2010: My Annus Horribilis but some bright spots!

To write my end of the year post, I'm making an homage to my nerdom, er, fandom for British Royalty by quoting Queen Elizabeth II. For Queen Elizabeth, 1992 was her Annus Horribilis.....3 of her 4 kids separated, Prince Charles wanted to be a tampon, Fergie got her toes sucked, and then Windsor Castle went up in flames. That would be an off year!

For me, I've had a bit of my own Annus Horribillis.

(1). The Personal: I never quite grasped the meaning when people said, "Well, you have your health" until it was a little too late. In 2009, I began struggling with anemia. But 2010 brought on a full on B12 deficiency, which is way more serious than I ever imagined until I suffered from it. Most people think, "Oh, just take some vitamins", but my doctor prescribed twice a week B12 shots. I went from going 90 miles a minute to being sidelined. Friends, coworkers, and family used to always say to me, "You need to learn to say NO more!" because I was willing to do anything at school, for friends, etc. I also loved walking 4-5 miles every day or every other day. That came to a screeching halt as well.

In mid January and February, I began having to come home from work and go to bed. I couldn't make it through the day I was so exhausted. Even after eight hours of sleeping, I could not get up in the mornings. It just wasn't hitting the snooze button, it was like being physically incapacitated. It also made the depression I often suffered from worse....

The good news is I'm doing much better...I now administer the shots myself, which is a feat in itself since I hate needles! I'm hoping to get back in the walking groove in 2011.

(2). The Professional: Last year was also one of the worst years professionally. So much so, I left teaching to pursue freelance writing full time(or so I thought...more on that in a minute!). Although I loved my students dearly, last year was a tough group. Throw in my health problems, and it made for a volatile mix. I had never actually dreaded going to work before....usually I was pumped about what I was teaching or introducing a new topic. But last year, I grew to literally hate teaching.

I also didn't receive the support at my school that I would have hoped....Sometimes when you do everything you can, people do not look kindly when you no longer do it. It's kinda funny how the tide can turn so quickly. One year you're given a Class Act Teaching Award by a local news station and featured on their morning program, and then the next year you can't do anything right. That fact coupled with everything else led me to leave teaching for my mental and physical health.

Although I'd gotten my answer from God early in the summer about what I should do, my leave from teaching lasted all of a week and two days! LOL Staying home and freelancing all day wasn't quite what I thought it would be, and I missed the kids. I got a call from Walker County about a 12th grade British Lit job...major drawback was the job was an hour and ten minutes away....old teaching job was 25. But I fell in love with the school and fellow teachers the moment I interviewed. I accepted the job the same day I interviewed. God seriously meant for me to be in the classroom because I got two more teaching job calls that week. I'm very thankful for my new job and new environment.

(3). Submission Angst: 2010 was the year I came so close to my dreams of publication that I could reach out and touch them....only to have them brush past me like a stranger in a crowd(yes, that's a Field of Dreams quote allusion!) People told me I'd get book news when I least expected it....that couldn't have been more true. I was a on a tour bus in Washington DC when my phone rang. Since the driver/guide had been like, "DO NOT ANSWER YOUR PHONES", I had to die a little when I saw it was my agent. I knew she wouldn't be calling if it wasn't something. When we got off at the Wall aka the Vietnam War Memorial, I hid under a tree and called her back.

An editor at a Big 6 Pub loved Don't Hate the Player....this editor might even be at ALA, the conference I was in DC for, so I should go scope her out. Things were looking good! I could have peed myself with excitement. And then came the waiting game/roller coaster ride that stretched an agonizing two and a half weeks before DHtP went to an Acquisitions meeting. In between this time, I had a conference call with the editor and my agent...she was a former teacher....we clicked....I loved her revisions ideas for DHtP....it was awesome.

And then it all took a hellish turn like in I Dreamed a Dream, from Les Miserables. Acquisitions wouldn't support pubbing it. I'll never forget that day either. I was getting my house ready to have the minister and about 30 other people from church for lunch the next day. I was so upset by the afternoon call, that I couldn't go to church that night. My faith had been tested. But once again, I pulled myself up my the bootstraps and went on.

There's been a lot of faith testing in 2010....but miraculously each time I was tested, God spoke directly to me. He showed me he'd been guiding me and keeping me in the palm of his hand. That's one of the greatest things of 2010....even in the darkest moments, he's always with me.

One of the bright spots was acquiring Duke aka Little Man. Sure, he was supposed to be my grandmother's dog until his crackdog energy antics made her unable to keep him. And he's eaten more of my shoes than I care to say, but he's also one of the sweetest tempered dogs I've ever seen. He's also so very loving, and he brightened many dark, dark days with his crazy antics.

I mean, how can you not love that face?

Here he is "degutting" a pillow when I turned my back to change the sheets.

One of the greatest bright spots for me is my grandmother....I plan on doing a separate post for her later on, but she is srsly what gets me through. She is the sole beacon of light in a sometimes dark world. After losing my mom eight years ago, my grandmother, Big Mama, or Grammy as she is known in the writing world, has meant the world to me. She lost her only children, my mom and my aunt, within a month of each other in 2002, but throughout those dark and desperate days, her faith never wavered, and she persevered. I'm so thankful she only lives five minutes from me...it's nice having a Rock of Gibraltar so close!!

Besides God, dogs, and my grandmother, bright spots have been the funny things my students say, old students who keep in touch with me, my writer buddies who keep me sane, my regular old friends who make me laugh.

When it all comes down to it, I'm very, very blessed.

And so, that has been my 2010....I'm hoping 2011 is going to be "sent straight from Heaven",and that many of the things I've been hoping and praying for will materialize.

I wish all my family, friends, writer buddies a safe, happy, and prosperous 2011.

Back on Sub with a CRAZY Idea!

So, I officially went on sub today for The Guardians. Being on sub for the second time is a strange feeling. There's excitement, fear, giddiness, anticipation--all of what I felt the first time I went on sub with DHtP, but it feels magnified times a million! So much so that my Grammy, and resident therapist, was already pep talking me last night about "putting it out of my mind', not getting down and out with rejections, etc.

That's is soooooooo much easier said than done. Especially for me who is highly neurotic and a big time worrier.

Going back on sub is tough for another reason. I didn't talk on my blog about what happened in June/July with DHtP and the submission process. I've talked about it lots on AW, but I'll go for it her. Basically, an editor fell in love with DHtP, and I fell in love with the editor when we talked on the phone--yes, I even got to conference call with this editor, and then the most horrible thing happened. It died in acquisitions. It was very, very devastating.

Since mid July, I haven't been on sub. I was officially on sub with DHtP from late November to July. I've been fine tuning The Guardians, which was the first YA I ever wrote. It's a labor of love to keep with something for so long because you believe in the story and characters.

Anyway, long post short, here's what I'm planning to do if & when I sell......

I seem to favor red heads lately for the MC's in my novels. Cassie, my songbird angel, is redhead, and then so is Cadence, my spitfire in Testament. So, when and if TG sells, I'm going to DYE MY HAIR RED!!!

Yep, that's right. I'm going red! I already have some "cinnamon" lowlites in my hair during the winter months, but if I sell, I'm going full on red!!!

It's about the craziest thing I can think of right now to do when/if I sell.

Whatcha think? Cool or lame idea? Think of something else crazy I can do?

PS. I've also thought of buying an angel costume since TG deals with angels!!! :)

The Soundtrack to the Submission Process Part One

Anyone who has been querying or on submission knows it's not an easy process. While lamenting how I was firmly set in the 7th Ring of Hell the other night, I got to thinking about how we have playlists for our books. We sometimes even have the playlists of our lives--you know those songs that meant something to us during special times and places. Well, that got me thinking of if someone were to put together a compilation cd of all the songs that relate to the agonizing process. Here's Part One of the Cd!

(1). Highway to Hell: Yeah, this might seem excessive, but seriously, it would be numero uno on my list of the Soundtrack to Submission. I spent nine months on the query train a chug, chug, chuggin’ along. I seriously couldn’t imagine anything could possibly be worse, but alas, it is. Maybe it’s what querying nine months did to me in the fact that submission feels like one more hellish crusade.

(2). Under Pressure: There’s a lot of pressure in the submission process. First, there’s a race to prove yourself. Gotta sell, gotta sell, gotta sell! The sooner the better---you wanna be that person on submission a week or less before having a preempt deal or going to auction. There’s also the pressure to prove yourself to your agent. They chose you out of hundreds—maybe even thousands—of eager beaver applicants. You wanna make them proud and make them realize they were visionaries when choosing you. So besides proving it to yourself and to your agent, you also want to prove yourself to all your family, friends, critique partners etc—all those people who have supported you, loved you, allowed you to go on acidic, demon possessed rants and still talked to you, etc. It’s a heck of a lot of pressure pressing down on you!

(3). Survivor & (4). I Will Survive: You need some songs to remind you that no matter how hard and how emotionally and physically crippling the submission process might be YOU WILL SURVIVE. Sometimes I just have to put on the headphones and let Beyonce remind me that I’m not going to give up because I’m a survivor!

(5). Eye of the Tiger & (6). Gonna Fly Now: It’s hard not to feel like a pumped up conquerer when you hear these two songs from the Rocky movies. Just hearing those trumpets in Gonna Fly Now gives you the image of Rocky Balboa working his ass off to get in shape for the big fight. I totally feel revived when I hear it, and somehow I do my own mental run up those stairs and end in a fist pump…well, not a Jersey Shore fist pump or anything like that, lol.

(7). Don’t Give Up, Never Give Up: I really love this Eagle Eye Cherry song. I first heard it in the Holes movie. It’s not just the jazzy beat of the song that I love; it’s also the lyrics. “All our dreams are gone with a loss of faith. We're still hanging on for another day. It's so hard to see that it's going to get better, and when will that be it's hard to say…..Don’t give up, never give up. We won’t stop giving all we’ve got.”

(8). Sitting in Limbo: I think this song just about sums up the most agonizing part of the submission process….the wait. When you’re querying, it’s like you hold the cards. You research the agents, you query them, and then you wait for their response. When going on submission, it’s completely taken out of your hands. Not only do you have to wait, but you have to wait on many other people to let you know what’s going on with your book. The whole song is great, but I especially love these lines:“Sitting here in Limbo waiting for the dice to roll. Yeah, now, sitting here in Limbo. Still got some time to search my soul. Meanwhile, they're putting up a resistance, but I know that my faith will lead me on."

(9). When the Going Gets Tough….the Tough Gets Going: Yes, the awesome 80’s beat from Billy Ocean. And it’s such a true one. To survive the submission process, you gotta be tough, and when things get really hard and you don’t think you can go on, you gotta just keep persevering.

(10). The Climb: I actually blogged about this song when I was querying. It meant a lot to me then, and it still does now. I like the idea that all the hardship of the querying and submission process will mean something in the long run. It's about keeping a dream alive even when you think it's impossible. As long as there's that little flame flickering within you, the dream can stay alive until it comes to fruition.