Break

Received another rejection letter today. The total is now 15 rejection letters with 1 of positive feedback. Break it down further and it’s this: 6 no responses, 9 actual rejection letters. And to break it down even further, it’s this: 8 form rejection letters and 1 personalized rejection letter.

I’m sitting here listening to my friend Gareth Asher’s song “Break” and it’s kind of how I feel right now. “Got fear sitting right along by me in the passenger side. Somebody break. Somebody better break. Somebody break, before we take a fall.” July and August have been a very long, busy, & tiresome two months in my real world job. I feel it has beaten me down to a soulless drone, but I do love my real world job and I’ll take the 2 months of busting ass for a soon to be weekend completely off of work. But because I’ve feel like I’ve been beaten down, this 15th rejection letter could have just stayed out in the wonderful internet world of space and I would have been completely fine with it being a no response rejection.

For the first time, my heart just broke while reading it. It stung worse than the previous 8 letters and it dashed any hope I had. So I sent a message out to the Twitter world that read: Another rejection letter but I will continue querying & writing. "If I'm not getting rejected I'm not reaching far enough." by @SusanAkaSARK

I meant my tweet. I will still write & query. It’s not in me to give up on my dreams. I might set them aside for love (as I regretfully did when I was in my early twenties & thought I knew what love was) and I might set them aside for a career (which I happily did in my late twenties), but I’ve never given up on them. The quote I found on Monday from Sark, an author who has always given me a sense of hope and inspiration, was perfect and even more perfect today.

Then I had 3 friends reply back with the following:

you're the bomb and so is your book! Love you Sistah Bear!! @YOOOadrienne

we all believe in you and will be first in line for your very first book signing!!!@parneezy
 Keep going! Your book is amazing and you owe it to your characters and future readers to get it published! @Nellie429

The support I have is amazing. The above support is amazing and as Malcolm Gladwell said in his book THE OUTLIERS “no one ever makes it alone.” Though I may feel it at times, I am not alone.

So...

I will not break. I will not give up. Something will break but it will not be my spirit, it will not be dream, and it will not be my stride.

I will raise my head high, square my shoulders, and sing very loud, “Ain’t nothing gonna break my stride. Nobody gonna slow me down. I got to keep on moving. Ain’t nothing gonna break my stride. I’m running and I won’t touch ground. I got to keep on moving.”

Listening to “Break My Stride” by Matthew Wilder

(This is my rejection letter theme song. It has been from the 1st one and will be until the last one)

Goodnight Baby

It’s Sunday, October 18th and it’s 9:02 pm.

I’m sitting in my room listening to the sounds of life outside my apartment window. I much prefer the sounds of the countryside. I recognize the sounds instantly there. Here, I’m not sure if the noise I hear is from a neighbor, a business, a light rail, people, the settling of a new apartment building, and so on.

It’s my first night alone here. My thoughts are with my mom because it’s her first night alone as well since my dad is on the road and my sister hasn’t moved in yet. I wonder if she feels something missing because I know I do. I’m worried about her too. That’s the daughter in me and the caretaker in me. If I knew she wasn’t asleep, I’d call her right now and make sure she has taken her meds, locked the door, and so on. I’d tell her goodnight and then she’d say “goodnight baby” and all would be right in the world.

So tonight, I’ll just have to look for a star and say goodnight to her that way and listen for the wind to bring back a “goodnight baby” to me.

Permission to Write

From Jeff: Without a doubt, however, your biggest strength is in your characters.  I like them enough that I could probably write my own stories with them.  Helen could be very, very interesting. If that is your biggest strength, I would consider your need to explain everything to be your weakness.  Give your reader something to do!”

I listen to everything Jeff says. I know he’s not blowing smoke up my ass because we know each other. There are only a handful of people I trust that tell me exactly what they are thinking especially when it comes to them critiquing and reading anything I write. I also value everything they say and listen, take, and learn from what they have said to me.

I’ve been really stuck in my new WIP. I’m having a Negative Nancy/Defeatist attitude with the project lately. I HATE THAT ABOUT ME! I want to throw in the towel with my new characters, their story, and run into a cave and live out the rest of my existence.

And then I go back to Jeff’s email and I find the courage to trudge forward. There’s a reason my characters want their story told. There’s a reason they picked me to tell their story. I love my characters. They are part of my soul and I can’t give up on them. Even the ones I have set aside for the time being, their stories will be completed if only for my own sanity.

I read blog today that said “Give yourself permission to write how you write.” (Read it HERE) and decided that today that was exactly how I was going to write. I’m going to tell less, show more, and write the best damn characters that I can.

Listening to “Free” by Train and this entry is dedicated to Jeff who needs to write his own insane adventures into a best selling novel!

To the Lust of the Life

Amy, Adrienne, me, Joe @ Margaritaville, Key West
August 2009

As my dear friend Adrienne screams when she’s doing a shot that she shouldn’t do, “Ow, my life!”

Not that my life is in “Ow”

It’s very far from “ow.” It’s actually a great life. I have great friends and a great family. I have a great job that I enjoy going to daily. Life is good.

I think “Ow, my life,” when I have a negative thought or bad day and it makes me realize that my life doesn’t suck. So thank you Adrienne for that little saying. For that I give you my saying of “imaginary balls.” * Come on, you know it’s great :) *

And then my other dear friend Amy sent me a link to her blog today and it’s great (and yes, I’m biased - we’re friends but I’d tell her if it sucked too) and it inspired me. (It inspired me to write this blog entry.) She inspired me to be more truthful than I already am and be more of me than I already am. So thank you Amy for telling me about your blog and sharing a slice of you life & thoughts with me. We do get wiser as we get older & we learn to stand up for ourselves and it is the freedom that we gain that makes us all amazing people.

But they are also 2 of my friends that inspire me with their sheer lust for life. Life may throw rocks at them and they may take the hits, but they dust off the rubble, flip the naysayers the bird, get back on their horses (or bikes) and continue to ride toward that setting sun.

I love that part of them.

I have a circle of friends that are undoubtedly the craziest, most inspirational, and supportive friends in the world. I couldn’t write without them.

They inspired me to finish The Dumbing Down of Love. They encouraged me through text messages, tweets, emails, etc as I spent 28 days in February giving up every social opportunity to hang with them. Yes, there were the occasional, “come out instead but we understand why you’re not here.” They were my backbone when I thought I had none & they were my inspiration for my characters in The Dumbing Down of Love. Every character in that book has a part of them. Every part of them is in every part of that book. Like my characters that live in my head or on paper, without my friends, I am nothing, but with them I am everything.

Yes, writing is a solitude job, but living life shouldn’t be one of solitude. It should be filled with people that inspire and move you towards your dream.

So this blog entry is dedicated to all the beautiful souls who inspire me, who move me, who laugh with me, who encourage me, who challenge me, and who help me hone my craft.

I dedicate the song below to all the ones in the world that crave that “lust of the life.”