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AI: And so you had... you were preparing to discontinue your, your work in consultation and your work with the foundation, and so tell me what you were doing and what happened in that year --

PJ: In that year...

AI: -- leading into 2001.

PJ: Well I, you know, I was an English major in college, but I think I never really had -- I've had a lot of faith in my ability to do just about everything, except write. And so it's been this very emotional place for me where I've never taken the risk of saying, "This is just what I'm gonna be. I'm just gonna write. I'm not gonna do other work, I'm not gonna be an activist, I'm not gonna be a consultant, I'm just gonna write." And after my book came out, and I think I talked about this hunger that people had for more information, and I just felt like there was a lot that I wanted to say that I still hadn't said yet, that I was gathering in the re-acclimatization to the United States. And so, and I was also doing these interviews for the Casey Foundation which made me realize the power of an individual story. And so I had this idea to write a book about South Asians in America, kind of focusing on individual stories of people to try and dispel some of the stereotypes and say this is not a singular culture, this is a... you know, they're incredible, there's incredible diversity of, in South Asian Americans that are here in this country, and here's what they're contributing and here are some of the struggles that they go through and here are their personal stories.

So I had this in my mind, and at the same time I was also working on a collection of short fiction that I started, actually, in March of 2000 when my book had just been published. And I was working on this book on South Asian Americans out at Hedgebrook, a women writer's retreat. And it was a beautiful day. I think I had just picked up the hardcover of my book, so I had just seen it in print. And I took the ferry out to Whidbey Island and was sitting in my little beautiful cottage. And suddenly I just realized I wanted to write a story. And it was a story of a young girl in a village, and it was fiction. But it was a wonderful experience because again, it was about rural... most of the literature that you see is about the urban India. It isn't so much about rural India. There's a few people, Rohinton Mistry and a few people, but not much. So I had started writing these short stories as well. So I had this idea that I wanted to take six months off and work on this second book on South Asian Americans and also this collection of short fiction. And it took me a long time to do that because I'm an activist at heart and so there's fear involved and you know, if I put away all this stuff that I know how to do and I know I know to do it, then what's gonna happen to me? What if this doesn't work out? What if I'm a complete flop as a writer? You know, what do I do then? And it's a funny thing because I've never thought that about anything else. So it took me a while to really work out how, both the finances of it but also, you know, yes, this is what I want to do. And so I had decided that I was gonna take that six months off. I worked to clear everything off my plate and I was gonna take that six months off the day that I moved into my new house because I had just gone through a separation and a divorce. And I moved into my new house on September 10, 2001. And September 11th happened the day after. And sometimes I think about it and I think, is this, was this fated somehow that my plate was completely clear, and I jumped into doing what I know best? Or was it something else? And I don't know the answer to it. But September 11th happened and because of all the work I had been doing in immigrant refugee communities and with Chaya, I started getting a lot of calls from Sikhs and Muslims and people who were being targeted right after September 11th. And...

<End Segment 4> - Copyright © 2004 Densho. All Rights Reserved.