In the ‘no news is good news’ category, I don’t have much to report today. Completed reading the book, added a few names to the acknowledgment section and had to think about what to add to ‘the future’ part. As in, what do I have planned for the future. I won’t give it away, but I think I’ve got some ambitious things lined up; because that’s just how I operate.

I actually toyed a bit with the idea of adding an epilogue about our issues with the publisher. I don’t suppose they were issues so much as it was a separation of interests. It does go right along with the actual theme of our book, in that we ended up having to do things the long and hard way. Ultimately, I also feel it ended up being the right way for us, and things worked out better, and for the best, for all involved. That was the pro of including an epilogue.

The con would be feeling as though I was pointing fingers or trying to make the publisher look bad. I don’t plan on ever naming them, because I don’t want to make them look bad, or point fingers.

I’ve said it before, I don’t think they meant anything personal by it, I think they just felt it was better business move for them not to pursue the project. We are unknowns. We were quite aware of that fact (have been for a while)—that it took them this long to discover such a thing is impressive.

As I grappled with the decision, I did what I always do. I thought of Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid.

Normally seen as a pleasant and adorable film personality, Meg gave an interview to a a magazine, whose name escapes me, about the dissolution of her marriage to Dennis. At the time of the breakup, she had a very public affair with Russell Crowe. Whether it came before the breakup or after, I also don’t remember. It’s not important in the scheme of this story.

It had been ten or so years, and to say the interview was scathing is a bit of an understatement. She recounted all the many and varied things Dennis had done wrong that had lead to their breakup, and possibly a reason for her relationship with Russell. I’m not going to recount them here because I don’t remember them. I just remember how it made me feel.

While I’m sure her intentions were to tell her side of the story, and to make people understand, she came off sounding angry and so very, very bitter. Even if she was right, and he was a sliver of the man she said he was, she ended up looking like the bad guy. To me, at least. Ten yeas, and she was still so raw and unforgiving.

I don’t want to be that person. I don’t wish the publisher ill, or for people to boycott them. I want everyone to be happy and prosperous. For that reason, I decided not to include the epilogue. I think it’s enough that I’m blogging about it.

So to Meg Ryan, I say thank you for the perspective, and I sincerely hope things are happier for her now. Or that I read the interview completely wrong. Either way, it’s given me years of reflection, even if that wasn’t her original intention.

Right at 35 days before my 35th birthday, Rachael and I found out that a book we wrote about our experience making our first film “No Lost Cause,” was being returned to us by the publisher after a year of waiting for it to be printed. Instead of wallowing in our collective misery, I committed to blogging every day while I searched for ways to overcome this perceived rejection and obstacle to our goal. I currently also have about three other projects brewing at the same time, and write about the progress of each of them. This is part of that series.

Read the first entry here: https://ashleyraymerbrown.com/2015/01/23/35-days-to-35-dealing-with-rejection/