Where I Write: With Brooke Segarra
Where I Write, a series of short interviews with current students, faculty, and alumni of the Creative Writing Program. It is a discussion of place in writing. What our writing spaces look like can be as varied as the physical spaces that exist (or don’t!) in New York and beyond, and as varied as the mental and psychic spaces we occupy while we write. Bring the fragments together with second year MFA in fiction Brooke Segarra.
Where do you write?
Everywhere, honestly. I write fragments of things in the Notes App on my iPhone. Later, I open Notes on my MacBook, copy and paste that shorthand into a Google Doc and then go from there.
Stand, sit or other?
I’m usually in the middle of something, about to fall asleep, or pacing around my apartment listening to music at its max volume on my headphones when I come up with an idea I like. I’m usually sitting when I try to bring those fragments of thought into something coherent.
What is your writing practice?
Mostly it’s a lot of attempting to be kind to myself. I make several cups of tea. I take my two rescued chihuahua mixes to the dog park. I listen to a lot of music. I do a lot of walking around my apartment, and not that much sitting. I might buy myself chocolate at the bodega. Play chess against the computer.
What are your favorite procrastinations?
My life feels like one big procrastination, but life also advises writing, so maybe avoidance assists the writing?
We live in interesting times, which book/author keeps you sane/grounded?
I like to flip through Malina by Ingeborg Bachman and Veronica by Mary Gaitskill. I also like True Stories by Sophie Calle. Right now, those books make me want to write.
What is your new skill learned during the shutdowns of the Pandemic
I can do a very beginner, yet intuitive, tarot reading.
And also, now when I’m invited to a get-together I am very likely to be in the mood to go without a second thought.
What is your dream writing space?
Somewhere the ocean is outside my window, and I can hear the waves against the rocks.
Brooke Segarra is a second year MFA in fiction student. She lives in Brooklyn and is working on a creative project that hasn’t realized its finalized form.
