Why Do I Love to Write?

Good question. I'm glad nobody asked. I'm going to list the reasons why I love to write (which is, incidentally, a different list than the reasons why I write period). I hope this list is more than four items.

1. Meeting new people. 
   I love meeting people when it's one on one and in a comfortable setting. Since I have control over the setting (some hazy ether I can't be bothered to describe) and the number of people if I'm writing, this is an ideal way to discover a person. I can take the relationship as deep as I want to, though I prefer that most of them are intimate--I'd like to know everything! I don't feel like God creating beings to serve me; I feel as if I'm finding friends.
2. Creating Entertainment.
   This is not a lofty attainment, for sure, but who cares. I love finally reading what I finished (finishing is rare for me, so a rare treat) and enjoying it. I mean, I hope that's the experience others have reading my stories so a good indicator is my enjoyment, right? Laughing at my own jokes sometimes makes me self-conscious, as if I'm being narcissistic, but if it happens, it happens. One of my goals when writing a story is a connection to the emotion of another. Not mere manipulation, but to connect to those powerful feelings that are already there. I know that some believe that emotion is a lower state and to frighten or inspire wonder or create fear or amaze or anything else to do with that nature is not as high a calling as stimulating someone intellectually. But I don't kowtow to snobs...
3. Exploring a place I've never been.
   I have not been to many different places. I only left the South when I was 21 years old. Yet there are many places I would love to travel to--to visit landmarks, eat new food, see colorful people, breathe different air. I like researching these places and trying to recreate them on the page so that I'm going on a journey.
4. Expressing values, beliefs, and attitudes.
   Not necessarily my own. I like studying why people are the way they are. The first thing I think about when I need a character for a story is her motivation. What drives her? What makes her tick? What made her tick that way? How did she come to believe that? How does she express her values. I even like delving into values and believes that are totally foreign to me. I like dissecting a society that could lead to certain attitudes and ways of life. These are things we don't usually question, yet act upon. We live them. I like finding out what we live for.
5. Feeling satisfaction.
   Yay, five! Doing something that I'm getting better at every day feels like an accomplishment, as if I'm fulfilling my higher purpose. When I write I feel as if I'm reaching towards my destiny and all that rah rah.
6. Communicating to a wide audience.
   I can have one-sided conversations with others. I have examined each word, throwing out the ones that don't fit my needs and rebuilding meaning, intention, and circumstance. I love knowing exactly what I mean and want to say and then sharing it with someone else.
7. Discovering myself.
   We don't know ourselves as much as we'd like, at least I feel that way. In the struggle to convert instinct and thought into words, I find out who I really am. Stories are like arguments and debates for and against certain ways of life. I like figuring out what side I'm on. I like getting to know me better.

There you have it. These aren't all the reasons I love to write, but all I will ramble on about here.