Introduction: Partners Who Don’t Write Together
Faith Adiele and I consider ourselves collaborators, even writing partners, even though we don’t write together. As a matter of fact, this is the first time we’ve collectively embarked on a writing project–inspired by our special ride-along relationship in writing and in the world. Over our 17-year relationship, we’ve come to realize that writing is a pursuit, a challenge, an obsession—the work of writing penetrates our skin, defines us in the literary, political and cultural worlds, and affirms our existence. And it’s impossible to go it alone.
The environment and culture of the literary world dictated this relationship. The navigation of the thorny, often racist, unbending nature of publishing requires something stronger than an ally. A partner whose stake in our writing work and writing health is a commitment of alertness and care. Gradually, through a series of planned and unplanned encounters, Faith and I morphed into life partners in writing. We ride side-by-side through this thing called a writing life. This collaboration dives deeply into each other’s practices, products and spirits as writers in an intimate way.
Like a gift, the call from About Place arrived just as writers are called to hold fast to each other and to the truth. The holistic reframing of collaboration spoke to us, and Elmaz Abinader and I jumped at the invitation to retrace our journey together—the way partners at a dinner party perform the story of their love affair—from writing in parallel spaces to cohabiting in a literary partnership that informs not only our work but also our teaching, activism and vision for the literary world.
Online Dating Profile: Getting To Know Each Other Before Meeting
My connection with you, Faith, started before we met or even knew each other. We inhabited the same terrain in publishing, writing, and teaching. As two of the handful of women writers-of-color working in memoir and teaching non-fiction, we were identified and identified with each other and our work.
I taught your memoir, Meeting Faith: The Forest Journals of a Black Buddhist Nun, long before I met you. This memoir bears little resemblance to my work, Children of the Roojme. Mine was sweeping, multi-generational, bound historically, and moved across three continents. Yours, Meeting Faith, is very personal. The title extension “forest journals” signals intimacy and contemplation. Meeting Faith takes place over a few years, the story an accompaniment to the journey of your becoming Thailand’s first Black Buddhist nun. The narrative uses the whole page, inside and outside the margins with humor, poetry, meditations and images.
Faith here. As with my husband (was it the African students’ dance at MIT or the birthday brunch at my apartment?), I have a different memory of our first meeting. I remember my excitement at discovering another memoirist of color at my publishing house, especially one who’d written the type of sweeping, multi-generational, multi-continental, historically bound family memoir to which I aspired.
Once I learned that you’d been selected for an official, two-year-long mentorship with my literary idol Toni Morrison, I was in awe. You described literally sitting at her feet for the years between getting your graduate degree and publishing your memoir. That was your nun apprenticeship, as it were. Part of the impetus behind you later starting VONA, a summer workshop for writers of color, was her directive to you to pay it forward. In some ways, Toni Morrison godmothered us both along this journey.
First Date: Socially Engaged Writers at Pittsburgh
In 2008, you called me to be part of a mini conference you were organizing called The Socially Engaged Writer. You arranged readings, class visits, and a panel on Writing and Social Responsibility with Vietnamese American journalist and writer Andrew Lam, Liberian American poet Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, white American-raised-in-Ethiopia memoirist Tim Bascom, and me. The idea of presenting predominantly writers of color was daring then and led to my meeting you and what-would-last-for-a-while, conversation with each other. I still have my souvenir University of Pittsburgh mug.
Yes, when I cold called you, you said you’d just gotten off a flight and had been reading Meeting Faith! You asked how I knew you were a Pitt alumna, which believe it or not, I had no idea. I was calling because I needed an Arab American activist-memoirist in my life. I spent the first afternoon running around buying treats and souvenirs. When at dinner you raved about the welcome basket in your room, I was like, “Yes, Africans and Arabs are cut from the same cloth. Hospitality matters.”
Second Date: Co-Teaching at VONA
At the VONA (Voices of our Nations Arts Foundation): Summer Workshop for Writers of Color, I taught a class in memoir. By 2008, our tenth year, applications surged, and I overenrolled the class. Our limit was ten; I had sixteen—an untenable number of writers to give attention to in one week. I needed a co-faculty member to provide intimate and focused support for these writers I couldn’t bear to turn away. I deliberately chose you for your sensibilities and unique styles that would not only complement mine but also disrupt the standards my work exemplified. I needed your light and breadth and so did my students. You sat with all of them, not just half–you encouraged our writers of color to derive and to deliver their stories from a multitude of source materials, from music to family storytelling.
I couldn’t believe my luck. Prior to grad school and academia, I’d been a diversity trainer and director of a non-profit that trained students to do social justice work in multiracial collectives, but I’d never even heard of a workshop for writers of color. I was used to being the only one in the classroom, one of two Black women in my MFA program. VONA was like a dream—the faculty were warm and welcoming as family; the students bonded quickly and hard.
It did wonders for my identity as a writer/activist and as a teacher/mentor. For the first time, my multiracial Black femaleness and my reading list and my social and political engagements were seen as strengths in the classroom, not something to complain about on evaluations. At the same time, I was blown away by your teaching skills. You were charismatic and funny and confident in the classroom; it was a performance full of quotable nuggets of wisdom and inspiration. I nearly wore out my thumbs typing notes on my not-smart phone. For this one crazy prompt, you nearly hypnotized the class, speaking nonstop, guiding them to a particular moment in childhood, a specific street, house, room. I was like, “How is she remembering all this, and how are they following?” A spell settled over the room, everyone scribbling furiously. Their shares were brilliant little gems glowing with authentic detail and recovered emotion. I was gob smacked.
Courtship: Mills College
Soon after! The English Department of Mills College, where I was a professor, established a new position for our burgeoning MFA program in Creative Writing: Distinguished Writer. We rotated one-year plus spots through different genres, one year poetry, a couple years, fiction. When we were looking to appoint a Distinguished Writer in Creative Nonfiction, I persuaded the chair of the English Department to consider you. I really didn’t know if you were available, or that you were having a career crisis, and that Oakland had more than one attraction to you.
Ohmigod, that invitation changed everything! Pitt had kicked me in the teeth, and I was thinking about leaving academia. I’d reconnected with an ex-boyfriend who lived in Oakland, but everything else was up in the air. On faith, I accepted this position at a school I’d never seen and moved into faculty housing with a man I hadn’t dated in a decade! My first week, you drove us around, pointing out the lay of land and how to design a life. Though my now-husband had been living in Oakland for years, he didn’t know about coffeehouses and hiking paths and consignment stores. For a full year, whenever we had to decide something, he’d muse, “What would Elmaz do?”
Getting Serious: BinderCon & Shared Teaching Philosophy
I think BinderCon 2015 was one of the first times we thought about creating something completely new together as collaborators, something that we owned together. I guess you could say we were getting serious. We were invited to present at a women’s conference, and you’re great at coming up with a million catchy ideas in minutes. We decided to focus on Writing the Other, something that always came up in our teaching and speaking. I could talk about memoir, journalism, and documentary film; you could talk about poetry, fiction, and playwriting. We had a blast building a shared Google Drive of materials. There’s a great picture of us in L.A. leaning over the table mid-laugh. It captures the joy and energy we discovered presenting together (and the enthusiasm with which the audience responded). Afterwards we said, We can do this. We should take this show on the road! We were invited to recreate the workshop at BinderCon New York, but sadly, it wasn’t the hot topic it is today. If only we’d waited a bit longer, we’d be rich!
BinderCon cinched our collaboration as we knew our aesthetics around “writing the other” were similar. We co-created our curriculum. And exhibited to each other the kinds of cool stuff we do in our individual classrooms. I would say we contributed equally, as much as any two people can. One of your exercises, the “Inventory Your Biases” worksheet was so simple and illuminating. The tone was set for our workshop and the mission was clear.
The Proposal: Writing Residencies & Traveling Together
Every time we had a reading or a teaching gig or a weekend or week-long workshop, the flow of our time, our work together, our interest in each other’s projects was organic. A reading at the East Bay Book Festival, the VONA/Voices workshop, Vortext Weekend master classes at Hedgebrook Residency for women and the pursuant week of writing in our cabins clarified how in-tune we were with each other and most importantly, how much fun we had when we spent extended amounts of time together. Although other faculty shared our spaces, I beamed in on your experience and you checked in on mine. I knew our connection would solidify and grow.
Of course, one of the classic tests of any relationship is going away together. For our first two-person writing retreat, we rented a creekside cottage a couple hours north and discovered a couple things—that we were compatible living and working together, but that a DIY residency wasn’t equitable. You were in charge of cooking and our workout schedule, which ended up being too much. The next summer, you suggested applying to an artist residency together. Both international residency veterans, we started emailing each other aspirational listings.
One of the unknowns at an artist colony is the other residents, but by applying together, we could ensure a good experience while also deepening our opportunities to collaborate and travel together. We took different approaches to our three-person residency in a French village—you wrote for short bursts, interspersed with walks in the countryside, while I stationed myself at my desk until dinner time. But we made time to explore the countryside together, befriending vendors at the farmers’ market and integrating into the community. Our public presentation linked our respective projects—your novel about the war in Lebanon, my memoir about Afro-Nordic heritage—while also inviting locals to reflect on and share their own family and regional histories.
Other years, our schedules didn’t align, but applying together still opened the door to magic. One year, you got a residency in the south of France, and I didn’t, but we traveled to the town beforehand and stayed together. Serendipitously, as your residency started, a friend of yours got me a cat sitting gig three hours away. In the afternoons, we’d write together on Zoom.
Keeping The Marriage Alive: Things We Do Together
Another collaborative milestone is when we started our writing group. Folks always ask me how to find a group, and it is a complex thing to get right. You and I were already writing together weekly as Accountability Buddies, and one day you were bemoaning not having anyone to read your manuscript before sending it to an editor or agent, and I was bemoaning not having found a writing groups in the Bay. We looked at each other and it was a lightbulb moment. Could we be the answer to each other’s problems? We brainstormed the ideal group: women of color who were ready for a Finishing Group, that is, who already had completed manuscripts and were willing to meet every two weeks to speed through them. We decided that four was the ideal number and tasked each other with coming up with potential names to review together.
Initially we thought we’d each get through our manuscripts and disband, but the group took on a life of its own. Now we don’t just workshop pages—we help each other plan book promo, apply for grants, write book proposals, find agents, throw each other book parties, even talk each other down off the ledge and take spa days. During the pandemic, Group was my central pod and lifeline. Members have come and gone. You and I have remained the constant.
Every one of us brings a superpower to the table, whether we are structure masters or world-building crafters. Each person’s comments and concerns resonate in my ears after a good workshop session. You, in particular, help me see through the lens of vitality—how is my work engaging with political and cultural realities and how does it affect the global perspective? Those questions stay in the subterranean writing consciousness. I don’t need to ask myself what the purpose of my work is anymore.
Keeping The Marriage Alive: Things We Do Separately
Although we started in the same terrain back in our early days, like any good relationship, we struck out on individual projects. I developed two poetry manuscripts in our time together. I am finishing a novel and have published several short stories. You swirled into many avenues of creative nonfiction and hybrid works, and writing for various projects in media and magazine publishing.
Yeah, but whenever I get a freelance writing gig, I ask you what I should write about! At this point, you’re like a living Rolodex. You remember which stories I’ve drafted but not sold, which vignettes could be developed, what my various obsessions are. And even when we’re doing our separate things, we intersect at key moments or end up influencing each other somehow.
We both love great ideas, particularly about craft and teaching. You introduced to VONA BIPOC travel writing which developed into a trend of decolonizing travel writing. Of course, I hit my palm to the side of my head, because, as I learned from you, “Every time a person of color leaves home, they are traveling.” Ours are the stories of relocation, or dispossession, of resettling and unsettling. And also of traveling. I was able to see in my essays, how I had focused on my body in unknown places and how I fit or didn’t fit there.
During the Pandemic, I started BIPOC Writing Party, a free weekly online community, with a graduate of VONA I’d met through you. (In fact, she’d asked you first and came to me when you declined.) So many of the folks who turned up each week were from the VONA community, and we modeled our ethics of accessibility and care on what we’d learned from VONA’s golden years. Eventually the Party took on its own literary activism, raising money to pay underemployed Black and indigenous hosts during a national crisis, training members of the community to facilitate, modeling non-hierarchical leadership for three years.
When each of us gets to the end of the journey of a project, it’s like we’ve both arrived.
How We Practice Reciprocity & Ethics of Care
Write or die writing partners buoy our writing lives and spirits when resuscitation is needed, when quiet is called for, and also by influencing a new vision for each other and the worlds we inhabit. The trust we have stems from an amazing confluence of factors: from the terrain we inhabit as writers, to our thrust as teachers and mentors to our activism as and for writers of color.
We hear that the power to “be oneself” is a key ingredient in a good relationship. After negative experiences in workshops, rejections by editors, self-doubt, I overcome all that in this partnership. I can signal disappointment hard. You have figured out how to wait that out till I get to the other side and become productive again. The care is subtle, patient and solid.
In a capitalist society, it can be hard not to tie your worth as an artist to production. Am I writer if I’m struggling for years over a manuscript no one wants to buy? When I’m helping others find their voices through teaching and speaking and mentoring that doesn’t leave enough gas in the tank to get to my own work? Sometimes I drive to your house to cry. Or to admit to feelings of failure I’d never dare voice in the world. Or if I did, folks would try to talk me out of. Sometimes we need someone who can acknowledge that our deepest darkest fears are legit, the same someone who holds up a mirror showing our shiniest self.
Relationship Hints!
- Create a Safe & Supportive Space – Find a partner who shares your literary values, your moral and political concerns, and commitment to growth.
- Recognize Strengths and Insecurities – Celebrate each other’s uniqueness, swagger, and presence. Make room for flaws and follow through with grace.
- Commit to Accountability – Be part of each other’s foundation and drive. Not only maintain momentum with regular check-ins, stay interested in each other’s work and direct opportunities to each other.
- Integrate Reciprocity – Offer as much as you receive by supporting each other’s projects–note that sometimes this exchange is lopsided based on where each other is in a project. Stay enthusiastic with every step of each other’s development. As activists and feminists, we commit to sharing resources and lifting each other as we climb.
- Prioritize Longevity – Invest in each other as writers and as partners. Manage bumps in the road through communication and love.
- Believe in Magic – A reminder that the best partnerships transcend logic and are built on trust, shared vision, and a bit of creative alchemy.
