Shoes--follow up

Last week I blogged about a shoe dilemma—buy them for an event not? Thanks for those of you that wrote in and told me to go for it. Several have asked since then if I bought the shoes after all. Well, for those curious, I did NOT (I compromised by painting my toenails purple). The stressful event passed and was a success, and do you know why? Because I wrote myself through it. I thought about my novel most of the time—through awkward dinner conversations right down to the hotel we stayed in with its cheesy bright blue carpet and cockroach shaped cracks in the bathtub (you better believe that’s going into my book). I brought my notebook with me everywhere and at one point left the dinner to jot down a new chapter. I put on my social pleasantries in public, but in my brain my characters never left me. I had an epiphany of how the ending and have decided to cut one of the characters, which changes everything in a good way.
I never needed the shoes after all. They were cute, but really how often will I wear tropical colored four-inch high platform espadrilles? Certainly not around the Hamline campus as I dart from GLS to the lecture hall. I know some of you may be disappointed that I didn’t make the splurge, (I would have told any of you to buy them, too) but I feel fantastic. I saved money and I got good work done, plus I got through a stressful situation with ease. What more is there to life than that?

The lesson here? Writing is the answer to everything. For a writer, writing saves us more than shoes ever will, and it is far more satisfying...really. I love shoes, but trust me on that.

Now if I sell this book, I will most definitely buy something fantastic to go meet with my editor.