The Village it Takes

I hate prologues, they tend to screw up my relationship-building with the written narrative. If there is a necessary back story, for God’s sake, put it on the back cover or weave it into the manuscript, like a boss. Eighty-second Airborne me into the first chapter and I’ll follow any book to the tender last page. Acknowledgements, on the other hand, yum. The good ones are a juicy peek into the medicine chest of the writer as a real human being. The top shelf of my gratitude list; right next to my wife, mother, sister and son, stands City Lights Bookstore and Publishers with two extraordinary figures: Amy Scholder and Elaine Katzenberger. On the next shelf, you’ll find kick-ass ministers, Reverends Alice Solstice Wife King, David Miller, Wendy Bartel and Lynn Gardner. A song of serious praise to Nancy Jo Mackey and Gary Ruyle for decades of bringing back the light and to Wizard Roy Attridge for insisting I create a space to write and use it. Shout out to Mollie Kellogg the Incognito Witch for years of excellent and wholesome creative support, and a crucial, agradecimientos especiales to Isabella Furth of Blue Fish Editorial for encouraging me to push my words into the public arena.  I am forever indebted to my trusted platoon of first-line readers, S. Barnard, L. Bessemer, E. Diana, D. Lonergan, L. Partido, and T. Southfox. To my darlings, D.L. Alvarez, and Martina Kaden, a big fat #LoveYouMeanItCallMe for bringing more writing into the world. To Barbara Bright Wilder & Dr. Lynn Northrop for letting me change your linen and to Nikki Clinton Lewis and the San Diego Community Birthing Center because they midwife new life and hope to a broken world.