Finding my place, at last

Day 53

All done, finished, on it's way, hope for the best. Have just emailed the last of the agents with the manuscript for 'I am Red', and there's nothing more I can do now but wait.

That's seven agents in total which doesn't sound like a lot, I know, but they are all in London (which is only 1 1/2 hours away) and they accept submissions of children's books. There were two more on my list, but one turned out to be in Cumbria, and the other isn't taking on anybody at the moment. Needless to say, J. K. Rowling's agent is chock full, big surprise.

The next job is to clear out my work cupboard (which has been geared towards college for the last two years), and turn it into an ordered space for all the paperwork about my book. I can, at this juncture, feel happily confident that there will be paperwork about my book (that doesn't just consist of rejection letters), because I have no evidence to the contrary yet.

This is a FAB space to be in.

This feels like it did when I was ten years old and just knew I was going to be a popstar, or when I was fourteen and discovered I was clearly destined to marry Donny Osmond. (Moving swiftly on....)

There came a time, however, when I wasn't sure what I was useful for. I used to joke that I was born in the wrong century - I could sing and paint and sew and entertain people - and I sometimes felt as if I was missing a tuffet upon which to sit, saying "La" and "Lawks a mercy", whilst looking terribly good in a bonnet. My qualities of being good at raising children and being nice and rather arty seemed more fitted for a Jane Austen novel than London in the 1980's.

At the time, Madonna was photographing herself naked or in bondage gear, and Mrs T was Prime Minister. Yuppies were up and housewife was a dirty word, (thank you Nigella for rebranding that as Domestic Goddess, by the way). I'd missed the tie-dye and macrame craft-fest of the sixties, and I felt out of my league and out of place.

Roll forward to the present day, and suddenly I am congruent with the times. Being a children's author is too cool for school (although saying that, probably isn't). Finding one's own path and treading it with determination, creativity and self-belief, undaunted and unapologetic, seems to be what it's all about.

Maybe this is my decade, who knows? Just as with my book, I must wait and see.