The Glamorous Life of Writing

Being a writer is a glamorous lifestyle. Right? It's all cocktail parties and book launches. Not to mention publishing deals with great big advances. Why else would we do it? Why else would we spend any scrap of time, ploughing through fake worlds and fictional characters, obsessing over each word we choose? Staring at notebooks and blank screens. 

If we don't do it for the glory, then what do we get out of writing?

Book Launches and Cocktail Parties

Nope. I'm having cups of tea and going to bed early to get a little bit of quiet time with my laptop and a Word document. Just so you know, though, sometimes I watch Netflix with my earphones while I write, so I'm not totally dull. 

The plus side to this is I'm an introvert, so any kind of social gathering where I'm the centre of attention fills me with dread. I shudder just thinking about it. Every cloud has a silver lining, and being an unsuccessful writer who never goes out, makes my cloud lining sparkly silver. 

Publishing Deals and Big Advances

Yeah... not so much. More like book rejections and no money to spare. Any money coming in from writing isn't from my books or scripts. It's from blog posts and content writing. That means when I want an income from writing, I'm not so much researching my characters and plot points as I am things like reverse circular drilling and the best Uno decks to buy. 

You might think that's a good way to learn about a range of different subjects, but not much stays in my brain beyond the writing of the blog. Still, I love writing and I love learning, so it's not a bad way to to do it.

Fake Worlds and Fictional Characters

This is the best part of writing. Getting to actually do it. When you listen to music and your mind drifts into another world, where stories play out in your imagination. When you highlight the word and check all the synonyms that work in that sentence. 

Writing is definitely the fun part of being a writer, even when it doesn't feel like it is. 

Dazzling Excitement

The reality of being a writer isn't so glamorous. Not for most of us, anyway. To those of us who are the rule and not the exception, it's mostly fitting it around our day jobs, and our every day responsibilities. It's thinking about story development on our commute to work. It's having strategically placed notebooks to write on while we cook or clean. And it's planning out scenes in bed as we drift to sleep. 

We don't have bundles of money coming in, it's not our full-time job, but we do it anyway. We must love it or something.

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