Being America's Favorite Lower Mid-list Urban Fantasy Author is a burden, but one I lovingly accept.

That said, I'd like to talk for a moment about what it means to be a writer nowadays.  When I was a kid, I remember hearing about Stephen King when he published Carrie.  It was his first gig as a novelist, got a nice advance and BOOM, he was a full time writer who could suddenly afford food and to not have to another job anymore, in his case teaching.  That still happens these days (Mr. Rothfuss, I am looking in your direction) but I'd say 90% of the writers I know all have second jobs, ie. ones that pay their bills and take up most of their day.  I, for one, like health insurance and that is not a luxury writing can afford me.

I suppose the real solution is 'write better books, dumbass'. Like that's gonna happen!

This is more an analysis of how my time breaks down than a complaint about 'oh poor published me!'.  Trying to find time to write all revolves around my day job responsibilities which means I have to be pretty amped and focused to keep on target with my writing deadlines.  And frankly, shifting my mind from work thoughts back to book thoughts takes a little ramp up each and every day.  I try to allocate that to my hour commute home, but even once I sit down at the computer there's the time it takes my mind to settle into writing mode.  I think those of you who write know this feeling...

And it makes me resent the day job a little. 

Now onto the bipolar nature of being an author at my level, which I will admit keeps my brain in roller coaster flux from highs to lows.  One one hand, my books are around the country.  People are reading them.  Some send fan mail, which is quite keen to get and can keep me pretty elevated for some time.  Then you go to a convention... people seek you out, want to talk to you, hear what you have to say, want you to sign something that you don't think they're doing just to eBay it... very ego stroking, but it does help balance out all those hours you fretted alone writing the book by validating the time you spent.  And when you get to speak on panels with authors you admire, well... it gives you hope for the future.  You might not be king of the castle, but at least you've been invited to sit at the Round Table with the other knights.

Then there's the day job.  Bosses, errands... meetings.  No matter what you're doing, I think you always feel like someone stripped that knighthood away from you, handed you a puppet on a stick, a hat with bells on it and said "Dance, Jester, Dance!"  It is difficult for me to manage the shift from (very)minor celebrity to taskmonkey.  Yeah, I love my day job and the people there, but really, who doesn't want to be a rockstar instead, right?

At times it gets me down.  I hope that doesn't come off as whiny, but there it is.  For some, they can choose to wallow in it, let it fester and eat away at them, maybe even give up writing.  For me?  I like the fake people I create.  I want to spend more time with them.  I like sitting at the Round Table.  I want to go on a quest.  Right now that quest is to keep on keeping on, to tell the tales I want to read, to charge at windmills.  It's not quite dreaming the impossible dream... it's dreaming the possible one and at the end of my day,  I can't not write and I take inspiration to reach for the high of the bipolar disorder that being a writer is.

I think I've mixed enough metaphors for now.  Just needed to vent... thanks for listening.  Back to the day job..