Wrap It Up

Baltimore friends, come join me tonight at The Womb Room at 7pm for our parents Writing Circle. If you’re exhausted from the holidays and need an hour to decompress, reflect, and sit in the quiet company of fellow parent-writers, this is the meetup for you!

I wanted to write a grand year-end reflection about the things I discovered in 2024, the ways I failed and succeeded, and what I’d like to change in the year ahead. But between winter break with two children at home all day, holiday celebrations, and finally getting over my cold, finding the time to even sit down at my computer has been hard enough without trying to fit in any kind of thoughtful engagement with what it means for one year to end and a new one to start.

So let me just say this: 2024 had its moments, both good and bad. Mostly I will remember it as the year when I got to watch my boys really start to become brothers, playing and interacting and loving each other in a way where no matter how much dismal news pushed in and tried to paint the world in darkness, they were a constant light, a steady joy. I will remember it as the last year of my debilitating pain, a turning point in my life that has left me energized and excited about what comes next for me and my body. I’ll remember it as the year we had to say goodbye to our beloved cat whose absence I continue to feel in surprising moments that make me catch my breath.

From a writing standpoint, I will remember it as a year where I wrote much more than I published, where I threw myself into projects that challenged me and kept me interested, ones that I will continue to work on in the year ahead.

I am thankful for the few publications I had this year and to the editors who saw something in my work and shared it with their readers.

If you’d like to take a look, I have links to my 2024 publications below.

As always, thanks for reading and for all of your support! I hope your 2024 was full of bright spots and I wish you all a safe and happy start to the new year.

First up, I published three issues of my children’s literature magazine, Little Thoughts Press this year. I am so proud of these issues and thrilled to have been able to share the work of so many talented kid-lit writers and artists. If you have young readers in your house, be sure to check out our subscriptions options. We have three new issues set to publish in 2025 that we are really excited about.

Second, a big thank you to The Womb Room & the Enoch Pratt Library Hampden branch who helped me kick off 2024 on the highest note possible by welcoming me and fellow poet Annie Powell Stone for poetry readings in January. It’s hard to believe that happened this year because it feels so long ago, but it was such a joy and a real highlight of my year.

Thanks to Identity Theory and specifically Vic Nogay for publishing three of my micros, “Mommy and Me,” “Treasure,” and “My Son Invents a New Game.”

Thanks to Stanchion Zine for including my flash story, “In The Shadow of the Big House” in Issue 15.

Thanks to Moist Poetry Journal for publishing my sweaty, summertime baseball poem, “After the All-Star Break.”

Thanks to DMQ Review for the publication and Pushcart nomination for my poem, “While my son rattles on about dinosaurs I contemplate the futility of life.”

Thanks to Bulb Culture Collective for reprinting a poem that I think has my favorite title, “The Baby Won’t Sleep So We Go for a Long Walk During Which You Recount the Entire Plot of Space Jam.”

And thanks to Serotonin Press for including my poem, “Resolve” in their Anthology of Poetry and Prose on Mental Illness and Suicide Prevention.

You can find more of my writing & contact information at clairemtaylor.com. If you’d like to further support my work, please consider purchasing one of my books, or a copy of Little Thoughts Press. I also have a ko-fi page.