By Maryanna Gabriel
Hard to believe after all the snow, there is a crown of rhubarb showing in the garden here on Salt Spring Island. It is so hopeful. I have just finished an intense residency session for my Masters in Creative Nonfiction (now in the closing stretch) at Kings College, of Dalhousie University and a walk in the garden feels like a foreign exercise. What are legs anyway?
We had to do a grueling pitch to prospective editors and agents. I cannot tell you how many pieces of paper ended up on the floor in preparation. A lot. I used everything I knew from my theatre days to try and keep calm for opening night. I kept saying to myself by lunch it would all be over.
The first editor was charming and it was a fantasy interview come true. So maybe this will go somewhere. I am to forward three chapters to her. The second was more like being crushed under a high and mighty heel, a someone much snobbier than I will ever be, and too busy watching her phone to listen. I am happy to report that some things in life are very clear and by mutual agreement she will not be my agent.
Tonight I will start a fire and burn all the papers I have accumulated to the reassuring sound of crackling wood, while the rhubarb grows ever bolder in the garden beyond.