So this other blog I’m doing is fun. Not because the content is very interesting, but because of the activity that it’s centered around: researching & submitting pieces of writing to random places. I got my first rejection letter today. Not my first ever though, because I made a few abortive attempts to get published when I was much younger. Rejection letters are really funny. The text of the one I just got said:

You certainly have some original images in these pieces. However, I’m passing on them for Star*Line.

The whole thing with writers and rejection letters is looked at all wrong, I think. Writers for some reason usually decide that somehow an editor can either validate or invalidate the quality and importance of their work, based on how their decision falls. Which is ludicrous. What does an anonymous editor know about me or my work since I am equally anonymous to them. All they can really judge is if the style of the piece(s) you send them (1) makes sense with their publication/company and (2) if from that perspective it’s marketable for them. That is strictly the only thing that they have expertise in at the end of the day.

The other thing that I think writers forget about rejection letters is that they are more than nothing. What I mean by that is that before they sent out a submission, they had nothing. They had just them and the things they wrote. If nothing else you get a tiny measure of exposure when you send something out and have it rejected. At the very worst, you haven’t actually lost anything. It seems like a lot of writers see it as some big loss, or as a blow to their ego or something.

It’s like, if your work is good and you like it, then great. Never let anybody take that away from you, even inadvertently.