I'm not obsessed with Duotrope (in a twist for me, I'm actually serious about this), but sometimes I do have a look at the stats and such just to get a feel for how things are going. Rejections don't much bother me, which is fortunate because I anticipate at least 2 or 3 within the next week, perhaps the next couple of days if the stats are close. Seems I just submitted to a bunch of super-fast places. That's nice, but it also sucks when things bounce back faster than you can say Papa Hemingway. I almost prefer a little wait, because then it's not so fresh in my mind.
The longest piece of mine out right now is at 85 days today. And I have to tell you, if it's rejected, it's gonna hurt. Not because of the time frame, but because it's the longest story I've ever written, my second substantial story written this year, and one that I feel really, really good about in a way that's rare for me. It made me cry when I wrote it, then made my daughter cry and even got her pissed at me because the character she loved doesn't exactly come out of the thing in great shape. It
is a horror story. It would also be my highest-paid story if it's accepted, which would be a nice thing.
I do check occasionally to see if anyone has been accepted or rejected for that antho, but no reports yet. He recently posted on the blog that he's swamped with other things and is still getting through the slush, so I suspect he hasn't made any decisions yet. I even know what I'll do with it if it comes back to make it suitable for other markets. But it'll crush me briefly, all the same.
I'm just saying right now, if it's rejected, I will probably retreat into movies and food for a day or two, and decide in a childish part of my brain that I didn't want no part of this fiction writing business no how anyway. And if it's not rejected, I'll be over the moon for a solid month. If it's rejected with some nice commentary from the editor, then there will at least be a mild funk, though perhaps I won't need bowls of chocolate and cream cheese to make it all better.
I also noticed today that a market I sent a story to 25 days ago has recently done a 0-day and a 2-day rejection. Seeing that makes me hopeful, even though I know it may not mean a thing. So where I wasn't really thinking about it before, now I think about how mine have usually mine have sold after things like that, so it gets my hopes up and I think about the thing. Especially since it's about 5 days away from the average response time. This is the type of mild fretting I can almost always avoid. That's the drawback of looking at stats.
I do hope I don't get any rejections on Mother's Day. I may skip email altogether! I got an acceptance on Easter morning, and a rejection later that day. I think I would have felt bummed if it had just been the rejection on Reese's Peanut Butter Egg day. I'd have probably had a couple more of them, and believe me, I do not need them.
Shelley
