Exciting news in my writing life!! A prose poem I wrote during my sophomore year of college was picked up for publication last week (coming out in May). I wrote the story 7 years ago and it'll be published by Sharp Piece of Awesome Literary Journal! Super, super cool. I wrote this piece as an experiment. I wanted to write something short and in first person plural/second person. It was hard. I brought it out this summer and started reworking it. I sent it to an editor and they actually wrote me back about it (most of the time when you get a rejection, it's a generic letter they send to everyone). The editor said they loved the piece but that the last line was awful--too preachy. I agreed. It's hard to write second person and not sound preachy. I rewrote the last line and sent it out again. This time they want it!

Even cooler, my Young Adult piece, "Where You're Going and How You Get There," published by For Books' Sake is ready for purchase today! Check it out: http://forbookssake.net/store/products/resisters-stories-of-rebel-girls-revolution-empowerment-and-escape/

I haven’t known how to write about what I was going through the last few of months of 2015. But I’m thinking now, that’s probably all the more reason I should be writing about it—to sort things out.

I don’t know what “problem” came first. Or maybe none of it has been a problem, but a rolling series of occurrences that in a year from now will make total sense. Whatever happens, I know I’m going to be OK which I couldn’t say a couple of months ago.

When I was young, I thought I’d travel the world with the Peace Corps, going wherever I was needed and helping everyone I could along the way. I thought I’d have a dog that traveled with me and I’d go from each world crisis to the next doing whatever needed to be done.  One morning a few months ago I woke and realized that I was working to help those who have more than me—helping people as a trainer, yes—but not with those who have less. I was volunteering 2 hours a week working with at risk kids. Two hours when I thought that would be my life’s work. I had a house, stability, a full savings account, responsibility, and all the things I thought I’d cast aside for traveling the world and giving myself to others. I realized I’d become a sell out. There have been days I would get home from work and lay down with my dog and cry. I cried for refugees without homes, children without food, shooting victims, animals dying in shelters—people I’m not helping and feeling overwhelmed by my own insignificance.

Two things saved me. One, Bernie Sanders talked about America’s rate of childhood poverty. We are number two in the world for highest rate of childhood poverty. Number Two. When I was a kid I thought America was the greatest country in the world and I would have to leave here to help people. No way. We have plenty of problems right here. I remembered something my good friend Kim once told me—if all of the “good” people leave a place, then it will never change. While I love that I am from Nebraska, I’ve spent all of my life thinking I need to leave here because here I am so different. But maybe that’s not the case. Maybe I’m supposed to be here to bring the change I’d like to see.

The second thing that saved me from self-destruction was a breakup. In the fall I told the person I was with how much I hated myself and how I wanted to lie down and give up because the world is so big and I am so small and insignificant and he didn’t listen. He never saw me drowning. Without him I’ve told others my fears and insecurities and I’m learning that I’m not small. That I can make a difference and I have so many people supporting me, cheering for me, when with him I thought I was alone. It's weird to think of that--I was far more alone when I was with someone than I was after walking away. 

I went to Arizona a few weeks ago to stay with my friends, Trish and Mike. They took the best care of me. Trish took me out to the mountains every day. We hiked and talked and I ran. She pushed me to scale rocks to the tippy top of a mountain and face my huge fear of falling/heights. It finally hit me how much doing things that scare us push us to become better, stronger. I was terrified of mountains before I ran 50 miles in Colorado and almost lay down and gave up and died. Now, after coming back from that dark place, when I hit this new low, the first place I wanted to go was the mountains. I wanted more than anything to be outside running in a place where I found so much confidence in myself. The mountains have gone from being a source of fear to the place I feel most at peace.

Coming back from the Arizona, I’m excited. I’ve realized the management role I took on semi-unwillingly isn’t a step away from the do-good life’s work I want for myself. It’s a resume builder for when I find the non-profit I want to work for. A breakup isn’t a step back in my quest for love but chance to remedy the only regret I have. Being afraid and doubting myself isn’t poor self-esteem, it’s seeing what scares you, looking it in the eye and taking it head on.

My friend and co-worker recently told me 2016 is going to be a big year. In addition to us crossing our fingers for things to be “normal-ish” at the gym, he said that, for me, 2016 will be my year to run. He said in 2015 that I had a parachute tied to my back—not necessarily holding me back, but training me and making me stronger. The parachute is off. I’m trained. I’m strong and I’m ready.  I’m going to believe he’s right.