses to engage with me (or not) tells me a lot about them. About what they think about me / my work / my voice / my thoughts / the nature of our relationship or connection or lack thereof, according to them. About how they view themselves and myself and our rolls

Tommy Orange never ceases to devastate me, and this is the highest compliment and truest homage I know how to give.

Same scarf as 2 months ago. That’s one lesson—I CAN do larger projects. I just have to break them into smaller than typical time and energy burst. Maybe I’ll be done in 2 more months. We’ll see. Another lesson has been starting over and making corrections. I got maybe 1/4 of the way done

Question about Bluesky: Is there a way to like someone’s reshare of your post without liking your own post? Like, I always appreciate a reshare. But I don’t want to basically be saying, “Say it, Sis.” To myself. Help?

Being physically near my kids, in those quiet moments when everyone is feeling regulated and getting their needs met, makes me feel so, so good. Their happiness and wellness is medicine.

I wish it were illegal to make/sell/own unnecessarily loud, aggressive-sounding trucks for leisure. Grown men intimidating pedestrians by revving their belching gas guzzlers are just 🤮

Things I’ve personally found healing in lately: Snuggles with family members (including fur family) Fresh air / sunshine / birdsong / plants Knitting Music Stories and poetry Laughing Crying Journaling Screaming / swearing raging into a pillow or empty room Dancing

What a difference a day makes 🌺🌞🌳

I wish y’all would stop demanding Black women continually strive to reach the absurd, sadistic standards of perfection you hold only for us, just to earn your most basic respect and consideration. We are human. In our joy, need, ability, disability, imperfection. Human. Let that be enough.

Do you call it a caftan? A moo moo? A nightgown? A house dress? I call it summer living, breathing room, granny wisdom, self-love, medicine. I call it my stay-home-day look until fall rolls in. Welcome to my grown woman summer ✨

Thank you for inviting me 💓🫶🏾 I want to go. I want to be there with you, for you, for me. I’m longing to spend time with you and in community. I need it. It’s just that my family’s needs are intense, immense, and my ability to meet them is painfully finite. We desperately need support we don’t have.

1/ I’ve said this many times in many ways, but people never seem to really hear it, so I’m going to try again: Writing is not a career. Not for myself. Not for the VAST MAJORITY of professional writers. It is a vocation, a practice, a lifestyle, a lifeline, an art form. It is a huge part of who I am

Speaking for myself, screw the cards and flowers. Give me, my children, our communities, more support.

This is an everyone issue. We need supports, but we don't want eugenists stealing the data for whatever bullshit they plan. I know they're going after autistic people, but this is a wider disability issue. Non-disabled people, you can find yourself part of disabled community at any time.

There are so many things we can’t control. We can’t create job offers or massive book deals for ourselves or our loved ones. We can’t automatically enrich the places where we’ve grown up and grown roots with the resources we need. Can’t hand our children the world they deserve. But we can play Sims

I wake up somedays terrified for Rumeysa Ozturk. She’s been jailed for 5 weeks. She’s a storyteller. She’s a #kidlit author. #FreeRumeysa www.npr.org/2025/04/29/g...