Monday, March 28, 2005

by the way (not to brag)

Waaay back in fall semester (ages and ages ago—ha ha), I took a Creative Non-Fiction writing class. We worked on writing, um, creative non-fiction. Essays about our thoughts, opinions, childhood. That kind of thing. (Not persuasive essays about capital punishment, or researching and source citation stuff.)

Fantastic class. Our last project was to revise one of our earlier essays and send it out for publication… and then see if it got accepted.

And so… (can you see where this is leading?) last Tuesday I got a letter from the magazine I sent my essay/article to (the Young Salvationist). I had sent them a few pages about my relationship with my first roommate at Calvin. 

I grinned, knowing that getting the first rejection letter is an important step for any writer. So I tore it open and read “blah blah blah we find that it fits our needs blah blah…” and I thought: hold up. They’re really supposed to say “however, it does not fit our needs at this time” or “unfortunately, we have no use for this type of article.”

I read it over and over.

And each time, it sounded like they wanted it.

So, after I stopped shrieking (fortunately no one else was in my apartment), and then stopped shrieking for a second time… and showed the letter to my parents (who were still hanging around Grand Rapids), and stopped shrieking again… it started to dawn on me that this is called “being published.”

I still can’t believe it. I’m a junior—I haven’t graduated, I don’t have a degree. But after all the revisions, the critique group sessions, the professor’s comments… and with a lot of God’s grace… my humble article will appear in a national magazine. Unbelievable.

My professor was delighted to hear my news, and I’m still shocked about it. Anyway, that has to be one of the most valuable assignments I’ve ever done!!
—jl

Posted by Jenn Langefeld on 03/28 at 10:11 PM
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