My last encounter with a deadly foot and mouth disease took place a couple of months ago.
I was born into the type of family if our foot isn’t inserted in our mouths then we’re not talking.
I was having the type of day where everything I touched turned into poo, so when I received a direct message from a woman I had never talked to before, my guard wasn’t up. Survival instincts should have kicked into high gear and I shouldn’t have looked at the message until after going home, eating supper, taking a shower and grabbing an hour or two to wind down from my stressful day.
I was only twenty minutes away from leaving my workday from hell behind, but I read her message and the rest is humiliating history. Any names and conversations have been changed slightly to condense events and to protect me from a lawsuit.
Soon-to-be-new-editor, “I recently read one of your stories and loved it but it has several mistakes in it. I thought you would like to know so you can make the necessary changes. If you send me your email address I will gladly send a document with all of the corrections highlighted.” I don’t remember her exact words but she did say something to the effect that she didn’t want to insult me by telling me about the errors.
Me? (I didn’t change that name). About this time I’m rolling my eyes and sighing because just the week before I had received basically the same message from another editor about a different story of mine. I’m frustrated because I had paid someone to edit both stories so I’m thinking I need a new editor or these women are just trying to drum up new business. It turns out I did need a new editor but that a totally different story.
Me, “Thank you for taking the time to tell. You’re not insulting me.” I included my email address in the direct message. Sure enough a few minutes later I receive an email with a butt load of highlighted errors and realized I needed a new editor. I emailed her and thanked her for sending me the corrections.
Right about there should have been the end of my story but I’m sorry to say it is not. I wrote an email to my daughter: “Would you make these corrections to my book? I just received a message on Twitter from another damn editor trying to get my business.” So far so good but it couldn’t last. Rushing and exhausted I missed the ”forward” button and, instead, I hit, “reply”, so I sent the message back to my soon-to-be-editor by mistake … I know. I’m horrified too.
.
I cringed, this could have been the end to a sad tale with an offended editor fuming at me, but no, a couple of minutes later I received another email from my soon-to-be-editor. “Did you mean to send this to someone else?” She might have said more but if she did it’s miraculously blocked from my memory because this is all I read before pounding my forehead on my desk and making wailing noises. I wanted to sink into the floor but God has a sense of humor and He can create circumstances to make us face up to our own messes.
I laughed and cried before I finally hit reply (got it right this time-damn keyboard). “I’m sorry. I meant to send that to my daughter.” I can’t remember everything I said to her either but I ate crow and my foot for several emails before we both laughed and made a pact to pretend none of it happened.
Fortunately this little tale has a happy ending. We both gave each other a chance and I discovered she’s the best damn editor around.
I was born into the type of family if our foot isn’t inserted in our mouths then we’re not talking.
I was having the type of day where everything I touched turned into poo, so when I received a direct message from a woman I had never talked to before, my guard wasn’t up. Survival instincts should have kicked into high gear and I shouldn’t have looked at the message until after going home, eating supper, taking a shower and grabbing an hour or two to wind down from my stressful day.
I was only twenty minutes away from leaving my workday from hell behind, but I read her message and the rest is humiliating history. Any names and conversations have been changed slightly to condense events and to protect me from a lawsuit.
Soon-to-be-new-editor, “I recently read one of your stories and loved it but it has several mistakes in it. I thought you would like to know so you can make the necessary changes. If you send me your email address I will gladly send a document with all of the corrections highlighted.” I don’t remember her exact words but she did say something to the effect that she didn’t want to insult me by telling me about the errors.
Me? (I didn’t change that name). About this time I’m rolling my eyes and sighing because just the week before I had received basically the same message from another editor about a different story of mine. I’m frustrated because I had paid someone to edit both stories so I’m thinking I need a new editor or these women are just trying to drum up new business. It turns out I did need a new editor but that a totally different story.
Me, “Thank you for taking the time to tell. You’re not insulting me.” I included my email address in the direct message. Sure enough a few minutes later I receive an email with a butt load of highlighted errors and realized I needed a new editor. I emailed her and thanked her for sending me the corrections.
Right about there should have been the end of my story but I’m sorry to say it is not. I wrote an email to my daughter: “Would you make these corrections to my book? I just received a message on Twitter from another damn editor trying to get my business.” So far so good but it couldn’t last. Rushing and exhausted I missed the ”forward” button and, instead, I hit, “reply”, so I sent the message back to my soon-to-be-editor by mistake … I know. I’m horrified too.
.
I cringed, this could have been the end to a sad tale with an offended editor fuming at me, but no, a couple of minutes later I received another email from my soon-to-be-editor. “Did you mean to send this to someone else?” She might have said more but if she did it’s miraculously blocked from my memory because this is all I read before pounding my forehead on my desk and making wailing noises. I wanted to sink into the floor but God has a sense of humor and He can create circumstances to make us face up to our own messes.
I laughed and cried before I finally hit reply (got it right this time-damn keyboard). “I’m sorry. I meant to send that to my daughter.” I can’t remember everything I said to her either but I ate crow and my foot for several emails before we both laughed and made a pact to pretend none of it happened.
Fortunately this little tale has a happy ending. We both gave each other a chance and I discovered she’s the best damn editor around.
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