I have always wanted to be a writer. As a kid, I was determined I’d be that person who would wait tables in the evenings, write every morning, living in an exciting city like New York or Boston (then I did actually live in Boston for a long time, thank God I’ve escape THAT cost of living). Each morning I would wake up early, go to the nearby city park with my hot tea, and write. After lunch, I’d go get ready for work and spend the evening bonding with my restaurant guests, being personable and friendly and raking in good tips.
Once I turned eighteen, I did begin waiting tables, and quickly discovered how terrible it is, or can be. Most restaurant guests were not friendly, even in the South, and many tipped poorly. I made enough money to subsidize my expenses during freshmen year of college, rounding out the year with literally eighteen dollars to my name, almost enough for the gas home. My mother loaned me one hundred dollars in case I got stranded on the mountainside.
In graduate school, though my stipend was meager, I experienced the thrill of a paycheck on the 30th of every month. I always knew it was coming. I could count on it. If I had to see a specialist, or spent too much on gas for a visit home, I could eat ramen the next week until my paycheck came, as expected, on the 30th. If I was low on money, I could scrape by, until the 30th.
I realized then, despite my love for writing and all of the arts, that I was not cut out for the uncertainty. I’ll write part-time, while working full-time, after I finish graduate school, I convinced myself.
I got my first full-time job in education after earning my master’s, working in residential life, which is fraught with stressful situations, crises, and long hours, so I crashed at the end of the day, exhausted.
Then the pandemic happened. I’ll write during the pandemic! I told myself, glad to have something to look forward to during the covid scares. I gained an hour into my day every day simply by cutting out a commute, but with in-person meetings replaced with zoom, I struggled to stare at a computer screen for another second. Besides a short story or personal essay here or there that I never submitted anywhere, I didn’t keep my promise to myself. (I did read a bunch, though!)
And so for a decade, I postponed my dream. In 2022, my wife got a new job and we moved back “home” to Columbus, OH. I knew it was now or never. My wife encouraged me, saying she’d be happy to keep the lights on, saying she thought it was sexy to having a work-from-home author for a wife. Knowing I may never have the gall to quit a salaried job, now I was in a situation where I had to quit my salaried job. They wouldn’t let me work from Ohio, and since the commute from Ohio to Boston was not reasonable, I left the comfort of my twice-per-month-paycheck-with-healthcare job once we moved.
November 1 was my first day of unemployment. I began writing my first book. Now, in June, I am editing, working on my next draft, realizing how vastly unprepared I have been. I had in mind I would try-out the self-employed writing life, give it 6-12 months of dedication, to then make a decision if I should keep at it or go back to education. And truly, it was delightful at first. I felt accomplished, I felt like I have had a story to tell for years, and I finally completed it. I was thrilled. I still am thrilled!
I knew that, as a first-time book-writing author, I needed a completed manuscript as my first step. When I had a solid first draft, I researched how to get an agent, learning the steps and reading advice on crafting a book proposal. I spent a few months on that, reading all of the somewhat-similar books I could get my hands on to ensure there was a market for my book, but not too much already out there. I labored over a synopsis; how do you cram 80,000 words into 500!? I literally cried in frustration over my pitch, a hook, and query letter. I realized that each agent requests a month or so before getting back to you. I read advice that most authors query 30-70 agents before finding a match. Some agents particularly emphasize the “platform,” and I look at my social medias and WordPress traffic in a panic, is it good enough? I learned quickly that 6-12 months of dedicated writing, treating it like a full-time job, it’s just not enough. Not even close.
Agents need manuscripts that will sell; I get it. I want to make money, too, but more than that, I want my writing out there. And I of course want an agent that’s passionate about my story, but half the agents out there say they want LGBTQ memoir. So I dig deeper, investigate where else their interests lie; does my book fit within their hopes, too? And suddenly I am hours deep into one particular agent. For some, I decide the agent is awesome and I definitely want to reach out, but the next day they are closed to submissions for a few months. Damn! Too slow!
I check out indie presses too, which often don’t require agents, but each of them take 6-12 months to review, and many are open to the fact that they won’t respond at all unless they want you. So you sit around for six months, each day passing and you don’t know if you’ve been thrown into the rubbish bin, if they’re reading it now, or if they haven’t gotten around to it yet. Maybe they never do. Which, really, it’s not challenging or time-consuming to send a form response saying, thanks but no thanks. For the agents and publishers who do send rejections, form response or not, it’s appreciated. It’s always better to know.
I loved the writing stage, but now I’m looking at the upcoming year-ish with uncertainty; I am patient. I can keep trying. And wait. Try again. And wait. Other writers tell me, don’t worry! It’s a grueling process, but it’s meant to work out for author, agent, and publisher. They share the rejection letters from the likes of now-super-famous authors. It’s designed to be encouraging, but I find it to be the opposite; if [insert super-famous author here] struggled for so long to get published, what hope is there for me?
I have been getting feedback from friends and fellow writers and working through another edit, after which I will reach out to agents in the hopes that someone will be have passion for the story I have to tell. Meanwhile, I glimpse through job postings, wondering if I can do it. If I’m ready to go back in to education, into a 9-5 with a salaried pay, however mediocre, knowing that, even though I try and convince myself otherwise, I won’t keep writing, not like I am now. And I will miss it, even though I am both loving and hating the process. But I won’t give in now, not yet. And I don’t want to.
J.C. Thrash 