Just Breathe

Over at the Ruby Slippered Sisterhood blog, they're talking about getting the Golden Heart call.

No, I'm not a finalist (I wish). Well, I might be. Though I guess I don't know for sure till next Thursday. I'm really trying to talk myself down so I won't be too disappointed when I don't get the call. And its really killing my writing mojo this week.

Well, that and a trip to Vegas, a mountain of laundry, my birthday, my son's birthday, my mom's birthday, our chapter RWA meeting, and is there some kind of alignment of the planets this week or what? I think I forgot to mention the birthday party my daughter's attending tonight, and her soccer game (right in the middle of RWA), and the enrollment forms due back to her school today (which I totally forgot about until I was already at work), and a little incident at work involving excrement and fans (no, not literally, thank goodness).

I had this trouble last fall around the time of the local chapter contest. See, I got a hint that my MS was scoring really well. In fact, it was given one perfect score. But it was also given one "pretty good" score and one not great at all one, which meant that I didn't final. The whole waiting killed all my motivation to write something. Now, darnit, the Golden Hearts are doing the same thing to me. See, the results could go several ways: lots of judges love it = finalist. Lots of judges hate it = lucky to be in the top half. I'm trying to keep my expectations low. Really really low. Top half. Seriously, that's all I'm aiming for. Top quarter would be a bonus. And I won't even know that until late spring.

It doesn't help that I am honestly rooting for several other writers I know. Including one of my crit partners, who's in the same category. And a chaptermate, whose manuscript finaled in our contest (yes, ahead of mine, and the parts of it I've read were really good). What are the chances all 3 of us would final? About zero. So I'm thinking that this is not going to be my year :)

Besides, aliens and a hot male nurse. I almost can't write that without giggling. And sobbing that I'm incapable of a dreaming up a sexy cowboy vampire or werewolf or something *normal*.

Correction: For some reason I was under the impression that finalists were announced on Sunday the 21st. Nope. The date is Thursday the 25th. Even longer for me to drag my feet and wring my hands. Just what I needed to hear. (Now what on earth is happening on the 21st, because that date is circled in my cerebral calendar but I appear to have lost the accompanying mental sticky note...)