Personal Reflection: A Flower Without Water
I have six frames in my living room, three holding certificates of achievement, and three holding publications I’ve been in. Beside the publication frames stands two award trophies. And they are all dead. I have toiled away at a tutoring job for nearly 4 months and spent every other spare moment either cleaning or wallowing in my messes. As the year has worn on, I’ve been ready to give up at any moment. When you’re waiting for everything to fall apart, you start pulling at the seams. Loose threads start attracting attention. If you cut a flower and leave it to sit without water for a long time, it will immediately begin to withdraw to conserve what energy it still has. Once you put it in water, it may never be the same, it will still be damaged. However, if you cut it and put it into water within seconds, it can have a prolonged life for sometimes up to 2 weeks. It can still bloom any unopened petals. The dry flower will shed pieces that are unnecessary for survival, in its last desperate attempt to save itself. A pressed flower is deadly dry, but preserved. That is what my frames hold: remembrance, not life.
There were about three minutes in March or April this year when I thought that I was going to get into an MFA program. I was on the waitlist, I saw someone report on an MFA tracking group that I had joined that they turned down the school I was waitlisted at. I had so much hope restored in that couple of minutes, thinking “I’m next.” But, three minutes later, another person posted a waitlist acceptance and it was gone. When I got the “we’ve reached a decision” Dear John, I felt the pain of loss in my fingertips. What happened after didn’t matter in that moment, it was the end of the road for me. I had tried so hard and applied to 9 programs, all ending in rejection. It was shameful because my recommenders truly believed in me, and I had let them down. After that failure, I sheepishly took a very expensive (and ultimately pointless) seat at a low-residency program with a high acceptance rate. When I realized that the program wasn’t going to be the experience I wanted, for way over what I was financially capable of, I left. All I had to show was the remembrance of former successes and three minutes of hope. The rejection changed me.
Here it is that I haven’t written anything in over a month. No blog posts (except my Thanksgiving food blog post), no new work, and edits only to sadly submit to another depressing year of rejections yet to come. And I feel old. I wonder, frequently, if I even have it in me to do this at all. The more I live in expectation of failure, the more I want to withdraw; I pick at the edges. Writing feels like a chore. Between the failure in March/April, leaving the program, and my failed writing career, I can’t help but feel like I just do not have what it takes. My life of cruel, constant gaslighting takes it a bit farther. I really have nothing worth saying, it reminds me. I am not even that good at making up stories, just talking shit about things completely out of my control. Perhaps I had succeeded once, but once the rejections come in Feb-April, they will truly be dead. I will not be applying again.
I said that I would not apply again in 2024, but here I am. However, it is worth mentioning that I have cut my list down significantly from 9 last year to about 6 this year, all local, and some unfunded. This is a huge departure from my efforts of the past two years. In the next two years, my partner and I are looking to buy a house (if possible). I’m not being defeatist in saying that I will not apply again, I am being realistic. I do have a lot of other things in life to pay attention to. Michelle Latiolais said to me that I don’t need an MFA to write — that is true. However, I need it to stay writing before my own mind eats me alive. I will unravel entirely. I have already been out of water for nearly too long that I don’t even know if I could do what I might have been capable of in 2023. However, while my dried petals continue to fall away, I found myself writing today. I am still applying. I’m not dead yet.
