Small Victories

It’s getting harder to make your way as a freelance writer these days, but I have had a couple of small victories - my story Under The Lanterns is coming up in Monthly Short Stories, and the latest anthology from Atriad Press, called Haunted Encounters, features No Place Like Home. I do have a couple of acceptances from the anthologies Changing Course and Simple Pleasures of the Kitchen, but they won’t be available until later this year and next year, respectively.
Trolling through guidelines is often a depressing task - not only do they demand top quality and all rights for no pay, but the tone of some guidelines is off putting. I don’t like people to start being rude to me even before I’ve put my foot in it. The gall of some is an eye opener too - one states baldly that while the author retains all rights after publication, the magazine will republish at will for no extra pay. In other words you get your cake back but they can still eat it. Blogs and message boards abound with other examples.
Talking of message boards, the Absolute Write board recently ran a thread suggesting the editors judged submissions by the email address - those from yahoo, AOL or Hotmail, for example, are apparently deleted immediately by some editors, who feel that they signal a `non-professional’ attitude.
Heaven knows where this stuff comes from, but a couple of ezine editors did seem to agree that such addresses were beneath contempt. It’s a problem I haven’t encountered - well, not directly - so I’m not about to rush off and buy an exclusive email addy just to keep a few editors happy.
But it reminds me of the pre-Net days, when we still used snail mail on a regular basis, and the kinds of arguments that used to arise periodically over whether it was more `professional’ to use a post box or a home address. I regard Yahoo email as something like a post box - I moved home several times and correspondence often went astray, which didn’t happen with a post office box as you could just keep going back to it to pick up your mail, or have it forwarded on by the post office. Similarly, I have changed service providers several times, and subsequently lost whatever email addresses they provided, but Yahoo keeps on keeping on and can be accessed from anywhere I happen to be. I think it matters more to the writer than to the editor which form of address he or she chooses.
The whole discussion made me chuckle though, because of such rituals and good luck charms are our writing hopes formed - if I get a personal email address, my stories will be treated more seriously, if I wear my lucky green hat when I click the `send’ button, the editor will read it and love it…
But the only luck, really, is the luck you make yourself, by writing consistently, writing well and sending the damn stuff off to as many editors as you can. If the personal address and the green hat make you write better, write more, and submit with confidence, then use them by all means.
I’ll just stick to my ritual desk tidying. I’m sure if editors could see how tidy my desk is, they would respect the bejasus out of me.

FOOTNOTE:
The differences between American English and English English can be a thorn in a writer’s side. I am much more likely to be told I can’t spell if I insist on putting the `u’ in words like neighbour than be chipped for my email address or sloppy desk. But it can have its humorous side. I came across this little gem in a 2002 edition of Good Housekeeping, where the subject was Winona Ryder’s hairstyles, rather than her private life (if you don’t get it, think of Austin Powers):
“Don’t aim for a blunt cut directly after a shag.”
Wise words, indeed.

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