What would you be?

An interviewer asked Lorrie Moore of all people this question:

Interviewer: If you weren’t a writer, what would you be instead?
Lorrie Moore: I’d be a bad singer or an okay waitress. But I would undoubtedly be writing in my spare time. Just as I do now. Writing’s natural place is as a passionate side hustle.

I like what she said. Writing has been my passionate side hustle for the last thirty years, but it’s also been my actual hustle. I have been writing for a living–a corporate poet of sorts!–since 2003. I’ve done other work in addition to the writing for my company, to be clear. I have prepped and packed and laid out and edited, I have managed projects and print runs. I managed press placements for years, which was really, really demanding and really, really fun. For the past eleven years, I have been primarily focused on copywriting.

Its been good work, writing for a company. It doesn’t use up my creativity. It spurs it, because sometimes, when I’m churning up some romance copy for the side of a box or a hangtag, my longing to write something of my own is so piercing that I think I might cry. So I come home, and I do that.

But what would I do if I hadn’t written for a living ? That’s easy. I’d have been a realtor.

Why? Reason One: I love to sell!

When I found myself a single mother of three with a high school diploma and a pressing need for employment, I went to work at the mall selling things. I worked at a seasonal Christmas store first, then went on to women’s plus-size clothes. And I loved it. If you hate selling things, this won’t make sense: There is something rich and satisfying to be found where merchandise meets customers. I am good at making the match. I don’t want to sell something to someone who doesn’t want it. I want it to be right.

But you don’t make any money working part time at the mall, and I needed benefits and a retirement plan, so I went back to school, finished my degree, and became employable at a rate a little higher than minimum wage.

Side note: I think I’d have been great at selling cars, too. My South Dakota dad sold farm implements and cars and he was excellent at it. My facility for sales was inherited from him.

Reason Two: I love homes.

I am fascinated by homes. Fascinated by how they are laid out, when they were built, how they work for the people who live in them. I’d have loved to find just the right home for someone, to scour the listing and make the match. I have a great nose for a deal. And as a side benefit, I could go into people’s homes all day long for a living, and see their furniture, what they hung on their walls, how they lived in their own sacred space of home.

That’s the problem with the modern trend of home staging. It removes the personality of the owner by design. I get that from a sales perspective, but for a snoop like me, it’s a real letdown. This is general curiosity, mind you. I am just as curious about the homes of friends. I walk in and start my inspection, gleaning what I can from what they hang and where.

Do I have regrets?

Maybe. I’d have made so much more MONEY if I’d spent my career selling things instead of writing things. But I’m in the home stretch, here. It’s a little late for regrets when you’ve signed up for Medicare.

I am what I am. Until, in just a few months, I am retired.