Crickets Chirping

Here’s a funny aspect about the art of personal essay: I write first.

Meaning, I do the work upfront. Once I have a solid version, I send it to the publication I’m targeting so they can consider buying it.

I put in the time, the energy, the tears and laughter, the enjoyable (but difficult) effort of structuring scenes, developing place, and crafting dialogue. This differs from “regular” articles where I pitch the idea and only put in the time and effort after a magazine has agreed to buy it. Anyway, after I write the essay – with no guarantee that it will sell – I wait.

And I wait.

And wait.

I’ve adopted a prayer my mom encouraged me to utter when I first started this business: Thank you God, for finding a home for my piece. I may not know where that “home” will be, but I’m grateful first and foremost.

Still.

Waiting for the news can be nerve-wracking. It helps to leave my office. Go to a yoga class. Spend days doing freelance editorial work for a newspaper in their offices – far, far, away from my personal e-mail. Take the dog on a walk.

“Any word on your essays?” Ron says when I call him.

“Nope. Nothing but spam in my in-box,” I say.

“Crickets are chirping?” he says.

Loudly.

But then, when I’m least expecting it, I’ll hear an e-mail ding.

I do a happy dance.

Jump on the bed.

Add a flip.

The wait was worth it.