Sometimes I think that getting published was the worst thing that ever happened to my writing. Publication. It's what every writer wants. The Holy Grail of freelancers. We all want to see our name in print. To agonize over just the right words for our bio, buy five copies for our mother. To be able to say, when asked, "What do you do?" followed by the inevitable, "Have you been published?" a resounding, "Yes! Yes I have."

But when it finally happened to me things changed somehow. After years of writing for my own enjoyment, after lining the walls of my laundry room/office ceiling to floor with rejection letters, I finally got the call I wanted. I got two calls. Three. Sold three essays in three months. Then I started getting assignments for articles as well. Editors gave me their direct line and personal email address. I'd go to the mailbox and where rejection letters had been, there were contracts and magazines with my writing inside. (Okay, there were still rejection letters. Some things never change.)

The problem was, now that I was not only writing but selling what I wrote, now that actual living, breathing people were reading my stuff, it was hard to stay focused on why I'd started writing in the first place. Back in the day, I wrote because I had something to say. There were messages, ideas, opinions inside of me that just had to get out. My kids were young and motherhood was so raw-- in a million wonderful ways-- that I had to write or bust.

Becoming a mom at the ripe old age of 30 was the most exhilarating, exhausting, life-giving, draining, confirming, confusing thing I'd ever done. I loved it but it was HARD! Add to that my decision to stay home full-time, the closeness of my first two babies, the location of our house (about 20 miles from civilization), and my husband's workaholic tendencies and the first three years of motherhood were grueling for me. I made it through with my sanity intact largely due to the friends I found and clung to for dear life. And my writing.

When I finally came up for air, around the time my third child was born, I was haunted by the idea that there was someone else out there going through what I'd just survived. I had an image of a new mom just as madly in love with her kids as I was, also just as insecure, just as overwhelmed, just as desperately lonely as I'd been. I couldn't shake the thought that I could help her. If only I could tell her everything I'd learned and let her know someone understands she'd have it easier than I'd had.

So I wrote. I wrote to her. I wrote and I wrote and I wrote. There were so many things she needed to know. I had to tell her that losing your temper doesn't make you a bad mom. It's okay not to know what you're doing about half of the time. I wanted to tell her that I knew how much she loved her kids, loved being home with them, even if she cried herself to sleep some nights. I wanted to share with her all the secrets I'd learned, to encourage her to find some friends like mine, but mostly I wanted her to know that someone understood what she was going through and I wasn't giving up until I got the word out there where she could find it. She's what kept me plugging away in the face of so much rejection. As long as she was out there, I wouldn't stop trying to reach her.

Then it happened. I started selling essays and writing articles. I received phone calls from total strangers, other moms who'd read what I'd written and called to thank me for writing it. Each time I wanted to say, "It's you! You got my message!" I started getting checks too and that was pretty cool. I could buy my kids the extras we'd been doing without. For the first time, we could go to the movies and the Children's Museum. I could buy them new clothes not second hand stuff from the thrift store.

The more I sold, the more I wanted to sell. I bought books to tell me how to do what I was already doing, books that told me what editors want, what they look for and what they buy. The more extra money I brought into the family coffers, the more I forgot how we'd gotten along without it. The more essays and articles I sold, the more it burned me up when my ideas were rejected. I'd flip through magazines and smirk at articles by other writers, "Humph, I could've written that." Sometimes a magazine would turn down my idea then four months later I'd see the same topic among their pages and feel incensed.

I wrote about topics that didn't interest me in the least. Overblown preschool graduations? I'd never been to one but I found people who had and cranked out an article. Thumb sucking? I hadn't raised a thumb sucker but how hard could that be. Churned it out too.

Rejection letters started to exasperate me. After all, didn't they know who I was? Hadn't they seen my writing clips? I joined a writer's group and was the only published author in the bunch. I felt superior until I started listening to the things the other women wrote. A couple had real talent. Others were pedestrian at best. But all of them wrote with passion. Their writing was angry and chilling, sexy, sweet, and provocative. I became reluctant to read my own stuff at our meetings and secretly decided the other women looked down on me. Although they all claimed to want to be published, they didn't do much about it. I'd advise them about submissions and they'd make a half hearted attempt now and again but mostly they just wrote. It seemed to be enough for them. It wasn't enough for me.

One week, the day of our meeting rolled around and I had nothing to present. I'd been working on yet another article about potty training which had taken up all my time. I started searching around my computer for something old I might read to the group. I found essays I'd written back in that laundry room when my kids were younger. (I have a full fledged office by now.) I was astounded at how good the writing was. I figured I'd learned a lot over the past few years. Turns out I'd been forgetting. I'd forgotten how to write from my gut, how to open a vein and let what's inside spill out. I'd forgotten I had something to say. Where was my message? Where was my opinion? Where was my passion? I'd abandoned that other mom long ago, the one I'd wanted to help. I'd started thinking only how to give the editors what they wanted, how to tell them what they wanted to hear, what they'd pay for. Nowadays, as I perched my fingers over the key pad with a new idea, I'd ask myself who was going to buy it. If the answer was "Nobody", I'd write something else regardless of whether I had an opinion on the topic or not.

Where's that other mom now? Who's telling her the things she needs to know? Is she feeling as alone as I did 10, 12 years ago? Clearly I'd let her down. I looked at the list of articles I was working on. Discipline. Teething. Separation anxiety. I called one of my favorite editors and told her I had an essay I wanted her to consider. The topic was "Mom Friends: Why We Need Each Other." As soon as I had it written, I'd send it to her. I've already decided, if she doesn't buy it, I'll keep submitting it until someone does. If I can't sell it for $1,000, I'll sell it for $20. If I can't sell it for $20, I'll give it away. When I'm finished with that one, I'm writing another one from the heart. I still have something to say and there's still a mom out there who needs to hear it. After all, if I don't tell her, who will?

Mimi Greenwood Knight is a freelance writer and frequent contributor to parenting magazines, anthologies and web sites including Parents, Working Mother, American Baby, At-Home Mother, Living, Christian Parenting Today, Campus Life, Homelife, and In Touch. She finds pleasure in helping newer writers get their start. After all, as Anne LaMott says, "All writers are like streams feeding into the same river." http://www.writergazette.com/mimigreenwoodknight.shtml

Sponsored links

Ring binders

 

Make a Real Living as a Freelance Writer!

How to find a book publisher

Home

Text on this site Copyright © 1998-2007 Absolute Write, all rights reserved.
Please contact the authors if you'd like to reprint articles on this site.  All copyrights are retained by original authors.  And plagiarizers will be rounded up, handcuffed, and stuck into a very small and humid room wherein they must listen to Barney sing the "I Love You, You Love Me" song over and over again.

writers writing software