So what if I'm jealous? Go celebrate your good humanity at Upworthy if you're not in the mood. This is my blog and I'll bitch if I want to. Maybe I'm just sore over my first grad school rejection letter topped with the chocolate kiss of the first magazine I didn't get into sent directly to my door. Thanks for the kind reminder! You know who else does that kind of thing? No one. All the "let's just be friends" emails I have gotten over the years have in no way sent me follow-ups filled with pictures and stories of the girls I was rejected for. Why? Because those guys took the two seconds out of their day to ask themselves, "Does she really want to see this?" and then answered, "You know what. Probably not."I'm okay, really. I've been writing a long time, because anyone who even tries to get published has been writing a long time. It's not the first (two) rejections I've gotten in a single day, and they won't be the last either. And the delight that writing brings me far outweighs the disappointment of rejection, as any successful writer will tell you. My last workshop leader commented, "It hurts for like, a second. And then it's over."
I always come back to this article about how it's near impossible to succeed in the world of writing if you don't have some other income. The really lucky ones just have a lot of money to begin with, meaning all they have to spend is time. The less lucky ones have to spend time we don't have on something that won't make any money. And it brings me a lot of comfort to know that I'm in the same sucky boat as a lot of other talented people. It's legitimizing.
America is a hard place for artists. Not that other countries pay their artists more, but we have more liberal arts colleges than we know what to do with. Which I wouldn't have any other way, but it increases competition in a market that doesn't pump out a lot of cash. I have been to exotic countries where the local talent was...someone who didn't go to a liberal arts college, or had to compete. And it shows. Maybe the answer for us all is to spread out a bit.Like I said, I'm fine, and I won't post a rant for every rejection I get. One day doves will fly through my window and they'll call me an "emerging writer," which is a term I find hilarious because it means "someone who's been writing all their life." Just as the term "aspiring writer" really just means "unrecognized writer." Thank you all for attending my pity party. Take a gift basket on your way out. It's filled with all the magazines I didn't get into.
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