My latest column for the Washington Independent Review of Books talks about busy schedules, the great literary community we live in, our commitment to that community, and our desire for a way to do it all. Here’s the opening to the post:
On the last Sunday in August, my wife, Tara, and I had two afternoon/evening readings on our calendar — overlapping events: the Reston Readings Series at the Used Book Shop in Reston’s Lake Anne Village Center and a Noir at the Bar at Busboys & Poets in Shirlington.
But the next morning was the first day of second grade for our son, Dashiell (and the first day of my own courses at George Mason University), so the three of us ended up staying home instead of going to either event.
The two sentences above may seem straightforward enough, but the whole story of that Sunday featured an extra layer of complications — and then deeper quandaries and questions beneath that, some of them stretching far beyond that single evening.