LaFayette: 'Nuff Said

The Post WCF celebration

L to R: Patrick Reichard, Sarah Frank, Bajo Ojikutu, Mary Hawley, Mike Puican, Ceci Vaisman, moi, Elise Johnson

Chicago Headquarters: WCF!!!

There’s nothing more thrilling, or nerve wracking, than looking out at an audience and seeing worlds colliding. And that’s what always happens to me in Chicago.



Thursday night at Women & Children, it was a raucous cosmic rabble out there: former students, current students, a former roommate, the boy whose birth I witnessed, other writers, my girlfriend’s friends, my ex girlfriend’s friends (but no ex gfs!), former Trib pals, folks who formerly worked at the Trib whom I’d never met until that moment, that woman who comes to every reading I do at WCF, the folks from my writers group, a former landlord, the girl I met on a layover in Jamaica en route to Cuba who was dating a friend of mine (and whom I liked so much right away, I wanted to warn about his, er, wandering eye, but didn’t), bunches of dykes, at least a couple of Orthodox Jews, a hip little cadre of Art Institute girls, really cute Cubans (some new ones!), poetry community big wigs like Mike Puican (a/k/a, the world’s most handsome man), et al …



I’ve been coming to WCF since it first opened in Lincoln Park in 1979 (it’s since moved twice, having taken root in Andersonville, prob one of the country’s queer friendliest and most diverse neighborhoods), first as a reader and then as a writer. It’s a big, bright place, one of the last feminist bookstores still standing. Long before I ever had a book published, owners Linda Bubon and Ann Christophersen would frequently book me, usually for poetry. When I was writing Days of Awe, the WCF staff practically doubled as a research team. There’s a whole different crew these days but they’re just as amazing.


Anyway, it’s always a little special to read here because it feels like home base. But this time it was really moving to hear Linda’s heartfelt introduction to Ruins. What got me wasn’t just how effusive she was, but how different it feels when somebody has read every word you’ve ever published and really knows your work. There’s familiarity, sure, but there’s also a bond that comes from having survived so much together (besides our literary adventures, Ann, Linda and I also served way back when on Mayor Harold Washington’s Committee on Gay and Lesbian Issues, which revealed whole other sides of our personalities and temperaments!).


It was sweet and wonderful to see so many folks turn out (there were people standing all over). I don’t have the strongest voice in the world so I tried to be conscious of projecting. I noticed a number of people were following along on my reading – no doubt noticing that I actually edit quite a bit in the process, trying to make the excerpt as self contained and smooth as possible. When it was over, I was so flush and nervous, I actually needed to sit down.


I hung out for a good long while, greeting friends, signing books, meeting lots of new people. Afterwards, a group of us went to the Korean place down the street to celebrate. The worlds continued to collide.


“How do you know each other?” Ceci Vaisman, a terrific radio artist and former NPR producer, asked me about the poet Mary Hawley, who’d joined us.


“We used to be in a poetry group, ‘Girls Night Out’, which used to do readings all over the city,” I explained. “It included Patricia Smith, Susie Berger, and Cin Salach. Back then, the only one of us who had a book out was Debbie Pintonelli. Patricia worked at the Sun-Times, but as a copy girl.”


“How do you two know each other?” Mary asked in turn.


“We used to share a boyfriend!” Ceci said with a laugh.


“I was about to say that Mary’s one of my oldest friends,” I said, “and then I realized, wait a minute, Ceci’s one of my oldest friends … “


I looked across the table at Patrick Reichard, one of my very best buds, who was laughing and shaking his head. We used to room together and this kind of thing happened with alarming frequency. He’d already met Ceci at last year’s seder. Then he leaned forward and made a point of introducing himself to Mary and Mike.


NEXT: Lafayette, Madison and Iowa City.

Adventures in Mishawaka

Oh, man, so I'm driving to Mishawaka, which butts up against South Bend, Ind., home of Notre Dame University – this is familiar territory – not just Indiana but northern Indiana. This is so close to Michigan City, where I grew up on the coast of Lake Michigan, that my high school team, the Raiders, used to play against the Mishawaka Cavemen. Not that we were rivals or anything but driving to Mishawaka wasn’t a big deal. Parents didn’t even worry.

The scenery from Chicago to Michigan City is, of course, familiar: the busy and crowded Skyway (always in construction), then industrial and cloudy Gary, transformer lights and steel towers rising from the side of the road, and then, suddenly, green, a yellowish I-survived-the winter-green but green nonetheless, and clusters of naked trees up and down both sides of the highway.

I’m just rounding out from Michigan City, turning a slight south away from the lake shore, when, in a stuttery flash of light, my phone flips one hour forward. What? I’d given myself so much time, I’d so wanted to get there early and hang out at the Barnes & Noble café, I’m actually packing my lap top.

But no, no, no: the phone is telling the truth: Chicago, Michigan City, the whole curved panorama of Lake Michigan is on Central Standard Time but Mishawaka is, inexplicably, on Eastern Standard Time. Mishawaka is on New York time, as if it had just turned its snotty little municipal back on the entire Midwest.

Best case scenario, I’d be 10-15 minutes late. I called the store, of course, and talked to a very nice man named Dave, who assured me it was fine. “Be careful, don’t do anything crazy,” he said. I assured him I wouldn’t, even as my foot sank on the accelerator. The buzz of the air speeding around my PT Cruiser (the poor Midwestern girl’s version of a low-rider) intensified and the car actually wobbled.

I was on my way for almost 20 minutes and then, just as I was getting cocky, just as I was passing with impunity, a mess of twirling lights appeared in my rear view mirror.

“Do you know how fast you were going” asked the breathless state trooper.

“I dunno, 70, 80?”

“Seventy, 80? Lady, the speed limit is 70 – I clocked you at 105!”

He wanted to know why I was in a hurry; he wanted to know what was wrong. I didn’t even try. I just told him the truth. He wandered back to his unmarked squad car – a big, thick American model with a grill that looked like a muzzled dog – and performed his investigative tricks.

I was good after that, going 70, doing breathing exercises. And Dave and I got to talk a whole lot more. As it turned out, my MapQuest directions to the store didn’t take into account a smattering of construction. And so Dave, who couldn’t remember street names but was fabulous with landmarks (“Is there a Martin gas station on the corner? Yes? Great!”), was transformed into a live GPS. Thanks to him, I finally crashed through the Mishawaka Barnes & Noble, my legs a little wobbly, my heart racing, 20 minutes late.

Waiting for me was an audience of three (which grew to five during the reading), two of whom I knew as former students, both from the University of Chicago: Lindsay, who’d been in my very first class on Jewish Latin American literature (and later went on to do her thesis on Days of Awe and even stayed at the house I shared with my then girlfriend in Havana) and Terry, who lives in Chicago and likes to drive, thus his Indiana cameo. It was, needless to say, a very intimate reading!

Unfortunately, this will not be the last of my Mishawaka adventure. A speeding ticket lingers on driving records and impacts stuff like insurance rates. So, in order to get that thing expunged, I’ll be taking a driver’s ed class in Mishawaka later this spring.

Sigh …

NEXT: Chicago, Lafayette Saturday, Madison Monday, Iowa City Tuesday, Chicago again on Thursday.

The fabulous Ricardo Brown, us, me.

Interview with Donna Seaman on WBEZ (Chicago's NPR affiliate)

A link is to the right ... thanks!

MIYAMI

Miami is a kind of calvary for Cuban and Cuban diasporic writers. We love it, we hate it, we feel its weight, and we utterly fear it. I woke up last Tuesday at my mom’s house in Kendall to a disconcerting call from one of the managers at Books & Books. “You know, we really like it when somebody introduces local authors,” she said. “Not one of us but, say, a person from the community, a personality.”

I was pre-caffeine but I thought maybe there was a misunderstanding. “But I’m not local,” I said, thinking, first and foremost, that it was going to be tricky to find someone so last minute.

“You’re Cuban!” said the Books & Books person, “Of course you’re local.”

One advantage to the Facebook events program – where I’d posted a notice about the reading -- is that you have both a quick read on who’s coming or not, and a quick way to get a hold of them.

And that’s how I snagged Ricardo Brown to do it. He had made the mistake of commenting on the page, saying he “wouldn’t miss it for the world.” So I sent him a brief note and, somewhat to my surprise, he not only agreed but also asked me to be on his radio show.

Who the heck is Ricardo? Only the best journalist in South Florida. Currently, he hosts El Factor Brown, a nightly news commentary show on WGEN-TV, Channel 8, in Miami.

Ricardo used to work as a foreign correspondent for the Spanish International Network, Univision, Telemundo and CBS Telenoticias. He was also news director for the HBC national newscast on Telemundo and CBS Telenoticias. He has covered major news events in more than 50 countries and has four Emmys on his mantle.

I mean, in Miami you don’t get bigger than Ricardo.

And, er, he’s my cousin.

Well, sort of. He used to be married to my dad’s cousin. But we always liked him so much – and I was so in awe of him – that we just claimed him right out.

And I call him Richard. Always have. Couldn’t begin to explain why, just do.

He was, of course, just delightful on the radio – throwing me total lobs, being so warm and sweet I just wanted to reach across the airwaves and squeeze him. We talked about the genesis of Ruins and I said that it had, in part, been inspired by my neighbors in Cuba, on Tejadillo Street in Old Havana. I added that less than a month ago, one of those neighbors, Jorgito, had made it to the U.S. by crossing the Mexican border. He’d said he was coming that night, and I wanted to dedicate the reading to him.

That evening, my mom and I got to the Books & Books early, a kind of miracle considering Miami traffic and construction (and both of our penchants for running late). “Oh,” said a staffer, “you know nothing starts on time at the beach, right?” There were maybe five people there, of which four were probably related to me.

The first time I’d read at B&B, in Coral Gables, at the old store, was also my debut as a published author in Miami and when I got there, it was pretty much the same scenario: a handful of folks, most of them familiar. I got so sad and felt so miserable I had to leave the store and go for a walk just to regain my composure. When I got back, I was stunned to find a line out the door.

That experience should have kept the tremors at bay but, truth is, the only time I’d ever been scheduled to appear at the Miami Beach store before had been pretty dramatic: it was for Days of Awe, slated for September 12, 2001. Needless to say, we cancelled. As I looked around this time, I worried again … it doesn’t matter how many readings I survive, how many books I publish, it’s still scary – and especially in Miami. Why? Because I’m Cuban and thus I’m local.

By the way, the new B&B space is lovely – it’s just off the mall, a little twisty to find the bookstore itself but not at all difficult. Upfront, B&B has set up a café, not as big as the one in Coral Gables but the same idea. And, of course, the entire staff there is just terrific: knowledgeable, friendly, tireless.

Richard showed up at B&B shortly after my mom and me. Totally casual, with one of his sons in tow (a tall, Irish looking young man – reddish blond hair and moustache – with a very Cuban swagger). I would have much to thank Richard for the next day, since two other local radio programs – tipped off by my appearance on his -- would call for interviews. But for now I was just glad to see him.

It seemed that within minutes of his arrival, the place got packed. The B&B staff set out more chairs and still there were folks standing on either side of the room and along the back. Among those in attendance were Moisés Asís, a wonderful Cuban Jewish writer I worked with on Havana Noir (and who I hope to include in an anthology of Latin American Jewish writers I’m editing with Lawrence Schimel), the spectacular Jordan Levin from The Miami Herald, and Adrian Castro, one of my favorite poets. There were so many relatives of mine there, I stopped counting. The one person nowhere in sight was Jorgito, and my heart sank a little.

Richard’s intro, though, brought it right back up. He was kind about the book but, for me, the most important part was when he talked about my Abuela Lala and my dad, and what original storytellers they were. It was personal, not so much literary, but that was precisely what made it so right, especially there, with so much family present.

Early in any book tour, the reading text is still being adjusted, but as I began I realized I was enunciating quite clearly, going slowly and deliberately at the text in a way I never do. And then I saw my Tía Yolanda was directly in my line of vision, and, to be honest, I don’t think I’ve ever heard a word of English come out of her mouth. I’m not saying she doesn’t speak it – for all I know, she may be tutoring Judy Dench – but I have never had a conversation with her in anything but Spanish. And the absurdity of her being there – strictly to support me – hit me so hard, I almost lost my place.

I was just about at the end of my text, finally relaxing into it a bit, when I heard rustling and saw a flash of movement in my peripheral vision. I glanced over and saw Jorgito, his wife Leticia and their daughter, all breathless. He grinned as big as the whole world.

When I finished, I took questions, as I often like to do, and these veered all over the place, from curiosity about how to travel legally to Cuba to the real identities of the characters in “Ruins” (fiction, folks, fiction). There was a lot of laughter and a very warmly casual atmosphere, which permitted me to back up and do what I had promised: dedicate the reading, albeit after the fact, to Jorgito, who blushed and waved, holding his daughter against him like a human shield.

The next day, I hung out with Richard and one of his producers, Gloria Diliz, in the a.m. and met Alex El Mago, who performed card tricks at the breakfast table. Then Jorgito and Leticia and I grabbed lunch, which turned out to be their intro to sushi – he was a good sport about it but we ended up adding some beef to the plates anyway!

 

Later I sat in with Ariel Gonzáles at WLRN, the local NPR affiliate. I always enjoy these chats with Ariel because he is supremely well-prepared. He has a calm, unpretentious manner. Even though we talked for more than a half hour, it felt like five minutes – it just turned into a conversation, which is really the best kind of interview.

I’d just gotten into my car and was headed out to hang with friends when I got an email from an old Chicago bud, Tomás Martínez, who’s now in management at Radio Caracol, one of Miami’s pan-Latino stations. He’d heard me on Richard’s show; could I come in and meet with Enrique Cordoba? Sure but Enrique Cordoba? Enrique’s a totally unassuming man, completely belying his status as a giant of Latino radio. When he interviews writers, it usually means Mario Vargas Llosa. So I was more than a bit nervous. We taped close to 40 minutes – and talked hardcore lit – but if you didn’t know that Tomás had just thrown this at him, you wouldn’t have had a clue Enrique hadn’t read the book. I don’t think it gets any smoother than that!

The last interview was Monday morning, which Gloria Diliz arranged, and it was a minor miracle we pulled it off. By then I was already long gone from Miami, nestled in Oakland with M. The time difference meant a 4:45 a.m. wake up call for a 5 a.m. interview – three hours earlier than sunny and beautiful Miami.

Can’t wait to go back.