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            Since finally completing an MFA in creative writing with a poetry emphasis over a year ago, I've sporadically tried to get published. It took me nine years to complete the degree, with life, work, and waxing and waning motivation and inspiration causing me to drop out of and in to the program. Professors and students came and went. Whether the university liked my money—tuition about doubled over the years—or my advisor actually thought my writing decent, I was readmitted three times. Given the efforts required of former professors on my behalf the last time, I figured I owed it at least to them to finally finish what I'd begun.

            Unfortunately, my last poetry-writing workshop left more than a little to be desired. The professor, whom we'll call Solomon, and whom I'd benefitted from working with in an independent study when he first came to campus, seemed steeped in personal problems, mentioning not infrequently his need for his job and his sex life with his wife; devoted to a younger coterie of students, who mostly lacked curiosity; and interested in doing as little work as possible. When discord erupted in the class over how the workshop should function, he swayed. I at first encouraged him to please take charge and run the class as he saw fit, no holds barred, let the brutal comments fly for it's what we need to improve. But as the class stumbled along, we in the elder population grew increasingly frustrated, which we expressed to both Solomon and the program director. He usually gave little input on my writing, and when he made a point of speaking first on one of my poems, I couldn't tell if it was because he thought it was so awful that he wanted to get something out there to save me embarrassment or he actually thought it was good. When he announced whatever we wanted to turn in for our final project was fine and we'd all get A's regardless, contrary to my usual philosophy that I will give it my all to glean from a situation what I can, I did little, then wrote copious complaints on the class evaluation.

            But still, what I took most from the class was the memory of poems written by the cowboy of the group, a young man who worked the back country trails of the national parks in the summer and wrote poetry vivid in the pictures of horses, people, and nature in potent interaction with each other. That made it all worth it.

            In a political arrangement, Solomon, whom I had chosen as my thesis advisor a couple of years before, was joined by my former advisor and the program director, at my request, after Solomon told me to simply turn in my thesis when I thought it was done, which shocked me, as I had assumed there would be input along the way. When I did submit a rewrite, his sole response was to chide me that an erroneous comma he had previously pointed out remained, and to direct me only to show the poems to him when I thought I was done. I'm an editor. I love punctuation. But it seemed it was his ego—or his laurel's ride—that was talking. He'd made a point once that the founder of the program had personally wanted him to join the faculty. I basically begged him for input, of which he provided a modicum. Fortunately, my former advisor provided more, yet still not the analysis, challenge, and guidance I would have hoped for. Perhaps because of the political situation I fell between the cracks. Perhaps they just wanted to shuffle another student across the stage. Perhaps my writing was that good.

            That fall, when Solomon and I met for him to sign off on my thesis, we seemed to work out our differences, and I acquiesced to my former advisor's request that Solomon introduce me at my thesis reading, that it would mean so much to him. I was touched by his introduction, but he was gone before I could greet him after the reading—he was on sabbatical after all. Then, a few weeks later, he declined to write a job recommendation for me. I was stunned.

            Degree in hand, I submitted poems here and there and collected the usual rejections. I did have a few poems published, as well as a few essays in the Fresno Bee, years ago, but, as is the norm, most submissions have been rejected. Yesterday, yet another call for submissions came into my email box from the MFA program list.serv, and I yet again thought, okay, I'll try again, thinking of an essay I've long wanted (in principle) to publish. I remembered, too, that I'd been thinking of submitting to a sports-oriented poetry contest.

            I sat at my computer reworking the baseball poem for about six and a half minutes, then stopped, realizing I just do not have the emotional stability to revise and submit. I was still hearing the former head of the program, when he visited a poetry workshop once, saying I needed to learn how to write a line of poetry. I was still healing the wound of Solomon never saying to me, as he seemed to say to someone or ones each week during that last poetry-writing workshop, You should submit this poem to such-and-such journal. When I practically begged to know if there wasn't anything I'd written that was worthy of submission, his response to try a journal he'd suggested seemingly to everyone seemed begrudging—and definitely unsatisfying. I was still hearing Solomon saying counting syllables (which I did for much of my thesis) worked as well as anything to determine line breaks. I was still hearing him say a good line of poetry is like a Honda: it's not fancy, but it's reliable. I was still hearing him describe my poetry, when introducing me at my thesis reading, as being just that, saying it wasn't propaganda but poetry "we can trust."

            But I just don't want to keep revising the same poems or write new poems that sit on my computer desktop wondering what they will become. I was proud of my thesis. I had it printed and bound for everyone in the family and read from it at family gatherings that Christmas. Just recently, my younger son commented on a favorite poem, and I thought, I should try to get it published. But yesterday, once again, I thought, I really have no interest in being published in a small literary journal read by a few hundred people at best. I want to be in the New Yorker, the Atlantic! I've even submitted to them on occasion. But the chances of publication there, without a name or even a publication record? Pretty much less than nil.

            Mostly I quilt, embroider, and read these days. The sewing gives me the creative outlet I need. But there's always the nagging question in the back of my mind: Am I a writer? If I am, wouldn't I be willing to devote the time and energy to getting published somewhere someday? Was it the bad workshop and thesis experiences—albeit the reading introduction was bittersweet, the refusal to recommend me for a job, which seemed a vote of no confidence, that undermined my desire once and for all? Am I avoiding feeling deeply?

            Even now, as I write, I feel a certain fulfillment, a sense of peace with myself and the world, not even noticing the angry gnawing of a chainsaw until I stop to do something else. But is it necessary to be a published writer to be a writer? Is saying there is too much else to do in life an excuse or the truth? Can heeding a former counselor's admonishment that artists owe it to the world to share their art be fulfilled by sharing only with family and friends?

            This morning while vacuuming, I remembered that this is exactly why I began blogging a few years ago: I could enjoy the process of writing, express my thoughts, share them with those I love, and not worry about the whole process of finding the "right" place to submit, revising what I've already revised ten times, waiting for the rejection, secretly thinking each time the response comes that this will be the one. Of course I'd love to be published! But not enough to go through the process.

            I think I must have quit blogging three years ago when I decided to make a final return to the MFA program. Since then, I taught for a year in a new school district and was not rehired, interviewed furiously all summer, began the new year in another district and resigned three months later, finished my degree. My mom died. My son graduated from med school cum laude and moved back to the West Coast with his wife. My other son was married. My husband's daughter became engaged, and his son enlisted in the Marines. We have traveled for weeks at a time, argued and made up ad infinitum. Life goes on and on. I love to write, but I'm not compelled. I also love to read, garden, quilt, sew, embroider, travel, and talk and spend time with my children and friends. I avoid writing like the plague, and I think about it a lot.

            Time to start blogging again.