How do my fellow aspiring authors feel when visiting a bookstore?

To be honest, I feel depressed. Walking up and down the aisles, staring at the bookshelves, I can’t help but wonder if I’ll even make it there. Will someone like my work? Even more: will anybody bother to publish it?

Why does publication matter so much? Why can’t it be enough to just write the story? I often wonder why do I feel the need to share my words with the world. What does that say about me? Why am I hoping for it?

I don’t know. Ego? The need to connect? What is it? Man, I love and hate those shelves so much. Looking at the elaborate covers and reading the enticing (and often misleading) blurbs I just… I just wonder, and hope, and dream, and worry, and hope again.

It’s odd, and real. I wonder if visiting a bookstore will ever stop feeling like this.