Countless Disappointments

I'm prepping for a new course I'm teaching called Buddhist American Literature. I'm reading African American Buddhist Charles Johnson. His work is incredible salve during these hard times. I'm also watching a lot of movies during this Covid time. I saw Ma Rainey's Black Bottom based on the play by August Wilson.  

After reading Johnson's story Night Hawks, I see they were friends. There was something magical about discovering this happenstance. Here is what Johnson wrote of Wilson in Night Hawks:

"How many times had his heart been broken? He could not remember the countless disappointments. Like so many writers and artists I've known, his art was anchored in lacerations and a latticework of scar tissue."

Let our sadness be a spark in the night time.

A Lit Path, 2017

The 20th Anniversary of the Killing of Joseph lleto

On August 10, 1999 Buford Furrow, a white supremacist, killed Filipino mail carrier Joseph Ileto. Furrow said he was specifically looking for an Asian or Latino man to kill. Earlier that day, Furrow had sprayed a Jewish daycare center with bullets, wounding five.

The death of Joseph Ileto inspired my second novel Talking to the Moon.  I suppose I wrote the novel to try and make sense of what happened. I was inspired by the Ileto family who went onto to discuss the effects of hate crimes and ways to prevent it.

That was probably one of the most moving experiences I'd witnessed in the Filipino American community in Los Angeles. Joseph's brother, Ismael, stepped up to bring awareness to the situation.

I wonder how many of us would have the strength to do this kind of advocacy work.  Would you?

Beloved Toni Morrison

I read Beloved, Song of Solomon, Tar Baby and Sula within two years. There was something about her voice that inspired me.  There was a rhythm and a style in her work that transported me. Her dedication to exploring African American life was a model for how I would explore various communities that I identified with.  

In 1993, when I first started studying writing, my writing teacher Ayofemi Folayan was ecstatic.  

"Toni Morrision won the Nobel Prize!" she said.

"Cool," I said, but I was hiding the fact that I was unfamiliar with her and her work.  If she won the Nobel Prize, I guess I should know who she is.  I started with her master piece Beloved, the tale of a black woman who kills her children rather than have them become slaves. 

I didn't know such story telling could exist.  I became a different person, a better writer because of her. Thank you.

Literary Again

I'd been updating my CV. A great way of documenting my work was to go through this blog. It was wonderful seeing my posts from the last 10 years. I'd grown a lot. When I started this blog, there was no financial meltdown, I had a new novel coming out--things change.

At some point, I stopped focusing on literary stuff and opened it up to all sorts of stuff.  I was exploring my world, I guess. I wrote on my blog less--as I had other writing projects that took up my time. 

Now, I think I should just focus on the writing. And go back to looking at the world purely through a literary lens. 

Literary is back.