A Work in Progress

I'm writing this for myself as much as I'm writing this for you. Think you didn't get done, or didn't accomplish, or didn't make, or didn't have, or didn't overcome -- fill in the blank, this year? Don't give up. Time is just time. And all things are possible outside of time. For me, the end of year always culminates in me wondering what I wrote, if anything and did I have any of these writing published? Of course, being published doesn't equal success ... and yet, sometimes it does. There's a ton of writing I do that no one will ever see. Not just because I didn't send it out into the world, but because no one wants it. Yep. It isn't the right fit (or it really isn't any good) and I have to keep looking for the right home for the piece. I'm always, always reminding myself I'm in the rejection business. Because it gets old, this whole rejection thing. Yet, if you know it's part of the job, it's manageabl

You know what's uncomfortable? Me letting my work go out (the one that's been in a writing/editing/rewriting process for the last ten years) to my writing/ critique partners. It's like letting your baby -- your sweet, little child -- go to school on his first day of preschool.You are relieved, but terrified. Happy but seriously overwhelmed. There's a two-fold dimension of emotions. And I can't figure out what I want or should feel. Many of you don't know that this story has been with me since my now-high-school son was a three-year-old. It's been over ten years of trying to figure out what and how I want to tell this story. For a while, I thought it was just a concept that would never come to fruition. And that it was a crazy idea for a book. Shouldn't happen. Nah, dumb idea. But, it wasn't just that.  Okay, perhaps it is a dumb idea, but I never could give it up. AND (I'm going to speak "positive proph