Post date: Jul 31, 2018 10:32:55 PM
I don’t like fishing however, I like fish!
I especially like salmon and tuna. Good stuff and it is good for me.
What does this have to do with anything?
A long time ago, I went fishing with a family friend. He taught me how to bait the hook and cast the hook and the most important thing of all he
did not mention. He said just to wait and I’d get a fish. I was good at all the steps except waiting.
Turns out, that is the most important part of fishing. And it is not just waiting, it is having the patience not to mess with your pole, line or bait.
Just sit and wait.
The art of fishing is patience.
Currently, I have several projects going in various stages of development.
The process I like the least on all of my projects is the waiting for a reply or an answer by an editor, or a mentor, or a publisher or an agent.
Yes, I have no patience. I think we’ve established that.
I am patient with me. But others I have no tolerance for patience. I’d love to send a scorching email to the agent that
I am WAITING on for a review on my Children’s Picture Book. I sent the book in January 31st of this year. She said, “[the book]…
has great potential.” “It is not quite ready for her to represent…” She’ll send me some “wildly awesome” (her words not mine)
notes about how to make it ready.
April 10th I nudged her (of course, politely). The reply, “Thank you for the ping. Keep in mind that agents sometimes
take months to get back to somebody. You would not believe what the workload is like.”
Now it is July 10th and I’m wishing an email would show up and stun me with “amazing notes” so I could incorporate the notes and
eventually have an international best seller, prizes and awards and acceptance speeches in various parts of the globe.
Okay, now be realistic. Okay, I’ll go for just a publishing house to accept it and get it printed.
I don’t care about the “international best seller, prizes and awards and acceptance speeches in various parts of the globe” part.
Well, I do, but I don’t have to have it, I understand that one enters into writing with just the simple fact that there is so much material out there,
that that material is darn good; that just to get a nod from her and having her say “it has potential” is fantastic.
We have firmly established that: The art of writing is patience.
If you have ideas for how to play the waiting game. Please by all means drop me a line and let me know. I’d really appreciate it.
Perhaps a question that I should ask in my author interviews is, “How do you have patience, waiting to hear from an agent or a publisher?”
By all means please send me your ideas.
I’m waiting.
ab3rimg AT juno DOT com or dalanbinder AT gmail DOT com