Herb

Oh, January. I promised myself that this year I would not fall into the usual post-holiday blues that culminate in the dreaded February funk.

But my book is out there on submission with editors, its fate being decided, and that is scary. Way scary. I feel very Herby. (Herb is my new, less-threatening word for anxiety.) There’s a constant nervous chatter at the back of my brain. Are they reading it now? How about now? Now? (You get the idea.)

Part of me wants to GO GO GO. I have a zillion goals for the New Year and I want to throw myself headlong into them: eating better, exercising more, reading more critically, writing more consistently, being a better wife/friend/daughter/employee. I scribble down to-do lists with great joy.  And I have been way more productive at the day job. It keeps me from staring at my inbox all day, for one thing. But then I get home and it’s cold and dark and there’s no news yet and there are another ten things on my to-do list and I hate doing laundry and–

I kind of just want to take a nap. And eat some more peppermint patties. And read the rest of Some Girls Are, which is OMG amazing and awful and brilliant.

I know I should be working on my new project. I love my new project.  In an ideal world, I’d have a draft of it finished by the beginning of May. That’s the goal I set. But I’m having a hard time putting Garolass out of my head and focusing on these new characters, building this new world. I managed it for a few hours Saturday on a coffee-shop writing date, and it was wonderful.

Is this crawl-under-the-covers phenomena normal for the submissions phase of the process? Anyone have any advice?