My TueNight 10: Stacy Pratt

Stacy Pratt always meant to be a writer but ended up teaching freshman composition and Native American literature for almost 18 years instead. Then last year, just before her father died the day before her 42nd birthday, he told her to stop teaching and write. She always obeys him, so that’s what she did. Now she is the web editor and a contributing writer for First American Art Magazine, a magazine about Indigenous arts, written primarily by Indigenous writers. She is also a contributing writer at Hello Giggles, and has written for several other places, including Indian Country Media Network.

1. On the nightstand: Ready Player One by Ernest Cline for an essay I’m writing, art magazines, and Before I Grow Too Old by Pat Jilks on Kindle. It’s a self-published book about a woman who walked all the way across England, and when I finish reading it, I just start over.

2. Can’t stop/won’t stop: Defending Taylor Swift on Facebook. I can scroll past all kinds of serious injustice, but when someone unfairly criticizes her, I spend twenty minutes composing a rebuttal.

3. Jam of the minute: The Turnpike Troubadours. (We’re from the same part of Oklahoma.)

4. Thing I miss: Metallica before the black album.

5. 80’s crush: Johnny Lozada of Menudo. All day, every day.

6. Current crush: Aquaman and Sue Perkins

7. Will whine about: Every little thing, honestly. But right now my serious mind is on sexual harassment allegations in the Native literary community. I’m also focused on L’eau Est La Vie’s work to protect Louisiana waterways from pipelines.

8. Will wine about: I have never tried alcohol. I made a vow against it when I heard someone say Indians are all drunks when I was about eight years old. I chocolate and herbal tea, though.

9. Best thing that happened yesterday: I got to interview a Russian ballerina. I’m from rural Oklahoma. I hoped that kind of thing would happen in my life, but I only sort of believed it might.

10. Looking forward to: So many things…the Crazy Rich Asians movie because I loved the books so much. Rebecca Roanhorse’s book Trail of Lightning coming out. My next visit to our ancestral mounds in what is currently Alabama and Georgia.

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