In 1861, a 45-day-long rainstorm hit California, causing the largest flood in our state’s recorded history. It created an inland lake 300 miles long in the Central Valley, and drowned roughly 200,000 cows. Governor Leland Stanford had to attend his inauguration by rowboat, and the state went bankrupt. In an effort to escape future flood […]
Month: October 2021
When I turned 11, I wanted to have a blow-out party. My sweet, patient parents arranged for ten of my friends to show up at Mr. Gatti’s, a combination all-you-can-eat pizza buffet and arcade. (Southerners: IYKYK.) After bumper cars and skeeball, we all piled into a designated “party room” and sat at a long table […]
There is a much-fêted relationship between a writer and his editor. Less often is it mentioned that a writer often keeps up a second backchannel with folks from the business side of a publication, dealing with invoices and working out logistics. With smaller pubs you may actually be talking to the publisher, as is the […]
A version of this poem appeared in Doubleback Review. The Death of the Lobster I. The death of the lobster will commence quietly. One night, she will awake and find her shell slightly too snug: The lobster’s shell has stopped growing. The lobster has not. Tomorrow, her shell will be tighter; the next day, tighter […]
I’ve spent a lot more time in a car than I used to, since the pandemic started. Because of not wanting to be in spaces where other people are exhaling. On Sunday, I spent a few half-hour stretches in a car. And I noticed a number of things, and I’m here to tell you about […]
Last week I asked a friend, new to town, to meet me on the corner by Mockingbird Lane. I have been noticing mockingbirds more since the start of the pandemic—the bright flash of white tail feathers, the snippets of stolen songs. And I’d been to this corner many times—it’s the start of one of my […]
The other day, my friend Max — a brilliant aquatic scientist whose work lies at the center of the herpetology/gender studies Venn diagram — tweeted a comment he’d received from an anonymous peer reviewer. Evidently this reviewer had doubted Max’s claim that frogs have political economic histories. Max’s reply: “lolz yes. All critters on Earth […]
I’ve been interviewing women scientists again, younger ones this time. I ask them if they have some kind of semi-official, almost casual way of staying connected with other women scientists. Because, you know, staying connected helps you survive the bullshit. Every time I ask them this question — and the answer is almost always “YES!” […]
