Happy Palm Sunday! A New Poem in the Shore, Under the Weather Reading Sylvia Plath (and Parents in the Hospital), and Finding a Way Forward
- At March 24, 2024
- By Jeannine Gailey
- In Blog
- 2
Happy Palm (Springs) Sunday!
Palm Sunday always had good connotations for, a truly celebratory religious holiday. (Here’s a poem I wrote about Palm Sunday and Palm Springs for the Los Angeles Review for extra fun.)
I wish I had been up for celebration, but I’ve been sick all week and injured my shoulder, plus my dad was back in the hospital for pneumonia. This picture on the left with our neighboring cherry tree was the last one I took before I got sick. Sadly, I haven’t been out exploring for new blooms, I’ve been stuck inside, stressed—and starting with a new physical therapist for spine issues.
And, in other news, my dad went into the hospital this week with pneumonia, so I’ve been super stressed out because he’s got COPD and he’s so far away. I do have a lot of experience with pneumonia myself (my dad and I share a crappy immune system) but who knows whether he even listens to my advice? It’s tough with parents.
Reading Loving Sylvia Plath with Sylvia the Cat
Fortunately, to take my mind off things, I got an ARC of Loving Sylvia Plath: a Reclamation by Emily Van Duyne. If you felt like maybe Red Comet left out some details, you’re right, it did! But this book explores more than unpublished letters and medical documents which Van Duyne carefully researched, it re-raises the idea of respecting Sylvia Plath’s work and reclaiming the reputation that was sullied not only by her husband, Ted Hughes, but also mountains of critics (who were mostly ex-boyfriends!) and just that feeling that you’re a silly, emotional girl for liking Plath’s work, which the new critics were out there saying for years. You’ve been gaslit, dear reader! And this book shows the exact path to how critics, terrible husbands, and so-called friends of Plath’s went about belittling Plath’s legacy and her fans.
If Plath made a terrible decision marrying Hughes and leaving America (and her support system) behind, this book made me realize just how few resources she had and how little people who could have helped her, did. It also made me value my friends and family more, because when you get yourself in a tight spot, it helps to know someone—as many someone’s as possible—have your back. This is not to belittle Plath’s mental illness, or explain how she was some kind of saint, but it does highlight the practical ways women still have to fight to be supported, to be taken seriously, to be heard.
Speaking of Survival, a New Poem in The Shore
And speaking of survival, I have a new poem, “Cassandra Shares the Secrets of Survival, Pandemic Edition,” in the latest issue of The Shore, which also has great poems by friends like Martha Silano, Kelli Russell Agodon, Ronda Broatch, and Donna Vorreyer. Here’s a sneak peek below:
Finding a Way Forward
I’ve been thinking, recently, about finding a way forward. After a terrible diagnosis, like cancer, or MS. After you’ve had a loss. After you’ve lost your way. How does one pick up the pieces, and find a way forward? Did this happen to any of you during the pandemic? Are you feeling frozen in Spring of 2020?
I realized that a lot of me I had left back in 2016 when I was told I was going to die of terminal liver cancer. (We are still having to MRI those tumors every six months, but still breathing, if somewhat hampered by MS.) I just didn’t snap back from that. I left behind a lot of my ambitions. I left behind relationships of people who didn’t want to associate with me once they know I was sick. I left behind work, assuming I wouldn’t be able to contribute much. I gained some things—a renewed appreciation of the moment, a habit and hobby—photography and gardening—and some not good things, like PSTD and increased anxiety—but I realized that my vision of the future was still frozen back in 2016.
But I realized as I was frantically updating things I had forgotten about—resumes, work samples, career goals—that I not only was still a writer, I was a writer who could help contribute things to other writers. I am a pretty good editor, and not only that, I can help people promote their books in the same way I have from my first book back in 2006. I’ve decided to start offering those services on a limited basis—see this link—in the hopes of feeling like part of the writing community again for real, and feeling I am contributing to not just my family but to other writers. I think I’m a pretty good teacher and mentor too, especially for writers who feel that for some reason—money, disability, chronic illness—that the writing world is not for them. I could help them navigate some of that.
Anyway, these are my thoughts for now. And if you are struggling with feeling like you fit in, or to find your way forward, just know you are not alone.
The Spring Equinox and Sunshine at Last, Japanese Garden and La Conner Visits, More Thoughts on Writing and Money
- At March 18, 2024
- By Jeannine Gailey
- In Blog
- 1
The Spring Equinox is Upon Us, and It Brought Sunshine to Seattle at Last
After a mostly cold and stormy March, we were finally given some sun and warmth. Glenn and I took breaks between doctor’s appointments and assignments to find evidence of spring. Not everything is blooming yet, but I have some evidence the Equinox is truly bringing spring.
This week I’ve been working on finishing some paid assignments, updating my resume and work samples, finishing up some unpaid work I’d already agreed to (more on that later) as well as working on taxes. But since (as you could probably tell from my last post) I’d been feeling stressed, grumpy, and generally terrible, Glenn thought it was important to do some spirit-lifting things. So, I got out my camera and photographed the flowers in our neighborhood, and this weekend we took it to excursions to the Seattle Japanese Gardens and La Conner’s daffodil and snow goose fields. I am physically exhausted but feeling a little more cheerful.
Japanese Garden and La Conner Visits
Saturday, we decided to take a quick trip to the Japanese Garden, where we saw eagles, a hummingbird in a waterfall, and blooming rhododendrons, among other things. We stopped by Roq La Rue and got the scoop on upcoming shows and looked at fantastic art books. And then we got stuck in terrible traffic. (Seattle had closed down a bridge and the intersection back to the other highway had a malfunctioning traffic light, so it took us two hours to get home. Sometimes Seattle’s traffic problems make me never want to cross either bridge again, honestly. Who runs this down’s DOT? Evil trolls?) But we did get some wonderful relaxing time before the stressful traffic. And some good pictures.
On St. Patrick’s Day, Glenn worked on refinishing an antique farm table we got last year, and I worked on updating my sadly neglected resume and writing samples, sending out poems, and looking at freelance jobs. A helpful friend gave me good tips on the resume and had some suggestions for other kinds of work I could be doing as well (which I’ll talk about later in the post).
After lunch, we decided to drive up to La Conner to see the daffodil fields and see if we’d see any snow geese (the answer was yes—and we were circled by three bald eagles which we sadly didn’t catch on film). The daffodil fields and hyacinths in particular smelled as lovely as they looked. It was beautiful, everyone was friendly, and it was actually a faster trip—up and back—than just getting home had taken us yesterday. When we got home, we made Irish stew and watched our traditional St. Patrick’s Day movie, Secret of Kells. And yes, that is a green dress with tiny foxes on it.
More Thoughts on Writers and Money
So, last week’s surprise money crisis helped me clarify my thinking how I’m spending my limited time and energy. (I mean, everyone has limits, but with MS and several other chronic illnesses, I really do have to very stern limits what I say yes to.) I’m going to start to say no to unpaid work more often. Not only that, but when we really do need money (this kind of money crunch may happen again sometime), what can I do that I’m not already doing? I’m seeking out part-time freelance work that I can do from home, whether that’s writing articles or essays or reviews. And the friend I mentioned above asked me if I’d considered doing a small coaching package for new authors who wanted to learn how to do PR for their books, instead of just doing the standard manuscript editing and coaching. Empowering others to learn to do for their small press books to do the basics of PR and marketing themselves, instead of relying on someone else. What do you think, readers? Is there a market for this?
Of course, it also started me thinking about how I can sell more books for my publishers (and for myself) and find paid reading and teaching opportunities. (Once again, if you want to order a book, that would help me out a lot, or just ask your library to order it, or consider writing a short review on Amazon or invite me to speak at your college—all super helpful.) As my actual birthday—and book birthday—approach, I went back and looked at what I’d done for Flare, Corona so far, and what I still need to do.
The reality is most poets do not make a living writing poetry alone. And if we cannot, what else do we do? I do have limitations—being disabled means I couldn’t work some of the jobs I did in the past—but I also have experience, education, things that are valuable and could be valuable to others. I just have to learn to find opportunities that allow me to use my specific skillsets. My mind is fluttering in ways it didn’t have to for most of the pandemic.
A Good Day Followed by a Terrible Week, MS Awareness and Women’s Awareness Month, and Writers, Disability, and Money: Some Thoughts
- At March 11, 2024
- By Jeannine Gailey
- In Blog
- 5
A Good Day (Followed by a Terrible Week)
This is a picture of me on Tuesday of this last week. So happy to be out in the sunshine (despite the 45°F temperature) enjoying the early flowers, some deer crossing in front of her on her street, walking along Lake Washington. So terribly unaware of the how the rest of the week would go. The bobcat, the predator, appeared last week. This week, the prey, the deer, appear on my street. So which am I to believe, the predator or the prey?
After this, I had dental work, which was supposed to be a crown and a couple of fillings, but ended up being two crowns and a filling, which cost me a thousand dollars more than expected (surprise!) but also, my husband came back during the work and I was in so much pain and so lucid that he asked for more sedation, which meant it took me two full days to get un-sedated. But my jaw still hurt, one of the crowns was too long (and I was unable to get back in to get it fixed—still!) and basically, it made my MS symptoms flare up and took me out for three days which were going to be very busy with work and taxes. Very fitting for MS Awareness month. Hello, MS! I remember you.
Then, I got an estimate. I had mentioned I was doing a remodel for an ADA bathroom in my house. I told the group at the beginning what the total cost was we could afford. Alas, after we’d sunk $20K into materials, they sent a work estimate that was twice what we could afford. Then I started stressing out about my choice to be a poet which pays no money (see my taxes for proof,) being disabled (which I can’t help) but forces you to do expensive things to a house to be more independent, about trusting the people the way I did to get the project done in the budget we’d agreed on (ha ha, niave woman!) On top of getting the too-expensive and super painful dental work, I was suddenly counting up things I could sell (old jewelry? clothing? books? not enough) and scrambling for any kind of money in the works – from poetry royalties (which publishers can conveniently forget sometimes) to freelance work even knowing I’m already overcommitted for March and April as it is. People with MS have a certain amount of energy, and after that, sadly, we are out and we have to rest and recover. Dental work has always been a major trigger for my MS (in fact, what caused the first flare), so I should have known this week would be tough. Then I cancelled cable services, housekeeping services, sold some clothing, and cancelled some magazine subscriptions. None of this, sadly, makes much of a difference financially. None of this is the end of the world, but it was very stressful. It did make me think about money, being a poet, and being disabled…
AND SO…
On Writers, Disability, and Money (and Possibly Gender Pay Disparity?)
(Warning: Frank talk about money. If that makes you uncomfortable…flee!)
I started thinking seriously about the writing world and how little it values writers, especially poets. Back when I was healthy and could keep up with the stressful atmosphere, the sex discrimination, and the terrible hours, I was a tech writer, and I was good at it—I got promoted and promoted and ended up with a pretty good job at a pretty good salary. Unfortunately, I had spent all my spoons (see: spoonies) getting there, and almost immediately was hospitalized and almost died from health things that were undiagnosed (who has the time when you’re working 80, 90 hours a week) or neglected (again, when you’re in a time crunch, there goes your self-care). I ended up quitting technical writing and becoming a full-time poet, with some side things like essays, book reviews, and occasional journalistic writing that paid something. That was 23 years ago now. I am now pretty disabled, and all my health stuff is expensive. I just can’t do some of the things, energy wise, I was happy to do when I was younger—like volunteering 20 hours a week at lit mags and creative organizations, for example. I can’t make it to as many readings, or travel for book promotion like I used to. MS—which I probably had for over ten years and have been diagnosed with for seven—has made energy conservation a serious matter. If you do something one day, you have to rest the next. And if you don’t, your body WILL come for you. MS is not unique in this way. CFS, long Covid, lupus, and cancer all affect energy levels AND finances.
So if you’re a writer and you’re disabled, what are your choices? Well, I can tell you from experience, even if you paid into disability for years—and I did—it is very hard to qualify for government disability payback (which is different than disability social security?)—it is just paying you what you paid into the system for this occasion. Plus, they limit you to $1100 a month in pay or they kick you off and you have to reapply. It takes an average of six years—and a lawyer—to get any kind of real disability money, the kind you could sort of live on. So, instead, you choose freelancing, gig work, OnlyFans—whatever you can do to pay the bills. Maybe you have wealthy parents (I don’t) or a wealthy husband (again no)—I do have a husband whose health insurance at a big tech company helps keep me alive, but we pay out of the nose for it. We both have student loan debt. Specialists are expensive. MRIs are expensive. All the meds I’m on—you guessed it—very expensive. (Most MS drugs cost 3-5K a month.)
Writers right now are getting squeezed. Universities are shuttering whole English departments, not just literary magazines which are also falling by the wayside. That means more writers, with less ways to make a living. (Adjunct teaching, by the way—which I did for four years at an MFA program—pays worse than minimum wage and requires a ton of time and energy.) Publishing—which used to a respectable business you could do to earn a living—has been consolidated so much that making a decent wage there is nearly impossible, and certainly not if you’re not in-person working, young, attractive, energetic and in a big city like New York City. I have noticed there are fewer places that pay for book reviews. Many newspapers are folding. My little brother tells me “Print is dead! You’re working with extinct ideas!” That may be. I’m also a little older—wiser, too, maybe but not wise enough to figure out a way to support myself. My brother encourages me to put ads on my web site, but I don’t want to do that. Yet.
Anyway, I come upon some hard facts: do I try to get paid for poetry, or do I try to do something else completely? If you are disabled, your choices for work are fewer and farther between. As much as I hustle, my books aren’t selling as well as they used to. (Buy a signed copy of my books from me to support a disabled poet! Or have your library request the e-book or print book of Flare, Corona.)
I am doing tutorials and college visits and virtual readings. Should I be turning down unpaid work at this point (like the con that pays you in free attendance)? Should I only be sending to journals that pay that don’t have submission fees (and how many of them are there?) So many questions. Where should I direct my limited energy in the short—and long—run? Are the rewards worth the effort? I’m questioning a lot of my decisions, and that’s okay. Tax time by itself usually brings up a panic attack about how much I’m NOT making, and this year with the unexpected immediate expense just throws that into greater relief. It’s not any of the things that happened this week individually, but the accumulation of them. I try to look on the bright side of things most of the time. Maybe it’s a sign from the universe that I need to change, but how and what I have no idea. It’s a new moon tonight. I was happy that Miyazaki won an Oscar but sad Lily Gladstone did not. I felt so positive about things last month, that maybe things were moving in a good direction. Maybe I’ve let the dental pain and financial stuff overwhelm me. The time change never helps, either. Anyway, signing off, and hoping for a better week ahead.
New Podcast on BeautyHunters, Bobcat Visits, and March Comes in Like a Jerk
- At March 04, 2024
- By Jeannine Gailey
- In Blog
- 1
March Begins and a New Podcast: Q&A with Me and Tatyana Mishel Sussex on BeautyHunters
March has come in, not like a lamb or a lion, but like a jerk, bringing hail, sideways snow, heavy rain, sunshine and all in two days’ time. The flowers continue to bloom through it all, and a bobcat comes to visit. Meanwhile, I’m reading a ton, trying to do some submissions this month, and getting ready for a ton of readings and talks later on in March and April.
From Tatyana’s substack:
What do you do when you’re told you have six months to live? Poet, author, and lover-of-life Jeannine Hall Gailey went immediately to a giant writer’s conference, bought a house, took up photography, and reminded herself of all the beauty around her.
“You have to give your body a reason to live,” Jeannine says.
And through all the years of doctors appointments and emergency room visits, pain and low-energy, Jeannine continued to be fully in life: writing and submitting poems, finishing and publishing books, beelining her way to parks when the sun shone, the leaves turned gold, the blossoms pinkened, seeing friends, starting book clubs.
In my view, Jeannine shows us what we’re capable of, even if we don’t feel we are—in the way we all show each other what we’re made of, and what’s possible beyond the limitations of our thinking.
Grab a cup of coffee or tea, take us for a walk—treat yourself to the gusto and all-in-ness Jeannine possesses, along with some fun, creative and wise views about all kinds of things.”
On how I faced a terminal cancer diagnosis, why I write, what I think about immigration, how I find beauty in the world, and an hour of all kinds of fun things. At the end of the interview you can hear a terrible noise which is my small cat trying to escape the bedroom because she really wanted to be part of the interview by jumping up on the laptop.
Bobcat Visits and March/April Mayhem
Below is a little Ring video of our bobcat visit. But in life news, I have several things lined up in the next two months, including a visit to NorWesCon, participating in a speculative writing panel for Cascadia Writers, a virtual college visit, and a Zoom reading for the Olympia Poetry Network. It seems April is almost here, bringing its National Poetry Month busyness, and hopefully some sunshine and warmer spring weather.
I’ve been trying to come out of my plague-years hibernation—doing AWP, my book launch, and visits with family last year. my first travel in seven years last month, and so, I’m trying to get out there in the world a bit more. I’m currently also working on my next book, sending out poems, doing serious edits (as opposed to those lighthearted edits of the last several years). But like the Northwest’s weather in March so far, it’s been a bit of a stop and start, with my energy and health being good for a while, and then having to rest and recover. Here’s looking forward to the warmth of true spring, better weather, and the opportunity to get out and enjoy it!
Early Cherry and Camellia Blossoms, New Poetry Books and a Rattle Podcast Where We Talk about Poetry Submitting
- At February 26, 2024
- By Jeannine Gailey
- In Blog
- 3
Signs of Spring? Early Cherry and Camellia Blossoms and a Frost Moon
This week was a confusing and overstuffed week of a doctor visit a day (two brand new, which is always fun because you’re explaining all the weird stuff that’s wrong with you AGAIN) and three poetry Zoom sessions (two podcasts and a planning session for an upcoming poetry presentation).
On the plus side, a beautiful frost moon, at least one sunny day, some signs of spring around town such as early cherry and camellias blossoms—although we’re supposed to have snow tomorrow and again later this week. And some field trips—to Kirkland to walk on the water, and downtown during a windstorm to Open Books. More on that later.
Rattle Podcast on Poetry Submissions
One of the podcasts I did this week was “The Poetry Space” for the magazine Rattle, and I was joined by several other poets and the editors to talk about poetry submissions: advice about them, how we organize them, pet peeves, and more.
You can listen on Spotify (link below). It’s about an hour long, and I still don’t think we covered everything. Always interesting to talk about this sort of thing, the humdrum work of not writing, but getting published—a difficult and complicated chore that can be discouraging (all the rejections) and off-putting (all the different rules). But if you want to build an audience as a poet, it’s probably a good bet that you have sent out some submissions and will send some out in the future. (Although we also discussed sharing work on social media.) Anyway, I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments! I believe this podcast is also available on iTunes and other podcast listening options.
ep. 53 – How to Submit by The Poetry Space_ (spotify.com)
New Poetry Books
Although I missed AWP this year, I did try to make up for missing the bookfair by picking up a few books at our Seattle all-poetry bookstore, Open Books, today, during a windstorm (A tree fell in a car in our neighborhood while we were away, the 520 was closed for construction, and I was nearly blown over walking down the street. Still, we would not be stopped!)
So far, I’m loving the essays on feminism and pop culture edited by Marisa Crawford, The Weird Sister Collection, and Dorianne Laux’s new book, Life on Earth. More on these later, but I particularly loved the essay the “White Male Canon as Nineties Pop Songs” by Marisa Crawford, and this beginning to the essay “The Honesty of Jean Rhys” by Kristin Sanders:
I recently had a conversation with a man about Bukowski. Had I read much Bukowski? I said I’ve avoided a lot of the bro-writers: Bukowski, Burroughs, Miller, Kerouac (though I’ve come to love Kerouac). He said, Yeah, those guys are great writers, but, you know, they’re not really great toward women.
It’s not surprising we have a whole genre of literature by men who disrespect, objectify, reduce, and silence women. A more interesting question is, who are the women—especially the early women writers—of whom we might say the same: they aren’t really great toward men, you know, but they’re still worth reading.”
This bit got me thinking if I knew any women writers who weren’t great with men but are still worth reading. Even Margaret Atwood writes at least as many female villains as male ones. Also, would I count as one of these? The men who show up in my poems aren’t always great, although I don’t think I’m mean in general to the men in my life, i.e. brothers, husband, male friends. But maybe male enemies? I had to think about it. The self that represents us in our writing isn’t necessarily the self of our real life. Anyway, a book I wanted to discuss with people as soon as I stopped reading it.