The Saturn Return

There's a cosmic correlation that happens around the age of twenty-nine known to astrologers as the Saturn Return.

The slow-moving planet Saturn takes twenty-nine and a half years to complete its orbit around the sun and return to the exact same spot in the sky as it was on the day you were born.

The Saturn Return is notoriously disruptive - known for upheaval and thrusting things taken for granted into question. Whether or not you believe in those influences (and I take it all with a few grains of salt) it makes sense that whenever you hit the natural cusp between your extended younger years and adulthood, you can expect uncertainty and apprehension with the onrush of big change.

- Failing Up, by Leslie Odom, Jr.

A week and a half before the Earth spun into the new year on January 1, 2024, I spun into my new year and the precarious, teetering age of 29.

You can't talk about 29 without conjuring up the specter of 30. Either you love the idea of a fresh decade or hate the idea of leaving your 20s behind. Or perhaps you feel completely ambivalent about it since time is a construct, in which case, I applaud you. I fall on the more positive side of looking at 30. My 20s have been like that hike your outdoorsy friend promises you will be "easy and short" but quickly reveals itself to be highly challenging and never-ending.

But even more than my 30s, I've been looking forward to the age I am right now, 29.

I read Failing Up by Leslie Odom Jr. (Hamilton's OG Aaron Burr) during lockdown in 2020. I was 25: in the middle of my 20s, in the middle of a global pandemic, and in the middle of Texas. In short, I was lost. Maybe it's because I was born on a cusp between seasons, between astrological signs, almost between calendar years, but of Failing Up's many lessons, the one that grabbed my attention was the one about transition: the Saturn Return. The idea that 29 could be a meaningful year, an age of change, and not just the bland waiting room of 30, buoyed me. I finally had something to aim for and look forward to in my 20s.

Then I forgot about it.

I moved from Texas back home to Boston. The lockdown lifted. Once I was "over the hump" of 25, 26 and 27 sped by in a blur. Off the top of my head, I can tell you I got engaged and worked at jobs I didn't like, and that's about it. I continued to feel lost, especially in my career. I started to internalize and stress over the (false) narrative that my early 20s were for being lost; my late 20s were when I was supposed to have started figuring it out.

Enter 28.

I felt my wheels starting to turn like a planetarium creaking into motion, the planets and moons and stars realigning. It felt like a meaningful shift was finally happening for me, but why now? Why 28? The more I thought about my age, the more something began to feel familiar. Didn't I read something about this? Yes! I remembered Failing Up. I was feeling the pull toward Saturn's Return and 29 early. And once those wheels were turning and the picture of my life started sharpened into focus, there was no going back.

I started talk therapy early in 2022 to make sense of this new picture of my life. I talked about how unhappy I was in my career (very articulate about this). I tried to talk about what I loved to do and what I could see myself doing as my life's work (not articulate about this). During our first call, less than 30 minutes into our relationship, my therapist said, "Ava, you're a creative." I tried to laugh it off, but my heart skipped a beat in my chest. Was I?

It dawned on me in June of 2022 that, yes, I was. SCOTUS overturned Roe v. Wade, and all I could do with my two political science degrees was write poetry about it. I didn't fundraise, organize, or apply to law school - I wrote poetry. My therapist asked me how I felt about the court's decision and if I needed to talk through anything.

"Yes," I said. "I think I'm going to be a poet."

But as soon as the words were out of my mouth, I fretted. I started naming obstacles and reasons why I couldn't be a poet:

One, it's an absolutely insane thing to be.

Two, I didn't have an MFA. I didn't even have a BA or MA in English.

Three, I didn't have a writing portfolio.

I shared these concerns with a close friend who does have a BA and MA in English and a much more solution-oriented mindset than I do. He said, "Get out a folder, write 'PORTFOLIO' on it, and put writing in there. That's how you start a writing portfolio."

By his definition, I realized I did have a portfolio. It was small, but I had started. It was my Vocal page. I was 28-and-a-half and on my way to 29. I decided to lean into my Saturn Return and poetry. It was time to write.

And write I did. 2023 was the year of writing. 2024 is all about putting that work into action and maintaining the momentum of a fast start. I have four writing resolutions for this year where Vocal will play an integral part.

Resolution 1: Use My 2023 Vocal Portfolio to Fuel My Big 2024 Leap

Treating Vocal as my portfolio completely changed my writing. For the first time, I was creating regularly and sharing my work with a broader audience, with strangers. My confidence and curiosity grew alongside my portfolio. I finally felt like I had something to back up the wild statement, "I want to be a poet."

Vocal was the spark and the springboard. It inspired me to sign up for writing workshops. I applied to writing grants and fellowships with pieces from my Vocal portfolio (and was, miraculously, accepted for one). I began submitting to literary journals and magazines. I've received plenty of rejections, but I've also had four poems accepted. The workshops, the fellowship, the externally published pieces, the expansion of my confidence and craft would have been impossible without first starting small and vulnerable on Vocal.

In 2024, I'm taking a bigger leap. I'm hoping to turn what was once a dream and is currently a passion into a sustainable reality. I'm applying to an MFA program for the fall. I included "Enshrined," one of my earliest pieces on Vocal, the poem I wrote in response to the overturning of Roe v. Wade, in my application manuscript.

My portfolio continues to expand along with my horizons and what I believe is possible for my writing. And it all goes back to this platform.

Resolution 2: Push My Creative Limits - Vocal as an Area of Exploration in 2024

For whatever reason, when I sit down in front of a blank page, poetry is the place my brain goes to first. It's the form that feels most accessible and comfortable to me. But it's easy to get pigeonholed, to believe you can only be one thing, that there's only one voice within you, that to find traction and success, you must choose a genre and master it rather than be a jack of all trades. If I've fallen into this way of thinking, Vocal's challenges have proven it to be the fallacy it is.

I'm proud to have two first-place finishes in Vocal challenges. Neither of them is for poetry. "My Dear Friend" is a personal essay, and "Solo: A Star Wars Story" is a 50-word critique of the movie. I was also a runner-up with "The Ten Clouds," a short fiction piece. Only two of my poems, "Car Debrief" and "I Don't Say Much," have gotten a runner-up nod. This isn't to say I've lost faith in my poetry or that I'm second guessing it, the opposite. It's a reminder that I have so much more to offer than one genre. It's a reminder to push myself.

In 2024, I want to keep pushing my creative limits through Vocal challenges. I want to lean into prompts and genres that seem, well, challenging. If my first thought is, "Hmm...I don't know about this one," that should signal me to press forward and explore rather than shying away. It could be the first step to unearthing a story I didn't know I could tell. I could discover something about myself. Something I write here could lead me somewhere else. The possibilities are endless.

Treat the challenges as an invitation to keep innovating and exploring. That's my Vocal mantra for 2024.

Resolution 3: Operation Zero Vocal Drafts by End of 2024

Last December, I came across a magazine I wanted to submit to. The theme for the issue was "I Have a Secret." I wracked my brain and looked at all the poems I had from every angle I could, but none of them fit the theme. I peeked in my Vocal drafts as a last resort, and there it was, the perfect poem, a haiku I had written but never published (why?!) during Vocal's run of haiku challenges last year. I put the poem in the magazine's desired formatting, made no other edits, and hit submit. They accepted it the next day. Granted, that is not a normal turnaround time in our business, but I learned my lesson: no writing is wasted writing. At worst, it's practice that builds the muscle. At best, it gets accepted to a literary magazine within 24 hours.

In 2024, I'm not letting my half- or fully-finished pieces languish in my Vocal drafts. Right now, I have a backlog of pieces that have so much potential: a villanelle about worthiness, an ode to a rabbit, an essay about how a podcast changed my entire life, another essay about heartbreak, a poem about the difference between flotsam and jetsam, to name a few.

Whether they make their way to Vocal or to other publications, I want to find every draft a home by the end of year.

Resolution 4: More Vocal Engagement in 2024

Under Resolution 1, I talked about sharing my work with a broader audience, with strangers. They are strangers no longer, they're you, the wildly supportive Vocal community. The kind words and support have been such a confidence boost for me. I've learned so much from reading your incredible work. Your ideas, language, and modes of expression - this community never ceases to amaze me and make me want to keep stepping my game up to keep up.

In 2023, I joined two Vocal groups on Facebook: Vocal + Assist and Great Incantations: A group dedicated to Writing Challenges. I highly recommend joining us! These groups have connected me even more deeply with Vocal creators. It's a virtuous cycle that exposes you to excellent writing while providing engagement for your own - keeping you inspired, motivated, and accountable.

In 2024, I'm committing to engaging more frequently on Vocal and in new ways. First, I want to read through all the challenge winners, placers, and as many submissions as possible. Second, I want to do a weekly Top Story round-up and read. Third, I received a generous shoutout in one of the Raise Your Voice Threads last year (thank you, Mackenzie Davis!), inspiring me to do the same. This is also a virtuous cycle. The more pieces I read through challenges and Top Stories, the more I can shout out and highlight those pieces and creators on Raise Your Voice Threads.

Come Rushing Forward

I made a commitment to myself to come rushing forward in the rooms I was invited into...

The lesson of the Saturn Return was a reminder that we each have a choice. Do we let the past dictate our future? Or do we come rushing forward with the best we have to offer?

- Failing Up, by Leslie Odom, Jr.

Now that I have taken some leaps and made a few Big Risky Decisions, I sometimes wonder, "What if I hadn't?" What if I hadn't written this poem at this time and submitted it to this magazine that accepted it into this issue and published it? What would be in the space that my name and poem occupy? Would it be someone else's name and poem? Would it be blank? If I have this thought about just one poem and opportunity, imagine how many endless opportunities are out there waiting for your name and work. It's time to rush forward toward those opportunities.

I'm treating my 29th year like the significant transitional moment that it is. I have Saturn and all its rings and moons on my side. I have so much to show them about who I've become. Zora Neale Hurston wrote, "There are years that ask questions and years that answer." Much of my 20s were years of questions. 29 feels like the beginning of the years of answers, of deep purpose, and, of course, more writing.