I taught at a visual and performing arts summer school. I worked at the zoo. I was a waiter. I was unemployed. In fact, when I did Time Flies I was unemployed and had the time to sit down and it took me six or so months to make a dummy and figure it out. But this is what I did, this is the influence of the world on you.
I was working at this place and I was teaching girls and there was a sixth grade girl, brilliant girl, and I showed her the dummy for Time Flies. She said, you know, I think I’ve seen a book like this. I put it away for two years simply because one kid, my audience, said I think I’ve seen something like this before.
Maybe so, but that was the influence. I put it away and then I took it out and started sending it around to publishers and I think it was rejected 15 times before you know I actually went to New York City and showed it to somebody and they took it. What I’m finding out is that’s a pretty good percentage, you know, because some people are already doing a book that has dinosaurs or they only do books that look like cartoons. You never know why they’re going to take it.
But everything I did before that was leading up to it, you know the jobs that I did, all those people that I know are in those books. There’s no way
everything you do in your life has a chance of making it into your book, which is why it’s always great to have a liberal arts education before you start doing this or like Peter Sís be a filmmaker or Chris Van Allsburg be a sculptor, find your way and live a life and then it’s going to make the books better.