That could be one meaning of AWP, the Assocation of Writers and Writing Programs, which next week holds its annual convention – North America’s largest – in Tampa. With at least 12,000 attendees, 2,000 speakers and 500 readers, it’s an inspiring wave or, depending on your daily rate of interaction with the rest of humanity, a rather  overwhelming one. I’ll be happily floating along, reading on one panel (Friday, March 9th, 10:30 a.m.-11:45 a.m., “A Reading from Flash Nonfiction Funny” will focus on the new collection Flash Funny (non) Fiction, edited by Tom Hazuka and Dinty W. Moore) and speaking on another (Saturday, March 10th, from 1:30-2:45 p.m., “Writing the Pain: Memoirists on Tackling Stories of Trauma,” with Melanie Brooks, Richard Blanco, Andre Dubus III, and Kyoko Mori, among the 18 authors Melanie interviewed for her essential Writing Hard Stories: Celebrated Memoirists Who Shaped Art from Trauma. And I’ll be hoping for reunions like these few escalator seconds of catching up with Richard Hoffman at last year’s convention, in Los Angeles.