I hate to start the new year ranting . . .

I'm a writer. I love to write. I went to college and got a degree in writing —well, Journalism. Writing has been my world. From books to blog posts to letters and emails. There are people who actually know me as Cheris, the writer.

Once, I was speaking the former president of JCSU and she called me the writer lady. Man, I was so proud. But my world changed in 2011. I was no longer getting paid to write. My day job was no longer writing.

I went to a call center and stayed there for about a month. Couldn't do it. Wrote a lot while I was there. Great story too, and yes, you're going to hear about it. :)
Then I applied for a sales job. I had no idea that this job would cause me to hate life. You've read the Wonderland Chronicles, you know that I've worked with some characters and what not. But now that I'm working with assholes, I can't take it.

Walking into my job makes me physically ill. No lie. The closer at get to Horrorville, the new place where I work, my stomach twists in knots. My throat fills with bile. As I walk in the front door, my knees quiver.

That place is not for me. Not at all. Because, damn it, I'm a writer. I'm a writer who needs to come home and be able to sit down and WRITE. When your brain is tired, you can't create a good story, you can develop characters and you can't meet deadlines.

So, what's a writer lady to do? Quitting writing is not an option. But sister has to eat.

When I sat in a meeting this morning and a manager said: "This is a career. This is not just a job you do until something better comes along."
That innocuous quote was a wake up call. It was like a threat. Writing is my career. That job at Horrorville is not what I want or need. Just because you're good at something, it doesn't mean you should do it, right. I could be good at fucking, but being a call girl is illegal. (In North Carolina anyway)