Today, I got the best kind of email from an editor at Longreads and learned that I’d sold an essay of mine from my experimental memoir, DREAM POP ORIGAMI. This is a major victory for me, not only because I’ve been working on and off again on this essay for the past five-six years (as I have the memoir itself), but also because this essay died in limbo at The Rumpus after the Torch series editor had recommended and passed it on to one of the editors who never responded to my emails, so yeah, it's wonderful to see “Snagged in an Old Butterfly Net” find the right home at Longreads, which has been curating and publishing amazing original work for a long time now. Among other things, this is an essay about the redemption of language, the way I have found solace and self-empowerment in my words from my first Spelling Bee in junior high to my stint in the Peace Corps in West Africa to college and beyond all the way to this year as an emerging (non) fiction writer. This piece means a great deal to me because it explains why language is still important in this world and how my writing has saved my ass repeatedly growing up. I feel that this personal essay, that combines elements of cultural criticism, deserves to be out there in the world. I’m so grateful to Sari for buying it today. More info to come!