Hi there, it's Micah, producer of the slowdown.

Today's guest episode is hosted by the poet and editor Leslie Signs.

I hope you enjoy, and rest assured that Major will return to the host chair on July 1st. I'm Leslie Signs, and this is the slowdown. I learned how to enjoy my own company while living in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania.

A borough of less than 6,000 people, Lewisburg is most known for housing Bucknell University, where I was

employed for a year as a writing fellow.

Because I didn't own a vehicle and lived on the top floor of a university-owned

apartment affectionately titled The Writers' Cottage, I walked everywhere.

To the giant supermarket, with only the number of reusable bags I could carry back home when full.

To Wilson Ross, the vintage clothing store on Market Street that supplied most of my wardrobe by the time the year was up.

To the Samic Art Museum, where I'd float about, glassy-eyed with a notebook in hand,

admiring the latest exhibition while hoping to run into the

proprietor and operations coordinator, who I was seeing casually.

Other than working on the manuscript that would eventually become my first book, I had just two formal responsibilities.

Serve as an associate poetry editor for West Branch, Bucknell's literary magazine, and a staff for the seminar for undergraduate

poets.

Outside of our Tuesday morning editors meeting, my time was entirely my own. Despite forging a fast and long-standing friendship

with the other writing fellow, I was mostly alone. After my third date with a museum guy, I felt lonelier in his company than when I was alone.

Even my beloved apartment, which was overly spacious for my few belongings, served as a reminder that the stuff of my life had yet to take up enough space to feel substantial.

At the time, all my close friends lived in larger bustling cities.

I regaled them with stories of how blank I felt, not bored but restlessly frozen. All I'd ever wanted was the freedom to

write without having to worry about life's usual intrusions and obligations.

But even with the fellowship of my dreams, my feeling like an island

...