….it happens. Or seems to. Your story, essay, book sells. The other night Melissa Bank came on my show and talked about how she worked on The Girl’s Guide to Hunting and Fishing for 10 years and endured a ton of rejections and it wasn’t until she had given up, until she just didn’t care anymore, in a deep way, about being published, that her book sold. She was as committed to writing as ever–it was what she did–but she no longer had that deep, longing need to be published. Everyone who has been published and who hasn’t been published, but wants to be, knows what this is. It’s horrible.

I was at that point with Pen on Fire, too. I had been making jewelry and my web designer was putting together a web site because I was no longer banking on getting a book out there. We were thinking of moving back to Vermont and planned a trip to New England right after I sent my proposal off to my agent. Not long after we returned to California, with thoughts to move and with my designer putting together a web site, my book went to auction and sold.

When we are feeling needy for anything, whatever that thing is, it seems to elude us. When you’re not in a relationship, and you just have to have a relationship, there are no relationships to be had. It’s when you say, Screw it, I’m through with men/women, that someone seems to magically appear.