Desk Diaries 05: A Writing Session & Book Update

A quiet record of desk days—what I’m writing, working on, and figuring out along the way. This is Desk Diaries.

If you’ve been following me for a while, you probably know I wrote a poetry & prose collection a couple of years ago. In 2023, after much research and nerves, I started the querying process that went on for months. While most of my queries went unanswered, the few answers I did receive told me to seriously consider 1) getting an agent first or 2) looking into self-publishing. (Since apparently it’s challenging to sign a debut poet without having a serious online following.)

Last year, as I was looking into agents and self-publishing, so much happened in such a short time. First, I met someone amazing and quickly fell in love, after being selective and single for three years. Then, I fell out with someone I considered one of my best friends due to my falling in love. Then, I had to make the painful decision of saying goodbye to my 15-year-old dog. Then, I had another falling out with a different friend after that.

It was a complicated year for me, balancing the joy and excitement of new love—the love I’ve deserved all along and was so patient and particular for—with the pain and heartbreak of losing my dog, who I had since she was a puppy. Friends who turned out to not be true, honest friends after all? I could replace those. But I could not replace my sweet little dog and missed her so much. Because of this, I put my book on hold for most of 2024. I stopped querying, stopped tweaking, stopped researching.

Finally, after a life-changing year, I am ready to focus on it again. On a day off from work, I sat at my desk with a cup of tea and a playlist my boyfriend made me and got to work again.

A lot has happened since 2022, when I finished it. My prose collection is about friendship and romantic relationships, and how sometimes those lines can blur, especially when you are young. There are conversations and moments with people who are no longer a part of my life—in fact, most of the conversations are. It’s about family, scars you are born with, and wounds that never seem to heal. It’s about relationships in all forms, the beauty in them, and the pain. So, after everything I’ve been through this past year, the great and the awful, I knew I had to write about it.

Out of 101 pieces, I cut roughly ten, replacing them with musings about my dog, how difficult it can be to find real friends, and falling in love again. I rewrote my acknowledgments and dedication in bittersweet ceremony. It felt cathartic, to say the least—a cleansing of sorts, a speaking of truths, a microphone to what really matters: people who are always there for you.

Now that I’m almost done for the second time, I hope to self-publish it within the next year. (If anyone has any advice about this process, please get in touch!) Next up? Finding a cover artist. As always, I’ll be sharing all my updates on Ko-fi, so follow me there if you’d like to know things before everyone else.

Honestly, I’m just so happy to be back at my desk, waxing poetic about love and loss and friendship again. I hope you’ll stick around for the journey, and I can’t wait for you to read my book in the near future.

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