RACHEL SHOPE
YEARS AS MENTOR: 2
OCCUPATION: Senior Associate Editor, CB Insights
BORN: Chapel Hill, NC
LIVES: New York, NY
PUBLICATIONS AND RECOGNITION: Short play Vinegar Syndrome was published in Twenty-Five Short Plays: Selected Works from the University of North Carolina Long Story Shorts Festival, 2011–2015
MENTOR’S ANECDOTE: Brianna continues to inspire me with her talent, the way she thinks about her creative work, and her active desire to refine her voice. Meeting up in the little Inwood bakery for our pair session is always one of the highlights of my week. Reading her work and talking about the writing process with her has honestly made me a more ambitious writer and a more focused editor. I’m so excited to keep watching her grow and seeing her brilliance continue to evolve.
An Investigation on Affect
BRIANNA CLARKE-ARIAS
This piece was inspired by my evolution as a reader and a writer and how small but impactful experiences have formed how I create along the way.
1. My grandmother left the snow for the sand, and the crowds for the plains, and the present for the future. She filled boxes to the brim with old, browning books that smell like decay and life and left them in her past.
My mother gave them away, but I picked gratuitously from the piles. Kept more of them than I could ever hope to read. They overflow with pages and now my room overflows with their thoughts. In the dark, I’ve heard them speak.
I only ever read their words in my own voice, but when I speak I feel them cling to me. Like I carry them in my voice, like I carry my textbooks to class, like I carry flowers to my mother, like I carry my body from room to room, like I carry feelings in my marrow. Like I carried those books through city blocks and up my stairs.
1. My favorite moment is when words are dripping from my lips, bubbling up and falling in perfect harmony with gravity. Sometimes I feel an emotive tang on my tongue and I know any words that leave my mouth with be languorous and embossed as if with gold.
1. I write poetry on my homework in a stark orange marker. If I press it too sharply to the page it turns red like the dark of juice, wrinkling the paper. Its tip is large and clumsy, but it overpowers the meticulous computer print. That’s how I know the thoughts that flow from my hand.
Orange marks out my words, stains the page, permeates the fibers, floods the space between the pulp with color. I can’t take anything back, the ink of my words does not leave my hands. My fingers carry them. They are the only things I cannot drop. They are still on my skin when I press a new pen to my hand.
1. I read once about the power to be affected. It reminded me of a loud room, where the walls throw the sounds back at one another like a fraught game of tennis and I have to sit immovably in the middle. I wanted to spin tales where I had the power. But what I spun instead was a spiderweb of affection, a canvas of forces absorbed and exerted in all of my words. Sitting in a loud room and playing tennis with the walls. Words dripping from my lips and staining as they fall. Handing back my homework splayed with orange in illegible scrawl. My grandmother handing over the books from her history and my naïve hope to read them all.
Ode to San Vicente
RACHEL SHOPE
This piece is about starting over after deciding the city I was living in wasn’t right for me. Trying new things requires you to be bold—so does scrapping something and trying again.
Outside of Albuquerque, I wondered if I died.
I’d been driving for hours
when suddenly there was no barrier
between land and sky.
Just the same swath of ochre and rust—
homogenous. Infinite.
My hatchback alone on
the road.
The journey I’d made before,
snaking down the southern coast,
Now cut in half—
Pulled taut on I-40.
I have tried to write this so many times.
Mostly it comes out a joke.
Like cutting my foot on the shot glass
I shattered myself.
Like the dogs on the barstools in Flagstaff.
Like being sent on the coffee run
for a soy chai latte.
“It’s just on San Vicente,” they said,
as if that should mean something.
But it all looked the same.
All of it leading me here:
Eastbound. Limitless.
My coffee turning cold.
LILA COOPER
YEARS AS MENTEE: 2
GRADE: Senior
HIGH SCHOOL: Institute for Collaborative Education
BORN: Brooklyn, NY
LIVES: Brooklyn, NY
MENTEE’S ANECDOTE: Carly (my mentor) and I had been toying around with the idea of writing about the important women in our lives for a while, but kept putting it off for other more elusive topics like tofu and a potential DJ who frequented the coffee shop we like to meet at. I had hit a real creative block when trying to come up with ideas for the theme, until Carly suggested I write about my mom.
CARLY PIFER
YEARS AS MENTOR: 1
OCCUPATION: Content and Creative Director
BORN: Los Angeles, CA
LIVES: Brooklyn, NY
MENTOR’S ANECDOTE: Lila doesn’t consider herself to be bold in the traditional sense, but that’s not what I see. At each of our meetings, Lila arrives wearing amazing vintage finds and eye makeup looks that deserve their own YouTube channel. More important, her voice is intensely honest, vulnerable, and impactful, whether she’s writing about vegetables or body image. Our meetings remind me that there is endless inspiration in the coffee-shop world around us.
Sunday Scaries
LILA COOPER
This personal essay is about my mom, who, as cheesy as it sounds, is one of the first people I think of when I hear the word “bold.”
The first time my mother sent her food back to the kitchen I wanted to hide under the table and get up only when all of the chairs had been stacked, so the staff would think I was just an errant second grader; that had to be less embarrassing. Sure, it was the wrong order, yes, it had cheese even though we explicitly ordered something without dairy because it made me break out into a rash, but I still would’ve eaten it, I would’ve rather eaten dairy for the rest of my life than this. I would be red, but at least there would’ve been a reason that didn’t include excess shame.
To me, causing conflict was the worst thing I could do. Somehow I had found myself sandwiched between never wanting to be seen and wanting everyone to notice me, like I was a giant traffic cone that everyone looked at for only a second but wondered about for days. Maybe it was because my mother was always assertive, at five feet one inch, you wouldn’t expect for her presence to fill up a room the way it did, almost like the room swelled to fit her, and secretly I always wanted that.
Her opinions were brash and sometimes unpopular *insert one of her many grand stands about why drinking iced beverages is the reason that Americans are sick, here,* but she didn’t seem to care in the way that I did. Shame didn’t seem to permeate her bubble the way it filled my mind, like volcanic ash, covering my tongue in a thick layer of soot.
As a child I hid in corners, marred by feelings of inadequacy but inspired by my mother’s boldness. I watched her haggle with the women in Chinatown over the price of ginger and cherries, an act I am admittedly still afraid to perform even though nothing brings me more joy than a deal. I would marvel at how she could make small talk with the cashiers; once I stopped being adorable and morphed into an eleven-year-old who looked like a gremlin, small talk got a lot harder. It was no longer people fawning, and instead people asking real questions, the kind you get bored of answering almost as soon as you hear them.
What I loved the most about my mother’s boldness was that it was the kind that lent itself to everyday situations; it was discreet. Over the years, I have become moderately l
ess timid, and I attribute it to her. Watching her confront everyday life, even when she didn’t want to, makes things seem less terrifying.
Shoe Thrower
CARLY PIFER
The Ctrl + B theme made me reflect on the bold women I have known. While those relationships are often intense and emotional, there is beauty in the moments of chaos and even humor in the loss of decorum.
My mother likes to tell stories from her childhood. There’s one I remember in particular; it’s called “The Time Joycie Threw Her Shoe out the Window.”
On the whim of my grandfather, who can’t decide if he’d rather be in Illinois or California, my mother and her five younger siblings are driving across the country, when there is commotion in the backseat. Joe is antagonizing Joyce, and in a moment of rage, Joyce grabs her shoe off her five-year-old foot and aims for Joe’s head. She misses, but her attempt is commendable. The adults in the front seat inquire, “What’s going on back there?” and the answer is stated simply, “Joycie threw her shoe out the window.”
Joyce was my favorite aunt growing up. A rebel! A shoe thrower! Like me. When I got sent away from home at sixteen, she said she would take me. It didn’t really work, though, two women like that in one house. She kicked me out after two weeks. Joycie: takes no shit! Also: throws shoes.
I imagine the shoe flying out the car window and into the light (I’ve always pictured them in Arizona, scenery I borrowed from Thelma & Louise); there’s dust and lots of sky. The shoe sails cinematically through the air and lands on the side of an untouched ridge, a bit off the two-lane highway. About two hundred feet up, the station wagon screeches to a halt.
A shoe was a precious thing, a thing that made you slam on the brakes. My grandfather, at the wheel, pulls over to the side of the road. My grandma, hair whipping over her eyes, hand shielding her face from the sun, exits the car and runs down the road, scanning for the shoe.
She’s squinting against the desert heat, searching the ground. After not too long, she finds it, right side up, sitting like it’s part of the landscape. She plucks it.
The shoe is a rare succulent, a misfired weapon, a discarded trophy. My grandmother carries it back to the car.
BERNA DA’COSTA
YEARS AS MENTEE: 3
GRADE: Senior
HIGH SCHOOL: Stuyvesant High School
BORN: Goa, India
LIVES: Bronx, NY
MENTEE’S ANECDOTE: Jamie! Where to start? Almost three years and I realize now, at the end of this final one, I am no more ready to miss our Friday (sometimes rescheduled to Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday) meetings, to miss writing with you. Hazelnut macaroons, Joe & The Juice’s obnoxiously loud playlist, Financier’s amazing one, deadlines we missed (I missed), watching umbrellas break in the rain. I am so grateful to have met you, to have gotten the privilege to know you. You’re wonderful (wonderful). Thank you for being my mentor.
JAMIE SERLIN
YEARS AS MENTOR: 3
OCCUPATION: Director, West Wing Writers LLC
BORN: Philadelphia, PA
LIVES: Brooklyn, NY
MENTOR’S ANECDOTE: Berna! Where to start. We’ve been through so much together over these last three years—awkward silences, writer’s block, impossible deadlines, tears, self-doubt, and never, never enough sleep. And we’ve also had genuine giggles, sparks of creative genius, surges of inspiration, amazing accomplishments, (happy) tears, and a probably unhealthy amount of sugar. I’m so grateful for every part of this journey, and so excited to see and read what Berna does next. I can say with confidence, I’m a better writer, mentor, and human for the time we’ve spent together.
[yellow …]
BERNA DA’COSTA
A piece dedicated to my favorite yellow dress, to all the yellow things I have amassed since then.
yellow
all i knew once was that no one could wear it
too bright
and i wasn’t bright
dark hair, dark skin, dark eyes
but i can wear it
i don’t know since
when i began to notice how wonderful it looked on me
on my darker than i thought dark skin
maybe since i bought that yellow dress
my favorite dress
and wore it so much the threads are beginning to break
the yellow it was now paler
it’s short but not too short
off the shoulders
and i get a sort of thrill from that
slipping on a cardigan because i want to
not because my mother told me to
wrapping it around my body because i’m cold
not because my chest is exposed
my earliest memory of yellow
was at my sister’s communion reception
the children were playing a game
who knew her the best
and i had thought
of course i do
the question was, “what is her favorite color?”
and i immediately said blue
because it was everyone’s favorite color
not the sun
but the sky behind it
but she shook her head
then i said black
because our hair
her ripped black jeans
my black hoodie i wore so much it had become gray
the color i thought my eyes were because everything else was
but she shook her head again
colors flew out of our mouths
and when no one could answer correctly
she said yellow
and i watched as the prize was taken away
wrapped in sparkling blue wrapping paper
the color yellow had tasted sour after that
the lemonade i made
not my mother’s
always sweet with just enough salt
i ignored it
continued to consider my favorite color black
sometimes if i liked someone
and wanted them to think i was interesting
then my favorite color was electric blue
but then i bought that dress
this life-saving dress
it had ended up over my arms
with the pile of clothes i had accumulated
because i take everything off the rack
hoping it would fit well enough
that i could convince myself to buy it
and it did
so well
in the most beautiful way to say it
i felt like a girl
and that’s a good thing
i know now
i remember an article i read about how
awesome, badass female characters are
stripped of their femininity to be
more appealing
more interesting
and realizing i was complicit
my writing ugly evidence
ashamed of being associated with
caring, loving, kind
thinking of my mother
who wore these qualities
fit her
so well
i scrapped the first character i had ever written
killed my darling
even though no one could kill her
rewrote her with long hair she
knew how to style
because makeup isn’t shameful
it’s deadly
with all the details you notice when you look at yourself
in the mirror longer
instead of only briefly
expecting to be disappointed anyway
the small mole dotted under my eye
the shape of them
my father saying “don’t look at me with those big eyes”
that they’re a warm brown, not black
the pennies my grandfather collected
when he traveled the world on a sh
ip
i stood, looking in the mirror
the lighting in the dressing room unflattering
but my confidence didn’t shake
didn’t want to take it off
scolded me for not wearing yellow sooner
before it had been so destroyed
but maybe i didn’t deserve it yet
because i wasn’t happy
i was shadows and smiling without teeth
i was avoiding my reflection
i was creating characters i wanted to be someday
but i am happier now
still chipped in so many places
but no one should be perfectly, unbreakably designed
even this character of mine
my darling, even more darling now
should be flawed
should be defeatable
should be happy
wear a yellow dress
short but not too short
off the shoulders
get a sort of thrill from that
her favorite color
yellow
sunflower yellow
the amber in my eyes
the loose scarf my cousin knit me
the lemon on my mother’s hands
her love
gold
sparkling
shining
in mine
Most Improved
JAMIE SERLIN
I believe accepting ourselves is one of the boldest things any of us can do. I wish I’d learned to do it sooner, but I’m glad to be getting there at last.
Growing up, it became a running joke in my family: At the end of every season, no matter what extracurricular activity I was involved in, I always received the award for Most Improved.
Tennis.
Soccer.
Swimming.
Hebrew school attendance??
(Yes, I am a member of the Participation Trophy Generation. We had award ceremonies for everything.)