May Be Unusual

Dateline May 31, 2021
Location: Southeastern Minnesota

"Moon of Green Leaves," so
They called you long ago,
So the Indian child at play
Spoke your name, dear Month of May.
by Annette Wynne

In this issue:

---

1. The Weirdness of May (a month to remember)
2. Writer’s Side (still thinking like an author over here)
3. World Classroom: Curiosity & Patience (passports to dual citizenship)
4. Featured Guest: A Verified UFO! (I couldn’t turn away, neither will you)

1. The Weirdness of May

A hearty welcome back to my loyal subscribers. I’m so glad you’re here. If you’re not yet a subscriber, consider sharing with me your email address in the pop-up form on this site. Thanks!

This past month seemed weird to me as I am still feeling the effects of a pandemic hangover. While we are truly blessed to be living in a wealthy country with a flood of vaccines now available, we’re still recovering from a devastating public health crisis as a society. New behaviors are called for. Some new social conventions have become necessary. In short, I’m feeling some awkwardly weird moments. How about you?

For example, do I still wear a mask in public, even though Kay and I are fully vaccinated? I know the CDC guidance now says “not necessary” in most situations, but how do I personally feel about that? Mandates vary by state, so now we research those in each state we visit. Never had to do that before. Do we still wear our masks to set an example for those still not protected and still vulnerable? How should I feel about every second or third person I meet who is likely not yet vaccinated?

Not to belabor the point, regardless of my confidence in the science, fifteen months of isolation and wearing a mask for our few sorties out to fetch gas and groceries while living in a highly infectious state (Florida), we are now sixteen hundred miles away from our COVID cocoon, where we sheltered in place, and with the nightmare we call 2020 in hindsight, we’re once again living in our beloved bus on the road. While we’re enjoying the experience, it still feels weird. It will take some time. And that’s okay. America and the rest of the world have come through the weirdest year yet, and there’s a whole lotta living left to do.

---

2. Writer’s Side

Are you thinking of becoming a writer? Or are you curious how an author productively starts their own writing journey? I will share with you a great place to start, something I teach in my writing seminars. I include this information, plus a whole lot more, in my new book, “Why Write? Why Publish?” which will be available later this summer.

Write Your Own Story First!

In my March newsletter, I advised you that reading must come before writing as part of your education as an author.

This month, I’ll share with you two different approaches to writing your own story before writing anything else, a necessary step for serious writers in the making. The most successful writers use both approaches. Both include specific introspection as a solid foundation before you start to write. So I’d ask you to answer some tough personal questions. What are your:

1. Five “W”s, and,
2. Twelve Goals?

You’ll then leverage your answers to these questions to create a six-point author’s business plan. If you think this is too much unneceessary work, maybe a career in writing, or even writing as a hobby, isn’t for you. Better to know that now, right? But if you think you have what it takes, starting with a willingness to do some up-front work, or if you’re just curious and adventurous enough to explore the insanity of a serious writer’s mind (like mine), then press on, intrepid word player!

Your Five “W”s:

1. Who will you write for? If just for yourself, enjoy the ride. Let ‘er rip! If for others too, listen up, grasshopper. This is more challenging, but “funner” too.
2. What are you thinking of writing? Fiction or non-fiction? Short stories, magazine articles? If so, for which magazines? Periodicals? Historical? Fantasy? Mystery? Thriller? Crime? Romance? Adventure? Science? Topical non-fiction (cookbooks, travelogues, memoirs, instructional, autobiography, etc.)? Remember March’s advice? You need to read it before you write it!
3. When will you write? Occasionally? Every day? When will you start? If not today, why not?
4. Where will you write? At home? Outdoors? At your favorite coffee shop? Why not anywhere?
5. Why do you want to write? This is tough to answer, but  important so you can set appropriate goals. That comes next. The only wrong answer? You just like the idea of being an author.

Your Goals:

If you can exercise ruthless honesty to answer these starter questions, you will gain a clear sense of how far down the writer’s rabbit hole you’ll choose to shimmy. 

Nobody answers all these questions the same. But you need to understand all of this if your love of writing is compelling enough to devote time, energy and a large piece of your soul to this work.  Or is this just a casual interest? A hobby? That’s okay too. Thinking about answers to these questions will also help you talk with other writers in a meaningful, honest and specific manner. They provide you a useful reality check to help you best plan your writing journey, or to better understand a loved one who may be afflicted with this creative disease.  

Author Business Plan

Okay! Now that’s all information you can use to come up with your personalized planning objectives for your business as an author, if you choose to dive in to the deep end of the pool. That is, if I haven’t scared you off yet. You should now be able to articulate your:

1. Vision: how many books do you wish to write? For what audience, etc?
2. Strategy: do you need to make a living from your writing? Or is it just for fun?
3. Investment: how much time, energy and money can you justify to fund your writing and your skills as a writer? Be specific. Requirements can be zero dollars but require more sweat equity. But know that creative energy is always required!
4. Networking: are you willing/able to hang out with other writers, attend writing conferences, critique the work of others to pay forward? More is almost always better.
5. Pressure: if you accept deadlines, advances, etc, are you willing/able to handle the pressure to meet them, to create on a schedule? If not, acknowledge that now.
6. Balance: how will you balance your writing efforts with the rest of your lifestyle? Sustainability requires balance.

Yes, this is a lot, but this is what serious writers consider sooner rather than later in their careers (or avocations).

This is an excerpt from a book I’ll be publishing later this summer called, “Why Write? Why Publish? Passion? Profit? Both?” Watch for it as it will contain much more specific guidance including a surefire approach to leveraging your own hidden creativity, how to monetize your inspiration, a surefire seven-step writing process, market-proven fundamental and advanced story structures, how to efficiently and beautifully design and format your book, and how to capture visibility, publish and sell your book. Finally, I describe specific steps to put your book marketing efforts on autopilot, offer you dozens of resources I and other serious authors leverage, and a lot more.

Next month I’ll share with you the basics of writing your novel.

3. World Classroom: Curiosity & Patience

My family lived on a farm. That’s where I was born. Then we lost the farm and “moved to town.”

After growing up in a small town, then a small Midwestern city, I witnessed very little diversity of cultures, opinions, philosophies or religions. But I’ve always read a lot, and to this day, I still possess an insatiable curiosity about people and places. That led to a desire for travel which further fed my curiosity.

During my career, I was blessed with a certain ambition that enabled me to work with and manage employees in various locations across the United States, and within several other countries around the globe. After a little “marinating,” as a Taiwanese employee of mine was fond of saying, I felt a certain kinship everywhere I traveled.

From that observation, an epiphany stunned me. Where people invariably seemed very different at first, I realized how much alike we all really are. With an open mind and a little patience, I discovered that we as a people command an infinite capacity for delightful diversity. I wanted to understand, and in many cases, practice it all.

So I declared dual citizenship. Not only was I a proud American citizen, I decided to become a world citizen—embracing  the endearing aspects of every culture I encountered, seeking to understand widely varied opinions, philosophies and religions–delightful dimensions to my brief life. I found beauty in the human spirit and all its facets. I found ugliness too, but because of my insatiable curiosity and hunger for understanding, even that became easier to filter. Nevertheless, I remain a work in progress.

Cultural misunderstandings often originate with conflicts between folks from different regions of our own country, now more so than in recent memory, as well as between folks and groups in different countries. This self-induced conflict almost always smolders the hottest in the minds of those who become entrenched in agendas that focus on differences rather than commonalities.

Raised in the corn fields of Iowa and Minnesota, but having worked for a company headquartered in New York, my neighbors often joked about east coast transplants to the Midwest, and how most “New Yorkers” (said with disdain) seemed like “they” didn’t care about the same values as “us,” and were not worthy of our respect. I saw evidence of this attitude from some of my friends and neighbors, especially outside the workplace.

I worked for IBM in semi-rural Minnesota. Some of the locals (of which I was one) made jokes about IBM and all the New Yorkers who transferred in to gain experience in our research and development division.

The joke’s bones: “What’s the difference between IBM and a cactus?”

The punchline: “With a cactus, the pricks are on the outside.”

That never tested well with me. After living and working in New York myself for a couple of years, I came to realize this was largely a deep-rooted cultural misunderstanding. I learned from my New York friends, neighbors and co-workers that they weren’t so different from me. Those who lived or worked in and around the city existed in such high population density they necessarily adapted in ways incomprehensible to those of us who grew up in rural areas or in much smaller venues.

How muscular would YOUR attitude be so you wouldn’t physically or emotionally get trampled by the crowd? No car? Not even a license? No yard? Commute to work on a train so tightly packed that they viewed personal space as useless nicety? Anything east of the Hudson River, certainly anywhere outside the five burroughs was considered “wilderness?” How would YOU adapt to suddenly living a thousand miles west of your only home? As if in a foreign country where most everyone you meet immediately brands you as one of “them” based on your funny accent?

Many Midwesterners assumed the worst. In reality, most “outsiders” from New York and elsewhere weren’t intrinsically mean, for example, they just matched the level of intensity of those around them in order to survive and thrive before moving to “the wilderness,” as I myself did after living in New York for a while.

When I returned to Minnesota after almost two years of adapting and adjusting my self to that very different climate, my Minnesota colleagues would jump back from my adjusted attitude, usually as I unintentionally invaded their personal space in some demonstrable (think Brooklyn Italian) manner. They’d shirk and offer comments like, “Jeez, Jurrens, back off and throttle back before you blow a gasket, buddy!” Hence, my epiphany.

But I had already become an equal opportunity observer, and even a practitioner, of cultural diversity. Four years in Uncle Sam’s service had earlier broadened my exposure to not only life and death situations, but also gentle folk who explored Eastern philosophies and religions. In the 1970s I began my forty-year practice of Transcendental Meditation (with a hiatus here and there as a long-time friend of Bill W). After my discharge from military service, I took up Hatha Yoga to relieve the chronic pain from a service-connected back injury. 

Later as I continued my exploration of cultural diversity in college and in business travels, I arrived at a profound appreciation for the deeper beauty of all cultures, even those that seemed initially incomprehensible, even reprehensible. While I was raised a conservative Christian, for example, the undeniable subtlety and beauty of certain practices originating in the Hindu religion and Buddhist philosophy enchanted me. The subtle Chinese practices of Chan and Japanese Zen still elude me to this day, but strike a sympathetic chord deep within. That mystery only attracts my curiosity even more.

Parochial Politics Notwithstanding…

Thirty-one years with IBM blessed me with a useful global perspective. By the time I retired in 2008, with almost a thousand employees spread across the US, Europe, Asia and the Far East, not to mention a unique perspective offered me from millions of air miles and associating with folks from countless cultures, I couldn’t help but appreciate stoic Scandinavians, eclectic Europeans, profound Chinese, the introspectively intense Japanese and Taiwanese, the fiercely independent Singaporeans, emotionally staunch Russians, and the surprisingly diverse cultural norms between folks from the Northeastern US, the Midwest, Rockies mountain dwellers, the Southeast, Southwest, West Coast, the Pacific Northwest, and our delightful Canadian and Mexican neighbors. And I felt I had just scratched the surface.

Going Native

More recently, the ancient heritage of the Native American culture within North America felt so right to me with its focus on how our own well-being must remain so closely integrated with the well-being of our environment and of each other, that we dare not ignore or trivialize the sacred importance of those connections. That led to my fascination for Native American music and my passion for building and playing Native American-style flutes. 

Blowing Zen

Most recently, this winding path further attracted me to what most of you would consider a bizarre fascination with an ancient instrument from feudal Japan called the Shakuhachi. Rich in tradition, this microtonal bamboo flute, with only five holes that produces nearly an infinite number of tones and timbers, is considered by many to be one of the most difficult instruments to learn and to play well.

That challenge only escalated my interest (do you sense a trend here?), but I am rapidly and humbly learning why their masters emphasize patience and diligence. But like the Native American culture, the Shakuhachi is much more than “just” a robust musical instrument. It is an instrument of meditation, and acolytes will claim it is also a path to enlightenment.

Connections

I find the similarities of this Japanese instrument itself, however, to the ancient Native American instrument of the Southwest US Anasazi tribe a meaningful thread woven across the fabric of ancient cultures of the Southwestern US and at least two significant Far East cultures within China and Japan. A common thread. Fascinating.

Similar end-blown instruments, all with either five or six finger holes, central to their cultural, spiritual and/or philosophical roots, originated in South America. For example, Andean flutes (Quenas) were sometimes made from the bones of the llama – an animal held sacred by the Incas. Or the Bolivian Tarka flute with its strong, hoarse tones.

Now, more than ever, based on personal anecdotes and friends I have made over the years, I feel as if we all are as one. I am proud to identify myself as an American citizen, but equally proud to consider myself a world citizen. 

To a significant extent, spirituality, philosophy, literature, music and art now comprise the quality and meaning of my life. More so lately than ever—out of necessity—as I continually try to pull back from that which doesn’t offer quality to what’s left of this old man’s diminishing time on this shrinking cinder. I am not maudlin, folks, just pragmatic, but most of all, eternally grateful.

Do you now have a better sense of how much the allure of the obscure has its grasp on your humble scribe’s gray matter? Yeah, it’s acute in its “clutchness!”

4. Featured Guest: A Verified UFO!

Do you believe in UFOs? If not, you will after you meet my friend, Art Howard.

Have you ever suspected someone you know might be associated with a UFO?

Spoiler alert: I’m not talking about an unidentified flying object. Rather, a long-time friend and boating buddy is a certified member of an organization called the United Flying Octogenarians.

Yup, this is an organization of pilots in their eighties! My friend Art is a member in good standing of UFO. And he has the passport to prove he is still a very active pilot in command of his own aircraft. But this is not a passport to other countries. Rather, this is a passport used within the state of Minnesota. Curious? Me too. Keep reading. 

When you’ve lived as long as Art, you will have collected a lot of history. Three years in the Army, of which thirteen months he spent in Korea, a trade school graduate and later a university graduate, my friend collected degrees in electronic communications, physics, education and became an important part of our nation’s infrastructure. IBM employed him as an electronics engineer for thirty years during which he taught high school physics. But Art was just warming up!

He’s a member of two veteran’s organizations—American Legion and Veterans of Foreign Wars. He serves his community as a member of the Honor Guard where he participates in military funerals of veterans if requested by their families. He also holds the highest class of amateur radio license which comes in handy as a live-aboard offshore sailor.

Art and his venerable partner, Jean Harris, lived on a sailboat for over ten years, traveling to various ports of call on the Chesapeake Bay, all over the Caribbean, Mexico and Central America. But again, that’s just another launch platform for his passion for Aviation. 

Art is not only a member of UFO as an eighty+-year-old pilot (we’ve never discussed his precise age), he’s a 47-year veteran of the Oshkosh (Wisconsin) AirVenture, a member of the Civil Air Patrol, a 26-year veteran at Sun ’n Fun in Lakeland, Florida and a member of the Experimental Aircraft Association.  

This amazing flyer holds a commercial pilot’s license with over 4,400 hours of flight time, but you’ll find his passionate avocation for aviation is his passport to frequent adventure to this day.

Yesterday, we shared a delightful visit with Art and Jean for a few hours in our motorhome (currently parked in SE Minnesota). They now winter on their sailboat in Florida and the Bahamas, but in the summer, like us, they venture north. But not just to sit in a home they keep in Lake City, Minnesota, our mutual stomping ground during our own boating days before we all sailed south.

Art just filled out his “passport” after flying into the last of Minnesota’s one-hundred-thirty airports in his low-wing Piper Cherokee aircraft. As an avocation, he’s flown his plane as far north and west as Prudhoe Bay perched on tundra bog—on the very northern coast of Alaska (yeah, by the Beaufort Sea above the Arctic Circle), and as far south and east as Marsh Harbor, on the east coast of Great Abaco Island in the Bahamas.

If you fly a small aircraft yourself, you know this is not at all like grabbing a ticket to fly in a commercial airliner for hops to such destinations. Such sorties entail deploying extensive knowledge, myriad planning details and endurance we mere earth-bound or commercial-bound mortals can’t even imagine. Having done some flying in a small aircraft myself, I know from limited but visceral experience that this is a big deal, my friend! 

This guy, more than a decade older than me, doesn’t fly into an airport and stay in fancy nearby hotels for the night either. That would be too easy. No, Art pitches a tent and camps by his aircraft. How many folks do YOU know that do that? I just love free spirits who trod the path less traveled, and in Art’s case, his path is not only on terra firma, but on the high seas and in the air. 

Oh, and have I mentioned he drives a forty-one year-old Honda Gold Wing motorcycle? Of course, he pilots a bike with the word “wing” in its moniker. I would expect nothing less. 

---

I just love my fascinating friends!

With pen in hand,

Gene