Here. Sometimes that's enough.

On showing up and making progress, along with a few things to read

“How can you feel hope when the weight of last year’s rejections is enough to bury you? Still, the empty page craves the pen, wants to feel the black ink unscrolling on its skin. In spite of everything you sit at your desk and begin.” —Barbara Crooker

The last couple weeks have been a trial for my writing. You know that feeling when just one thing out of order can push a carefully calibrated life into chaos? I had three or four of those last week.

The saddest was my responsibility to facilitate layoffs on my team (just the loveliest people, email alumni-hiring@lattice.com if you are hiring and want a list of talented folks). In addition to that already-heavy load, we had to speak to our daughter’s principal to make a classroom switch for her, as she was making herself physically ill from the stress of her disruptive classmates. We then had to find new homes for our two now-very-loud roosters that had been with us from chicks but were beginning to wake up neighbors. And I began my Master Gardener’s course which I am super excited for but also much intimidated by. Felt like something big and hard every day and while that might sometimes fuel my writing, I found myself more often staring into the dark at 5am and letting my whirring mind settle. Maybe something will come from all this eventually!

All said, I didn’t make a ton of progress this past week. However, my community (you all) have been incredibly supportive and consistently reminded me that at the very least I am still showing up each day, making space for surprising things to happen.

Here are a few of my small wins:

• I have continued to wake up at 5am-ish every day to give at least some of my attention to writing and submitting.

• I submitted my poetry chapbook manuscript, Letters to Dead People, for the very first time (this was huge for me! Not expecting anything from this particular submission, but at least now I’ve begun).

• I completed a short story since I last wrote to you all (see more below). One down, nine to go to meet my goal for the year.

• Despite the regular, heavy battery of submission declines, I continue to submit. I’ve gotten eight new submissions in since the year began.

• I created goal trackers to keep me on point throughout the year. I do have this in a spreadsheet too, but I most like having it in post-it form above my computer. Having it all in-my-face helps my focus.

• ⚠️ One thing I am wary of is that I haven’t started my 2023 novel yet (ideas are still percolating) but am still aiming for 5k words by the end of next week.

What I’ve been reading

“Fighting the Tree” by Davon Loeb in Sun Magazine

Beautiful essay about loving both his father and step-father, from his memoir The In-Betweens, pre-order now.

Maybe I wasn’t the son Dad wanted. Maybe, if he could have, he would have picked another kid, a son he could enjoy parenting. They could have built things, worn matching tool belts, read how-to books, and cut down trees together. I wanted to be that kid. I wanted to like cars and the smell of gasoline. I wanted to like making trips to Home Depot to search the aisles as if looking for ourselves: our eyes in the shades of paint, our skin tones in the wood, and our hearts in the steel frames of rolling red tool chests.

“Backward” by Warsan Shire

Clever, difficult poem about undoing trauma.

The poem can start with him walking backwards into a room.
He takes off his jacket and sits down for the rest of his life;
that’s how we bring Dad back.

“How we Take Our Grief” by Kimberley Grey

Reminds me of two people who have ever shared in loss.

We pour
the morning. We drink the morning together
and split the brightness. We take the morning
out of us and put it in our mouths.

“Panther Girl” by me

I have finished my first short story of the year! I’m looking for a publisher for it in full, but if you’d like to preview it I’ll send you a pdf. Let me know, I’m still very much working on my story craft and I’d love to hear your reaction to it.

Wintering, by Katherine May

This book, a recommendation from my friend Heather, has been sitting on my shelf since, well, last winter. It’s a really amazing book to read at this moment in time. (Also, let’s share book recs on Goodreads! Follow me here https://www.goodreads.com/cassiebegins)

The changes that take place in winter are a kind of alchemy, an enchantment performed by ordinary creatures to survive: dormice laying on fat to hibernate; swallows navigating to South Africa; trees blazing out the final weeks of autumn. […] Once we stop wishing it were summer, winter can be a glorious season when the world takes on a sparse beauty, and even the pavements sparkle.

Resources

• If you are a poet, this resource from Emily Stoddard of chapbook (or pamphlet, in the UK) publishers is incredible and valuable. You can make a copy of her spreadsheet of deadlines and details and make it work for you.

And that’s it for January. I hope you all are well. I’ll see you in Feb.

xo
cassie.