Cliff Garstang has a great post about keeping hope alive as a writer: Don't Give Up! Truly, mental fortitude in the writing business is as important as the writing itself, especially in the beginning. As Fred Leebron counseled us during our MFA program, "Writing is a game of attrition. Don't attrish."
I'm very pleased to announce that I have not attrished, and any plans for attrishment that were being hatched have been ferreted out and squashed. The writing is going well on all fronts. I only wish I had more hours in the day.
A bit of excellent news arrived in my inbox yesterday. I won the League of American Pen Women Mary Mackey Short Story Prize for my story Viewing Medusa. This story is part of the novel-in-stories that I'm working on, so that's doubly heartening. Also, that story has been sent out to over 100 magazines and journals without ever getting picked up (yes, I'm stubborn). It is also the story that helped secure me a Bread Loaf waitership and an SLS scholarship in a contest judged by Margaret Atwood. It's served me well, but no magazine has seen fit to publish it. Am I alone in finding that odd? Well, until one finally does, I guess I'll just keep using it to apply for as many good opportunities as I can. :)
