THE WAR ON VACCINE: On PBS's Frontline tonight

Ashland is noted for having one of the highest populations of parents who choose not to vaccinate their children. I believe the number is at about 1/3.

Personally, I've had my kids vaccinated, but I think the debate is a really good one to follow. The more we research and learn, the better informed we can be in the long run.

My friend Jennifer Margulis, who's an award-winning journalist here in Ashland, has opted not to vaccinate her children. And I'm incredibly impressed that she agreed to this Frontline interview in order to further the conversation about vaccination.

Watch PBS tonight on your TV or online to learn more about the vaccination debate.

IT'S NICE TO BE WANTED - PART I

(ANOTHER ACCEPTANCE!)

A few years ago I wrote "To Cop A Feel," an essay about how Aubrey's curious and admiring gropes reminded me to embrace my own body-- and my destiny.

I got an email today that The Mom Egg, a New York-based literary magazine, wants to publish it in their upcoming annual issue, which will have the theme "Lessons."

Yay! I'm super excited about this.

I'm super excited about this, and I have to let them know by the 15th if my piece is still available, but now I have the dilemma of what to do about Skirt and Underwired.

See, I sent it to Skirt as a possibility for the "X" issue, with the title "Exemplary Behavior," and I sent it to Underwired as a possibility for their "Backside" issue.

Unlike The Mom Egg, both of those markets pay (and I think their websites are snazzier, although the literary content is probably similar). Additionally, they should be deciding soon whether they want it, because the deadlines were this week and the issues both publish in April.

That said, I have a call in to my local writing etiquette expert, Jennifer Margulis, asking her if I should email Skirt and Underwired separately to let them know this piece has been accepted elsewhere, unless one of them wants to grab it first.

We'll see if she says that's acceptable.

What do you think?

Travel Writing: A Novel by Peter Ferry

This'll be quick. I'm off to meet Pete Ferry, author of Travel Writing. He's chatting with my book club at Jennifer Margulis' house and then he's giving a two-hour mini-writing workshop at SOU. Can't wait for either of those. I loved the book -- so did Mick. But I'll have to report back later...

Shewrites. And she writes. And she writes...

Yesterday's coffee with Kamy Wicoff of shewrites.com was rather exciting. Kamy brought her boyfriend Pierre, a musician with The Dimes (click on their website -- music will play, and you'll hear their great sound). The others who joined us were writer/storyteller Devorah Zaslow and world renowned science writer, Virginia Morell, who had the February 2008 cover story for National Geographic and just signed a high six-figure book deal based on her research. Of course, Jennifer Margulis was there, too, who is an accomplished writer in her own right, having, among other things, held the cover story for November 2009's Smithsonian magazine, an article which was recently chosen for The 2009 Best Science Writing anthology.

You might say I was in exceptional company.

That's what made it fun, inspiring and special - but so was all the frank talk about writing and commitment and networking and choosing agents. Obviously, I'm nowhere near the stages any of these women are (by the way, Kamy's written a book, too, called I Do But I Don't, a book about marriage and divorce), but as Jennifer went around the table and introduced everybody, ending finally with me and my small accomplishments and novel-in-progress, I somehow still felt like I was part of the big picture.

There's a kind of big picture kindness and respect that comes from good writers. They're the ones who respect the process, the stages, the hard work, and the successes of any writer at any level. I definitely felt that respect and kindness yesterday as talk around the table shifted to different experiences and issues from each of us. Admittedly, I was the one playing the newbie card, but it was okay because they'd all been there.

But that's the point of shewrites.com, and that's the feeling I got from these other writers: at some point We've all been there. We've been at some spot, and possess information or advice or ideas that are valuable to share. And that's the purpose of a community of writers.

Kamy said she'd wished she could've recorded the meeting for her website, as it hit on the topics shewrites.com pursues. And, afterward, Devorah suggested we (sans Kamy) get together once a month or so to talk about writing.

Perhaps Devorah's comments were directed more at Virginia and Jennifer, but I didn't necessarily get that vibe. I got that writers-supporting-writers vibe instead.

It sounds like Virginia is absolutely swamped with her book deal, kind of like she wants to sneak away to a cave and pound the book out, uninterrupted, so I'm not sure what will come of Devorah's suggestion. However,I still came away inspired to work hard -- and you'd better believe I'll be sure to write again if I ever have the pleasure of actually being part of something so cool.

FIRST INTERVIEW

One of my new friends here in Ashland, Jennifer Margulis, is an accomplished writer. And I mean accomplished: she's published a couple books, was a Fulbright scholar, and has written articles for the likes of The New York Times and The Smithsonian.

Imagine my surprise then when she wanted to interview me for her website. I didn't think about it too long, though, and decided to just jump right on board. You can read the interview here. She says you should feel free to comment.