Shine

For years I knew I wanted to be a writer. I took all the advanced English classes I could in high school. I was rarely seen without a book or journal in my bag, frequently both. I was the girl who would get called out for reading a book not for class in the middle of class because it was just that good.

I majored in English in college and took numerous creative writing classes with some really awesome professors. I was an editor for the school news paper. My class notes were half bits of poems or stories half notes.

Somewhere between junior year and graduation, I became disenchanted. I thought “I’m not cut out for this.” The stresses of Chris’s military career getting kicked off and all of the changes our family was facing got to me and rather than write through it all, I abandoned what I had once loved so much. I lost my dedication. Somewhere in there I lost my faith in myself to be able to do anything other than to play my role of wife and mom and figure myself out later.

Later, later, later.

The past six months have been about “later.” First it was “when we get to Virginia.” Then, “Once Sophie remembers how to nap again.” Then, “Once we get settled in Germany.”

Now became changing diapers, going for walks and dreaming about this “later” that seemed would never come. This “later” that just kept getting pushed, you guessed it, later and later. Now became sad. Now became feeling like everything I did was for everyone else. It felt like any time I was given to myself was wasted because I wasn’t working toward anything. I wasn’t concerned with a career or a financial contribution, just something. Something that would make me a better person, a better mom, a better wife and make my soul shine. Something that could make me feel like I accomplished something.

Motherhood is demanding and oh so rewarding, but it’s often impossible to see the effects of your love and nurturing when your child is refusing to nap, pulling your hair and eating the dog’s food AGAIN. I can’t see how Sophie is better because I built a block tower she got to knock over or that I submitted to another hour of being the “mama gym.”

I needed something for myself that wouldn’t interfere with my important job of full time mommy. It took me a while to be okay with that. It took me a while to be okay with the fact that I’m not the type of mother who can be all diapers and bottles and sensory play activities all the time. I’m not super mom. I’m not a picture perfect stay at home mom, no matter what my social media accounts will lead you to believe.

That was never anything that I thought I expected of myself. I always said I wouldn’t be that, that I wasn’t cut out for it the way some women are. I always said that I was OK with that, but deep down I don’t think I was. I think I wanted to be the kind of mom who only needs her kids, but there’s been this energy stirring inside of me that I’ve felt like I need to get out.

So I started writing again.

By started writing again, I mean I started a new journal on the 2nd, it is now the 13th  and that journal is almost full.

By started writing again, I mean that I put some hard revising work into some old poems to the point that I felt like they were worthy of being submitted to the Asheville Poetry Review for their William Matthews Poetry Prize. The first contest I’ve ever entered, despite the fact that I have filled many a page of an old journal with contest deadlines and goals I wanted to meet. The pages yellowed and the journals got boxed up. The deadlines came and went.

I never saw myself as worthy. I was so petrified of failing that I didn’t even try. I didn’t think I could take the inevitable rejection letter.

It’s not that I somehow think I’m such a better writer than I was a year or two ago, although I’d like to think I’ve improved with time. It’s not that I’m so sure I’m going to win that failure it isn’t even a thought that occupies any space in my mind.

I probably won’t win. I’ll probably lose, but I’m not afraid of that anymore. If I get a rejection letter or an email, I’m gonna go out and buy a frame for it. Maybe I’ll hang it on the fridge with a gold star sticker. I’ll wear it like a badge of honor because it isn’t about the poems. It isn’t about being the best or winning a contest. I still don’t know if writing is what I want to do for a career, or if I’d ever be successful enough to call myself a writer or make a career out of it.

It isn’t about any of those things.

For me, the image of that priority envelope I carefully placed my poems in means that I tried. That I took a chance on myself. That I beat self doubt and believed in myself. That I finally see myself as worthy.

Sure, it’s just one contest of surely many more to come (I hope). But for me, it’s bigger than that. You might think me silly, but this is my first step. This is my step toward healing, toward building something for myself. To believing in my words and my craft and believing that I have something to say that someone might want to hear. That might spark something in someone the way that so many other people’s words and art have sparked something in me.

After I sent my poems off, I headed to Books a Million to pick up the new copy of Poets and Writers. They always have a great list of upcoming contest deadlines, and I wanted more options. I was honestly on some sort of euphoria, halfway between tears and grinning so hard my face could’ve split open. Anyways, I was reading the editor’s letter and he said something that I loved.

Whether thousands, hundreds or dozens of people might read what we’ve written, or even if we reach just one single soul, we are being given an opportunity to create something bright in all this darkness. Shine.

So if you are reading this, thank you. If you’ve read anything I’ve written, thank you. If you’re my grandma, thank you. You may not get your novel, but you might get a book of poems, I hope that will suffice.

I’m choosing to shine. I’m choosing to do something for myself because I finally, finally think I’m worthy.

I hope you do the same. I hope you, beautiful reader, decide to shine.