Stuffing Envelopes

Last week, I applied for a job that I really want. It looks like it would be a challenging and fulfilling position writing marketing-ish Web copy for the research department of University College Dublin. As far as workplaces go, it just can't get much cooler or much more geographically desirable than UCD. Plus, since it's where Peter and I spent a bit of time during the early months of our relationship, the campus has a special place in my heart.

Since it's a university, the application process is very structured and completely anachronistic. They want you to go to a Web site, download a PDF form, fill out the form, and print out six copies. But that's not all. They also want six copies of your CV and a cover letter outlining how you meet the job description's criteria. Then you have to get your application packet into their personnel office by a certain date and time.

When I slid the 36 pages of application material into a big brown envelope, I couldn't help feeling that I was filling the envelope with all my hopes and dreams. It's funny that so much could ride on a stack of black and white papers. I knew that my brown envelope was going to join other brown enevelopes, similiarly filled. I hoped that something about my cover letter and my CV would jump out and put me on the short list.

Yesterday, I had a similar, but even more intense feeling, when I put together a submission package for a leading Irish book publisher. This company has a reputation for finding new authors and taking chances on them. It's how one of my favourite authors (Marian Keyes) got her start. Witty cover letter, tongue-in-cheek bio, earnest writing-oriented CV, the weakest-link synopsis (oh how I hate to write synopses), 50 pages of my first novel and several years' worth of dreams and ambition were stuffed into the big A4 envelope.

When the publisher (or, more likely, her unpaid work-experience intern) opens the envelope, what will she see? Just 60 sheets of paper with black 10 pt Arial type, most of it double-spaced. She won't see the 4am writing sessions, the all-day revision sessions, the tortured synopsis writing sessions. She might guess at my eagerness, but then, that's practically a hallmark of unpublished authors.

But, what I hope she sees, on those 50 pages, are people she recognizes, sympathises with and would like to get to know better. I hope she sees a little bit of herself as a teenager, a little bit of her daughter/neice/neighbor. If I'm successful in that, then even if she passes on the book, then I've still accomplished something worthwhile. My book will live another day, waiting for yet another brown envelope.