Hello To All This 

When I was in grad school, my advisor gave me a piece of advice that I don’t think she intended to stay with me for as long as it has. Like so many young essayists enamored by the New York City literary scene I was entering, my MFA thesis was a take on Joan Didion’s Goodbye to All That, but in reverse (a Hello to All This, if you will). I don’t really remember what I wrote, specifically, now that I’m thinking about it, but I’m sure I have it saved somewhere. What I do remember is my advisor reading what must have been the thousandth version of the same mediocre thesis from young writers like me, and saying this: “Give it three years.” 

She wasn’t talking about my writing, though giving some of my topics more time to gestate would have been sound advice too; she was talking about my life. Three years, she said, was the amount of time it took to feel like you truly live here. I’d already been living in the city for two years at that point, so as a student with temporary housing and a part-time job, I was skeptical. 

Then, a little over a year later, with my MFA behind me and a career in publishing ahead of me, I thought about my advisor for the first time in months. I had moved to Queens, regularly commuted into the East Village to work, had a group of friends and a regular happy hour bar, and ran around places like Book Expo America, Brooklyn Book Festival, and book launch parties with my new colleagues, and I realized… I have a life.  

Since then, whether consciously or not, I’ve thought of the different stages of my life in three to five year blocks. In my twenties, those stages could be easily defined by romantic relationships - both the actual relationships as well as my attitudes about the whole endeavor. In my thirties, it became more about my career - where I was working, what my title was, what I was working toward. Thirty to thirty-five became an era in itself - new relationship, new stepson, new borough, new literary agency to build my career. By thirty-six, a minor career change and a major global pandemic defined my late thirties for me. This is the era I can feel currently ending, and not just because my thirties are. 

At this point in my life, five years from now doesn’t look all that different from five years ago and I am pretty happy with that. This is partly why I feel like a new era is on the horizon. Feeling settled is a relatively new experience for me. The pandemic abruptly halted a lot of things, but it turns out that hustle, those expectations, that approval had paid off a long time ago; I was just stuck in the habit of chasing them. I have earned the right to relax a little. Except, historically, I have not been good at relaxing or letting come what may. It remains a struggle, but I think that’s where these last three years have brought me. Looking inward instead of out. Feeling nourished instead of fed. It’s hard not to think about my former writing professor’s advice as I find myself ending what, it turned out, was another transitional phase.

The question now is “what’s next?” What do I work toward? A published novel of my own, financial stability as a freelancer? Yes. Career goals still matter. But they feel secondary to simply following my own instincts, carving out my own space, and having a fulfilling life with my partner as we grow older together. It all seems so far away in the abstract. But maybe three years from now, I’ll be sitting in a new home writing a new novel, and remembering when, at thirty-nine, I had no idea what would come next and I let that be OK.

FUN STUFF

What I'm Reading: Things We Lost in the Fire by Mariana Enriquez

What I'm Watching: New season of Taskmaster!

What I'm Listening To: Taskmaster podcast

What I'm Eating: In my soup era. Specifically, this avgolemono inspired by Sierra Godfrey (whose books you should buy!)