I Feel Cleaner

Seems I'm on a cleansing kick lately, and it's expressing itself in various ways. I'm cleaning off my plate in 2008 (hey, that rhymes!) because I've been under the weather and I need to rest. Can't say I'm surprised because 2007 was a busy time for me. I got jacked. Threatened. Rejected. Accepted. Befriended. Rescinded. But it all made for good practice.

My latest editor emailed me with a wonderful compliment, and it reminded me of my need to be cleaner in every aspect. ". . . I also wanted to say I'm looking forward to working with you, especially since you had one of the cleanest mss. I've ever read."

I won't lie. My first inclination was . . . suspicion. After I left my first ebook home and went shopping for places to rent, I was chastised for all manner of bad form. In fact, in 2007 alone, I've experienced all these:

- My first editor took away my semicolons and en-dashes
- My second editor took away my ellipses
- My third editor took away my overuse of feel/felt (and my ability to trust)
- My fourth editor took away my goodwill
- My fifth editor took away my habit (or is attempting to, ahem) of beginning sentences with words ending with -ing
- A publisher that rejected me warned against my over-reliance on a body part to describe changes in emotion
- A reviewer took away my need to use euphemisms for sex-type-things

I took away from these experiences a willingness to learn, grow, and a determination to stop making up words when I feel it appropriate. (Note to Aliyah: No more lasering for you. Sorry, babe. I know. You love pistoning genitalia. Me, too. But I'm not allowed to do it anymore. No. Not ever.)

I notice that writers very rarely talk about this sort of thing. We're generally more than happy to share our good news, though, and forget that rejection ever happens. One of my writer friends even told me that I'm "weird" in that way because rejection is embarrassing. I shrugged. "For you maybe. But if we were all perfect every time, why the hell would we need editors? Shit, if I could slam out the perfect, destined-to-be-a-bestseller-story, I'd self-publish and cut out the middle man. Do you really think I'd waste my time submitting if I had the ability to craft the perfect were-shapeshifter-m/f/m-BDSM-urban-paranormal-erotica novel/with-an HEA?"

I think not. No sir.

More about cleansing: I've sold three manuscripts in past six weeks, but none are erotic romance. A very smart woman told me to write what I love, and when I began to do that, everything began to fall into place. I'm less anxious--also less angry--and finally able to keep to a set writing schedule. I've one last erotic romance floating around out there, and I only submitted it after an editor's request. No matter what the publisher decides about its future, I know I'm done with that for awhile.

The same writer who told me rejection is embarrassing also inferred that my stories worked better in the living room than the bedroom. More of a mindfuck than a, uhm, fuck. I'm finally willing to admit that she's right. And that's where my embarrassment finally displays itself. I'd struggled so long and so hard against my own nature and received little satisfaction in return. I won't do that anymore. A mindfuck indeed. And I'd been doing it to myself the whole time.