Good advice that is hard to follow

Irvine Welsh is another writer that I have followed for quite some time. He is most famous for his novel, Trainspotting which was made into a popular film. What I've always loved about Welsh are his highly recognizable characters, each carved into a unique, Edinburgh niche where they may be the only member of the niche, but a niche it still is within fiction. People reference characters like Begbie, "Juice" Terry, Renton and Sick Boy if they want to describe a certain characteristic about a friend, or certain actions. His stories are fantasically original, ranging from a group of junkie friends who make a porno together, to an amputated girl who uses her feet to chainsaw someone to death. Welsh is the only author who has ever made me truly laugh out loud.

What I admire about this clip, however, is Welsh's advice to aspiring writers looking for alternative ways to make money. It is my belief that writers, specifically fiction writers, will always have difficulty with traditional work because it seems to lack purpose besides "paying the bills". It is unfulfilling. Welsh's advice to "quit your day job" and seek charity work is an interesting and certainly viable option - one that I have explored in the past (this included a wine induced search of the Peace Corps homepage). I will admit, however, that this is easier said than done. A St. Joe's professor once told about his son who was enrolled in the Peace Corps somewhere in South East Asia. There was no electricity, no TV, no Internet and barely any phone service. All that the son asked his father to send him were books, and not just paperbacks but the classics. He thought that he had not read enough of literature's finest and was plowing through Hemmingway, Homer, Dante, Faulkner, Woolf, Melville and the likes. I truly respect someone who can do that, and wish that I had it in me to do the same.

Not everyone has it in them, however, and I think Welsh's point can still be applicable. I may not wind up working with street children in Mongolia, but I hope I can find work that is fulfilling and has some greater purpose.