Blogtemper: My Africa, my words

There's 30 minutes left the first day of this challenge. The challenge is to write a post every day for the month of September.

I'm not ready. I am afraid I will fail to post everyday, but here I am. I will do my very best and I will succeed.

Stories from home, that's what we are going with. I've developed an insecurity about not being African enough in my blogging. My all time favorite writers are European, what do I know about African literature? How dare I even think about writing African stories?

When you have been accused of "coconut", oreo or not black enough most of your life, it gets to you. I didn't realize how much till I stumbled upon the afroblogging community. The more I realized African bloggers/writers are nothing like that "African narrative" we need to change, they are normal every day folks with thoughts and words not too far removed from my own, the more I see that someone lied to me along the way.

I did not realize how deeply I was affected until this challenge, it's daunting task. I feel a bit inadequate.

Am I the only one who feels this way?

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Rejection Slips

I love my rejection slips. I am going to print and put them on a notice board in my room when I finally get around to making my writing corner a reality. I imagine, they'll inspire me to pour my heart out and try again, because failure is not trying. I got a rejection slip today, an email from an online magazine I really want to be published in. It hurt more than the others, it hurt because I really, really really wanted this and I poured my heart and soul into the article I submitted. It hurts, that's what I want to get across is, the " we regret to inform you that we eventually decided against publishing it as we do not think it is suitable for our platform at this time " that, that was an arrow through my heart. What does that even mean? I've poured over the magazine, I've read every article that caught my eye, I was guided by what was published. The article I submitted was a result of the feelings some one the articles evoked in me. So tell me, ...

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What I'd tell her, if she'd let me

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