Yesterday I submitted my manuscript.
I queued up an email to my editor at the University of Michigan Press and placed my the cursor on the send button. In the company of Colleen and my friend Lyle, I raised my hand and began lowering it at the pace of the Times Square ball we’d watched drop nine hours before. It collided with my laptop keypad and my roughly 200-page manuscript was sent off into the world.
☝️ me upon submission, also hungover, 📷: Colleen ☝️
This day once seemed so far away, I haven’t yet processed exactly how I feel about it. So I’ll just offer these three brief points about how it felt and what I’m thinking, with a more complete newsletter on what I’ve learned and what’s next coming to you soon:
1. Anticlimactic. When I pressed send I didn’t feel a wave of accomplishment, nor did I dwell on it hardly at all for the rest of the day!
I think back to while I was reporting the book, when I scored an interview with someone who I’d really wanted to talk to. In trying to get the interview, I’d felt like if I could just persuade that person to talk to me, that would be a huge leap forward. Then when I succeeded in doing that, it felt like almost nothing. I was already on to the next problem, the last one having quickly disappeared in the rear view mirror.
That’s what this, a much bigger achievement, feels like, too. The overwhelming joy and appreciation I’d anticipated for this moment was deferred. I find myself thinking that I’ll reserve that feeling for the moment that my editor tells me they’re going to publish this book. (Yes, I’m still in partial doubt.)
2. Surprising. As I reflect on the process that got me here, I’m surprised at how the drafting stage ended. I had anticipated long nights of furious revisions. Instead I took a few hours at a time during the holiday weeks — alternating work with Super Smash Brothers games against Colleen’s brother Michael — to punch up spots in the manuscript. Turns out I was far enough along for that to actually be fine.
I’m also surprised at how the manuscript turned out. After a day or so of not looking it over, I would begin reading and think to myself, Wow OK, this is actually pretty good. Can you believe it turned out to be pretty good?
3. Unsettling. Even though all the language has been vetted, and Colleen and I have checked all the facts, it doesn’t feel done. How could it be? In the manuscript’s history on this Earth, it’s always been a work in progress. I’m having trouble classifying it any other way in my mind, even though I know I’ve done nearly all the things I need to do to wrap it up. (A few tasks — fact-checking, response-getting — linger after the deadline.)
I’m also filled with the unsettling anticipation of waiting to hear the all-important opinion of my editor, on which the fate of this book depends. A year and a half ago, she gave the green light for me to do this. Did I do it right?
— Andy
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