I Don't Know AWP

by Amy Cipolla Barnes

The image above is my brain on AWP.

I went to Kroger this morning and took the picture to the great confusion of the parking lot workers. There are overturned carts, caution tape and also a gorgeous morning sky. I was there to buy “I miss you” cards and flowers and candy for my teenager. As I write this, I’m still not packed for the trip. I’m still putting together book swag. I have no to-do list even though that would help me. Instead, I’m carrying all the planning and anxiety around in my head. I also snapped at my youngest child (the teenager) yesterday. I’m carrying that around too.

In my head, I think I somehow decided that AWP should be ALL-WP: my fears and planning should stop normal life. It can’t. It hasn’t. It took me a while to realize that’s what I was doing — at the precise moment I snapped at my kid. It has been a month. She’s waiting on ACT scores that are taking way longer than they should and also have a heavy weight on college planning. She has a major event of her own at the end of the month, All-State band. She earned her way in but it’s three days out of school right before another anxiety-inducing time period: AP testing.

My other kid had to register for the fall term of college. Also complicated. If someone didn’t push that registration button on the very planned out schedule very early on in the registration process, he would be missing prerequisites that could delay graduation and grad school. There was a Zoom interview in there too for a major internship, his first one ever.

I had deadline after deadline for important book things, a pile of assigned articles, blurbs, interviews, product descriptions, published pieces, a journal issue that was published, reading, editing. Things that I can do and choose to do but have also left me on the day before I leave for AWP with my proverbial over-turned carts in a circle, caution tape flapping in the wind.

The gist of the snapping at the teenager ended with both of us in tears trying not to say more things but also both equally tired and frustrated. She said something to me that flipped my focus a bit — once I simmered down a bit. IT’S NOT MY FAULT YOU DIDN’T WRITE A BOOK BEFORE NOW. OR HAVE AN MFA. YOU CHOOSE TO HAVE KIDS.

She’s right. I have chosen to do other things as well. Things that are important too but felt like I could do them more easily with little sleep and a toddler in my lap. I’ve been a “writer” for years. Twenty years of teaching online courses through colleges, universities and businesses: journaling, southern lit, mystery writing, self-editing. In those same decades, I’ve also written widely for lifestyle publications from Gayot to Everyday Health to Allrecipes to Forbes.

All of that was/is important. But it wasn’t THE elusive BOOK. I’ve never been to AWP. I didn’t feel “official” enough even when it was held in cities that I lived in. I have been to band concerts and choir concerts and graduations and all the kid things. I love those things, even middle school band concerts. At some point (today) I had to admit I am still ultimately in control of what/when I publish, despite any positive or negative outside forces. My kids are both driving, both can operate a microwave and my husband can do all of that plus. I know that it is easier for me to attend AWP now with older kids. The truth is when they were babies or toddlers, it would have been nearly impossible. Not because I had kids but because they still needed me in different ways.

My point of all my ramblings is I know that everyone at AWP is coming from different places of being needed, needing things, feeling anxious, feeling excited, feeling like they want to hide in a corner, feeling like they want to stop spontaneously and read on every street corner. All of those things are okay. Texting with kids or a spouse during AWP is okay. Worrying about kids, pets, parents, partners, also okay. Wondering if t-shirts or sequins are okay is okay. I don’t think I’ve been around 10,000 people in my lifetime and especially not in the last two years. I may be spending time in the no-fluorescent lights room, texting about ACT scores or internship results or looking at cute dog pictures.

I woke up yesterday to news that a Chinese plane had crashed which did not help my fears about flying. I woke up this morning to a sweet Twitter post about where to find the best ice cream in Philly (thank you to Emma Copley Eisenberg!). As I approach AWP, I’m going to concentrate on the ice cream. Meeting people. Buying books. Celebrating that I’ve written books at exactly the right time.

At least one of my imaginary carts will still be overturned and I’ll have to buy something or several somethings at a Philly Target. I’ve just finally managed to rip off the caution tape. Come by and say hi — I’ll be the one eating ice cream in the place with no fluorescent lighting. And signing books at Word West and ELJ.