Rejection -The Least of My Worries

This week is the end of a beautiful, productive poetry workshop: World into Word-Poetry Editing with Melanie Faith. As I scan my old rough drafts, I’m finding gems and new ways of looking at old ideas. My enjoyment of poetry writing has sparked again, which helps spark all my writing—couldn’t happen at a better time. I feel a little more confident in not only my editing but also my writing decisions.

Not really. My tenacity, my determination and even the reason to keep struggling to publish is flagging, big time. Oh, there is not one thought to stop writing. I don’t think I could even if I wanted to, but I’m finding just the thought of dealing with the reality of my life as it is right now enough. Do you remember the scene in Regarding Henry when Henry (Harrison Ford) at the end of the show tells the secretary, “I’m saying when.”

I wonder, more and more often, if I need to say, “when.” It isn’t the writing and hasn’t been for a long time. I love the work, the writing. I have no trouble coming up with something the write about. In fact, I will never have enough time to get all the things already in mind to write actually written.

No, it’s my life. I’m blessed with a supportive family, a great life. At some point shouldn’t that be enough. Do I really need to keep reaching for impossible? Everything I truly care about is right here where I live. I’m lucky and blessed to be able to say that and what’s more, I know it.

Do I want to complicate what has become a very complicated time with another major wrinkle that publishing would be? I’m not alone in my feelings or realizing the impact being a caregiver has on one’s work. I just finished reading an article about the impact caregiving has on the workplace. How many workers are impacted and how it affects promotions, wages, and the wealth and health of the caregivers. Many workers are afraid to mention they are caregivers, afraid how their bosses will see it as affecting their work.

And the thing is I don’t think it would be fair of me to blame it all on being a caregiver. It’s often a struggle to keep the rest of my life on some kind of an even keel, too. And always has been. I have, technically been a widow all my husband’s career as he worked out of town, more than half the time, which gave me a unique view. I know what it’s like to be a single mom and a mom who has to learn to compromise with a husband who has different views on things. Neither is easy. Both have their difficulty and their blessings.

And now, since he’s been retired, it has been not only an adjustment to having him around all the time, but another complication. He’s spent his whole life working and has some things he’s been planning to do.

The fact is many people of my age, more every day, are struggling with the job of caregiver. It’s a strange place to be, caring for those who cared for you; making decisions for them while letting them keep as much independence as they can. It’s a lot like being a parent of a teenager—a grown-up, but not really. There isn’t an instruction manual and if there was, I’m afraid it wouldn’t have anything in it about my particular model.

I’m one of the lucky ones. My husband has taken on a lot of the chores involved and I know he does so because he loves my mom and because he loves me. While that makes things easier for me…it, also, makes it harder.

I’ve wondered if these feelings are just fear. You know there’s as much to fear about success as failure. And truthfully, I do fear. It’s not what you’d think. I can take rejection. I have had so many now, it is only a small blip and success isn’t one of those jump up and down things around here either. The best way to describe how I feel when something I’ve written is praised, accepted or wins a contest is stunned drunk. You know, a little slog, soggy, bewildered and gratefully the win, the good didn’t stumble up the not-so-well-oiled machine of my day to day.

Do I want to rock the boat? I’m scared to death, if I do, I might just drown. I’m taking on water as it is. So I sit here at my desk wondering if I ought to just work on my novels and poems and put them away. I lie awake at night worried that I’ll get the call that someone wants to see the whole manuscript of Ella and the Tie-down Man and then what? It’s ready, true, but then what? It seems the least of my worries is rejection.