So I rarely talk about my day job, mainly because I believe in keeping that world separate from this one. However, today I had a meeting with a financial advisor to discuss my retirement fund and a plan for the next two years. (Yes, I’m pretty young, but I’m also a planner and, to my chagrin, a realist.) During the meeting I also mentioned the books and that I feel like this job and retirement plan are my safety nets, my back up plans. Don’t get me wrong, I like my day job, but when compared to being able to write full time, to spend all day with the characters I know and love and to get to the point where I can share the stories with others…the day job just doesn’t stand a chance.
Thanks to my realistic side, however, I wake up every day and go to my job, despite the days when I feel like writing or when I have to cut myself off at night so I can get at least a few hours of sleep before work the next day. I show up and I do my best, because the job and my coworkers deserve it. (Not to mention my coworkers are some of the quickest people to support my writing goals.)
So on my drive home today I got to thinking about this acceptance speech Ursula K. Le Guin gave. (I’ve posted it to my Facebook page or just YouTube her and you’ll come across it and I just love it.) During her six minute speech she talks about how publishers are telling writers what to write based on a market strategy versus creating an art. Her final line was:
“We who live by writing and publishing want and should demand our fair share of the proceeds, but the name of our beautiful reward is not profit, it’s name is freedom.”
I had posted it to the Facebook page because I felt it pointed out how my pursuit of self-publishing allowed me to write what I wanted, without dictation from another source and so on one level I’d achieved the freedom she talked about. During that drive home today, I realized that the achievement of that freedom was also due to the day job. While the day job takes up several hours of my day it still allows me to leave the job at the door, financial stability and the income to market the books. It’s amazing how several little ideas foster together to create a larger thought. Now that I think about it, I’m pretty sure that’s how books have come to be, weird how you don’t realize how creative you can be with reality.
So tomorrow when I’m hitting the snooze button and thinking that I really wish I could stay home and write I’ll remember the freedom the day job grants…and that even JK Rowling was told to keep her day job in the beginning.