Plants & Query Letters

I was very sick today and stayed home from work (I was going to remote work today, anyway), but during the afternoon I replanted all my herbs (what remained from the packets) and all the seeds I obtained from the farmers market in Bethany Springs, WV during Laura’s birthday trip. The Master Gardener’s tent there was passing out a host of seeds, including two types of peas, cilantro, Swiss chard, arugula, spinach, white beans, pumpkin, and yellow squash. I added some cucumbers to the mix. 

I also repotted a few plants, finally giving my purple and green bush a real home and the plant from my bathroom a container that wasn’t broken (I don’t know how it’s been surviving so well since it lost so much soil). I’m hoping replanting my spider plant and rare plant will bring them back to life (I also gave them plant food), but they look pretty far gone. I’m optimistic they can come back, though. 

I tried finishing my Invisible Man Halloween stand but abandoned it pretty quickly when seceded that I didn’t have enough light outside. It was absolutely gorgeous out; it felt like the first real night of fall — so. I wanted to be outside. I had meant to go for a walk earlier, but my energy levels were draining from being sick, and I was caught up in a conversation with Melody that would have been difficult to maintain while walking. 

Early in the day I decided to push through the jam wall and get going on that query letter for my Eloisa story. I can’t ever publish it if I never write the query letter. So I looked up instructions, found a really good webpage right away, and wrote down the template. It was actually a very simple format, which made it a lot more approachable. There were only a few steps. 

So I switched gears, telling myself that I wouldn’t go to bed until I at least started a draft. It turned out to be a lot easier, and more fun, than I expected. The words rolled right off my fingers and kept going. Having that template really helped. I wrong one short paragraph (a sentence or two for each) on each subject and transitioned to the next. The next thing I knew, it was done. 

I re-read it twice, made a few edits, but felt very good about it! I’ll need to look at it in the morning again with fresh eyes, but I was pretty proud of it. I thought once I re-read it, I’d realize how terrible it was; but that wasn’t the case. A part of me reflected back on the difficult texts I’ve had to send the last month, and how both Laura and Jamie said they were perfectly worded without need of changing a single thing; and that made me feel confident. And when I checked the word count, sure that I had gone almost double over, I was actually exactly where I needed to be, even a few words under (giving me flexibility when I added a few words). 

I’m going to ask my mom and Melody to review my story and query letter tomorrow. I was worried that both, especially my mom, would judge me; but both of them really want to see me to succeed first-hand. I’d like to bring them, especially my mom, into the process. And they might have good feedback before I send it out.

After seeing how easy the query letter was, it felt like actually sending these out might be easier than expected, as well. That’s a feeling I’m already starting to lose, replaced by panic, fear, and anxiety; so future Caitlin: I want to you remember the feeling you had, where you though, “Hey, that was fun — and easy! It didn’t take any time at all. Sending these out would be a snap.”

You got this, Caitlin.