I Quit!!
Ten years ago today was my last day working for the California State Legislature.
Make no mistake, I used to love my job in the Legislature. I went in as a 22 year old idealist thinking I could affect change. Thirteen years later, I was cynical and bitchy. There are a lot of reasons for that, which I can’t get into without getting political. But even though I worked full-time in the Capitol, I still wrote. Because I loved writing. I’d been doing it my entire life, it seemed, but without a purpose or goal.
It took me years before I sat down and committed myself to finishing one of the many books I started, and then five manuscripts before I sold. That’s a story I’ve often told, so I won’t repeat it now. But I couldn’t have done written every night if I didn’t have a day-job to pay the bills. Most writers are like that. Most writers have a paying job–sometimes they love it, sometimes they don’t–but they write stories because writing stories is part of what makes them who they are.
