When Does the Celebration Come?

This has been a question ticking at my brain for the last several months. When I started my writing journey, I expected there to be more feelings of celebration throughout the stages of writing. I expected to celebrate completing each major stage. What I didn’t realize was that writing is a seemingly never ending process.

In October, I finished draft one of Broken Trad Wife, my debut manuscript. I celebrated for a total of two hours. That is how long I allowed myself to revel in the joy of completion. I started my second novel that same day.

My second novel, Left Side, I wrote in a writing challenge called Novel November. In 30 days, I wrote 60,000 words worth of that novel. It had a beginning, a middle, and an end. I wrote it in both the wrong point of view and the wrong tense (I now have to go and fix that). But I wrote that novel, and I was so happy to finish it. I allowed myself till the end of the day to celebrate it and was back on Broken Trad Wife edits the next morning.

I’ve spent seven months editing, Broken Trad Wife. I’ve gone through nine drafts. I’ve read it countless times. Reams of paper have been sacrificed in the life of this book.

Still, I can’t celebrate. It could be because I know this is not the end of the challenges for this book. In some ways, it’s just the beginning of the hardest parts.

I want people to find and read, and love this book. I want people to feel things, to recommend it. This next part feels the hardest. This part feels the most out of my control. But I’m choosing to bet on myself.

So, this is me attempting to celebrate this moment. I did it. It’s not over, but I did it.