“Fall Marathon” by Leonid Afremov
Summer is beginning to blur into autumn, and perhaps you will understand when I say that I remember almost nothing about the previous months except the exhaustion, and the deep, unimaginable longing for the chill of the colder seasons.
Somewhere, internally, I’ve gotten things jumbled up. I am active during the evening and sleepy during the day, I feel alive and rejuvenated during autumn and winter but prone to hibernating during the warmer months. I accomplish nothing when I have free time, but pile on the activities when I have something else that needs focusing on. The veil is thinning, and I feel more myself.
This evening, I am going to an interview for The Vortex, UCA’s yearly literary magazine. This will be my first time applying to be on the staff, so while I’m not holding out much hope of getting on it, I’m trying to view the potential failure as a valuable first lesson in being a writer: keep trying. I am preparing myself for rejection, just as I am preparing myself for rejection with the two short stories I am about to submit to literary magazines.
The cold brings hope with it. This has always been true.