A Slice of Orange

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It’s Worth It

By Kitty Bucholtz

Last month, my credit card bills were higher than I expected them to be. I didn’t buy a slinky new dress or a couple of pounds of Godiva truffles. (And if I had bought the one, I probably couldn’t have bought the other!) No, I had to pay over $100 in late fees and finance charges. I was so caught up in working on my book that I totally forgot to pay the credit cards until the day after they were due.

I’m a full-time writer, and as such, I have a tendency to forget a lot of things. If I’m writing, I forget to stop for a bathroom break until it’s nearly too late. If I’m walking down the beach, I forget to turn onto my street because I’m thinking about how that tattooed guy doing the one-handed pushups could fit into my book. If I didn’t set an alarm, I’d forget to pick up my husband from work – if I’m off in Book Land.

But I say it’s worth it. Writers get to spend their time thinking about solutions to impossible situations. They get to wonder “how” and “why” and “why not” – and if they wonder aloud, people forgive them because “you know how writers are.”

I downloaded a lecture I found on the Internet by Dr. Valerio Massimo Manfredi called “Storytelling and History Writing” given at The Australian National University on September 4, 2006. He tells the audience that early storytellers had a function, “to diffuse and transmit models of behavior that were essential for the survival of those communities.” I believe this is true today.

As often as you hear the sad and tragic tale of what is going wrong in the world today, you hear someone bemoaning the fact that something must be done. Writers can be part of the solution! We can give people hope. We can remind them that anyone can be a hero. We can urge them to act, to push themselves, to work together to make the world a better place. Perhaps a teenager will befriend “the new kid” because she’s emulating the cool teenager in a book she just read. Maybe a woman will find love where she wasn’t looking because she stepped out of her comfort zone – just like the heroine in a favorite book. Maybe a writer will help combat illiteracy with an idea that just may increase their book sales as well.

I no longer feel embarrassed that I write novels. As a storyteller, I have an essential function in the community. I may spend a lot of time alone. I may forget to pay a bill or two. But I might be able to make the world a better place.

And I say that’s worth it!

Kitty Bucholtz writes romantic comedies because, well, she lives one! She wrote her first book in the NBC cafeteria, the second snowed in at a Reno hotel, and the third from a tiny apartment in Sydney. Even though she loves talking about, writing about, and teaching about writing, she’s pretty sure she knows at least three people who aren’t writers.