Mary Sutton / @mary_sutton73
Along the side of my house, the western side, are five rose bushes. There used to be six, but one got smashed years ago when the siding guys dropped some materials on it. They paid for it, but I never got around to replacing it.
These are hardy antique roses, suited for the sometimes harsh western Pennsylvania winters. They also require little care because I have what might be generously referred to as a brown thumb. I’m really good with plants that require little maintenance. Hostas, evergreens, tulips (as long as the deer stay away from them), and daffodils. “Set it and forget it” plants. Not really all that good with plants that require special fertilizers, or pruning or what-not. Thus, when I bought roses, I looked for buses that would thrive with very little involvement from me.
And I found them. For years after I put them in the ground, my roses thrived. In fact, the one at the corner of the house, which gets the most afternoon sun, grew like mad. It covered almost the entire corner and climbed up to the window. (I looked for a picture of it in its heyday, but I can’t find one.) The rest weren’t quite as big, but they did okay.
Then came the winter of 2014/2015. There was a fair amount of snow. Almost a complete month of bone-chilling single-digit temperatures. We forgot to wrap the roses (and the boxwoods, but that’s a different story). Come spring my magnificent roses were nothing except a collection of burnt, dried twigs.
Undaunted, I took out my clippers and cut back all the deadwood. Cut right to the bone, in fact. That once magnificent rose bush was, um, not so magnificent. I didn’t get any roses off it last year, although its fellows did give a couple. And after another winter, I’d pretty much written the bush – down to two tiny green shoots – off. Oh well.
This past weekend, a glorious Easter spring with sun and everything, I went to check the bushes. Assess the damage, as it were. And I saw this:
Wouldn’t you know. A tiny bush, struggling to push its way up, heedless of the winter cold. Determined to hang on and give the elements the ol’ middle finger. Tenacious, that’s what this bush is.
I’ve been feeling kind of discouraged about the whole querying/publishing process lately. Lots of no-response rejections, a few short “sorry, just not for me” answers that give absolutely nothing in terms of feedback, one full request, and a few kindly rejections. Not the stuff that inspires confidence.
I see a lot of parallels with this baby bush. It’s gotten a lot of rejections (snow, cold temperatures). Not a lot of positive feedback (no fertilizer or special care from me). Yet there it is. Clinging to the earth and stubbornly pushing itself up saying, “Oh no. You can’t ignore me. You can’t keep me down. I’m growing in this spot whether you like it or not.”
The bush kind of shames me. Here’s this living, yet non-sentient thing, determined not to give up, no matter what. So how can I, a living thing possessed of a brain and cogent thought, do otherwise? It wouldn’t exactly be a great thing to admit I was shown up by a bush, now would it?
So like my bush, I’ll cling to the earth. I will stubbornly scratch and claw my way to to the sun. I won’t let the snow and cold of rejections and non-responses slow me down.
And maybe, like my bush, I’ll someday have some roses to show for my efforts.