WRITING

A Tale of Rejection

I was 8 years old and I wanted to be a novelist

It was the summer of 1971. I was 7 years old (almost 8, thank-you-very-much). I had just read E.B. White’s Trumpet of the Swan. Finishing a novel always brought a time of grief for me. The characters who had been alive for me during those chapters were now no more.

Was I capable of creating that same magic?

I decided to try. With lined paper and a pencil, I knelt at the coffee table in our living room. At that spot, I commenced my Magnus opus, which I would later call, The Artificial Grass Problem.

It was about a bird — a robin. (As at least one author of The Elements of Style would have surely agreed, anthropomorphic animals make the best protagonists.) This robin — Little Robin — lived in a tree in a suburban yard, where he would feast daily on succulent worms.

One day Little Robin comes home to find the entire lawn replaced with AstroTurf. With the help of a new friend, Squirmy the Worm, our hero overcomes this obstacle.

I’ll stop here. Lest I risk any possible future non-disclosure agreement with Disney, it’s best to avoid any potential spoilers.

I hammered out my tome on an Underwood manual typewriter. It was 5 pages long, including illustrations, which my brother provided. I then folded up my pride and joy and stuffed it into a 3 by 5 envelope, which I addressed to the Readers Digest. I included a SASE and a cover letter which began like this:

Dear Sir or Madam:

I have a little story here that I want published.

After a few weeks, I became concerned about the fate of my manuscript. I penned a follow-up query and fired it off to the Editor. The next day, I received a form letter from Reader’s Digest. Regretfully they were unable to make use of my story at this time. “At this time!” Hope!

It was signed, Natalie.

Some days later, I received a hand-written note from Natalie. She had received my follow-up letter. Natalie hoped that my manuscript hadn’t been lost in the mail after she had sent it back. “Sometimes that happens, you know.”

Touched by her concern, I sent another note, advising her that, yes, I had received my manuscript — not to worry. I had now sent it off to another magazine that had recently published The Lorax. Perhaps they catered to a more suitable readership.

Natalie responded to the chit-chat in my third letter. And that’s how I, at 8 years old, became pen pals with a slush pile editor at Reader’s Digest.

Our friendship continued for years. My brother and I would each write her letters. Natalie would write back. Eventually, she got a promotion at Reader’s Digest. Then she married a scientist. She wrote us about his research. (He studied mucus. You can imagine what two pre-adolescent boys did with that information.)

I have since lost touch with her. I was the first to stop writing. My brother continued the correspondence a little longer.

I think about Natalie often. I wonder if she knows that I finally got published in Readers Digest! In 2017, they printed a one-paragraph anecdote for which they paid me $50. (You can read it here: Whose Mom is it, Anyway?)

That was a half-century ago. I didn’t grow up to be Stephen King. But maybe that’s the point. I was an ordinary kid, treated with respect by a member of the adult world. And that feeling of respect stuck.

So Natalie, if you are reading this, thanks for the encouragement!

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