Writing

Recent Highlights

Current Writing: First Comes Love

My main focus right now is pitching my memoir, First Comes Love, which is based on my blog Unlikely Wallflower, to agents and publishers, as well as writing shorter-form non-fiction pieces and essays to submit to literary magazines and contests.

What happens when a “woman of a certain age” with a deafeningly ticking biological clock is running out of time to find “the one” with whom she always thought she’d build a life and family ?

For many women and/or queer folks, “First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes the baby in the baby carriage” was not just a schoolyard taunt; it was the heteronormative edict we swallowed whole. Romcoms and the patriarchy taught us that to love, first and foremost, means to be in (hetero) love. After a lonely childhood, I spent my 20s and early 30s desperately searching for a husband. At 36, I froze my eggs to buy myself more time and hired a love coach to help me on my search. When that didn’t pan out, I decided to pursue single motherhood and went on a long and bumpy (in)fertility ride, interrupted briefly by a fairy tale engagement that flamed out as quickly and dramatically as it began. I started trying to conceive again soon after; this time, it worked, but left me a depressed single mom bereft of my queer community in the middle of the pandemic. Throughout First Comes Love, I reckon with the clichéd narrative of what we’re told a family is and learn to create family and love on my own terms.

Spoken Word Poetry

In a past life (not so long ago, actually), I was a spoken word poet who toured across the country, and founded the London Poetry Slam in London, Ontario and spent a year as National Director of SpoCan (Spoken Word Canada). You can still find some of my performances here and here.