It keeps getting better

I periodically check email when I'm downloading jobs to type. It's a habit. It's a way of passing the time that is too short to do anything other than go to the bathroom, and I don't have to go that often. So, tonight, I checked my email again and found another contract.

The story I sweated bullets over, the one I had a hard time putting down on virtual paper, the story that just wouldn't come out has been accepted by Cup of Comfort for their Alzheimer's anthology due out in October 2008. I didn't have to wait months to hear about that one, but I did push the deadline a bit.

When the story was finally written I had a good feeling about it and it made me cry. That's always a good sign. Looks like my mojo is working. That makes nine books coming out next year and it makes the sweat and the bullets and the worry that I didn't have anything positive to say about Alzheimer's worth the effort. Into every life a little rain... It's a good thing I love the rain.

If there is anything I could say to writers struggling with a story or a book or wondering whether what they have written is worth sending out, it is this: Keep writing and submitting your work because it is worth it. It's not always easy getting a story just right and sometimes it feels like it just won't come. That's when you need to apply butt to seat and just write. It may not be good and it may turn out to be the best thing you've ever written. You won't know until you forget all the critics, naysayers, jealousy and doubt and just write.

That is all. Disperse.