Silencing Your Inner Cheerleader

What I'm about to share with you is a lesson in what not to do.

Sigh.

I believe!
So why is this so heavy?

I have had a favorite publisher. My hopes for being published somehow became tied together with this specific publishing company. They are located in my same state, publish books similar to mine, and...I'm embarrassed to admit it now, but I thought for sure my story was good enough for them to accept for publication. So after months of polishing and perfecting The Query Packet of Dreams, I sent it in.

Weeks passed. I'm aware that I should have focused on other things, continued to write, sent in packets to other publishers or agents. I didn't. In truth, I only half-lived, always some part of me focused on where The Query Packet of Awesomeness was at that moment. I even prayed, every night, that the slush reader would come upon The Query Packet, would be well fed, and focused. I prayed that it would get the shot that it deserved.

The weeks passed, and every day I went out to my mailbox, wondering if the envelope had come. I started to get excited. This was taking a long time. A lot longer than their website had indicated. Working as a slush editor made me think that extra time before the rejection, meant that it had survived one round, and The Query Packet had made it's way up the channels. I answered ever unknown caller with a nervous and professional excitement.

"Hello, this is Sheena Boekweg." (sigh) "No I am not interested in a newspaper subscription."

On their website, they said it would take an average of eight weeks to respond. So, after eight weeks, and until twelve weeks I lived in a state of nervous energy, and self doubt, which was quickly silenced by my inner cheerleader telling me (perkily) that The Query Packet was brilliant.

See, most writers have an inner editor, and I have one too. The real damaging voice in my head though, is the inner cheerleader who dresses like a New York Professional, and sounds like my mom. She's the one that gets me in trouble. The one who says "this is brilliant," and then after someone reads it I realize how embarrassed I actually should have been to send it out.

Basically, for twelve weeks, I was waiting for the shoe to drop, and then..oh look.. a falling shoe.

I don't have to tell you the kind and respectful words they used to tell me my baby was ugly, do I?

That inner cheerleader of mine, read those happy positive words in the form letter, and saw the silver lining. They must have liked it, quite a lot, to say something so positive, right?

People say you have to silence your inner editor to get the story out, but the inner cheerleader is worse.

For these reasons:

The inner cheerleader hasn't passed an English test. Never trust the grammar check made by your inner cheerleader. She's no good at grammar, or spelling. Perhaps she can't even read. In fact, she may be blind


The inner cheerleader is sadistic. The more you believe her, the more you need her when reality comes to bite your hiney. Which is good job security when you think about it.


I want to believe her, especially when kind friends or family, echo the words she whispers in my ear.


In fact, one day, that beautiful day when my inner cheerleader will be proven right, she will be my best friend. She will say, "See, I always knew you could do it." and I'll be glad I didn't silence her completely.

Okay...fine...you can stay.

But from here on out, you will have no hand in the editing process. That's the inner editors turn to whisper in my ear.

~Sheena

Volcanoes and wizards

Alas, I have some bad news to share.  I did not complete the volcano story on time, and thus did not submit it to the anthology.

I'm kind of bummed, and a little disappointed in myself.  As I've said a few times, I have lots of time to write.  But once I sit down to write, it's tough for me to focus, and I end up puttering around the internet looking for just one more distraction.

And there were three additional last-minute factors that did not help:

1) My computer seems to have acquired some sort of evil invisible ninja virus.  I get all sorts of pop-up windows, and it runs slow, but two virus software problems report "no infections found!" I'm in the process of getting the problem resolved (it might be a rootkit, still not certain), but having my computer suddenly freak out and slow way down on Friday was NOT helpful

2) Last Thursday, a good friend announced she was having her birthday party Happy Hour on Tuesday, January 31^st- the night the story was due.  I thought about it for a long time, and didn't feel I could skip.  I mean, birthdays are important, and so are friends.

3) On Sunday night, I went over to write at Lawyer Friend's house. We took a break to eat dinner, and she introduced me to the TV show Merlin.

In case you haven't heard of it, Merlin is relatively low budget British tv show about Arthur, Merlin, Guinevere, Morgana, and others as young adults.  As Lawyer Friend summarized it: "King Uther banished magic from the kingdom, but he did a really bad job, since something magical happens in every episode." I've actually grown really sick of the whole Arthurian legend, so I surprised myself by liking this.  I'm also surprised because this show is really terrible. The acting is horrible, the plots have more holes than a donut shop, and none of the characters seem to ever act with anything resembling  common sense.

But yet, I love the show.  My process of addiction went like this:

-This is terrible

-Why am I still watching?

-WHY CAN'T I STOP???

I'm still trying to figure out. I think it might do with the fact that the show doesn't try to take itself seriously.  And also because, despite the bad guys and the one or two townspeople who die per episode, it's actually a rather cheerful show.  And the guy who plays Arthur is the major exception to the bad acting. His character is pretty hilarious.

And I like what they've done with Guinevere (one side note: this story is not set in England, but some made-up land that I can't remember the name of.  This allows them to have a diverse cast).  See, Gwen isn't the standard drop-dead gorgeous girl, not like she usually is in these stories.  I mean, she's definitely pretty, but not your classic supermodel beauty.

Cool, no? I'm really happy that the heroine of the show is going to be more about her strength of character and less about looks.  And in these first few episodes, she's actually rather awkward and dorky.  I'm looking forward to seeing how she grows as a character. 

Wait, was this supposed to be a blog about writing? UH oh.

Let's see… so, to sum up what Merlin can teach us about writing: don't worry if your idea follows a pre-defined track, as long as you're original, and you find your own twist. If you make it fun enough, and have good characters, you'll get readers.

It also doesn't hurt to hire this guy to play one of your characters:

Bradley James as Arthur

What can I say? I like blondes.

Okay! Back to the writing, I swear.

Didn't I start out talking about Volcano Story?

Well, I might not have made the deadline, but at least I learned a few valuable lessons about myself as a writer.  So it's time for yet another list:

1) I can't yet write a story in a month.  So maybe I'd better pay closer attention to those anthology deadlines.

2) I need to learn how to focus.  It's something that could really help all aspects of my life.  There may be a future blog post about this.

3) I should always listen to Melanie.  Not that I didn’t before, but she was 100 percent right that I needed a deadline. It takes me too long to finish short stories.  So, starting now, I'm going to start imposing deadlines for myself.  This month: send out Volcano story, revise the opening of my story "Beneath Shadow" and send out again, and resubmit two other stories that were recently rejected.

Volcano story will probably come in at about 5,000 words, and there are all sorts of markets for stories of that length.  I'm really busy this weekend (another birthday party Friday night, a superbowl party on Sunday, and possibly another party Saturday afternoon… why do these things clump together like this???), but I want to get Volcano Story out to reviewers in this early stage (warning: there may still be passive verbs!!!).  I had several offers for readers last time I posted.  Anyone still interested? Don't worry… there's not deadline to finish your review. 

One in a Million Special

So I grew up with this kid Johnny Madsen. We weren't ever close friends, mostly because he was a really cute boy, and as a boy crazy girl, that meant I didn't ever talk to boys.

Logical, right.

Anyhow, I remember Johnny Madsen often because of my fifth grade teacher. One day in class she asked us what we wanted to be when we grew up. Everyone raised their hand and said things like, "I want to be a doctor," or a firefighter, or a mom. I raised my hand to say that I...Sheena then Dabel... wanted to become a movie star. Luckily for me, the teacher picked on Johnny Madsen before she picked me. Because Johnny said he wanted to be in the NFL.

The teacher, (I don't remember her name, but I do remember her really horrible haircut.) then proceeded to explain why that dream was foolish. She said that in classrooms all around the country there were kids dreaming of becoming professional athletes, or actors, or singers, and it just wasn't going to happen for ninety-nine percent of them. For most of those kids, she said, the closest they are going to get to being in the NFL is to watch it on TV. Then she looked pointedly at Johnny and said, "Do you really think you are one in a million special?"

I remember this, because Johnny, this tall scrawny kid with a mess of black shiny hair and gorgeous eyes, got royally mad at the teacher. He was usually pretty quiet, but on this day, the normally soft spoken Johnny he basically yelled at the teacher and told her she was mean and dumb and wrong.

After she sent him to the principal's office, she looked around the room, "So how about the rest of you," she asked, "What do you want to be when you grow up?"

My hand stayed hidden under my desk.

I think about her now, this nameless teacher with a bad haircut, as her voice tells me that I am wasting my time trying to become something special. I think about her as I get discouraged, and I think about her after I receive a vicious rejection.

What am I doing? Do you really think YOU are one in a million special?

And then I think about Johnny Madsen. That picture...right up there...that's of him playing in the NFL.

www.nfl.com/player/johnmadsen

Now it's true, not everybody who dreams get to wake up and realize that they are living their dream. But some people do.

But the fact is,  it's not something that you just wake up to make happen. I think about the hours and effort Johnny had to put in at the gym to go from that scrawny kid to that hulking giant. I think about the hours he spent on the field, the practices, the injuries, the hits he had to stand up and walk away from. He could have quit at anytime, but he didn't. I think about the stubbornness it takes to go from one in a million who dream, to become one of the few who are ready to become selected.

Now I can't choose if I will ever be "drafted" so to speak. But I can show up. I can practice. I can prepare, and hopefully when the day comes I will be ready to say, "Pick me, Pick me."

Hopefully, by then, I'll be ready.

Really, I don't think the odds are one and a million. I think it's much closer to fifty fifty. It'll either happen, or it won't. Fifty fifty.

But it'll be my choice if I'm ready.

So... Mz... whatever your name is... I, Sheena now Boekweg, want to be a writer.

Go ahead, tell me it's not going to happen.  See if the principal can save you from my wrath.

:)

p.s. How about you? Want to join me and say, I...[state your name] want to be...[state your dream]?