Community

When I first began taking writing seriously I was incredibly annoying. I wrote by hand in a notebook, infrequently, and would get mad if anyone questioned my ability or my earnestness. I eventually graduated to bringing my laptop to coffee shops and propping up next to an outlet and trying to write there. During those trips, I never got much done, despite my delusions, no one stopped and asked me what I was working on, no women noticed how intense and mysterious I was, so my public writing kind of simmered out. I would attend open mic nights and weird gallery openings, but I never saw myself as an artist.

And this continued for years. I would write without any sense of discipline and then get upset when I would send things in for them to be inevitably rejected. I didn't understand what I was doing wrong, and no one in my life understood what I was doing wrong, and everyone I spoke to about it encouraged me. It was nice but ultimately unhelpful.

I eventually decided to take writing seriously and wrote several first drafts of the same novel but never let anyone look at them. I got the courage to ask a friend's sister to read what I thought was a "good" first draft but she said she was too busy. And I took all of the rejections to heart and didn't write for years.

But I still talked about it, much like before. It was hobby that I did, that people knew that I did, but I had nothing to show for it and no real reason to do it. I wrote funny, little stories for myself and shared them with a few friends but never more than that.

After a virtual open mic, I was encouraged to submit one of those funny, little stories and it was published. Then I wrote another and sent it elsewhere, again published. And then another. I thought I figured something out, or at least figured out how to write short stories to be published by small presses and lit magazines. So again I wrote a new draft of that same novel from so many years before.

This time I let people read it and sent it out to publishers and eventually met the Amaranth team at a conference and they decided to work with me.

I say all of this because I find myself constantly learning and relearning the same lessons in my life. Writing, like any art, needs community. When I feel lowest about writing, it's because I've isolated myself from those that care about writing and me. I want to go to conferences and retreats and open mic nights, not because of networking or some misguided need to read aloud but because it makes the art feel better when you have people to share it with.