Young Writers Society

I scrolled back to find a picture of myself in 2009 and realized so many things that went on that year that I had entirely forgotten about.

My birthday is in July so I was 16/17 in 2009 and I was running out the end of a high school relationship that went on too long while I was calling in love with someone else. I hadn't known that someone else for long but we'd quickly become beat friends and when that boyfriend finally dumped me (I was just awful to him) and I confessed my feelings, this someone else turned me down and I lost my best friend and this person who I had such huge feelings for in one fell swoop. We haven't really spoken sense, and I was upset for a long time. Sometimes I regret the loss of that friendship, but I don't think I could have moved past those intense feelings otherwise.

In 2010 I graduated high school and moved away from home to a university where I didn't know anyone. I made a lot of friends who were a big part of my life for a time, but who I've since moved on from. I spent more than two years in an emotionally manipulative relationship with a guy I'd crushed on for years, and when he finally dumped me (out of regret I was the "only adult relationship he'd ever had) my junior year I was devestated. He was in the military and stationed overseas the majority of our relationship and had spent more than a year of our relationship stumbling through depression with friends who only ever complained that I didn't come out much anymore. When we broke up, and my friends celebrated that I would hang out with them again, I saw who my real friends were.

My junior year I studied abroad alone, out of the country for the first time and all by myself with a group of exchange students I had never met before stepping off the plane. It was the most transformative experience of my life.

I met one of my lifelong best friends the summer before my senior year of college, and in June I'll be a bridesmaid at her wedding.

In 2010 I graduated college and moved to a new state and a city alone where I didn't know anyone. I lived alone for the first time ever. I started my Master's program. I studied creative writing and English literature in college and did my MFA in fiction writing. There's a lot I didn't like about my MFA, but the dedicated time to write isn't nothing. I met my partner and we were in a relationship by the end of the first semester.

I've spent half the decade with him and I can't believe it. It's hard to imagine I haven't always known him. I can't believe I ever thought I didn't want to date another writer.

While I don't regret my education, if I could go back and do it over knowing what I know now I would. I'd have studied anthropology like I dreamed of and let myself become an academic in a way I didn't think I was capable. I'd have studied Spanish and not French. I'd have learned web design and how to code.

I stumbled into my current career path in 2017 when I hated my writing job and dreamed of only having to write for fun, when I hated working for a for profit company that didn't care about it's employees and longed to do something that matters. When I realized the work I did as a moderator on YWS was some of the most fulfilling work I had done and that it was something I could get paid to do.

My partner and I moved across the country to a city where we didn't know hardly anyone. I started as a full time community manager for a nonprofit member association that still doesn't always act like it respects it's employees, but for the first time I love the work I do every day. My colleagues are good, kind, passionate people who are a joy to work with. I met another lifelong best friend through this job. I do some writing, still, but I mostly manage projects and programs and volunteers. I track data and use spreadsheets and learn new things and I find it incredibly exciting. In 2009, I would have scoffed at the idea of working an office job.

I LOVE my office job.

The downside of my office job is that work stress is a big anxiety trigger for me. After more than a decade of anxiety, I finally started seeing a therapist and was diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder and social anxiety. I worked incredibly hard and more than a year later my life is so much fuller, so much more open.

This decade has been one of growth, of bravery, of pushing myself and putting myself out there. I spent half the decade with my partner, but that steadiness and love and support - while important and special - pales in comparison to what I did for myself.

Here's to ten more years of art, love, and change.

as you can expect there's a lot of death, including murder, suicide, suicidal ideation, and death of natural causes. That said, my hope is that it's rarely gratuitous. There are also two scenes where two different young women seek and receive an abortion. Early on, there are some suggestions of sexual assault against underage women but I don't believe there is any sexual violence on the page. If any of this is stuff you don't want to read, this book is probably not for you!