Troop 21: 20th Anniversary

The following is for a request made by my final Scout Troop for their 20th Anniversary celebration:

To say that I have been influenced by my time in Scouting would be like saying a pizza is influenced by its time in an oven.

For 17 years I was either in a troop or employed by Philmont Scout Ranch. My first troop taught me all the basics: camping, hiking, and being a good follower. My next troop taught me how to have fun. And my final troop, Troop 21, taught me not only how to lead, but then expected me to actually do it.

I doubt I was the best Senior Patrol Leader 21 ever had, but I was the first. For me that stands as an important honor and I like to think that my involvement with Scouts since then has been colored by that honor. In the final month of my time as SPL, I became an Eagle, graduated from Edmond Memorial High School, and then went off to work for the summer at Philmont Scout Ranch encouraged to go by events and people I met here in 21.

Blessed with ten summers and a single autumn at the Ranch, I worked in food service, tent cities, and the backcountry. During those years, I made and lost friends and then made more. Not a day goes by that I don’t speak to a friend, several friends, I made because of Scouting. My wife and I met at Philmont, I proposed to her in the Villa’s gazebo, and our daughter’s name bears small homage to that Scouting place.

The strength of Scouting in my life has never been more evident than it was this past February when I joined with friends, many I hadn’t seen in 12 years, to bury a great Scout that was taken far too early. At that gathering was my wife, my business partner, a groomsman from my wedding, and my first tent-mate.

Most definitely Scouting has left me well done.

Why I Keep My Day Job

Not the only reason, but certainly one that puts my writing in perspective.

Tobias S. Buckell blogged a great follow-up to his request for advance amounts.

In lieu of actual writing, I like to distract myself with investigation into the business of writing. The above is the closest I think I am going to get to seeing an advance for fantasy in a few years.

To characterize the poor pay one makes as a writer as the reason I keep my day job is a little over the top, but the disproportionate ratio of pay to effort increases my respect for those that choose to make a living this way.

I think that most of us unpublished authors still nurse the idea that we are birthing a work of art and that our child will soon be discovered as the next big thing. The reality appears to be that it is hard to become an author, harder to make a living that way, and barely affordable once one gets there.

Those that make a living this way have clearly been able to pass over a threshold and are able to both create and produce.

Really? A Business Partnership?

Elsewhere on the web I was asking questions about the loss of first publication rights upon publishing material on the web without access restraint. Specifically:

We spend alot of time discussing the fact that posting our manuscripts in whole or part will nullify our first publication rights. To that end most crit sites, this included, make sure to make crit areas protected. Here, we now have two levels of safety to protect us.

I have seen a handfull of authors that posted their currently published in hardback books on the web first. Two even continue to offer their books online.

What are we protecting?

I am not talking about the name of what we are protecting, but the value. What asset, what freedom, what monetary amount is lost by posting on the unfettered web.

Just curious.

The replies were semi-on target. While I got a little more than I was expecting in terms of describing to me how the internet works and how that relates to traditional publication, I did end up with a few anecdotal aggregates which, after sluicing, produced these nuggets:
-some unknown percentage loss
-0 dollars (recieved twice)

But I remain skeptical–at least on the 0 dollars front.

Elsewhere I read a great description of the distinction between a vanity press and true publishing. Vanity presses are purely service providers, but true publishers are business partners. That said, I think it would be foolish to assume that it is a 50:50 partnership.

I also suggest that the lame assertion that published on the web is no different than published with some other publisher and now you are hoping for re-prints is one of the tools that the publisher–read: guy with more money–uses to get the bigger half of the pie from this partnership.

We all know, author and publisher alike, that websites featuring non-hardcopy novels on the web form a spectrum of publicity not a finite definition. Some analogies may be: ‘sitting on the couch in my home’, ‘garage sale’, or ‘abandoned on a park bench’. Very few, I would guess, can equate with: ‘placed prominently in every B&N in the country’.

So, if this IS a business partnership and WE are the inventors, the builders, the makers, why do we insist on being so weak? Why do we allow our partners to walk all over us?

If our novel is interesting and it’s made it to the point where at least one other person in the world agrees, then it’s still a viable product regardless of web exposure and should be treated as such from both sides.

I rephrased the question:

What SHOULD the percentage reduction for a novel previously ‘published’ on the web be?

For the purpose of this discussion I am not talking about the ability for any third grader with a ceramic ashtray to put that quality of work up on a site. Let’s assume that we are talking about work that a publisher has expressed interest in.

Note: I am not suggesting that anyone actually put their work out on the web in an uncontrolled manner without first understanding the risks or rewards. I don’t now, but I might someday.

I am just curious about how/why this got to be such a big deal.

The Playpen

Artists, actors, and other fools say its Taos. Nearly anyone else will argue its actually Santa Fe.

They’ll start with something they figure we can all relate to: sunsets. Then they’ll throw in something about being closer to nature. At this point they feel they have you safely warmed up to discuss contrasts: the earth and sky, the historical and contemporary, and maybe even the spiritual and concrete. If none of those sway, they’ll roll out a mysterious conclusion about the light. “The light is palpable, even flavorful. Like the wind or the rain.”

All these things are true but not for either of these places. Santa Fe is a full blown city and nothing kills a gaian shakra like a few thousand gas stations. Taos, well you’ve been there, Taos is just too touristy.

I am no eastern philosopher, but I have to think that if a place is going to be a “The Place” it has to be able to remove you and replace the you shaped void with It. Not sure you even get the curteousy of being a vessel in this case. If that were the case then you could somehow carry a bit of It away; I seriously doubt The Place is going to stand for spritual evaporation of that magnitude.

I have been to The Place. Spent months and years in The Place. I have even spent some time in the The Place Within The Place.

There are a couple of cane chairs there. When I had first been there I might have told you they weren’t that old, but since those chairs are still there 15 years later maybe they are older than I would imagine. Maybe they came with TPWTP. The tile is not spectacular. But the wrought iron grills in the adobe archways are oddly turqoise–edging more toward the aged copper found in the nearby mines than the centerpiece of an awful squash blossom pawn necklace. “God, woman! Get a bra.”

Seems like things would grow better in The Place and maybe they do, but they seem to fail in TPWTP. I can only imagine that the roses suffer from the the same inexplicable malady I do. Sure they twine with the ironwork but only with the help of a few industrial twist-ties. Ultimately, they just aren’t really there as much as you might expect.

I have brought books here. I have brought pen and paper here. Even once, foolishly early on, I brought water-colors. But there was no point.

The book closed before I could call him anything, let alone Ishmael.

The pen was recapped before the night was dark or stormy.

The brush was a lost cause before I was stupid enough to show up Here with it.

I am gone Here. I am as important and as useful as the paint on the wall. Here I am an inanimate object. All my thoughts borrowed for a time while I am here, but returned without purchase in my mind. Don’t ask, I can’t tell.

Here, God huffs on the window of my soul and it does not fog up.

I just don’t understand why the mosquitoes can’t stay away.

Class Starts

I seem to be able to pull off a weekly update of this page. Hope none of you not reading this mind too much. This is going to be a busy week so I doubt I will be back for more till the weekend.

Got drunk Friday and Saturday night. Wasn’t so hard a hangover on the first day – mostly liquor. But waking up Sunday was a bit tougher since we had wine, sake, scotch, beer, and food. Getting old.

Sunday was taken up with a long Mass and a trip to the cathedral. I had never been there and it was quite an experience. Need to get down there and take a few more pictures during the morning hours. Good lighting.

This week I start my novel writing class on Tuesday. This should be interesting. Though no one has said otherwise, I am pre-suspicious that a fantasy novel isn’t the kind of thing they are looking for, so I will have to come up with something more mainstream. I have already started down that path so it shouldn’t be too hard. Just need to remember to get those hours in.