Hubris moves in mysterious ways

So there's a discussion over at jaylake's place about the nature of writers, the contention being that interesting writers are interesting people. I disagreed, based on my own wide-ranging uninteresting-ness (with which kaygo begged to disagree), and the even wider-ranging charm of my characters, based on reader report.

This morning at the gym, I fell to talking with a woman who I had worked with during the Bean Christmas Season. She, retired of something to do with accounting, banking, or perhaps both, is casting about for a summer job, to keep herself busy, and confessed that she was looking forward to November, when she would sign on again with Bean. I may have looked a mite dubious, because she asked what I was doing to keep myself busy.

Well, I said, I've been writing a book.

Oh? On what subject?

I did the short form of husband co-author, twelve books, available at Children's Bookstore right here in town, or at Barnes and Noble and Borders, down to Augusta or Portland, and gave her a card.

That was interesting. As in, my being a writer was interesting to someone who is not a writer, and she instantly grasped why I might not be eager to go "out" to work.

Then she realized that, though we had worked together and see each other occasionally at the gym, I had never been properly "placed", which she speedily proceeded to do: Where did I live? Did I know so-and-so? Where had I lived before? Was I related to the Albion Lees or the Waterville Lees?

So, being a writer is interesting, perhaps, to those in other lines of work. But I still don't believe that one needs to be a deeply interesting person in order to write compelling stories. An observer with a good ear, yes. Possessed of esoteric information and a store of bon mots and witticisms, which are delivered with charm and grace in face-to-face situations -- no.