Q: How long have you been in Ottawa, and what first brought you here?
A: Oh, I’ve been in Ottawa a long time. My family moved here – thanks to my Dad getting a work transfer – just after I finished kindergarten. Summer of 1986, I think? I’ve been here nearly my whole life.
Q: How did you first get involved in writing, and subsequently, the writing community here?
A: Look, my Mom would probably tell you that I’ve been writing since I was really little – like Grade Two – but as an adult? Ha. I was writing fanfic for fun and escapism in my early twenties and got brave enough to write original stories, and started writing poetry – inspired in large part by finding Kathryn Payne’s “Longing At Least Is Constant” and Kate Braid’s “Inward To The Bones” – just before my first marriage ended. I started reading at open mics in 2008 and ended up accidentally co-organizing a poetry show the following year. I kind of tripped into the deep end on that one.
Q: How did being in such a community of writers shift your thinking about writing, if at all?
A: So, I went to a high school full of writers, and was active in fandom, and yet somehow missed the memo that poetry could be a thing you do in a community. Like: Audiences are supportive, and you can go to workshops and other poets will help you to pinpoint your own voice and distill your work into something that’s both excellent and intrinsically yours.
Poetry had been this kind of solitary, almost-but-not-quite hidden thing for me when I started. So finding out that I could take a Dusty Owl workshop (this was 2008, so) or, to point to something more recent, email Little Birds – I swear not all f Ottawa’s poetry workshops have bird themes – a nd see if they’ve got room at the table this week… was new.
Q: What do you see happening here that you don’t see anywhere else? What does Ottawa provide, or allow?
A: Okay, so I’m the wrong person to ask this. Like I said, I’ve been here nearly my whole life so I have no idea if what Ottawa provides or allows is going to be unique to Ottawa.
That said, there’s a little voice in the back of my head going “How do we do it? Volume!” Ottawa remains an astonishing city for poetry in part just because of how many small presses, showcases, workshops, slams, magazines, literary radio shows, and readings are available here.
Q: Have any of your projects responded directly to your engagements here? How have the city and its community, if at all, changed the way you approached your work?
A: See, my first response to this is “Oh, definitely!” But it’s less the city and more the geography, the bioregion, the geology, the climate.
It’s not Preston Street: Gelato shops and underpass art, that I write about (much), it’s Preston Street: Dozens of serviceberry trees all ripe in early July, staining my hands and the sidewalk purple with delight. It’s walking home in the dark in -40C. It’s a 480 million year old seabed under every step I take.
I grew up here. I’ve been here almost as long as I’ve been able to write my own name. This place didn’t change how I approach my work. It made how I approach my work.
Q: What are you working on now?
A: Right now I’m editing, chipping a manuscript into its final shape. Working on essays and, unexpectedly, flash fiction, and so relieved to see my creativity coming back after what feels like a very long dry spell.
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