Gap Years

Way back in pre-COVID times, MFAngle chatted with poets Taylor Portela and Sonya Lara about their experiences with gap years. Do you need to take a gap year before entering a creative writing MFA? Do you need experience out in the "real world"?

This episode was inspired by Sonya and Taylor's blog post for the minnesota review blog.

A full transcript of this episode is available.

Host and Contributors:

Mirna Palacio Ornelas (@olot_o)

Honora Ankong (@yungwestafricanpoet)

Taylor Portela

Sonya Lara

MFAngle is shared under an Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International license.

Transcript:

[JINGLE]

Mirna: Hello and welcome to MFAngle.This is your host, Mirna. We're poetry candidates at an MFA program and today we'll be talking about gap years. This episode was inspired by Sonya and Taylor's post for the Minnesota Review blog, which we will link to on our website and we have them in studio today to talk about this.

Taylor: I'm Taylor, I'm a poet and drag queen, and I love fake blood and butts.

Sonya: Hey everyone, I'm Sonya, from the suburbs of Chicago, which means I have deep dish pizza running through my veins. [GIGGLE] I am a first year poet in the MFA program, and I'm an editor-at-large for Cleaver Magazine and the co-founder and poetry editor for Rare Byrd Review.

Honora: Honora, I'm from the 704, Charlotte. [GIGGLE] I am a poet—a first year in the MFA program. And I did not take a gap here and I'm still regretting it.

Mirna: Hey guys, I’m Mirna, 26, spent four years of my life in grad school. It’s my second time being a second-year poet in the MFA Program. I am from the following places Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua; El Paso, Texas; and Indianapolis, Indiana.

[JINGLE]

Mirna: So, to start off, could you guys tell us a little bit about your overall experience? Like, how long did you take off? What did you do during that time? Just to get a sense of we're ya'll are at.

Taylor: Definitely. So for me, I took off five years [OOP] between undergrad and grad school. That was not planned. I planned for only a couple of years, but it was wild and I kept going.

Mirna: Yeah.

Taylor: So, I moved with some best friends to D.C. We all looked for jobs and I was the winner of who was unemployed the longest. [OOH, AUGH] Twice.

Mirna: I like that, that's the winner.

Taylor: Right? You know, you gotta win sometimes. [LAUGH] And, then, I finally landed a stable gig and did my nine-to-five for four years, got into drag, did more poetry, lived that life.

Mirna: Just that life.

Taylor: Mhm. I started off at a fellowship around community organizing and leftist progressive politics. So, my main, my first role was a four month fellowship. And I helped run, like, a 3000 person conference and then I was hoping they were going to extend my contract, but then the non-profit tanked and went bankrupt.

Mirna: WHOA

Taylor: And so I didn't get that job. And then, I looked for more work for about the next seven months, living in a bunk bed with my ex-boyfriend [HONORA: YAY] and our friends. So, we have more beautiful low points. [LAUGH] And then I worked at a progressive non-profit tech policy advocacy place called the Center for Democracy and Technology. I assisted the president and CEO, and then worked on the development team and the comms team.

Mirna: Goddamn, you’re fancy. Whole-ass professional.

Taylor: Whole-ass professional.

[LAUGH]

Sonya: Mine was a little different. I took a gap year during my undergrad and in between my undergrad and getting my master's degree. [BACKGROUND NOISE] So, the first time I took a gap year, I felt a little bit more lost.

Mirna: As a fresh teenager.

Sonya: Yup.

[LAUGH]

Sonya: It really helped solidify how much I wanted to get my bachelor's degree, actually. It really helped me prepare for the two gap years I would take in between undergrad and my graduate degree. So, it was really helpful because it just reminded me that all of the low points, when I was feeling lost and really confused, I could use as motivation and a reminder that I wasn't where I wanted to be.

Taylor: All of the low points.

[LAUGH]

Taylor: I just want to echo that.

Sonya: There are a lot of low points, but also high points. I think it's important for people to remember that the low points can be framed, in a way, as, like, reminders to who you are as a person and what you want out of life. Like, I looked at those low points and those feelings of just feeling really lost and confused as reminders, that I wasn't where I wanted to be in life and that I wouldn’t be comfortable staying where I was forever. Like, I needed to branch out and try different things. So, that was my undergrad gap year.

Mirna: Whoa.

Sonya: Yeah.

Mirna: I thought you were talking about ALL of your gap years.

Taylor: And that was the first one.

[LAUGH]

Sonya: That was the first one! And the two in between. Like, I didn't even think I was going to go to grad school, actually. So they're gap years, but they were like incognito gap years where I didn't really know. [LAUGH] But I kind of had that same mentality when I figured out that I didn't want to be working a nine-to-five job every day because I wasn't doing what I wanted to do, but I also didn't know what I wanted to be doing. And, so, that nine-to-five job was that, like,. “I'm just gonna have a job to pay some bills while I figure out what they want to do with my life.” During my gap year in my undergraduate career, I worked at a pizza place. But then in between undergraduate and graduate school, I worked at a hospital in Madison and I was a—basically I was four surgeons’ assistant and I helped schedule their, like, meetings and worked with their patients’ information like scheduling appointments and making sure I had all of their imaging and blood tests and just, like, all of the information that we needed about the patients. But that, for me, provided an income to pay rent [TAYLOR: MHM] and groceries. And it was not something I first saw as a career by any means. I enjoyed my time doing it. But it really helped me realize that I wanted to be my own boss. And I didn't want to be the person that was working behind the stage. I wanted to be that person on the stage. And because I wasn't really working with any type of reading or writing creatively, I really threw myself into creating, really reworking the literary magazine that I had developed with my friend, John, in my undergraduate career that's called Rare Byrd Review. And it's for middle school and high school students only because we want—[AWW]—Yeah, we felt like young writers don't really get a chance to submit their work.

Mirna: They need a space, yeah.

Sonya: Yeah. And a lot of them don't feel like they have a voice, or that their voice matters, or that they can't call themselves writers or artists. So, I really used Rare Byrd Review to kind of remind myself of what I loved doing. And that kind of helped push me into wanting to pursue a MFA degree. And then once I did figure out I wanted to go to grad school, that just pushed me to start reading and writing a little bit more.

Mirna: You should make a motivational poster.

[LAUGH]

Taylor: Yes, for sure.

Mirna: Right?

Honora: So, for me, I think when I was like my last year of undergrad, I invested so much time into applying to grad programs, but I also thought about what would happen if I didn't get in, what would I do? [AGREEMENT SOUNDS] So, I decided that if I didn't get in, I would take a gap year and like, you know, reapply next year. And I was like, what would I do during my gap year? Because I spent all this time applying and programs and doing all of that stuff, preparing for the next step that I didn't have a backup plan. I was really lost when it came to, like, what “would you do if you didn't get into grad school?” And the only plan I could come up with was I was going to renovate my room at home.

[LAUGH]

Honora: That was gonna be my project for the year, you know, do something else that I love to do and like, you know, figure out what else I could do in the world, because I had spent so much time, like, working on my writing and just being in academia that I didn’t know. I couldn't imagine being out of it.

Mirna: Academia is a trap, ya’ll. Going back to school is such a heavy investment, monetarily, emotionally, mentally—literally in every way you could possibly think of. So, what drove you to come back either in spite of or because of all of these investments? And Sonya, I feel like you kind of talked about this, but I feel like there's a bigger answer there.

Sonya: Yeah. I didn't even know that there were MFA programs and I didn't know what they were at all. I had heard my professors kind of talk about them a little bit in undergrad, but I lacked a lot of confidence as a writer in undergrad. And I didn't even call myself a writer. I just thought it was something I really enjoy doing. And so when I graduated I was like, well, that's it for me. I'm not going to really work on writing anymore. And then one of the writing fellows I was working with, Natalie Eilbert at Madison, was like “Sonya, I really want you to look into an MFA program” and I was like, “no.” [LAUGH] but “thank you, no.” because I thought I had to take out a bunch more loans. I didn't know that there were fully funded programs out there. And so when I found out that there were and that that was something I'd want to do.

Mirna: Yeah, girl.

Sonya: I was like, I don't care. [LAUGH] Yeah, I will throw everything into my little clown-sized car that I can possibly fit and move anywhere. I don't care if I don't know anyone. I don't care if I've never been there. I'm going to do it. When I found out I could, like, spend three years writing and being paid to write and to study under such great mentors, I didn't care what the cost was. I was willing to do it.

Taylor: 100%, amen. When I didn’t have a job, I was spending all my money on books and then spending all my money on writing supplies and then talking to no one about anything I liked. And so for me, I always have loved being a student. So going back to school, it was just kind of playing to my strengths, doing what I wanted to do. Kind of reclaiming my time in order to really focus in. [MIRNA: GOOD FOR YOU] And just actually call myself an artist—[MIRNA: YES]—and not laugh when I say it, only give a subtle wink. [LAUGH] But yeah, for me, it's been such a huge weight lifted that I can sit in my house, write a poem, cry about a book—kind of spin into that void. But there's still forward movement and progression and I'm still working towards a thing even if it's a poem, even if it's the degree, making new friends here.

Sonya: And being in an environment where people enjoy the same things that you do.

Taylor: yes!

Mirna: That's such a big thing. Like even, regardless of gap years, or not. It's something we all actively look for or forward to, right? Because we're just trying to—we’re just trying to find people like us.

Sonya: it’s so nice

Honora: We’re all nerds!

[LAUGH]

Mirna: We are.

Taylor: We really are.

Sonya: We’re all wearing glasses right now, too.

Mirna: Okay, I can’t help that.

[LAUGH]

Mirna: So, what have these transitions in and out of academia been like for you? Because I know earlier I kind of semi-jokingly, not really jokingly, said academia is a trap. Cos we know it is. But you've been in, you've been out. I have been consistently in. Honora has too. We talk about it like “real world”, you know, “academia” as if they're separate. But there's—it's a shift. What has that been like for you?

Taylor: When I left undergrad, I was so burnt out.

Mirna: Ooh, I bet.

Taylor: I was ready to almost never read again. [LAUGH] Which is a lie! I had just kind of quit my thesis, barely was part-time, graduated, got into a U-Haul with friends and left. And so that transition was hard. It was the first time I'd actually done something that was unplanned, something that was really scary and risky. We had no jobs lined up. We had never seen our apartment that we bought. I didn't know what neighborhood I was living in D.C.

Mirna: You guys were just, signed and paid, and you were gonna get in there,

Taylor: Yeah! And, so, once I got to the city and, once I realized kind of what the game was, it was easier to manage, but I'm terrible at transitioning. And so super stressful, I got lots of weird stress-related illnesses. Scabies a couple of times.

Mirna: Whoa.

Taylor: Oh, yeah. The city is real. [LAUGH] But then the transition back to school has just been kind of like getting back to what I love. I do like structure. I definitely am a type A person.

Mirna: Yeah, you are.

Sonya: Me too!

Honora: Both of you are!

[LAUGH]

Taylor: Yes! That’s why we’re so happy here!

[LAUGH]

Sonya: Yeah. My transition was really difficult because of the lack of structure. I mean, I've always been the type of student that loved going to school all the time.

Taylor: Yes.

Mirna: Nerds

[LAUGH]

Sonya: But when I graduated, people had told me it's going to be a different life. Like, you're going to have to transition where you only work five days a week, if you're lucky. And you have that type of job and you only work nine-to-five and you have weekends to do whatever you want, and you don't have any homework to do after you get home. And so parts of it seemed really cool to me. But then I got home and I felt unchallenged and unmotivated to do a lot of things.

Taylor: And everything costs money!

Sonya: And everything costs money! And you don't have a lot of paid vacation days. So you can't do a lot of things, especially in the beginning. And so my biggest challenge coming out of undergrad was figuring out how to make a schedule and a structure for myself. And since I am also a super type A, I created my own classroom at my apartment. [AWW] I would read one book of fiction every week, a book of poetry every week, and a book of nonfiction. And then I would also go online and to Goodwill and look for old textbooks. And I would just read.

Mirna: I love this, this is like the tenderest approach.

Taylor: We both put ourselves in school! [LAUGH] I picked out other authors I didn't, I hadn't, read before. And then I read all of Bolaño. I read all of Murakami, I read all of Nietzche. And I was studying random philosophy.

Sonya: Yeah. But I picked up like a feminist theory textbook. That was awesome. And then there was a bunch of literature ones and, yeah, I just figured, you know, you don't have to be in a classroom to continue learning. Like, this is something that you can do on your own time and that's something that I wanted to do. So, I was in school before I came back to school!

Taylor: Yes!

Mirna: You guys are the cutest fucking nerds.

Honora: That is such a good attitude to have.

[GIGGLE]

Mirna: Did you—well, you didn't have a gap year.

Honora: I didn’t have a gap year. So, I thought coming to grad school would be easy because I, you know, I was an undergrad. I was an overachiever. I did everything and I was, you know.

Mirna: You were so hopeful.

Honora: So, I was like, “when I come to grad school, I just have to keep doing what I know how to do,” like, you know. But I got here and I have been struggling. I have been struggling. This transition has been a lot harder than I ever imagined, and it really made me reconsider whether or not I was ready for grad school ‘cos I'm also really young. So I'm, like, 21 so I’m like “I feel like a baby” all the time. I feel like I don't know anything. I feel like I can't do anything right. Part of it is imposter syndrome, which we’ll have an episode about. [LAUGH]

Mirna: Oh yeah.

Honora: But, also, part of it is, like, you know, I haven’t experienced the world in ways that a lot of the people around me have. So, everyone has, like, things that they know to be true about themselves—but for me, those things are still forming. So, a lot of the time, I just feel lost and just all over the place. And, like, you know, school was always something that, you know, felt familiar and just felt like school got me. If no one got me, school got me. So, to get here and to feel like I'm fighting just to get through really, like, was eye opening for me. Even to this day, I'm like, I'm struggling! I mean, it’s getting easier, but I'm struggling. I'm having to relearn everything because I had a very toxic relationship with school because I thought it was normal to literally work 07:00 AM to 07:00 PM. I thought that was normal.

Mirna: No, ma'am.

Honora: And it’s not. You get burned out really quickly. So, by the second week of grad school, I was like ready to jump off a building

Taylor: Oh no.

Honora: I'm so tired all the time. So, yeah. It's like having to learn healthy habits around school because academia is a trap. Like, a lot of things in normal—like it seems normal to overwork yourself. It seems normal to want to do all the things, or read all the books and keep learning. Which is great, but also realizing that I'm not just in school like I was in college. This is also part of—this is my life, basically, this is my real life. This is a real world for us. It’s not just school. It’s the real world for us. So yeah, it's so easy to look at someone else and say, “oh, they have it easy,” you know. Because people are probably looking at me like, “oh, you just came from undergrad. This is easy for you. This should be an easy transition.” And I'm looking out to people like, “you’ve had real life experience, so you got this.” And we’re all lost. We’re all equally struggling. And it's like—it doesn't matter what point you are in your life. This is a struggle.

Sonya: Yeah.

Honora: Like, it’s hard.

Sonya: I think that, coming back too, you have a lot of insecurities as to “did I lose any of my intelligence?”

Mirna: Yeah.

Sonya: Am I stupid now that I’ve been in the real world?

Mirna: No!

Taylor: Like, how stupid am i?

Sonya: right!

Taylor: Because I can't even measure.

Sonya: Yeah! Like, are my friends smarter than me? Am I going to be able to write it just as well as I did before. If people are coming straight from undergrad, have they read more than me?

Honora: Exactly.

Sonya: Like, am I going to sound really stupid in discussions?

Mirna: There's a pressure cooker.

Sonya: Yeah, there's like a lot of insecurities, but like all you can really do is just kind of get back into it. And it is kind of like riding a bike, like, once you go through the motions, you remember how to do things. And then you remember, “oh, yeah, I am smart. I got into this program for a reason.”

Honora: Exactly!

Mirna: Yeah!

Honora: The MFA is already such a pretentious space, so don’t beat yourself up for nothing, because people will act like they know everything

Mirna: that’s not true!

Honora: But they don’t know anything! I mean, they know things, but they don’t know everything, so don't beat yourself up. We're all—we're all in this together.

Mirna: We’re all dodging those flaming barrels that are being hurled at us, honestly.

[LAUGH]

Mirna: So, this is a question that I took directly from your blog posts, just because it was genuinely so, so good. And the question is, was there any advice you were given about what your time off would be like, or what you should do during that time? And was actually accurate?

Sonya: Yes. During my undergraduate gap year, I talked to two different professors and I'm so glad that I did. My first professor told me that my gap here was going to be the best year of my life because I'd be able to do whatever I wanted. And I was—I walked out of her office and I was like, “wow, I thought I was going to be so miserable” like I was stupid. I can just watch TV, read whatever I want, go to work, make some money. Cool! And then I went to meet with my second professor. And the first thing she asked me was, “have you ever been depressed?”

[STARTLED NOISES]

Mirna: Whoa.

[LAUGH]

Mirna: Oh my god!

Sonya: And I looked at her and I was just shocked because my first professor had made it sound like it was going to be the best thing in the entire world. And the second professor was like, I know you and I know that you enjoy structure and challenging yourself.

Mirna: Yeah, you do.

Sonya: “And you're going to have a really hard time without that.” She's like “this is something that you're going to have to work at, and you're going to have a lot of highs and a lot of lows. And I need you to be prepared for the days when you don't feel like getting out of bed.” And both were very correct.

Taylor: That’s the tea though!

Sonya: I had some really great times. Yup! And I had some very low times. And, so, I think it's really important for people to know that that's completely normal—that you're not going to feel super, like, happy the entire gap year. But to understand that the low points are what I called my “quarter life crisis.”

Mirna: Yes!

[LAUGH]

Sonya: They really helped me, like, get to a place to figure out where I wanted to go.

Taylor: And I got no advice.I was just told I should take some years off.

Mirna: That you should or you shouldn’t?

Taylor: That I should. And I really don't listen to advice anyway. So, that wasn’t [LAUGH] a struggle, but a couple of people and professors just told me to land a job, make a life, see what happens. And so I finally got that full-time job. Dreams were landing into place.

Mirna: Full-time job!

Taylor: Exactly! And then I found out what I actually liked by what I did at night; and by how I kind of built my schedule and found out who I really liked; by who I spent my time with, and how I built my communities. And that's how I found out I actually like drag. I'd never done writing an undergrad and, so, I found out I liked poetry.

Mirna: Oh, hey!

Taylor: And that's why I'm here!

Mirna: Discovery!

Taylor: Exactly! And so their advice of just kind of seeing what life is like with more freedom and less structure was important. And I think that's really why I'm here and doing all the things I'm doing.

Honora: The only advice that I got—because I did think about taking a gap year—the advice I got about it was to do it strategically. To have a plan, to make sure that I was using it to prepare for my next step, which I knew for a fact, I wanted to go to grad school. So, my professors were like, “if you do end up not getting in and have to take a gap year, don't just slip around,” like, you know. Find a job that has to do with what you want to do—writing—and, keep writing, keep the relationships you have with the professors I have now because you're going to need those letters of recommendation. You’re gonna have to like, you know—”this is what I'd been doing throughout my gap year. That's why you should recommend me for this program.” So yeah, it was going to be very strategic—very planned, you know. I wasn't just going to just sleep, which sounds a lot better than anything.

Sonya: I'll also say, I approached one of my literature professors in undergrad and I was like, “can you please give me a list of all the books that I should read?” Because I loved his classes that I took with him and I was like this seems like a great idea, then I can know what I should be reading. And he was like, “no, I'm not gonna do that.”

Mirna: Whoa. what?

Taylor: I love this

Sonya: Yeah! And I was kind of taken aback and I was like “why?” And he was like, “if you make a chore, it's going to feel like a chore.”

Mirna: Oh, damn!

Sonya: It should not be a list that you cross off every day. It should be an ambition.of yours to read a lot, but go to the library or a bookstore and figure out what you want to read. Don't make it a list and cross it off every day.

Mirna: Wisdom.

Sonya: Sonya means “wisdom!”

Honora: Oh, really?

Sonya: It does!

[LAUGH]

Mirna: First, Motivational Poster Sonya. Now, Sonya as wisdom. We’re just learning so much from Sonja today.

Honora: I would introduce myself like: “Hi, I'm Wisdom.”

Mirna: Yeah, do that!

Sonya: Oh my god, I’d have no friends.

[LAUGH]

Mirna: So, I have one last question, which I am hoping will hit several notes here. Would you recommend that people take time away from academia?

Taylor: I'm clutching my pearls; yes! I don't care who you are, or what your story is.

[LAUGH]

Taylor: Take some time off!

Mirna: You’re like, “you need that time!”

Taylor: Yes! Yeah, that's what I would say.

Sonya: Yeah, I agree. You need to have a quarter life crisis. And I think you do. You need that time to just explore who you are, where you want to be in the world, what you want to be doing, and you need time to fail and to succeed, to kind of figure that out. And I think that there are a lot of people in your life that can kind of help you during that time off, if that's something that you're afraid of. There's plenty that you can do to kind of give you the life and structure that you want.

Honora: Yes, a 100%. I think I made the right decision for me by coming straight to grad school because I knew that I had a lot of pressure from my family to do things that—something else that was in writing. And, you know, it’s just being an immigrant is a lot of pressure to have a conventional career. If I had taken a gap year and gone home, my mom was already signing me up to go to nursing school or to go teach somewhere, like she was applying for me at that point. So, I knew that it would be such a risk if I took a gap year. I might lose focus or give in to the pressure to do something else. So, I needed to come here straight, so I could do what I, you know, what I love to do and what I wanted to do. But in being here, I'm like, I really wish I had had a chance to grow a little bit before coming here. And just, you know, explore myself, and just explore the world. You know, being a good writer—you have to explore the world. So sometimes it's a good thing to just experience the world no matter how it is.

Mirna: I think the only reason I didn't take off an actual gap year was, like, like Honora said, I had pressure from home. I had pressure from my mom. Right?

Honora: Moms.

Mirna: Different values, right. And, also, I just had to keep riding the momentum of graduating from undergrad. My, my parents are still like “what, what the fuck does it mean to be a writer?” Right?. I’m like “Okay, peace out, see you!

Sonya: I will say, if you didn't plan on taking a gap year and that’s just what happens? It's okay to cry about it. But it's not going to be the end of the road for you. It's just going to be a way for you to restructure your life and figure out exactly what you want and to work even harder the next time for it. And to spend time with the people that you love, to do what you love, and ride all those hills. Ride that roller coaster!

Mirna: Motivational Poster Sonya!

Taylor: Yes!

Mirna: Wisdom!

Honora: Wisdom!

Mirna: Damn.

Sonya: And there's a lot of stigma too, about gap years.

Mirna: Oh yeah.

Sonya: Which really made me mad. Because, if you really want to go back to school, you're going to go back to school.

Taylor: 100%

Mirna: Yeah.

Sonya: Like, taking a gap year isn't gonna completely unravel who you are and what you want as a person.

Taylor: It fully told me who I was as the person. I’d have no idea who I was if I wasn't a student,

Sonya: Right. And so if people—like, if you do take a gap year, whether or not it is your decision, and people have kind of sassy, snarky things to say about you, just like let it roll off your back.

Mirna: Fuck ‘em!

Sonya: Right? Exactly. Like it doesn't matter. Like people are like, “oh, okay. Cool. Yeah, that's probably why you went to community college, huh? You just didn't care about what you were gonna do with your life.”

Mirna: Fuck you too, buddy!

Taylor: Cut them out of your life!

Mirna: I have a new slogan: “And to critics like you: fuck you.”

[GIGGLE]

Sonya: That’s good!

[JINGLE JANGLE OUTRO]

Sarah: I'm Sarah Boudreau, MFAngle’s producer and editor. We would like to thank VT Publishing for its support. Mirna Palacio Ornelas is our host, Honora Ankong, Sonya Lara, and Taylor Portella are our contributors. Joe Forte is our audio engineer and Podcast Dad. and Dash Elhauge created our theme music. Thanks, listeners for being listeners.