Hi all. I’m proud but semi-dejected to let you know that I’ve worked my way back into the Rejection Stack. Still it hurts.
Who needs an explanation as to why it hurts? All you have to do is say ‘rejection’ and everyone can relate in one form or another to being rejected.
The only thing is, I wasn’t rejected, my story was. At least that is the spin we writers (and all those who create something with the tools God gave us) put on the fact that someone doesn’t like the baby that we birthed out of our own mind and soul.
Perhaps, though, it might be a baby that only a mother or father could love? As the one who conceived the idea and grew it, my view is biased. But what parent doesn’t believe in their offspring being the best and most wonderful there could ever be?
Bah.
Here I am in the midst of getting my writing career back on track after the illness and passing of my mother and I get rejected. Right now would have been the ideal time for my writing ability to be affirmed by acceptance and publication...and dare I say renumeration.
Yes, money.
I write because it is who I am. I am a writer. I write because these strange ‘what ifs’ keep popping into my brain and have to go somewhere. I write to entertain myself and others. I write because it is my profession and I like to get paid, when possible, for using my talent.
Rewards are most appreciated. Rejections are not.
So, now I’m left to console myself.
I like my story and am amused by it. When the story came to me as I sat in a reserved study room at the library on my four-hour daily writing stent (yes I’m actually trying to be consistent), it felt right. The words flowed. The energy was there. The muse was with me and I touched the creative sky once again.
The long, long time of dry writing is over. The time when my mind and energy focused on my mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s is over. Forcing out the words in a word-by-word drip is now replaced with a flood. I’m writing about 2,000 words on most days in this greening of my creative world.
So...back to the rejection. It hurts. But it signifies, too, that I wrote and submitted a story. Even better, it is but one story among many which I have and am and will continue to write and submit.
The rejection, in a way, is a welcome back to the writing career that pretty much got put aside. If I am writing I will either have my stories accepted or rejected. That is the way of the publishing world. Learning to take these editors’ decisions and derive power and inspiration from them is another way of acknowledging that I have returned to my profession.
I am proud to say that this is not the first rejection I have had for my work, nor will it be the last. Write on!
P.S. Please check out the added page to my blog and let me know which story start you would like me to use.
