Seeing Bats, Hearing Voices (in Tacoma, at the Rainier Writing Workshop)

During this wonderful time of getting to know people and being fantastically stimulated as a writer, I've been so cautious around all the shared meals. Night before last, finally, something got me. Mid-way through Dinty Moore's hilarious and yet depth-plumbing reading about death and family, I realized that I was in for a night of shakes, hot and cold sweats, frequent trips to the bathroom.

Despite this, I spent some of the evening at the North Pacific Coffee Club, as I have almost every night, talking, appreciating, getting to know people better. It took my mind off the sickness, the bathroom was close by, I wouldn't have missed the conversation. Still, I left early, hoping to sleep it off.

Harstad Hall's corridors are long and bare, with a "T" at each end. When I came in, a bat the size of a starling was flying back and forth down the hall...

...knocking around in one "T" or other for a few moments, then making another lap of the corridor. Anxious. Swooping low, frantic. I opened the end door wide and tried to usher it out, but I banged the door on the wall and it fled to the opposite end. I tried to herd it toward an open window. It ducked out under my outstretched arm. On my fourth lap of the corridor, I listened at doors for voices and found two people in the ladies' room, asked them for help. One of them was horrified at the very thought of a bat; the other was willing to help me try to trap it, but really thought that calling Campus Security would be the thing to do.

So, I went downstairs and called Campus Security. Five minutes later, three kids showed up with walkie talkies dangling from their belts and heavy flashlights in their hands. One also wielded a butterfly net. They came upstairs with me: no sign of the bat. They started opening doors and shining lights in, although I assured them that the bat wouldn't have gone through a closed door.

As soon as they left to check the next floor up, here came the bat again, making its frantic laps of the corridor. I called out to them and went up the next flight of stairs as fast as my nauseated state allowed. As I stepped onto the third floor landing, the bat shot past my right ear and continued up the stairwell. I couldn't find the "Campus Security" folks and I didn't know where the bat was anymore either, so I just gave up and went to bed.

As I tossed between hot sweats and chills, flicking in and out of dreams like a mid-afternoon drunk surfing channels, voices started to intrude, loud, animated, back from the bar after closing time. The next time I had to get up for the bathroom, I determined I'd ask them to tone it down. I stepped out into the corridor. Silence. No one was there at all.

Back in bed, there were the voices again. And then I remembered Mary Blew's craft talk that morning, in which she quoted from "Crazy." The second-person protagonist, in the early stages of a psychotic break, is convinced that the downstairs neighbors, and eventually everyone else, are talking--about her--all the time. I realized that the voices were intensifying with my hot sweats and receding with my chills. I strained to distinguish words: yes, of course they were talking about me! Yes, of course they were all in my head. And what about the bat?

The morning brought some clarity. My guts were no longer in 'repel invaders' mode and the world looked more like itself again. There had indeed been a 'post-bar-closing' gathering in the first-floor lounge, directly beneath my room but not directly beneath the corridor.

And what about the bat? This morning, someone came down saying there was a bat in the third-floor bathroom. And the front desk folks were on the phone to Campus Security once again.

Gluten on Board and Other Boondoggles

Greetings from Tucson! It is quite an upheaving experience, to fly into a whole new climate zone.

Thanks for listening to my identity crisis. Being on the road is a great time not to feel bound by usual assumptions of identity, although it's also a time when those assumptions can assert themselves like neglected children, if they're not given their full expression.

One thing I want to set straight from the last post: I said: “I'm a poet, not a food writer.” I am, too, a food writer! Poetry may be my first string but denying the food-writing piece is wrong and unfair.

I want to share the story of Thursday afternoon and evening, when we were getting ready for our trip, when I wrote that 'identity crisis' post. There were three major boondoggles: two related to food, one related to poetry!

Boondoggle #1—it seems I took some gluten on board at lunchtime. Not a lot, but stupid and careless: I ate some baked yam that had been sitting in a pie plate that had pastry and crumbs all over it. At least I should have not eaten the skin (but I love the skin). So, sure enough, a couple hours later, I started to get that familiar, awful feeling. It's been well over a year since that last happened. And as usual, it took about two days or so for my tummy to feel anything like ok, and I wasn't in the happiest shape for traveling, to put it mildly. Focusing on feeling cheerful and doing my best (as opposed to beating up on myself for carelessness and such bad timing) was a good challenge: I think that the end result was that I felt pretty sick (intense nausea, cramps, runs) for two days or so, most of them on the road, but I wasn't miserable with it.

Boondoggle #2—while preparing dinner, I opened a bottle of 'ghost chili' powder. That's the hottest kind of chili there is, and I wanted a little of it with the curried coconut veggies I was making. Well, the heater was going, and the instant I opened the bottle, the fan swept the fine, scorching powder into my nose and eyes! (And yes, I was already sick from gluten.) I sneezed more times in one go than I can ever remember. Phil was wonderful: he has rewetting drops for his eyes and shared some with me immediately. I was relieved that the pepper-spraying didn't put me out of action for more than a moment, but for hours later I would intermittently have a sneezing fit and be unable to open my eyes. Yes, I maced myself! And was then cautious with the food: more spice ended up in my eyes than in our dinner.

Boondoggle #3—I was putting finishing touches to my poetry manuscript, playing about with the ordering, and then thought to look up the guidelines and email address for submission. Turns out, the maximum length was 20 pages. So, with the evening wearing on, I had to cut my manuscript in half!

This wasn't actually as bad as it sounded, despite sick tummy and peppery eyes. In fact, I'm glad that I didn't realize this until the last minute, because instead, I worked on getting a full, coherent manuscript together without worrying about artificial length constraints. And I submitted the 20 pages as 'excerpts' from the full manuscript. I'm so looking forward to getting critiqued, although I know I'll have to work on my thick skin.

If boondoggles come in threes, I appreciate the sign that the hat-trick was spread across the poetry and food worlds. We'll see how we go straddling the two plus visiting friends, family and new places over the next ten days.

Do you have any boondoggles to share? I'd also love it if anyone has any advice on what to do to feel better if you're celiac/gluten allergic and accidentally ingest gluten. I'd love to collect some tips and make a post about it. It's been a year and a half since that last happened and I hope it won't happen ever again, but it would be nice to know if there's anything to make it less worse.

much love!