Balancing Changes
About ten years ago, I was delighted that I’d finished a novel. Five or so years ago, I was thrilled that I landed an agent. A little over a year ago, I was ecstatic over having landed a publisher. In recent months I’ve been happy about getting short stories published, being invited to conventions as a guest author, getting a fabulous new cover for my novel, and restarting my writing e-mail group with some terrific writers. The book launch is next weekend, and the guest list currently stands somewhere between twenty and thirty people — which is amazing to me. My publisher says she’s having to reorder books to have stock on hand for the launch and RavenCon, because the initial order has already sold out to wholesalers … which is utterly amazing to me. Recent reviews have compared my writing favorably to Ursula LeGuin (one of my favorite writers) and Maria Snyder (who I’ve never heard of). Talk about taking my breath away …
And still … I get up and feed the dogs in the morning, drink my coffee, go to class, play too many computer games and don’t get up to stretch often enough; I battle “weight creep”, which isn’t helped by an inordinate love of good chocolate and a tendency to sleep for as long and as often as I can get away with it. Nothing has changed, and everything has changed. I’m being asked for my opinion on writing matters as though I actually know what I’m talking about; my dad keeps calling to tell me how proud he is of me; family members are buying my book without asking for a free copy first.
It’s all frighteningly real, yet a hazy vague surreality at the same time; which is possibly a defense mechanism against going barking mad at this point. I feel a sense of guilt, as though other writers deserve all this attention far more than I do; analagous, I suspect, to “survivor’s guilt”. And there’s nothing I can do but ride this out … and hope it doesn’t all turn out to be a dreadfully mean disappointing coma-dream … if I wake up in a hospital bed tomorrow I am going to be so ticked.
