A night alone gave way to introspection about my writing. While I stepped away from the laptop to work my evening job, then return home, eat, and watch a movie, without other family distractions and goals, though I did not set out for this to occur, it happened: I came to the realization that this writing gig is work.
Of course I knew that. Perhaps I didn't really know it at six, when I told my father I wanted to write books. But I certainly realized it in my twenties, when I wrote my first novel.
But I didn't know that this career goal of becoming a full-time novelist was a job. A JOB. I've had many, and mostly just as a way to support myself and my family. I suppose I thought writing would be fun, because sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, and imagination come naturally to me.
But it's more than that.
Like I always say, as human beings, we never really know how we will react or what we will do until we are in the moment. I watched "The Stanford Prison Experiment" this morning. Those young men didn't know what they would do until they did it. Would they succumb to the "prison guards'" wishes? Would the "prison guards" act humanely? Even Dr. Phil Zimbardo had no idea, admittedly.
It wasn't until this last round for me, with my most recent novel, PENNY'S SONG, that I realized this writing thing is REAL. It can get real real. Really fast. And it's more than putting ideas to paper and more than structuring a sentence. IT'S A LIFESTYLE. One that requires dedication, focus, determination, courage, a thick skin, a sense of humor, and time. Lots of time.
Nearly four months ago I embarked on the final editing journey for PS. It was brutal. I repeatedly acted like a prison guard to my own writing, cruelly taking out well-loved phrases and putting filter words in "the hole." And walking away at the end of the day, feeling badly, not just for having "killed" some characters or watching idly as other guards, my critique partners, did, but having killed certain scenes and replaced them with others. That one scene was always a nice guy.
It was a trying three months.
Then came perfecting the draft query letter. I had about ten versions. Yes, they got better over time. Yes, the new "pitch" received validation from a literary agent at a virtual conference this month. Yes, I began querying earlier this month, receiving five rejections. Six, if you include the agent who wrote me two separate rejection emails. Yes, another agent who rejected my manuscript lauded my query letter.
But the kudos did come with a price. Not the conference fee, or the webinar fee, the fee for the excellent query review, the charge for the editors to look at my first four chapters, or the writing group monthly charge. A mental price.
I never missed a work shift in my life. Last Monday, my supervisor called me twenty minutes into my shift, concerned about my whereabouts. I had failed to put the shift in my calendar. And the next day, I frantically drove my daughter to gymnastics "early," to find her session starts at 5:30 on Tuesdays in the summer, something I had known for weeks and had done correctly until then when I dropped her off an hour and a half too early.
In all fairness to writing, I also have been readying my son for college and planned two parties, one for him and one for my daughter's birthday. But I missed my daughter's piñata and water balloon fight to participate in a live pitch, one that though positive, resulted in the "double rejection" I mentioned. And prepping for the virtual writing conference, though helpful, also was stressful. I don't take anything lightly.
Just like Michael Angarano in "Stanford."
Am I saying I'm quitting? No, I'm not saying that. All I am saying is that while I knew and fully expected writing to present some challenges, and I was still prepared and willing to embark on this path, I now also see what I can become in the throes of this career.
It's not just a job I can leave behind at five pm. It's not even one that gives me a paycheck...yet. In fact, I pay to do this work and do it well. It feels more like having a child. Except this child is never going to leave home. Even when I'm gone, these children, "The Supplier," "The End of September," "Harley's Eclipse," "Vacation," and "Penny's Song," along with my future children, will carry on.
Is it worth it, knowing my voice will continue long after I depart this earth?
I wonder what Dr. Phil Zimbardo would have to say about that?
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