And please don’t ever worry about being articulate here. Don’t worry about spelling, grammar, stumbling in drunk, typing when you’re in a bad mood. This message is to everybody: Come as you are. I’m happy you’re here.

Hi. I am an unpublished nobody, also.

This discussion is kind of depressing (and making me feel a little self-conscious even posting. You all articulating your frustration so much better than I do.)

I, too, have deleted entire websites (my first website)because it wasn’t being read (it was, but whatever your hit total is, it’s not enough), or even though it was being read, everyone thought it (I) was a joke. I am also a photographer and it’s far easier to take criticism for a bad photo (there are more variables/excuses: poor lighting, cheap film, misbehaving subject…) than for bad writing. I don’t even know what bad writing is anymore–if I ever did.

Most of the time I simply don’t write enough. I rest on “well, I’m smart, right? It’ll come when I need it” rather than actaully putting pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard). When do write, I know all my bad habits by heart (like, er, excessive use of parentheses) and hyperfocus on them to the point that I’m over-editing.

I’ve always been a writer but it’s always been on the proverbial back burner. Career, (as a linguist, I’ve always thought it ironic that I made my living in a language other than my native tongue), and motherhood forever altered by widowhood, kept me, well busy.

When did I write? Alone, in the doctor’s office, at a school recital (between acts of course), and never so much as a peek at that creeping cockroach. I didn’t even know it was there.

But now I have time, which translates into a life; and I can maybe, perhaps, I think, write and actually share with others. But the roach crawled across my foot and I wonder, more often than is needed, or necessary, or desired; can I write? will anyone actually want to read my stuff? Is it worth it?

Of course it is. I simply keep the lights on.

I can’t believe not one person commented on the Mean Joe Greene picture!

my doubts tend to swing a bit more extreme than all of that. I get more the self loathing thing. I go through spells where I don’t doubt so much I just can’t stand.

I hate when the story isn’t going where I want it and that must be because of some detestable quality I possess…. I’m not smart enough to tell it, I’m too short, I’ve gained too much weight, I have bad habits, I’m lazy, I don’t know the right words, I’ve the wrong feelings, I’ve supressed the right feelings, just general not good enough type stuff. But, I never think of it in terms of doubt; it is certainly loathing.

and all of that is during the actual writing; by the time I venture to the rejection it’s as though the rejection is actually a validation, a “yeah, I do suck…..yipee! at least I was right about that”.

and I tend to write as compulsion to begin with. If people see something I’ve written and connect or feel anything. That’s great! Lovely! If not, well….maybe there are times I should be alone with certain thoughts….but, I write….through good and bad, cause I have to. There have been years I didn’t, I was afraid or whatever……those years were harder and darker than any idea of Doubt or Rejection…..Those years, silent ones…..I wanted to die almost every day. I don’t feel that way these days.
so doubt, rejection…..bring ‘em, they are after all interaction.

Over the years I have become pretty impervious to rejections though. Why? Maybe because I’ve had enough nastily rejected stories go on to be placed and enjoyed and sometimes even nominated for prizes. After a while, you realize that the only truth on a rejection slip is the part that says “I’m sure others may feel differently.”

Great discussion, Susan.