On the Market: First Anniversary, Minus the Gifts

Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash.

Part 18 in this series.

A few days ago marked one year since I submitted my first job application, just a couple days post being informed I’d need to start looking. This is not a milestone I was looking to, um, celebrate.

My gifts? A no from a job I applied for back in November. Fitting, though I thought one year was the paper anniversary and all I got was a digital rejection.

A day later, an agent who’d requested the first 50 pages of my novel to review emailed to say she’d be passing on reading the rest, let alone representing me.

This after a month of journal rejections and more job applications launched into the ether. Most of those positions don’t start until August and are in academia, so…urgency? What’s that?

I haven’t really been looking forward to hitting the fallow year mark since it became a distinct possibility in November. In fact, my holiday season was marked with feeling pretty low all around.

I’m doing my best, I swear. A former colleague bumped into me at the coffee shop where I work and, after a brief conversation, smiled and tapped my arm.

“I happy to see that you haven’t grown completely bitter through all this!”

And I haven’t. But I am worn.

Am I allowed to say that?

My friends and family have been great. Supportive. Checking in.

Former students have gone out of their way to try and help me find work.

Advice has been given. Gestures of solidarity and understanding provided.

And I’m still working creatively. I’m editing a memoir, working with a master’s student on his creative project, and just sent a proposal and sample essay to a publisher who has talked with me directly about the concept.

For all of this, I am sincerely grateful.

I’m honest, though, I feel the weight of the rejections piling up, heaviness that just grew a little as, while literally writing this line, another application failed to pan out.

Some days are easier to move through than others. I keep moving, regardless, but it would be dishonest to say my steps aren’t slower than they were a year ago.

Here’s hoping for a better update in the future.