Celebrations Are Under Way!

Well into participating in the 20th National Novel Writing Month enterprise, I had initially formulated my MFA blog post this month in terms of deadlines, how they can be friends and enemies, malleable or set in stone.  But as I read Facebook posts, both anxious countdowns and exuberant reports of submission, with deadlines met, I changed my topic.  It’s a time for celebration and affirmation—thesis projects are in and final packets completed.

            It always seems impossible until it’s done.     --Nelson Mandela

Measure the distance you have travelled:

From the first residency, when you confusedly and doubtfully faced the prospect of writing something called an annotation; 

From the second residency, when you began to feel at home with self-evaluation, apt seminar learnings and patience with seminars that seemed completely out of line with your needs;

From the third residency, when you were oriented toward writing a critical essay;

From the fourth residency, when were given the challenge of defining your thesis project;

From every packet, every semester, and every workshop submission, you learned to assess feedback and undertake revision, itself a black box of skills and challenges

            —deciding which comments to digest, and which to ignore

—finding pathways into your truest imagination and wellspring, whether by staring into space, doodling, walking, making lists, learning to trust your voice;

—drafting new scenes, new lines, throwing down more challenges to your memory or to your characters; discarding, bringing back, finding what rings true as you understand better what the work wants to be

            —learning discipline; lines that thrill the author but do not serve the work must go

            —line edits, demanding stronger words, compelling rhythms, and appeals to the senses.

You faced the challenge of producing new work; of trusting your voice; of experimenting with new forms; of continuing to wrangle an image, a situation, a haunting, an echo, to bring into being something that did not exist before.

As the artist sings, “Look I made a hat, where there never was a hat,” in the musical Sunday in the Park with George. 

That’s why one of the most important jobs you have as a writer is to celebrate yourself, your successes, your failures, your willingness to take risks, your ability to follow through on your commitments, you capacity to work through fear when it comes up—the whole shebang.  Every flawed and magnificent aspect of your writing life deserves to be celebrated each stop of the way.

                        --Sage Cohen

Congratulations to all,

Vicki Phillips, MFA Blog Editor