These little town blues are melting away:

I'm going to New York again in November and I'm literally counting the days. My friend, JT LeRoy, will have a new book out in December and I've been invited to the launch party. Also, I just found out I'm going to interview him again--this time for The Black Table--and I'm psyched. (I'm still sending out queries. Hopefully, I'll interview him for additional publications.) His upcoming novella, "Harold's End", is like a fish hook: it punctures you, gets under your skin and stays there. I can't wait to discuss it in print.

Near the topic, if not quite on it, at tonight's writing group Jade suggested a freewrite about "a city that we hate". She and Margaret thought that I should post my results here:

I can't be objective about this. I love my family and friends--adore them, really--but when I think about Seattle, I think of that Bob Dylan line from "Don't Fall Apart on Me Tonight": "It's like I'm stuck inside a painting/ that's hanging in the Lourve/ My throat starts to tickle/ and my nose itches/ but I know that I can't move".

As anyone who's known me longer than ten minutes discovers, I love New York truly, madly, deeply. I feel at home there in a way I never do here. And as everyone who knows me finds out soon enough, I've been sick for the past thirteen years. I haven't had enough health and cash simultaneously to make the leap.

I'm optimistic, though. No one has heard me say I'm staying in Seattle nor will they ever. And like I said, I can't be objective about this because I feel like I'm being held against my will. I've lived here my entire life and what bothers me most about Seattle is the pervasive anemia, the toxic mellowness that hangs over it like a mushroom cloud. Obviously, there are notable exceptions--we've got some amazing writers and musicians, for starters--but ambition is a dirty word here and I don't get it. I return to this again and again in my work and in my life: this is finite and we're going to be dead one day. I can't see the point in *not* running toward the highest bar.