The popular Native American poet Mark Turcotte told an audience of students and faculty last semester that progress can only happen when we look to the sky. So many people, he claims, spend their time looking at the computer in their hands. How can we progress when we are always looking down? His words are fitting today as I look up and find snow ( Read more... )

I have not blogged in over a year, and much has changed. My blogs will continue to be random rants, barely revised comments that refuse to sit inside as thoughts kept to myself. This thought comes after the latest Sports Illustrated issue arrived at my house yesterday, with a smiling Jason Collins on the front. The cover announces, "The Gay Athlete ( Read more... )

Everything we need to know can be learned in a children's book (or from children's book authors). Last week, I blogged about the Dr. Seuss exhibit at the MSI, highlighting the lyrical quality of Seuss's plea for world peace. It seems so simple. You in your comfortable paradise and me in my house with tiny feet to warm and paws to wipe, joining ( Read more... )

Singer/songwriter David Gray writes about seconds and moments that rarely occur in his song "Fugitive"; he describes how it's rare that people get a twinkle in their eye, but it happens, if only for a second. It happened to me yesterday at the Museum of Science and Industry.

After grading 1200 essays in four months the boys and I took a celebratory ( Read more... )

SCBWI Member of the Year 2010, Christopher Cheng, shares Australian gifts with Illinois writers!


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It's 1:30 in the morning and I should be sleeping, but my mind is fighting post-conference limbo, juggling between inspiration and motivation, willing me to do something profound with new creative fuel. This weekend I attended the best slumber party of all time--the SCBWI's 40th Anniversary Summer Conference.

I'm still riding a high from meeting ( Read more... )

The second time around is better in many instances. Love. Manuscripts. Conferences. You just seem to know how to avoid problems and what to do when they come up. So this year when I was asked to return to the DePaul Summer Writing Conference, I was both honored and extra-prepared.

I avoided one-lane highway closures due to Optimus Prime battles. ( Read more... )

I am not transgender. I am not seventeen. I am not a fourteen-year-old boy. I am not any of my characters from piles of manuscripts, but I wrote a book to make a difference. I chose to tell the story of a friend who struggled with gender identity before there were support groups and celebrities with books about transitioning, online photos of ( Read more... )

I'm baking chocolate chip cookies with someone I love and my hands smell like vanilla and sugar. Perfect for typing. It makes me grateful for the life I live. I spent the day building business plans and book plans with friends who mean the world to me. I enjoyed a moment walking arm-in-arm in the rain through Oak Park with a friend who I share the ( Read more... )

WARNING: FLASHLESS PHOTOS AND RUN-ON SENTENCES! eeeeeeek!!!
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In honor of the day before the last class of the semester (hoo-ray!), I took a trip to the Art Institute of Chicago. My palms are still a little sweaty from the thousand-mile walk and train ride, boat and plane ride ( Read more... )