Suppose I kept on singing love songs just to break my own fall

I know I said I had written my last post before Christmas but I had to share.

About a month ago I submitted a short story to a teeny wee magazine which was my first time sending off one of my pieces into the unknown. I agonised over the send button. What if they hated it? What if they sent it back outlining everything that's wrong with it and laughed at me for thinking I could ever write anything decent. Or worse. What if they sent it back with a standard "Thanks but no thanks." I shut my eyes, clicked the mouse and tried my damnedest not to get my hopes up every time I checked my mail and heard that 'plink' that tells me there are no new messages. All of this for a tiny magazine that won't pay me for my submission and I won't win fame from it. God knows the wreck I'll be when I try sending to the bigger publications. I'll probably have to post them drunk with several people helping me part with the envelope.

So imagine my surprise when I checked my mail this morning before heading out to mop and nestled between more Borders discounts I'll never use and a We Are Scientists update (I don't much care about their music but they make me giggle and I love the name) was a reply.

It was a rejection. But a good rejection. A rejection full of no criticisms, constructive or otherwise. It was a rejection based on word length. In the scary cult-like plurality I was told that "We felt it was well written, that the main character was believable, and the story of the “other woman” told from her own perspective was an interesting angle." And that they want to read more of my work. So I sent off another one with slightly less nerves (just slightly mind) and now it begins again.

My face actually hurts from smiling. People read my work and they liked it. Can you believe it?