Blogger: Janet Kobobel Grant
When I grew up, Labor Day represented a clear demarcation between summer and fall. We:
- Put away our summer clothes, but especially our white shoes and purses.
- Went back to school the day after Labor Day.
- Ignored that sometimes nature didn’t agree with that line in the sand, as it kept the heat turned up.
Nowadays, as in so many aspects of life, the line between the seasons is blurred. We:
- Wear whatever appeals to us, regardless of season.
- Send our children back to school anywhere from mid-August to early September.
- Check the forecast to determine nature’s mood for any given day.
Publishing has its rhythms, too. But its traditions stand firm. During the summer:
- Publishing houses based in New York ask employees to work extra hours Mon.-Thurs. Offices are either closed all day Friday or close at noon. (The practice is followed even by those imprints located outside of New York.)
- So many employees take vacations, especially grabbing those waning dog days of August, that publishing committees can’t meet pretty much all summer to discuss potential new projects.
But after Labor Day is like a second new year. Employees:
- Have sent their children back to school.
- Used up all their vacation time during the summer.
- Returned to the office, invigorated and ready to scrimmage their way through the manuscript submissions that have collected over the summer.
- Convene publishing committee meetings and plow like a behemoth ship through the waves of manuscripts, fishing out the few deemed worthy and right for some upcoming publishing season for that house.
Let the new year begin tomorrow!
Happy Labor Day, Publishing World.
Happy new [work] year!
This is when the fun really begins.
On the subject fun…Barbara can’t understand why I find my situation a joke. But if you can’t laugh at death, why even bother to die?
My father used to say, “No laughing matter, no matter if you laugh.”
*God has a sense of humor. The platypus is all the proof I need.
*Dear Lord, send Barbara the blessing of a good joke, let her laughter float up to you as a sacrifice of praise.
Shirlee God did send The B a good one…
* Yesterday she was talking about the place tuna has in her diet, and I was reminded of something and moved to say –
“You know I once considered making tuna part of my diet as well/”
“But you always said you hated it!”
“Sure do, but a long time ago I wanted to grow a ‘fro, and I was told that tuna’s an aphrodisiac.”
When Barbara recovered her composure and stopped recycling the Pepsi sh’d been drinking, she carefully explained my error, and then said, “Well, I know a history of concussion can have some weird effects, but you’ve just set a personal best.”
Andrew, you keep laughing and making us laugh. All Christians can laugh at death and even welcome it because Jesus defeated it. PTL!
I envy you. Here, everything’s blurred, including the demarcation between night and day. I had to ask Barbara why the sun seems to be setting earlier.
* Like a thoroughly beaten-out boxer, I’m reeling, and keep getting pushed back into the ring to take more hits.
* But if someone would so kind to be to slip me a couple sets of brass knuckles, next time bells rings the blood on the mat will not be mine.
That sounds amazing! Labor Day feels like a day of hope for me. Last week, I felt a little discouraged about my WIP, but today, just seeing the few changes I need to make and add … I feel so encouraged. My girl’s started college, and she loves it. I survived it. And I’m hoping to survive teaching my second daughter to drive. And to excel at math. And this is the first year we started school before Labor Day. But nevertheless, right now, I feel a fresh autumn breeze in my life. 🙂 I’m already ready for ACFW 2017. Bring it on. 🙂
Love this, Shelli. Sometimes we need that place to press our Re-start buttons, don’t we? I’m glad your girl is loving college. And, I suspect you’ll survive teaching your other daughter to drive . . . albeit with a few more gray hairs. 😉
Ahhhh, this would give all of us who sent in summer submissions hope that it isn’t necessarily our story, but the timing as well. Long wait times are a norm, but I see why they might be even longer in the summer. It would be hard to have committee meetings if editors are taking turns swooping their families off for vacation.
It’s good to know this rhythm of publishing houses. There is something refreshing about beginning new routines. As my boys are getting back into their school-grooves, I’m finding myself refreshed and excited to get back to writing with more intentionality (is that a word?). 🙂
Yes, it is a word, and a fine one, too.
I think every big business entity cools down in the summer, simply because most people have families. And if not families (spouse + kids), then a core of people with whom they spend quality time.
My sweet baby starts 8th grade tomorrow, and #3 starts university on Thursday. I cannot believe it. We’ve got 2 in the grown up world, but for some reason, #3 in university makes me feel OLD.
Well, back to work.
Which includes blackberry picking!!!
Oooohhh! Blackberries . . .
. . . a family affair in my childhood. My sibling, cousins and I had purple fingers and scratched arms. My mother and aunts made blackberry jelly, blackberry pie and blackberry sauce to go over vanilla ice cream. We were fat, sticky and happy.
This gives me hope. If this is a new year, perhaps I can begin wtih yet another re-write! Maybe if I’ve moved up a grade (I taught elementary school for 25 years!), this new re-write will demonstrate more growth. I can only hope!
Thanks for the encouragement, Janet.
Happy New Year, Susan!
I really love the idea of slowing down in the summer, taking long weekends, having two-hour dinners, and generally letting nine months of stress ease up. Don’t Europeans take off most of August? When my girls were home, I used to do that. Every year, I canceled all our obligations and weekly appointments in August. It really did help me to get back into the school routine with a renewed purpose.
Thanks for the reminder!
Carrie, yes, August is like a month of slumber for most Europeans. They head off for beaches, into the countryside, and out of the cities. We Americans could learn a thing or two about letting up on the gas pedal from them. I love that you made August a Dog Days sort of time for your family.