I got my first rejection letter of the current batch of story submissions today. I wasn’t surprised; I knew when I submitted that that particular magazine was a bit out of my league. As soon as I came home and saw the envelope lying on the table, I knew what it was.

Despite the fact that I know this is necessary, that every writer gets their stack of 10 rejection letters before they publish their first story, that it’s a commonplace part of the writing business… I still didn’t want to open the letter. I knew what it was, and I just didn’t want to see it in black and white, on paper.

The letter itself was pretty standard — probably the same form they send out to everyone. “Your story didn’t grab my interest, but thanks for sending it along.”

The “why am I doing this, I should just give up” phase lasted only about 15 minutes, I think. That’s pretty good. And now I will review the story again, and try to make it better, and send it along to someone else that will perhaps be a more appropriate market.

Rejection’s never fun. On a personal level, on an artistic level — anytime something you care about is involved. But if I’m going to play this game and try to be a writer, I know that I need to get used to it.

Gonna keep working on that stack of 10…