Signed, Bleurgh of Swansea

So on Saturday I was feeling bleurgh. Husband asked if I'd taken my pill; I had. I couldn't explain it; it was just a sort of apathy mixed with edginess. Which isn't a good combination.

I finally got myself together enough to go to Sainsburys - once that would have been a major achievement for me and I was nowhere like at that depth, thankfully. Driving there it suddenly struck me, the reason for my bleurghness: the rejection I'd received the day before for Novel2.

I joke a lot about sending in submissions and just waiting for the rejection so I can do it all over again but that doesn't take away from the fact that it hurts. I'd successfully pushed this one out of my mind briefly but it had taken its revenge in this sneaky surreptitious way.

I think it was worse than it has been because recently I've been thinking about aspirations and ability and wondering if, in my case, one outstrips the other. I know you should push yourself but surely you also must need a realistic limit beyond which you accept you can't go. I should probably never have gone to university. I scraped in and scraped through, though my determination to take science, which I wasn't very good at, rather than languages, which I was, probably didn't help.

So it's thinking this and going into libraries and seeing the hundreds, thousands, of books that have been deemed worthy of being published when mine hasn't that have contributed to my ennui. I read books and some I think, yes, I can see why this was published, but others I read and have to ask: what stood out about this that made the agent choose it, out of all the hundreds received each year. And, yes, I think some are better than mine but some are worse.

Anyway, once I'd worked out why I felt like bleurgh it was easier to handle. And this is why I shouldn't go to Sainsburys when I'm feeling depressed.

Not just a large box of Maltesers but three packets of Buttons too. One packet didn't even make it home; they were devoured before I'd even got into Sainsburys petrol station. I'd probably have eaten the other two packs in the car if the petrol pump hadn't been covered in fuel making my hands smell horrid.

In the shop I asked an assistant if they had a toilet I could use to wash my hands (knowing they didn't but seeing that she was grumbling about the state of her hands too.) She said it wasn't for public use but that I could go in there with her. Cosy. So we both washed our hands and she explained that it used to be open to the public but 'they abused it.' 

Apparently I wouldn't believe the sort of things people did in there. In twos sometimes. And men are the worst. They only go in there - here she lowered her voice Les Dawson fashion - 'for a dump. And they're not fussy how they leave it.'

I took great care not to splash water or soap around and even remembered to pay for the petrol (or diesel as Husband insists on calling it) before I left. But you know what it's like when you get fuel on your hands. It takes ages to get rid of the lingering pong. 

I have another submission, for Novel3, still 'being considered' so no doubt bleurghness is just around the corner but tonight I have to be upbeat as I speak to a ladies' group at Sketty Methodist church about my wonderful novel, This Time Next Year.

First or maybe second rejection

And so it begins.

I've had the standard rejection from the agent I approached with Novel 2. I've also had feedback from Dr Stu who offered to read a few chapters for constructive criticism.

Criticism however constructive, which this was, is always painful at first, as are rejections, so it's time to look again, think about the comments, take on board those I agree are relevant, and get back on my bike - or my keyboard at least.

But I need a cup of tea first ...

First submission - or not

I feel physically sick.

I have just emailed my novel to an agent (one of the few that accepts, requests even, email submissions). It still needs lots of work but the first three chapters have been written and edited to death so they're going now.

And when I entered it into my online diary I discovered that it has, in fact, already been turned down by the one agent I approached ...

However, on the plus side, the publisher I sent the first three chapters to last year wanted to see the finished manuscript so I shall hang on to that.

And that sicky feeling could just be connected with the excess chocolate I ate while making fairy cakes for Zac's this evening ...

I'm going to plant some plants now. Fresh air and exercise that's what I need.