I Waited 6 Months For Modern Love To Reject Me

The single experience is still a love story.

Since 2016, I’ve sent six submissions to Modern Love in the New York Times. Being published in the world’s most notable discussion of love has been my goal since I started writing for those trying to find it. All six of my submissions have been rejected. Two were submission errors on my part. Three probably weren’t up to their standards. But this last one? Y’all.

This essay mattered to me because it’s a perspective on love that’s almost entirely left out of the narrative: living without it. I thought it aligned well with Modern Love, a column whose most popular installment ever was famously “The 36 Questions That Lead To Love.” Does that not tell them most of their readers are still single and hopeful? Maybe I’m just not a fit. I’ve heard that one plenty.

All the other rejections came in rather quickly. I’m not sure why they let me wring my hands for six months this time, but I do know that making someone wait that long for the same feedback-free, copy-and-paste rejection as always is unkind, at any workload.

Below, I am sharing this essay for free with anyone who wants to read it because it’s really fucking good, and so am I. I’m not entitled to being published in Modern Love. But I’m good enough to be.