This Monday we welcomed our member Jessica Vealitzek to Portland’s feminist bookstore In Other Words to read from her newly published novel The Rooms Are Filled. Other local members of the PDXX Collective were her opening acts. It was an auspicious day: the day the Oregon ban on same-sex marriage was struck down.

Andrea Janda read the emotional ruling from Judge McShane opening the door for marriage equality before reading her own “Ride.”

Emily Hemson read about bonding with strangers over inappropriate breakfast foods.

Carrie Hamm read “A Love Poem to these Women, My Friends“

Sophia Pfaff Shalmiyev read a prose poem referencing a symbolic ostrich.

Soon-to-join-PDXX-Collective Melanie Coffee read about reporting on the racist backlash against Muslims after 9/11.

I read about the intelligence of octopi and eating seafood during a year in Japan with an excerpt from my MFA thesis.

And finally, our leading lady, Jessica Vealitzek.