I grew up in Michigan with three sisters, a grandmother who taught me to play math bingo and word games, a mom who made me sudoku puzzles, a dad who let me play with knives, and a slew of relatives who loved to entertain each other by telling stories. By second grade, I knew I wanted to be A Writer, even if I didn't know what that really meant yet.

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I later learned that writing could be whatever I wanted it to be! Bad poetry! Short stories! Single-sentence nonsense that I convinced myself was super wise (the teenage version of me really really  wanted to be wise, but I was definitely just pretentious). In high school, I learned it could be books. I wanted to write my first book before I graduated and—like a lot of writers—I finished just under the deadline. Two days before walking in my high school graduation, I stayed up all night until 7 AM to finish my first book in the euphoric haze of sunrise and eye strain. And I was hooked. I've been writing books ever since.

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I've been doing other stuff, too. College, for example. "Have a backup plan," they said. "Financial security is important," they said. It sounded like good (if annoying) advice. It's not the right advice for everyone, but in the end it served me well. I got my B.A. in both English with a Creative Writing Focus and Chemistry. What a combo! I tell you, pick opposite sides of STEM/Humanities spectrum, and it'll make a great talking point in interviews.

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With that funky degree combination, I landed a job as a technical writer just after college. Within a few years, I transitioned jobs to be a citizen developer (aka self-taught) for the very system I had been taught to use. Within a few more, I had rebuilt the process entirely as a developer and now I own it as an in-house technology product. (Is that enough corporate lingo? I'll move on.) Basically, I do process automation, product development and programming, and a lot of decision making. The lesson (if we must take one) is that your life and job and pursuits can be as eclectic as you want! I love my office job and I love my career as an author, and I'm so lucky to be in a place to do both.

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People often ask if I'll stop one job in favor of the other, but honestly the variety of both jobs is what I thrive on. Too much of one thing can get boring, but bouncing between automating a document management process and rehearsing an antagonist's monologue gives me life! I don't want to give up coffee just because I like tea.

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In fact, my relationship with writing books is similar to my relationship with coffee. (Yep, I'm setting up an extended metaphor doomed to collapse, but I'm a writer—it's what I do.)

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Writing (and coffee) gives me fuel. It can make me feel fulfilled and creative, excited and inspired. Depending on the day, it can be a sweet experience or bitter. Its quality is largely dependent on the effort I put into it. It also makes me crash. Inspiration (and caffeine) can only take you so far. The rest is a balance of hard work and self-care.