On A Sabbatical

 ( Image is copy right free and taken from Wiki Commons)

When i got a message on facebook from one of my friends, regarding a blog call from Yashodaralal, I remembered that " Oh My God", Dont i have a blog too?". So I promptly opened it and saw that my last post was somewhere in March 2012. I was aghast...What have I done? I had comitted an unpardonable sin against the god of words.. Did'nt i start the blog with a good intention of penning down my thoughts? But somewhere in the rigmarole of office and household duties I had completely forgotten that I had created one. So I made a promise to myself that i would regularly update it.
And what can be more better than the present. So i decided to pen it down. I dont have to rush to office and i had a whole load of free time on my hands. Yep, I am totally jobless now. I am on a sabbatical. Working for close to 2 years in a corporate environment somehow totally sapped me of my energy, but not my creativity. Being a content writer by profession, letting go of creativity would have been death knell for me.So even though I resigned from a well paying job, I held on to my creativity and I am glad I did, because I finally finished my first novel- a romance which I had started before I took up the corporate job.

Many emotions crossed my mind when i quit, main was the absence of interaction with my colleagues, deadlines and the hectic rush to reach office and immerse myself in work. I became very listless, depressed and could not sit at home. But, then it struck me that I had unfinished business, which was my novel and which I had shelved for want of time. So out came the saved manuscript and off went my fingers tapping furiously on the keyboard and Lo! in 10 days I completed my tale. Then i must have read it more than 20 times editing, rediting, snipping and adding and finally i was satisfied with the outcome. The day i wrote the words " The End", i had a goofy, but satisfied smile on my face.

Then i was faced with a hurdle. How do i go about publishing it? I did not have any clues about it. So i posted on fb and my friends gave their inputs which were very helpful. Then i found a very good website, which gave a blow by blow account on how to go about getting your book published. It became my bible. It is from here that i learnt to write a cover letter and chapter outline etc etc. Fully equipped now, the next task was to send it off to publishers with sample copies . I heard the wait is gonna be long to hear from publishers so here i am sitting with my fingers crossed. I am positive, but still have no other alternative, but to endure the wait.

In the interim period i wrote one more short story for the Indian Women's Press Corps short story competition. And as the creative juices started flowing so did my happiness and positivity. And i chided myself for thinking that i was jobless. I will ultimately go back to a full time job, but I decided that my writing is never gonna take a sabbatical again. So I said to myself, " Go girl! write as much as you can...reach out to people and entertain them with your stories...you are not jobless, you are a creator and your words are gonna blow them away."