Tucson and the USBBY conference

Things that happened in Tucson:
I felt in love with a saguaro. It stood tall and valiant, enduring the fiery sun without complain. When I saw it for the first time my heart was taken.
I was a USBBY opener speaker. Afterwards I was declared a skin shedder, like the Tucson lizards and snakes.

On the first night dessert was cinnamon chocolate nachos

Things I heard in Tucson:

“No one wants to be wounded by story. People want to be healed by story."

"You cannot blame people and expect them to help you."
“The job of an artist is to take poison and turn it into medicine.”

-Ibtisam Barakat

“Every voice matters. Every voice has a right to speak. Of course, we don’t have to listen.”
-Monty Roessel

"How do you become and artist? The secret is finding your own place and making it sacred.”
-Shonto Begay

"Writing is not about the big things, but about the small things.”
“We are imperfect beings moving towards perfection.”
“Writing is about vision. It is about seeing things.”
“I am a barbarian. I am a savage!”
-David Almond

Things I saw in Tucson:

Liborio, tattooed skin, big shoulders small legs, unshaved face, jumping into the ocean waters as shown in the picture book Un Hombre De Mar written by Rodolfo Castro, illustrated by Manuel Monroy, an IBBY Honour Book. A most poetic sight.
The story in Spanish reads something like this: “Liborio has sea water inside his veins. Waters from the seven legendary seas. With little fish and everything, with vastness, shipwrecks, tides, and swells.”
And here is Liborio on the cover of his book, a man who doesn’t want to be good or bad, but only be like the sea.

Ah, Liborio, I think he could be my uncle.