Geronimo Tagatac, after returning from Vietnam, began to write on scraps of paper as a way to deal with the strong ideas that would come into his head. At first, his writing was without form or direction. When he moved, he would throw the scrap piles out. Then he began to write on napkins in coffee shops, stuff them in envelopes, and send his thoughts to his friends. Eventually he started to keep a journal. He finally took a writing class and within a few years, he began publishing his stories in magazines. In 1997, Tagatac was awarded the Oregon Literary Arts Fellowship and in the summers of