My Writing Journey Started With a Pandemic (But Not the One You're Thinking of...)
Sometimes magic comes from our greatest disappointments. Here’s my story of how a kick in the teeth set me on the path to make my biggest dream come true.
Back in 2009, I was working in sales and had just earned a free all-expenses-paid vacation to Cancun, Mexico. This was a first for me! I had been working for the company for over five years, and I was finally, finally seeing the rewards my hard work had brought.
But then…a pandemic hit. Swine Flu was rampant in Mexico in the spring of 2009, and so the company I worked for didn’t want to endanger us and canceled the trip. To say I was disappointed was a huge, huge understatement. They did send us money—the equivalent of what the trip cost, so that we could take ourselves on our own vacation.
Rather than go on vacation, I opted for a staycation. I picked up a little book called Twilight that all my friends had been talking about and dug in. Seven days later, I’d watched the movie three times and had read all four books.
I was rapt. I was inspired. I was done being in sales.
I had always loved to write and read, and many of my past English teachers had pulled me aside to tell me I had a talent for writing. Stephenie Meyer had written down a dream and turned it into a book that changed the world. I wanted to do that, too.
So. I decreed that I would write a book, and then I cashed that check and bought myself a laptop. It wasn’t a great laptop. In fact, John and I nicknamed it the “craptop.” But it worked! And I wrote and wrote and wrote on that little craptop.
I hastily pulled up an unfinished manuscript and finished writing it. I researched publishers who would accept unsolicited manuscripts. I wrote a cover letter to Harlequin, and sent in my first several chapters.
I can’t remember how long it took to hear back, but I did hear back.
In the form of a rejection letter.
And because I had studied what it meant when one received a “form” rejection (read: generic), I knew that I was further off from achieving my dream than I would have liked. I had more work to do, and so I set out to figure out how to become a better writer.
I started a blog.
I read books on writing.
I joined the RWA (Romance Writers of America).
I made friends who were also writing and submitting their work for publication.
Two and a half years after plunking out that first clumsy attempt at a novel, I had written five books. I knew when I was rereading the draft of the fifth book (that would become Tempting the Billionaire) that I was onto something. I could tell I had grown as a writer. I was ready to submit the book to an agent.
What happens next is the story for another blog… but the point of this one is: losing that vacation was devastating for me. Watching my sales career crumble afterwards was hard. But sometimes things have to fall apart first so that the better future you desire can be built from scratch. If I’d have traveled to Cancun that summer, I might still be in sales and all of those worlds I’ve created might not exist.
Trust the timing of your life. Even if it starts with a pandemic.