I have a post over at DotMoms today. Go on over and check it out. While you are there, catch up on some of the other great mom writers that share their stories with you. It’s worth the time it takes to read through them. There are some wonderful women writing on that site.
Family members: 5
Case of strep throat: 4
Ear infections: 6
Mother losing her ever loving mind?: 1
I am pretty sure that whatever brain I had left in my head has melted into a bubbling mass of molten lava onto my laptop. I am the only one in the family NOT sick. They all have strep (including Clint). Every child has double ear infections. (But, the dog didn’t crap on my floor!)
While trying to play Florence Nightingale, I also got to work on my book proposal which entailed it’s own little drama. (Created of course by me in my sleep deprived, crazed mind.)
But I was half sane enough to pick up the phone and call another writer and say things like: “Rgggrgling flegshmeckilany redkfjjhtss.” Somehow he made sense of it all and talked me off of the edge of the curb as I prepared to hurl myself in front of an oncoming bus. Even managed to give me about 45 minutes of encouragement. 45 whole minutes where I was not trying to figure out how to bomb my own house with Lysol!
So I felt good. Honest. I went back to my critique group with my reworked proposal. I heard things like, “That is great! I like your voice coming through. Good job!” It thrilled me.
Until I read the next line by FOUR of them. “…But what makes it different from Book XYZ? It seems very similar. You would have to make it stand out more for me to want to pick yours up.”
BUS?! OH BUS?!! Where art thou?
I am proud of myself though because I didn’t email or call anyone in a fuss and emotional outpouring of Poor Me’s. For a drama queen that is pretty impressive. (Damn friends were probably screening their calls and wouldn’t pick up anyway. And I just may have reached a new level of being added to the spam-blocker of some of my writing buddies as well.)
But my patience did pay off with a very encouraging (and not sought after….much) email from an author that I really admire encouraging me and giving me advice. I decided to end the night on that note.
Not work on my proposal.
Not check my email.
Not contact my critique group.
Not stay in the room with anyone in my family.
And finally, not let the bad days get me down.
I am writing over at DotMoms this morning. Go check it out and let me know what you think. Don’t worry, I will be back to my ‘online shrine to parental self-absorption’ later today to document every moment of my hand-wringing and narcassism.*
*Gotta love it when the New York Times so freely hands you lines dripping with sarcasm.
My husband has learned what it is like to live with a writer. He has not only learned the lingo, he has also learned how to the mind if a writer works. (Well, as much as anyone can understand the mind of a writer.)
He sent me this comic today. I am not sure if he just really understands my ways when it come to writing or if he is saving me the drama that overtakes our house when I don’t “agree” with the response to something I have written.
Hey, writers…can you relate?
Today I have an entry over at DotMoms. Why don’t you scoot on over there and read it while you are waiting for me to update here.
(Quit yer poutin’! I’ll be back here later today.)
While you’re there, check out some of the other wonderful entries that the DotMoms have posted. It truly is a talented group of women writing over there. I love being a part of this group! Show them some love while you are there, okay?
Apparently I truly have lost my mind. “How can you tell, Jenn?”, you may be asking yourself. (First, that is a rude question, you know. Secondly, good point.) The answer is I signed up for NaNoWriMo Perhaps I have lost my mind. Okay, I have. No one is debating that one. (Okay, there is that freaky guy in the back that may be debating it, but he likes to debate everything so no one really listens to him.)
50,000 words.
30 Days.
Crazy.
Enough said.
I’ll keep you updated.
In other news, I finally picked up a book that has been recommended to me by so many people! I went to my library and got a copy of Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird. How can I put this? I LOVE IT. I have drawn little hearts around it and put “I love you stickers” on the pages of my favorite chapters. (All of them.) How can you not love a book with a chapter entitled “Shitty First Drafts”? If you are a writer, stop what you are doing RIGHT NOW and follow this link or go to your library and get this book. Now. Go. You’ll love it. You have my word on it. How could I not have snagged it up when I first heard about it? I don’t know either. Chalk it up to craziness. (I do that with everything else!) But I may have to tell the library they can’t have it back. I love it too much.
So, that is the going ons going on here. What about you? Tell me what I have missed being out of the blogosphere so much lately! Update me, people. You are my link to insanity.
I am beginning to think that I have developed a medical condition that is effecting my writing. I am not sure how rare it is, but I haven’t heard anyone talk about it. In fact, I have done a thorough and exhaustive search of the internet trying to see if I can find out more information about it. Hoping to find a cure. I have even checked WebMD from end to end to find a clue as to how I contracted this condition and how I can possibly get rid of it.
Maybe if I describe it, you can tell me if you know of any cure. Oh for the love of all things good and right in this world, please someone have a cure.
You see, lately, I have been able to come up with some really great ideas for writing. Ideas for entries here on the blog. Ideas for great essays for other publications. Ideas to query magazines with. I’ve even been inspired to add a couple of new chapters in my book. I am talking the Muse has been with me.
Apparently, my Muse really likes to visit me when I am active. Washing dishes. Cleaning house. Driving my car. And yes, even an idea or two as I lay down to sleep. I have even gone as far as jotting down notes. (They don’t call me Dory around here for nothing. I know I need reminder notes.)
Armed with my notes, my ideas and a block of time dedicated to writing, I approach my computer, pull out my chair and sit down.
That is when it happens.
What happens? you may ask. Well, as soon as my ass hits the chair, the ideas disappear. Literally. I haven’t found any documented cases, but I do believe I have a delete key on my ass that is directly connected to the idea center of my brain. Sit down. Ideas vanish. Get up and work. Ideas return. Brilliant ideas. Humorous ideas. Ideas that will take an essay from bland to byline. From plain to published.
Then I sit down.
Ass hits the delete key and I no longer have any idea what I was going to say. Oh sure, the general idea is still there. The concept is still there. The brilliant way I had it worded? Deleted. The humorous way I set it up? Gone.
The first impulse is to try to write standing up. It doesn’t work. I’ve tried it. Apparently, the is something in all keyboards that triggers phones to ring, children to fight and dogs to bark in order to disrupt any chance of fooling the ass delete key.
Now, I know that other people have conditions much worse than mine. But, for a writer, this is critical. Am I to suffer alone? Is there a cure? A support group?
Oh for the love of nondeleting asses everywhere, give me a cure!
Okay, I admit it. I can get pretty obsessive about things. And I am not talking about normal things that a lot of people get obsessed about. Plates I can see myself in? Don’t care. That April Fresh smell for my clothes? Not so much an issue as long as they are clean. A house that is spotless 24/7? Can’t say that tops my list either now that the house is no longer for sale.
No, I am talking about things that usually send him from the room shaking his head. Things that really would probably make the “normal” person give a double take and then move on. Oh no, not me. I get a hold of one of these things and it will haunt me for days (alas, sometimes weeks) at a time. Do any of these things make any difference in my life in any way, shape or form? Absolutely not. Let me give you a few examples.
I have said it before, I will say it again. I really do not understand why people cry reading this book. I don’t get it. Rather than just accept that there are people that just find some sort of emotional ties to this book, I can’t let it go. I ask anyone I see that has this book or has heard of if they cried when they read it. If (oh heaven forbid) they say they did, they will be treated to about a 10-15 minute round of questions. Questions like: Why? Could you please explain it to me! Do you not see the whole stalker attributes to this?? Were you neglected as a child? Are you currently seeking medical attention for the fact that this book made you cry? Why? I mean, really, why??? I don’t get it and cannot let it go.
You’re still here? Wanting more examples? Okay. Here is another.
Whenever I am traveling and come to a state line, I have this really bizarre obsession where I have to lift my feet up going over that state line. No, really. Not only do I have to lift my feet, I have to announce that I am doing it until we cross the state line and then I have to shout, “Welcome to [insert state name here]!!” Something that I just do? Well, yes. However, if I have fallen asleep (not while driving of course!), and no one woke me up to do it, I am mad. Clint has gotten more than one knuckle punch to the arm for not waking me when crossing a state line. IF that has happened, I am seriously distressed that I missed it. There have been nights in hotel where I will lay there in the middle of the night and mumble (loud enough for him to hear of course) “I cannot believe you just blew through there without letting me know. Do you know how mean that is?”
More? Wow. You may just be as weird as I am. Good to know.
Okay. Last one. (Not the last one I have, but the latest and last I am sharing with you today.) I was recently online IMing with a friend of mine who happens to also be a writer. We are looking at different websites sharing links and urls that we think the other would enjoy or benefit from. We are in a sense brainstorming together. Then she happens to come upon a site by an author that probably had really good advice. I will never know. Why? Because of the picture she chose to use in her byline. I am not going to tell you what the picture was, but I will say that it was inappropriate. Totally. Completely. It baffled me to no end. Right there, the obsession began. I mean, WHY? Really. WHY? My writer friend got over it rather quickly, but I couldn’t let it go. See for yourself:
Her: Another good one….but promise me, when we’re published we won’t use a cheesy picture like this for our byline.
Me: That was my FIRST thought!
Her: I hate having to come up with a good headshot.
Me: Seriously…why why why why did she use that picture? OH MY GOD that is bothering me to a very OBSESSIVE degree. WHAT?? WHY WHY WHY??????
Me: Probably thought that she really looked her best.
Me: Clint is laughing his butt off at me. I made him come here and look. And kept saying WHY WHY WHY? WTF? WHY? I don’t care who she is, I can never ever ever read her again. I need to email her. Just one word. WHY?
Her: She left that tip out of her article. Don’t use inappropriate pictures for your byline.
Me: Let me just remind you….I obsess over the weirdest things. This would be one of those things. Do not ever show me stuff like that again. I am going to have nightmares seeing that picture and wake up screaming WHYYYY FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THINGS NORMAL AND SANE WHY?
Me: I need a new brain. Mine is warped
Her: You should definitely email her then…just to get it off your chest.
Me: Can you see it now? “Dear Writer Chick, WHY? For the love of all things good in this world, WHY that picture? Because really you are freaking me out.”
You’d think that was the end of it, right? Not so much. I am pretty sure that every conversation I have had with my friend since then has at one point or another come around to WHY THAT PICTURE? Oh sure, sometimes she brings it up to see me go all off on a rant, but still. It still comes up. In fact, years down the road when we look back on when we were first starting out, I am quite sure when we get together at least one of us will (a) bring it up and (b) make up a mock picture of it ourselves. It is inevitable.
Want to hear one last confession (not obsession…confession)? This entire entry came about because I came across that picture again and really I had to tell someone. And you are that someone. Yes, I was willing to air my dirty laundry of strange obsessive behaviors for one reason alone. To say again…WHY?
Because really, once one of these things gets stuck in my brain, it is there forever. Sad, but true. Stay tuned because who knows, maybe one day I will share with you about sock monkeys, Gilbert Gottfried and bra straps that really need to be TUCKED in!
*update* This is not an author on my blogroll or anyone’s blogroll that I know. In fact, I don’t know her and have not even run across her on any of the writers groups that I belong to. Seriously, it was a drive by page hit that caught our attention. You have my word on that. Besides, if it was you, I am not that nice that I would keep quite. I would suggest in a nice manner that perhaps you are a bit off course with your photo choices. 
I have often read in interviews that there are celebrities and performers who after years of being in the public eye and putting themselves out there still get nervous and anxious when performing. Usually, such a declaration is followed by immediate eye-rolling (mine). If you do it often enough, surely you cannot still be nervous and anxious every time you put yourself out there? Every time???
So, if it is so hard to believe that the more you do it, the less anxious you become (according to my way of thinking), than why is it that I am in a constant state of feeling like I need a barf bag the instant I submit more articles or proposals or queries? Can someone please tell me that feeling will go away soon? It’s okay. You can lie.
I am starting to hear back on some of my submissions.
Could you please pass me the barf bag?
I’ve already told you many times how much I love to write. It is a passion. I do it because I love it and it fuels me. As far back as I can remember, I would write out my thoughts or my dreams or just some really bad poetry. (I am talking really bad poetry.) In fact, when I was younger I remember writing stories to give to relatives for their birthday rather than just signing a card.
Last week when I was at my parents house, I found a drawer filled with items that the various grandchildren had sent to my grandfather as we were growing up. In a box were some of the letters and stories I wrote to him. Among the various notes and thank-you cards, there were many of my first attempts at story writing. (He was my biggest fan!) Mixed within the cards and letters, though, I found a handwritten birthday card I had made for him. Complete with a cheesy poem. Reading it as an adult, I blushed for the young girl who thought this was a sweet card. Although, as an adult, I saw the humor my grandfather must have seen in it to have kept it all those years. It went like this:
Today is your birthday and you should be glad.
Just because you are so old, you should not be sad.
You can’t run and skip like you used to be able to do.
But you are still really funny and I really love you.
So be happy today even though you are old now.
Because I will love you forever, of this I will vow.
Love Jennifer, age 7
(Cut me some slack, I was only 7 and barely 7 at that.)
You see, my grandfather had the world’s greatest sense of humor. When I read that, my first thought was “How totally rude of me to call him old….TWICE.” So, I went to show my Daddy the letter I found. He cracked up and smiled at me. Then, he told me that my grandfather kept that in his office at home where he could see it everyday. He said that he got the biggest kick out of the sheer honesty of it and loved to show it to his friends. He used to tell them, “That’s my granddaughter. She may never write for Hallmark, but she will write. Mark my words on that one!”
Well, 27 years later, I am finally stepping out and braving the real writing world. I have talked about it more than I care to recount, but now I am doing something about it. What am I talking about? Well, I finally stepped out of my comfort zone and have started sending out my work to editors. I am also working on getting an agent for my book.
I am not sure it is possible to really put into words how good, yet frightening it is. How exciting, yet nerve-wracking it is. How thrilled, yet anxious I am to have finally started down the path to becoming a “real writer.” Wish me luck! And of course, you will be the first to know when I hear anything…good or bad. Acceptance or rejection. Either way, sending it out there in the first place is what it is all about and how it all starts.
Oh, and if you’re from Hallmark and you are reading this, honestly, I have gotten much better at the whole “greeting card” type of poetry. It has been months since I told someone not to be sad because they are so old on their birthday! Really.
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