It was 9 PM, and I was having dinner with my family, my phone charging in the corner. When it chimed, I instinctively knew it was an acceptance email. Don’t ask me how, there are moments like this that we cannot explain. I waited for dinner to end before opening it, and indeed, it was an acceptance for a piece I had submitted that very evening around 6. The subject line read: “Thank you for a great essay”. It was one of the quickest acceptance ever. The editor expressed how the essay resonated with her, her emotions palpable across the waves. The honorarium followed as soon as I had responded to the acceptance email and confirmed the piece’s availability. I’ve seldom been welcomed this lovingly in my brief writing career. But the story behind this piece gets even more interesting…
That night I kept thinking how we connect as humans despite our differences in nationality, age, gender, race, and so on. This profound realization makes me reflect deeply on the shared emotions and experiences that bind us together, transcending these various divides. This thought comes to mind every time I receive an acceptance from a publication that I know is helmed by people very different from me—different backgrounds, cultures, and life experiences that shape their perspectives. It reinforces my belief that storytelling is a universal language that speaks to the core of our humanity. The stories we share resonate on a fundamental level, reminding us of our shared aspirations, fears, and joys, and it tells how stories appeal universally. No matter from which part of the world we write, our experiences are nearly always the same, echoing with truths that can inspire, heal, and connect us. In that moment of connection, I find hope and solace, realizing that through our words, we can build bridges over the chasms of our differences.
The piece I’m talking about is an essay titled “I Owe You an Explanation, Son”. I do not usually overstress upon titles, but this one was different. It was only a working title at first but I soon realized how appropriate it was. With “I Owe You”, I meant to highlight my helplessness and debt; with “Explanation”, I wanted to denote that there’s a certain vulnerability in my admission of guilt, and that something significant has happened; with “Son”, of course, I wanted to address my son directly and thereby illustrate the nature of this essay and its orientation. Now, many readers may presume that it is an “explanation” of a familial matter to a son, but it is actually on a much larger canvas. I speak about my experiences of childhood, especially how we perceived the ecology around us and the nature of our homes, and how things are different now from that in our childhood, drastically so. At the core of this essay is climate emergency. I have always firmly believed that one generation owes it to the next to hand down a clean planet, at least as clean as they inherited it. This applies in the same way like we’re to leave a toilet or a hotel room or a train compartment in the same clean state as we found it. Use should not mean ruin. That very idea applies to our planet, we are simply transit passengers. But, do we do what it demands? We know the answer. And hence the slow dying of our planet.
The most interesting thing about this piece remains: why I call this a Lego-block style piece. Some time ago Split Lip had an open call for micro reviews of published flash (not sure if they still do it!). I wrote a review (in ~200 words) on Faye Brinsmead’s “Fires Near Me” published in WordCityLit (November 2022). Faye’s piece was also about climate emergency, and the review was more like my spontaneous reaction to the theme because it had greatly touched me. My review was declined. I kept adding to the piece over months, sometimes adding only about 50 words, sometimes about subjects that seemed quite unrelated but were not necessarily so. These passages seemed like tiny Lego blocks. I was building onto something, quite unconsciously, hoping one day, it became a huge structure. The additions were about my experiences of childhood and my concerns regarding climate crisis and how it was all the more closer home. I wrote about “load-shedding” and “gas cylinders”, about incense sticks and dusk, and about how I felt as a mother who was gifting a worse planet to her children. The piece which was once 200 words became a mammoth essay of 2200 words. I do not know how it was but this piece was different from any of the 350 other pieces I’ve published. I’ve said this before that contrary to advise, I do not revise much and hardly ever tweak after a piece goes into sub. With this though, I kept making additions while out on sub, and it kept receiving declines until it received a most delightful response from Michelle at The Fiction Attic.
So that is how this story has a special place, and why I wanted to share its backstory with you.
I also want to emphasize to every writer out there, especially those emerging and unsure, that every piece has its share of declines. Earlier, I shared my experience of how 20+ Rejections Mean Nothing and the piece can still be in listed in Wigleaf Top 50!
Finally, Happy Valentine’s Day in advance. You may enjoy reading The Inverted Syntax of Love in Fiction and 7 LOVE STORIES to read on Valentine’s Day published earlier.
Thank you for reading and happy writing!
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