Those Three Little Words: Rue The Day
How do I love Thee (my Writer Friends)? Let me count the ways…
“I love thee to the length and breadth… and way past the depth of stupidity of all those critics/agents/editors who do not INSTANTLY see and recognize your BRILLIANCE….” These are words every good Writer Friend should know and say, with some frequency, to her friends who are submitting their work. It’s in the job description!
(You know what I’m talking about. We writers have different “friend jobs,” different kinds of love we must show to our colleagues who are going through the fire with us. Read the manual.)
I hear a lot of talk about the necessity of being honest with one another, cutting through the BS, laying it all out there in critique and making sure our friends’ manuscripts are PERFECT and WORKS OF ART before they send them out to those editors/agents/contests.
Yes, yes, friends. We all must be cruel and honest with one another. But we also must be ready, willing, and able to share these three little words with one another: Rue the day.
As in, “Don’t worry, they’ll get theirs. They will RUE THE DAY they rejected your masterpiece. You’ll be the next Kate di Camillo, the next Jerry Spinelli, the next Nan Marino (did you know I LOVE her? Check out her blog) and then they’ll be DEVASTATED they made such a horrible, career-limiting mistake. *apply chocolate now; lather, rinse, repeat*
Okay, okay. We all know this talk may not be 100% honest. But the sentiment is, or should be. If it’s not appearing for you on your worst days, you need new Writer Friends — the kind who call you out of the blue (the best Writer Friends are slightly psychic) and say those three magic words.
I hope you have that kind of friend – I know I do! And I’ve needed them, even though my path has been way more sunlight than shadows for the last year or two.
If you do have those Friends? Make sure you show them all the love you can – and love them like a Mama Bear, even if their manuscripts seem like the runts of the litter from time to time. Who knows? Those runts sometimes grow up to be Wrinkles in Time.
And then those shortsighted people who rejected them? They will rue the freakin’ day.
End of sermon.
Note: One of my Very Best Writer Friends – Lindsey Scheibe – who will be famous very soon, and then will blurb my books (also in the Friend contract), just signed with the lovely and insightful Mandy Hubbard of D4EO Literary. Hooray for Lindsey! And congratulations, Mandy. You must have a good picker.;) *throws virtual confetti*
08/15/2010 at 1:32 am
I love this! Thanks for the reminder that we should cherish our writing buddies. I know one who didn’t and he’s slogging through mud right now.
08/16/2010 at 2:51 am
Valerie – slogging through mud? What a graphic image. I like it. I hope you have writer friends as fabulous as mine- I don’t think I could have kept going this long without them.
08/15/2010 at 2:12 am
Hi Nikki,
I just sent my cherished crit. group a link to this post; hence the traffic from S.B. 🙂 Thank you, WRITER FRIEND, for all your support! Couldn’t get by without a little help (of both the honest and the syrupy variety) from my writing friends.
Hooray for your friend, Lindsey! It’s always nice to hear happy news.
Thanks for a post smothered in virtual “Hang in there! Your day will come” chocolate!
08/16/2010 at 2:50 am
Lori, your day will most definitely come! I can’t wait until it does, and I can be all fairy godmother-ish about your book baby. 😉
BTW, I just finished reading Fairy Tale by Cyn Balog. Loved it. Have you read it?
08/15/2010 at 1:10 pm
Hoorah for Lindsey! And great post. Comes at the perfect time for me as I’ve got two fulls out to prospective agents and I’m doing the email duck-and-dive. You know, where you open your inbox, dive out of sight like you’re avoiding mortar fire, pace around frantically and eventually get someone else to look for you to see if you’ve gotten a rejection. 🙂 Definitely a time for Writer Friends…
08/16/2010 at 2:48 am
Ooh, good luck to you! Try not to go too crazy over the inbox. Writer Friends can help, as can chocolate anything. 🙂
08/16/2010 at 2:28 pm
Nikki,
Thanks for the shout out, and thanks for celebrating with me. LOVE this post! Love you.
I’m SO excited for your latest masterpiece! Keep me posted.
🙂 Lindsey
08/18/2010 at 9:02 pm
Love this post. And you are such a good writer friend to so many.
09/14/2010 at 12:42 pm
How can we do this without our writer friends? It would be impossible. So nice for you to give them a shout out.
By the way, your very kind mention has made my head swell so big that getting it into the car and going to work this morning will be difficult. Thank you.
09/20/2010 at 12:18 pm
Nan – I’ve been sick with worry about your head in car issues. Did you get to work? LOL You have reason to be proud of your work, you know that.
If you ever get a chance to come down this way (all this long way away) for a book festival, I would love to show you around!