Yesterday, I had a marathon of watching DVD's of my favorite series on my computer instead of writing on it. It was a rainy Sunday, perfect for writing. But instead of taking advantage of the splendid weather and getting some work done or even cleaning the house before the clutter I could tidy in less than an hour becomes another gargantuan mess I'd rather avoid, I watched television. I still have partials out to another agent and 3 editors. What if any of them comes back at me and says they'd like to see the FULL? It's going to be pretty embarrassing to say it's not ready. I always heard it takes months to hear back from these people - and although industry advice says no, many will say "how's your first 50 pages?" and then suggest to send them out because it will take longer than they say. Well, it's 2 months for one editor and this is coming into week 7 for everybody else. And I watched television.
Gotta love those self-destructive tendencies with deep roots. This isn't the first time performance anxiety has sunk its claws into my motivation. One time I remember was my first writing job I got at the local weekly - hired by the editor and everything. It was at least 3 months before I gave him anything. I ran into him at the therapist's office - small town - when he and his wife were coming out and I was going in. He gave me this befuddled look and asked, "so are you going to write us anything or what?" It was what I needed to thaw out and I got him something within a week. I was pretty lucky that time and had a great working relationship with that editor, but I know I've missed some juicy worms in the past getting to the hole too late. Frozen by a fear that feels like apathy.
Anyway, that's all for now. Thanks for reading.
No comments:
Post a Comment