Have you noticed that you generally like a perfect, gorgeous person even more when they accidentally do something stupid? It’s part of human nature that we warm to imperfect characters. We identify more with them and who hasn’t done something really stupid just this week? (Oh, sorry. That was me.) I forget what I’m supposed to get at the grocery store (even when I have a list!) and I sometimes whip past the really slow driver in front of me, only to realize a cop is sitting on the side of the road.
Really perfect people annoy us because we know we’re not perfect! Even when we try, we mess up and sometimes we’re just too tired to try.
You know, when you schlepp to the store to pick up whatever you forgot to get and end up—when there in your sweats with your hair grudgy and without a smidge of make up on your face—that’s when you run into an ex or someone from high school who always seemed to have it more together than you. This is the kind of thing that happens to me all the dang time.
Just because we look goofy sometimes doesn’t mean we are goofy. It’s just part of life. Even the most beautiful, highest-paid models and actresses talk about their “bad” sides or say they hate their hair.
I remind myself that we all have goofy moments, although that perfect girl from high school never seemed to get a zit. When a hero loves an imperfect heroine, we readers get that he’s a good guy. Who doesn’t want to be loved even though we aren’t gorgeous all the time(or any time) So, I write heroines who occasionally have bad hair days or who sometimes put a foot in their mouth, because we all have moments like that and real people are more interesting than perfect people…at least, that’s what I tell myself.