COPPERFIELD REVIEW QUARTERLY | AUTUMN 2021
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DEAR READERS Welcome to my favorite time of year. Yes, I’m a fan of pumpkin spice lattes, and yes, I’m one of the crazy ones who decorates my house with colorful leaves, pumpkins, and scarecrows. Since I live in Las Vegas, Nevada where it’s 110 degrees Fahrenheit in the summer, the cooler days of autumn are a blessing indeed. It’s also a great time to settle in with a good book, as Nancy Lee reminds us in her wonderful piece about the particular joys of autumn reading. We were humbled by the positive response we received from CRQ’s first edition. Thank you to everyone who reached out to say they enjoyed the stories, poems, and interviews. We’re thrilled that you loved them, and we think you’re going to love our Autumn 2021 edition just as much. As autumn weather arrives, I’ve been thinking a lot about slow living and slow writing. Those of you who are familiar with the Biblical tradition may be familiar with the idea that every seven years the land should be left to lie fallow. So how does that apply to me? I’m not a farmer so I don’t have land to leave alone. Instead of a sabbatical year for the land, I’m looking forward to an internal sabbatical year. What do I need to let lie fallow? The first thing to pop into my addled mind was letting go of my list of Great Things I want to accomplish. Like many people, I’ve spent most of my life working towards Great Things, some of which I’ve accomplished and some of which I haven’t. The times when I did accomplish my goal there was always this odd silence in my head, a sort of existential crickets, since the accomplishment was never what I thought it was going to be.
Two days after I crossed the graduation stage in my doctoral regalia, I was taking the trash out like I normally do and I had the profound realization that my life was exactly the same as it was before I finished my Ph.D. I had wanted my Ph.D. for 24 years by that point and two days after I achieved it I realized that I was the same person I was before. It seems obvious, I know, but it was a revelation to me. Goals themselves are wonderful things since they give us purpose, but I’ve set too much importance on achieving goals and not enough on the joy of the journey. Mind you, I’m not setting aside all goals for the coming year. I’ll finish my current novel in early 2022. Writing a new book brings me great joy, and we should always pursue our joys. But what would happen if I worked without any particular end in mind? What if I wrote just because I love to write? What if I wrote without any expectations? Without any ideas of what the end result should be? What if I practiced yoga, and cooked, and wrote, and colored in my coloring books just because? What if I allowed myself time to rejuvenate without basing my happiness on any particular outcome? What would happen, do you think? Although we’re still surrounded by craziness, I hope you’re able to allow yourself some rejuvenating time so that you can grow even stronger afterward. Happy autumn, everyone. See you in January.
Meredith
Meredith Allard, Executive Editor Copperfield Review Quarterly
Photo credit: Alisa Anton
