This is the first of an intermittent series of interviews with the artists who illustrate the wonderful stories we publish.

By Gay Degani

You’ve taken several photographs to accompany stories published at Smokelong. Tell us a little about your interest in photography. When did all this picture-taking start for you? Did you go to school to study photography? How long have you been a photographer?

Throughout middle school and high school, I always wanted to learn photography, but never thought I could. I kept making excuses: I didn’t have the right equipment, and even if I did, who would I photograph? In college I pursued a journalism minor and creative writing major, thinking I wanted to be a copy editor and reporter, and I happened to get into photography by accident.

Here’s how it happened: I was working as a copy editor/reporter at The Central Florida Future, the University of Central Florida’s newspaper, and the photo editor and I were supposed to cover the “chamber pop” band Margot & the Nuclear So and So’s together. Hours before the show, the photo editor called me and said her roof was leaking, happened to leak onto her camera, and now it wouldn’t work. So I had to photograph the show. I was nervous at first because all I had was a point-and-shoot, but I had more fun than I ever thought I would, more fun than I had copy editing and reporting. So I took one photojournalism class, and then another one, and soon became part of a wonderful network of Central Florida photographers.

Since Smokelong assignments come to you with stories to illustrate, how do you approach the task of finding just the right shot?

The art of translating flash fiction into photograph, for me, relies on instinct and spontaneity, which is why I find it so much fun. Each story has a mood to it, which is intangible. It’s my job to make that mood tangible, translate it into a photograph, something concrete. Sometimes I’ll free-write after I give the story a few read-throughs, and in my free-write, an image comes to me that fits the mood. But during each story’s photo session, I always give myself room to change the image, too. I put a lot of trust in the moment of each photoshoot.

Can you talk a little about your photographic point-of-view?

Life experiences are my vitamins, and I love to travel. I think a healthy balance of delving into individual landscape and experiencing a variety of landscapes has greatly influenced my point of view, the way I envision each story’s photograph.

What would your perfect (or next) gallery show consist of in terms of style and content?

A Prayer For Your Safe Return Home, a portrait series, is a project I’ve had in my head for a while. I want this series to feature those who have lost someone they love to anorexia. Particularly those who have had anorexia themselves. I also want the project to feature those who’ve had anorexia for a good portion of their lives and survived. This disease is an extremely private one, and I don’t want to rush the project. At first, I wanted it to happen right away, but now I’m okay with a longer timeline.

I first became aware of you as a photographer at Smokelong, but you are a writer also. Tell us about which came first? And tell us something about your writing? What kinds of things do you write? What are your writing goals?

Writing came first. I remember relying on writing for the first time when I was twelve, mostly because I had some big spiritual questions and had no one to talk to about them. My notebook became my safe space and has been ever since. As I got older, I learned how to use my therapeutic writing as a foundation to shape “story” and “poem” and everything in between. For me, one can not exist without the other. Reading Natalie Goldberg’s Writing Down the Bones helped me understand this process even further.

When I got my MFA, my focus was fiction, but I write poetry, too. And creative nonfiction. Exploring sexuality, body image, and the “alternative family” is important to me, and shows up in the majority of my writing.

Is there any cross-pollination that happens between your photography and your writing?

Without traveling and photography, I don’t think my writing would be the same at all. I wouldn’t have the same passion as I do now for the desert and the West, or even my home, Florida, and I probably wouldn’t have made these places such important characters in my stories.

Any other artistic endeavors you might be willing to share with us?

I’d like to believe I’m writing even when I’m not writing. Getting lost in San Francisco, that’s writing. Swimming in the American River, that’s writing, too. Meditating on the rocks in Malibu: writing. Driving down the coast of California—it’s all writing. Right now, I’m focusing on the experience of living on the road, and soon these experiences will compost, and hopefully, they’ll lead me where I need to go next in terms of making art.

If readers would like to see more of your art or read some of your writing, can you give us a couple of links?

Here’s one of my most recent stories, “Deconstruction,” written for Burrow Press’ 15 Views of Orlando project.

Two photographs I took for make/shift magazine this year.

My web site, where you can find a list of publications and links.

New fiction by Wyatt Bonikowski, Randall Brown,  Katie Cortese,Brandon Courtney, Trent England, Frances Gonzalez, James Greer, Kyle Hemmings, Jac Jemc, Donna Laemmlen, Cynthia Larsen, Rachel Mangini, Dylan Mohr, Dave Newman, Brian Oliu, Heather Peterson, Eliezra Schaffzin, Curtis Smith, Peter Stenson, and Weike Wang.

April 18-24 Aubrey Hirsch

April 25-May 1 Richard Osgood

May 2-8   xTx

May 9-15 Dave Clapper

May 16-22 Matt Bell

May 23-29 Ethel Rohan

May 30- June 5 Roland Goity

June 6-12 Rusty Barnes

June 13-19 David Erlewine

June 20-26 Fawn Neun

Molly Giles’ story “Seahorse Sex” and Wendy Oleson’s “How I Liked the Avocados” can both be found in Issue 28 of SLQ.

If selected for the final anthology, we will be notified in May. Good luck to these fine writers!

Please go read it: Wound Glue.

Ben Loory

April 18-24

Aubrey Hirsch

May 2-8

xTx

Gay Degani

Feb 28-March 6

Beth Thomas

Mar 7-13

Doug Paul Case

March 14-20

Gabe Durham

March 21-27

Sherrie Flick

Regardless what happens with the blog going forward, just moving from the grotesqueries of Blogger to the elegant simplicity of WordPress feels like a huge step in the right direction. I hope to see you back here again soon.

Oh, that’s because Hallmark will now print and mail your cards for you! That’s right—no more pesky pens, no more personalized messages or wishes, no more addressing envelopes, licking them, finding pretty Christmas stamps. As the voice over on the commercial says, “You can have more time to spend with your family.”

Sweet, isn’t it?

Oh right: except for the fact that the point of holiday cards is to keep in touch with family and friends and let them know you’re thinking of them even if you can’t see them every day. According to Hallmark, that’s the equivalent of exporting your Excel spreadsheet to them so they can print one generic message and ship it off lovingly to all your Google contacts.

Holiday cards just aren’t written on or personally signed anymore. Most of the cards sent these days are photo cards with printed generic messages or simply just big photos of friends’ children (some of whom you’ve never actually met) with no message or no indication that the photo is even a holiday card.

Now granted, I know people are busy. I’m not expecting long poetic letters expressing the deep meaning of our relationships. I certainly don’t need a typewritten “year in review” detailing all the teeth lost, vacations taken and promotions granted—I’m hoping if someone thinks enough to send me a card I might already know these things have happened.

Writing cards is not my favorite activity, even as a writer. Even so, I always dash off a few lines to let the person/people know I’m actually thinking of them when I’m writing their card. It’s nothing deep, and it’s not intended to be. But I do hope that it cuts above the noise with the understanding that it’s not just another address on the list. These are people I care about. If I have nothing to say to them, then I probably shouldn’t be sending them a card.

I don’t hate babies. I don’t hate your children or your dog or your cat. I love photos. Anyone who’s friends with me on Facebook knows that. I just hate the idea that once again, technology has made us so lazy that an act that was once meant to be personalized and heartfelt—on a holiday that’s supposed to be about connecting with loved ones, spreading cheer—is now just a mass-produced assembly line for another to-do we can easily check off the list.

I fear what’s next: packets of thank-you cards “personalized” with the bride and groom’s photo and a generic “thank you for your gift at our wedding” message printed in script font on the side. (Actually, maybe I shouldn’t give Hallmark this idea. Actually, maybe it’s already been done.)

I’m sorry if I offended anyone. I know that in all the hectic frenzy of the holidays, with all the present buying and decorating and traveling and cooking and eating and entertaining and keeping warm, writing out cards is just another time-consuming task that people dread. I dread it, too. But it’s also something that I think can be enjoyable if you think of it as something you want to do as opposed to a chore that has to be done. Shorten your list. Watch a movie while you’re writing. Hell, have a drink or two. And for christsakes, just SIGN the card yourself. Add a “have a great holiday!” or a “really loved spending time with you this year!” or a “Go Eagles!” to it, too, while you’re at it. I swear it doesn’t take that much longer.