Today I received another acceptance! It’s for a flash fiction piece I wrote last year in the Advanced Fiction Writing class at the community college. We were told (as a writing prompt) to take something else we’d written that term in that class and pull out four or five lines, and then rework them into a new piece. My flash fiction piece “I am Two” was the result, and it was accepted just this morning. I’m very excited.
A few days ago I received an acceptance as well. It’s for a flash fiction piece I wrote last term for my Short Prose Forms class at Marylhurst University. That class focused on brevity, and none of the pieces we wrote were longer than 250 words. The piece I wrote is a flash fantasy piece, and I am so excited it will be published this year! That makes eleven total publications one they all go live.
Last year was a really hard year for me. I had a lot of personal things going on that made 2016 stressful and, in some cases, traumatic. The few things that kept me going were my studies (I graduated Clackamas Community College with my A.S. in English and a Concentration in Creative Writing, an accomplishment that meant the world to me), my writing (my first, ever, publication came in 2016 along with three other subsequent publications), and transferring to Marylhurst University for my B.A. in English Literature and Writing (since I never thought I’d get beyond community college). I struggle with anxiety and depression, and for a long time I didn’t think I’d be able to finish my associates degree, but college ended up being a balm to my anxiety. My first and second terms back, I had a number of panic attacks, but the longer I was in school, the more I learned to manage my anxiety and my stress. I learned to identify stressors, triggers, and coping mechanisms. I realized that literature and writing classes, however reading and assignment intensive they might be, were actually helping me work through and around and under and over my disorders.
I still struggle with anxiety. Even the tiniest things can send me spiraling (like being cut off my a semi-truck on the freeway), and I often feel weighed down my tremendous self-esteem issues. I’ve changed a lot since returning to college; a lot of my personal and political views have shifted, and that has been a massive adjustment not only internally, but finding where these changes fit externally. Some of these changes I’ve kept to myself, outside of my closest friends, because I worry about how they will impact myself and others if expressed. I tend to overthink everything anyway, and anxiety and depression only work to magnify the things I overthink. Adding fuel to that fire is not something I take lightly. I have days where I’m functional, but can’t even think about homework or assignments or creative thought. In all, though, I am so much stronger mentally and emotionally than I was before. I’m learning that how others see me doesn’t define me. If they don’t “get” me, then it isn’t a reflection of a flaw in my identity, but in their willingness to accept others. Accepting one’s self is not always an easy thing to do, but I’m learning how.
Writing is my shield, my fortification.
