Where did you live/work before coming to Western?
Before Western I worked at UNLV in Las Vegas, Nevada. To quote Sheryl Crow, “Nowhere is far enough away.”
What is your area of specialty?
Some people call it creative nonfiction. I call it “the essay.” Most of them are Latin Americans making lives for themselves in a hemisphere decimated by the United States.
What do you like so far about being at Western?
I love campus. I’ve held class or had students do writing exercises on some large concrete blocks overgrown with moss next to a community garden, in the arboretum, and in the art museum. I love being able to quickly dip into woods that feel like you’re really far out, while being a 10-minute walk from my office.
What stirs joy within you outside of your work?
Running around Bellingham, and when my kids (2 and 4) think out loud or talk to each other within earshot.
What is your secret “superpower”? Tell us something that others may not know about you.
I don’t know if it’s a superpower, but maybe it’s the closest quality to it that I have. I really “go for it,” in pieces of writing. Sometimes that means I go to Ciudad Juárez because I heard about a weird play, or I go into the Sonoran Desert to see our horrendously violent empire at work, or it could mean I try to write an essay that spans 500 years and covers things from the conquest of Mexico to the legal philosophy of intellectual property rights.
