Copyright 1931

I learned recently that a woman I know has hired someone to write her biography.  I was amazed.  I know that celebrities hire authors (usually well-known authors) to ghost write their autobiographies, but this person is not a celebrity except, perhaps, in her own mind.  Also, according to my informant, the writer she hired is young and fairly inexperienced.
Hard on the heels of my incredulity came a niggling realization that perhaps I was jealous.  But of what?  Was I jealous of the writer who got the job – never mind that the person hiring is notorious for not paying bills?  Or was I jealous that no one is writing my biography?  I decided to discount the latter reason.  Why would anyone?  My life has been great but isn’t book quality.  And, besides, I probably satisfy that ego-itch by blogging.
Maybe the annoying part is that I don’t think the biographer’s subject, in this case, has had a more interesting or meaningful life than mine and probably not even half as exciting as a lot of other people’s I know – people who would never dream of hiring a biographer.  Somehow the whole thing seems wrong.  And a bit sad.
I couldn’t help wondering how one would go about hiring a biographer so I Googled ‘hire a biographer’ and came up with 2,660,000 results!  Wow!  Big business, apparently.  The very first entry I clicked on said, “Bare [sic] with us…”  Their site had moved and apparently their command of English had not moved with them.  (Or was I being invited to get naked?)  Not promising.
Undaunted, I took a look at four or five more sites. I found contact information for many businesses that would provide me with a “professional” or a “family” biographer to preserve my memories for posterity.  On the other hand, other sites told me how I,  could make a good living by becoming a personal biographer, myself.  Step-by-step instructions were plentiful.  One site said (and I kid you not): “In order to become a good writer you will need to have a flair for writing. Good spellings [sic] and a good grasp of grammar are very important.”
I even learned that for $199 a month I can have a ghost writer in India write my daily blogs.  All I have to do is provide a list of the subjects I want to cover and I will get one blog post a day – Mondays thru Fridays, only.  Food for thought…