Why Be a Writer?

When I was a child, people used to ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up. My usual response was 'a teacher.' Later, I modified this to be 'a high-school maths teacher.'
Looking back, I can see how much I've changed. From loving mathematics, I've come to find it more than annoying. The last thing I'd ever want to be is a maths teacher, leave alone one at high-school level, where, horror of horrors, calculus rears its ugly head. My blood pressure skyrockets at the very idea.
So, x number of years later, I find myself being a writer, or as I prefer to call it, an author, with 42 titles to my name, and counting.
It cannot possibly be that I'm enticed by the money, for so far, there has been next to none. I honestly doubt that I've earned a cent over and above what it has cost me to create my stories. And before you start thinking that I must surely be very unsuccessful, think again. Lately, my Amazon author rank has been hovering around the 30,000 mark, out of more than one million. Not so very bad after all, is it?
Now for the bottom line.
Truth is, I'm driven to write. With next to no effort, ideas pop into my head and I *have* to write and develop them into stories. I guess they're like seeds that beg to be sown: precious seeds, quite possibly unique. They are my babies. They evolve as though they have a life of their own.
Will I ever stop this seemingly endless cycle?
Who knows? My will to create has survived scathing criticism from a number of reviewers who have made no secret of their intense dislike of my style and ideas. Yet here I am, right now, tapping away at a keyboard...
For love, not money...


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writing, author, literature, career, achievement, reviews, money, books