Patience is a virtue

Patience is a virtue...

One I do not possess.

I admit, I used to sing the song from Willy Wonka all the time as a kid... "I want the world. I want the whole world. I want to lock it all up in my pocket, it's my bar of chocolate, give it to me no-o-ow!"

(Okay. I still do. Your point?)

I hate to wait. I don't like lines and I loathe and detest waiting rooms. I like to do things in waiting rooms so that I feel like the time is 'productive' like read books that I have due for review or that I want to 'preread' to see if they are acceptable for the kids.

I am pretty sure NO ONE likes lines or waiting rooms but they make me literally twitchy.

For college, my best friend has been trying to help me schedule and she wanted to give me gaps between classes so I had time to work on homework at school but one semester of this was enough for me to figure out that this meant, on times when I had my work done, that I was WAITING. Which I don't do well. And it wasn't like I could sit and write a book or do my other work on campus for a half an hour or an hour... So I was left twitching and waiting with things like, what, Farmville to fill the time...

Drove me NUTS.

So I eliminated the gaps.

The point of this rant? Submissions are hell for me. I am sure I am not the only person out there that goes wonky waiting. And since there is sometimes a THREE month wait... This is something I had to get big girl panties about and buck up and get past. Does it still suck... Yes.

Do you sit around in that waiting room and wait to see what they say?

Oh, no you don't.

While that book is out on submission, you can be writing another short. Or a full length. Do something else productive. If you spend the months or weeks or whatever inbetween while you are waiting just sitting there, chewing your nails...

You will have no nails, you will have pulled out all your hair and if they buy that book and ask you the million dollar question (Do you have any other work?) your answer will be... Ummmm...

But if you keep in mind that you want the whole world, in your pocket and you want it NOW you can be doing something rather than waiting.

(See? My impatience serves a purpose, doesn't it?)

Anyway, bet that song is playing in your head now. How does it feel to be my puppet? Muah ha ha ha....

Happy Writing!