Category Archives: Uncategorized

I turn 40 on January 4 of 2018. If you’d like to spoil me, here is a list of things I’d love: This book: This bookcase: https://www.target.com/p/7-shelf-hollow-core-bookcase-homestar/-/A-21536056?lnk=fiatsCookie This bedspread in Queen: https://www.overstock.com/Bedding-Bath/Urban-Habitat-Kids-Bliss-Blue-Cotton-5-piece-Duvet-Cover-Set/16740020/product.html?option=27852748&keywords=clouds%20duvet%20cover&refccid=4GX64BQGAC5JSQKCOWVAX3XVBE&refinement=&searchidx=0 These giant scarab earrings: This print:    This rug: A Sephora gift certificate

From AAWW: Join us for a subversive, raucous night celebrating novelist Randa Jarrar’s debut short story collection, Him, Me, Muhammad Ali(Sarabande 2016). We’ll hear from Randa herself as well as a cast of literary all-stars performing her work: essayist Moustafa Bayoumi, poet Hala Alyan, and Buzzfeed’s Sara Yasin. BTW, did we mention that we’ll have aContinue reading

A group of us have asked PEN America to decline funding from the Israeli Embassy for its PEN World Voices Festival of International Literature. PEN responded that they don’t do boycotts. Here is a letter I just sent to them: Dear Suzanne (and Jacob, and Colm), PEN’s egregious response to our call to reject fundingContinue reading “Open Letter to PEN American Regarding its acceptance of Israeli funding”

I’ve been working with wonderful student editors to revamp the Normal School literary magazine’s online presence. I’m very proud of the work we’re doing. Take a look! 

                      My heart is with Gaza.

    One of my essays, about a conversation I had with my son, is collected here in this new NYT anthology of Lives essays. You can read more about it here.

At the gym pool today, I saw an elderly fellow fat femme. Perhaps in her eighties, she was wearing a swimsuit with bling all along the bust. She approached me in the steamroom. “Where’d you get your bathing suit?” she said. Mine is a halter swimsuit with pineapple print. Me, sheepishly: “A store called…Forever 21.Continue reading

I’ve written about the Boston bomber; about the US government’s attempts to deport my brother, which kept him in jail for weeks, and about Israel detaining me– a US citizen– and denying me entry in March of 2012, but the essay of mine that has sparked the most impassioned responses is one about… Bellydancing. TheContinue reading “New Essay”

I chatted with Other People with Brad Listi Podcast this week. It was super fun, partly because I’d never done a podcast interview before & got to be myself (=swear like a sailor). Topics discussed: Sex-positive dads, Palestine, Singing in falsetto around the house, Racism, Flâneurs. Interview starts at 6:32. Give it a listen here. 

Outside the restrooms, each door bore the standard gender symbol denoting male (♂) and female (♀). She stood in front of them and said, “When I come out, I will need you to write something. Please get the notebook,” and disappeared into the women’s room. When she finally emerged, she stood in between the twoContinue reading “New Short Story”