Her name is Lucy (pictured). She’s about 48 hours old.

She chirps a lot.

She chirps very loudly.

Today I was home alone with her, and our new puppy, Emma. I was in the back room. I heard some noise in the living room, and I sat at my desk trying to determine what it might have been. And then I thought: It’s probably Emma. She’s probably . . .

TRYING TO EAT THE CHICKS.

I dashed into the living room. Emma looked guilty.

I put her in the back yard. Holly told me she has seen Emma licking her chops as Lucy chirps away.

Right now everything is quiet. The living room is awash in a red glow from the heat lamp. There are two new chicks in the house. I don’t know the other girl’s name for sure, but I think it might be Bill.

Chicks are too cute.

Reblogged from wild mountain memoir retreat / MARCH 15TH-17TH, 2013 / Washington's Cascade Mountains :

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What if your first published personal essay were in the New York Times?  What if your memoir proposal was snatched up by a publisher in your first round of submissions?  Then, your name might be Tim Elhajj, author of Dopefiend: A Father's Journey from Addiction to Redemption.  Tim talked to us today about how he came to memoir writing.  Looking forward to meeting up with him again at Wild Mountain in March!

Read more… 493 more words

This past weekend was spent at the impressive King County Aquatic Center in Renton. It was a grueling three days of swimming competition. I also got a new Windows phone with an app that can make animated gifs. The loop in this image pretty much captures what the weekend felt like for all of us.

It was a lot of swimming. And then we swam some more. But the weekend was not without its little moments of pleasure.

Kennedy was part of the girls freestyle relay team that first electrified the crowd. This is her and two of her teammates congratulating the anchor girl who is still in the water. Check out the exasperated hands-on-head look from one of the competitors in the next lane over.

And of course Aaron gave us all a little excitement. He won his 50 Free event and 200 IM. This is his sister and teammates cheering for him as he rounds the corner and switches from breast stroke to freestyle. I was so focused on getting a picture I didn’t realize how close he was to winning until I looked through the lens and saw the look of urgency on his sister’s face. I love how this shot captures the emotion of the race.

Aaron also injured himself in a thrilling last minute relay win. He basically sacrificed his arm to beat the boy in the lane next to him, overextending his elbow as he came into the wall. He had to go to the ER and missed the final day of the meet.

All weekend long complete strangers were coming up to me and congratulating me on my children.

What a world!

More pics at flickr.

Last week I was taking my fourteen-year-old daughter to a sleep over after swim practice, and we were caught in traffic. It was bumper-to-bumper, no let up, the kind of traffic snarl that can make you curse. Apropos of nothing, K turns to me and says something like: “Mitt Romney is a very wealthy man and that’s not going to play well with the middle class.”

And then she did that thing where she  looks at me casually, but I’m pretty sure she’s searching my face for a reaction. It’s a crucial moment for any parent: who doesn’t want to give their child tall he things they want, and especially the things they really need; but there is so much out there that is unaffordable to me, or beyond my reach for a variety of reasons. Me helping out with her geometry homework, for example. But these moments when she seems to need a specific reaction from me seem within my reach.

My first impulse was to giggle or snort–these are the words of a pundit, after all–but I was so upset by the traffic jam that I easily managed to beat that impulse back.

“Good point,” I said.

I’m so glad I did. I can remember being ten or eleven and wanting nothing more than to be able to understand politics. It was the middle of the Vietnam War, Watergate was in full bloom, and every day the television news seemed to offer some fascinating new story about how the world worked. Or, more often, how it didn’t work. I felt terrified to step into that world, let alone articulate an opinion.

K and I had the best discussion.

I pointed out that she’d be old enough to vote in the next presidental election. We discussed potential candidates, which means we bandied about a certian ex First Lady’s name. We both agreed that if the country was ready to accept a black president, perhaps it would soon be time for a woman president.

K wanted answers to questions like these:

“Was Bill Clinton a good president?”

“What is impeached?”

And then we discussed Hillary’s qualifications:

She was a first lady; she’s Secratary of State.

Had the hutzpuh to get through her husband’s scandal without shooting leaving him.

“I think she’d make a good president,” K offered.

I can’t say that I disagree.

But at this early stage, I must say that I’m way more impressed by the makings of the fine citizen before me.

My friend and fellow blogger, writer, and an all around extraordinarily great person to know, Christine Lee Zilka is holding a free giveaway of Dopefiend on her blog!

I met Christine through a comment she made on one of this blog’s posts. I followed her to her blog, 80,000 words, where I learned she had first ever story, Bile, had been published by Howard Junker in Zyzzyva (now available on the web). I added her to my Facebook profile where she turned me onto Sugar, an advice columnist on The Rumpus (then a secret identity, now known to all as the amazing Cheryl Strayed), whose columns I can no longer read at work, because they always leave me a tearful mess.

Not long ago Christine pointed out to me that the Kindle version of Dopefiend was no longer available on Amazon (a problem the publisher has since addressed) and I wrote her back, thanking her pointing out the problem, and asking for her address, so that I could send her a signed copy of the book. She said she’d be honored. I really believe it’s powerful to send out copies of the book to the really good writers who have turned me on to other really good writers or whose writing has inspired me. Christine does all of that for me.

And then she said we ought to do a giveaway. She bought her own copy of Dopefiend to give away. It makes perfect sense. I’m so excited. I have no explanation for why I haven’t done my own giveaway sooner. Probably because I needed to watch Christine in action on her blog. She’s done a lot of giveaways and it shows in the thoughtful the Dopefiend giveaway post she created for this event. I hope you’ll visit her blog. I hope you win a copy of DOPEFIEND. Know that even if you don’t win this time, I’m going to do a few more giveaways of my own later this summer. I really like the idea of giving a few books away.

If you go to Christine’s blog, I can promise you an absolutely adorable picture of a Wiener Dog named Scarlet reading DOPEFIEND! Scarlet actually looks very intent on what she’s reading. I imagine she must be at one of the good parts.

I’m going to appear in Seattle later this week at Unity on Union Bookstore, a really fabulous space in the central district. If you’ve never been there, you should come. I went down to see Carol Latimer, the owner, and fell in love with the store—big open spaces, gleaming hardwood floors, and just a really friendly vibe. I’m going to read from the book and sign copies. It’s going to be catered. I know Holly is baking treats.

Where: 2420 East Union Street, Seattle, WA 98122

When: Saturday, March 10, 6 pm to 8 pm.

Unity on Union Bookstore

I got my copy of Best Sex Writing 2012 earlier this year and was very pleased to have my work featured alongside so many great writers. Like they used to say in the old Penthouse Forum letters, “I never thought it would happen to me!“

For my part in the Best Sex Writing Virtual Blog Tour, I wanted to talk about how I came to write my submission, An Unfortunate Discharge Early in My Naval Career.

This was a difficult story for me to write. As nonfiction, I have long thought the story would work better if I had been gay. Consider the synopsis: caught having casual sex with a shipmate, a troubled teen collides with an out-of-control and powerful homophobic authority. This, in turn, makes our intrepid young protagonist confront his own homophobic fears, which allows him to realize that he is… STRAIGHT?

Humm. I hear you. You probably want to say something like: Your synopsis doesn’t seem quite right, my friend.

That’s exactly what I said. For years. Too many years. But then I read a brilliant craft essay by Kerry Cohen, a former Best Sex Writer herself, and discovered that the story really is mine, even if it doesn’t map cleanly to what a reader might expect. I can own it. I don’t have to tell it the way it would be told if it were in a Hollywood movie or a cheap novel. If I can overcome my own personal shame long enough to see the truth, I can make the story mine.

With that revelation, the only thing left to overcome was the social stigma.

As the author of a memoir about my recovery from heroin addiction, I know a little something about social stigmas, how damaging and infuriating they can be. In one of the first pieces I ever published, I refused to acknowledge I was an addict because I was afraid of what people would think of me. I published the piece—a great story about my relationship with my oldest son—without mentioning my addiction. But I started to think seriously about how much of my life I wanted to share in my stories. What does it mean to write nonfiction? What impact comes from openly sharing true stories about socially stigmatizing issues? Nonfiction gives our stories a little extra something that fiction can’t manage. That’s not meant as a ding against fiction writers, but as encouragement to writers of nonfiction: Our work matters in ways we can’t always know or understand. As Kerry Cohen points out, we have to be brave enough to “locate the truth,” to own our own stories.

I’m going to appear at RASP later this month to read from Dopefiend and sign books. I’d love it you came over and said hello. I’ll have a bunch of books and the readings usually include a little Q&A at the end.

Where: Old Redmond Schoolhouse Community Center, Room 105
When: Friday, February 24, 2012, 7 P.M. (and the last Friday of every month)

My kids have been attending a Spanish immersion school since they were in kindergarten. They’re big 8th graders now, about to move into high school, where the “immersion” part of school will change, so that they’re essentially only doing a single foreign language AP class. So they’re “graduating” from the immersion portion of the program.

For their final project they have to interview a native Mexican, who speaks Spanish. It’s just a crazy project for so many reasons. A Mexican? We live in Seattle. The photo above is an aerial map of Seattle. Red dots represent where all the white people live. Orange dots represent Hispanics. Where are we going to find a Mexican?

Plus, the assignment is just so ethnically specific. Meanwhile, Seattle is so liberal and progressive people tend to discount ethnic/racial differences, so this is putting ethnicity squarely into focus in ways I haven’t really thought about, and that make me feel somewhat uncomfortable.

“Hey. You Mexican?”

Why not just task them with interviewing someone who doesn’t speak English? They’re in a Spanish immersion class, so it’s hard to imagine they’re going to interview a Russian or a Texan or something.

We tried to coordinate a Skype interview with family friends from Mexico who we haven’t seen in years, but the logistics and technical challenges were too great to overcome. We have all sorts of ethnic friends, but no Mexicans. It was very frustrating. Finally, end of semester approaching, they loosened the requirements to any Spanish speaking culture, which opened up the door to my son’s in-laws, who are from Cuba and Costa Rica. Hooray for in-laws!

My kids interviewed Tim’s mother-in-law, who was kind enough to stay up late and chat with Aaron and Kennedy, who both got a HUGE case of the shy-kids, and proceeded to chat for about an entire two minutes. As it turns out, that was enough. Interview accomplished.

So. Major kudos to my daughter, Carry, who took a huge part coordinating the effort, despite a full-time load at university and two little ninas of her own to care for. Thank you Carry! And big thanks to your mother, Miriam, for taking Aaron and Kennedy and their school project seriously.

We really love you guys!

Will be interesting to see what the interviews look like. Not just Aaron and Kennedy’s, but the entire class. We were not the only ones that had a hard time. I know of at least one family who went to a Mexican restaurant and interviewed one of the wait staff. The assignment required the students to get pictures of the people they interviewed, and when the cameras came out, the restaurant staff all got a little antsy. Does that just seem — I don’t know — incredibly awkward?

Ingredients:

• 2 lbs boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
• 1 lb asparagus, trimmed and cut into 1-inch pieces
• 2 Tablespoons vegetable, canola or peanut oil
• 4 teaspoons chopped garlic
• 2 teaspoon cornstarch, dissolved in 4 teaspoons water
• 1/2 cup lightly packed Thai basil or sweet basil leaves
• 1 cup roasted cashews
• 1 fresh jalapeno chili, thinly sliced into rings (optional)

Marinade

• 4 Tablespoons lager-style beer, like Tsingtao
• 2 Tablespoon oyster sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon ground white pepper (or black pepper)

Sauce

• 1/2 cup chicken broth
• 2 Tablespoon lager-style beer, like Tsingtao
• 2 teaspoon soy sauce
• 2 Tablespoon fish sauce (or add an additional 3 teaspoons soy sauce)
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar

Directions:

1. Combine the marinade ingredients in a bowl. Add the chicken and stir to coat. Let stand for 15 minutes.

2. Combine the sauce ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.

3. Place a wok or wide sauté pan over high heat until hot. Add the oil, swirling to coat the sides. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 10 seconds. Add the chicken and asparagus and cook, stirring constantly until the chicken is no longer pink, about 2 minutes. Add the sauce and bring to boil. Add the cornstarch solution and cook, stirring, until sauce thickens, about 1 minute. Remove pan from heat and stir in jalapeno chili, basil leaves and cashews.