I don't like speed. I would have made a terrible Futurist. Even when I did take drugs, I never liked amphetamines and much preferred the slow taffy-pull of time that you get with opiates.

In Chicago, if you tell someone you're a writer, they look at you suspiciously - as if to say "yeah, right." In New York, people don't question the idea. If you say you're a writer, that's what you are.

The postcard is sacred to me. It makes me sad that no one sends them very much anymore because of email and texting. I still like to buy them, but they've lost their original function and now just seem like reminders or mementos of what they used to be.

Technology sounds quick and easy, but it ends up taking up too much of your time.

In the past things were either in your head (subjective, imaginary, fantasy) or else they were part of the outside world - cold, hard, concrete materialistic reality. If you want to look at it in terms of poetry, there was surrealism and objectivism. Now there's the veil of the virtual in between. The old opposition between inner and outer doesn't quite capture it, especially as it contains elements of both. It's real but not concrete.

I think the more stability a person has, the more they can follow esoteric or intellectual pursuits.

I can appreciate the idea that with e-books more people would publish, the work would be easier to disseminate, and that it could even be interactive. Being a lover of photography, I especially like the idea that you could include lots of pictures - full-color pictures - with your writing. That to me is exciting! We'll all have to stay tuned to see what develops.