My regularly-scheduled Friday blog post got waylaid by snow, an early morning interview about lobsters (followed by another one a bit later in Portland), and a newspaper deadline.
Notepad and pen (and a thumb drive).
I find my stories by putting boots on the ground. That takes time, some old-fashioned tools, and it sometimes supersedes blog posts. I also was forced to forgo my Friday morning pool time, also.
Add a laptop and a digital recorder.
The path to career success for many follows a time-worn tradition. Often, it’s off to college for a degree. Nowadays, the degree must be “marketable.” And then after that, an advanced degree is almost always expected, if not immediately, then down the road once you are established at the firm. Increasingly, all those initials after your name come with a hefty price tag and mountains of debt.
I’ve never followed convention, or the traditional college track.
My own “education” seems ass backwards according to the ways of the world. The journey of reinvention I’ve been on for more than a decade began later in life. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. In fact, I’m finding that my DIY ways and quirky approach to making a living is more of an advantage than a liability. Continue reading
A week ago Saturday, I drove to Bowdoinham to gather information about the town for today’s Explore feature in the Sun-Journal’s b-section. Things went much better than I anticipated.
It’s not as if I thought that Bowdoinham wouldn’t offer up interesting things to write about. No, last Saturday, I was in a pissy (see definition #2) mood, running on fumes after a long week. Actually, when I walked out the door committed to spending a few hours dredging up details for my story, I was dreading leaving the warmth of the wood stove and going out into the bleak, dreary November cold. I also know that this type of writing about local communities demands (if done well) putting boots on the ground in order to connect with the sense of the place.
This is my seventh Explore feature. The town of Wilton was my first one back in May. Seven is a number that comes up in my writing and in my latest book of essays—it is the “perfect number,” after all. Continue reading
For six months, I’ve been writing a monthly feature story called Explore for the Lewiston Sun-Journal. Once a month, I spend a few hours in a particular locale and dig beneath the obvious to capture elements of the town that I’m writing about.
Each time I’ve done this, I came away with a much richer appreciation of the community I was profiling. Several times, I’ve featured towns that I regularly drove through, but from the high-speed highways that often whisk us through these places, I knew little or nothing about the town other than what the typical roadside detritus that most communities are afflicted by during our era of Happy Motoring, offered. Discovery always occurs when we slow down, take a look around, and real exploring begins on foot. At least that’s been my experience.
Exploring another Maine town.
Creating structure.
My Tuesday/Friday self-imposed blogging deadlines have been helpful. They’ve developed the capacity to meet other deadlines as a writer—the kind that actually help in paying my bills. It’s one of the reasons I established them, back before I was getting paid to write regularly.
As a result, this morning’s post is a truncated one, as I’m on assignment, and on a tight deadline for today, with others looming ahead.
Have a comfortable place to work.
Every month, I head out to a town in Maine and try to capture the essence of its people and the place. Since May, when I began these Explore! features for the Lewiston Sun-Journal, I’ve visited Wilton, New Gloucester, Turner, and a few weeks ago, it was Norway.
I continue to hold a fascination about the changes that are taking places in smaller communities across the state of Maine and elsewhere. If America is anything, it’s a country of small towns and communities. Maine is no different in that regard.
The economic shift that’s occurred over the past 40 years hasn’t been kind to small towns like Norway. Many communities in western Maine have been hit hard by globalization, and the loss of traditional resource-based jobs that have disappeared. Continue reading
It’s likely that you are reading my blog for the first time, sent here from the Sun-Journal’s website, or the print version of today’s Explore! feature I wrote on the town of Turner. These monthly features are fun to do—they allow me to scout around a town for an afternoon, talk to locals, and uncover a bit of the local history, along with some color and flavor.
I often have “left-over” material, and in this case, it relates to some writing and research I did on Turner a decade ago. The subject was baseball.
Back in 2004, when compiling information, box scores, and research on town team baseball in Maine for my first book, I spoke to a number of former players, some of them former members of the Turner Townies, or chief rivals of the talented local baseball team that drew fans out on many a summer night to watch them play. Back in the 1960s, they played their games at the field that was located in front of Leavitt Institute—what is now the village green, where the gazebo is. Continue reading
In May, I began contributing to the Sun-Journal’s Explore! feature in their Sunday b-Section. I pick a town and explore it with fresh eyes. Last month I visited Wilton, and for June, I was nosing around in New Gloucester.
I had a bit of bonus content last month about a giant and a naked man in the wilderness that I tied in to the print piece. This month, with Moxie deadlines looming, a new book just off to the printer, plus a few other irons in the fire, I wasn’t intending to post bonus material. However, since Pineland Farms is in New Gloucester, and is mentioned in today’s feature, I’d be remiss if I didn’t share just a bit about Pineland’s past, my own ties to it, and the unique destination it’s become. Plus, I’m a writer and a blogger, and I can’t help myself.
The entrance to Pineland off Route 231.
Deadlines drag us from the idolatry of ideas, forcing us to produce, and then ship. It’s the best cure for paralysis emanating from over-analysis.
At the JBE, I’ve self-imposed deadlines in order to force the issue and keep fresh content coming. Not all the content is award-winning, or apparently, even enticing to people who’ve visited the site in the past. That’s ok—I’m going to keep on keeping on, robust blog stats or not.
As for deadlines, I’m now facing other types, the ones that come from making successful pitches to editors and having them tell me when they want my article, and how many words I get to tell my story. I especially like those kinds of deadlines because they also come with dollar signs attached. There wouldn’t be these new opportunities if not for my diligence in keeping my blogging storefront up-to-date and current. Continue reading
Sometimes I am at a loss about what is the best method for me to use in communicating my ideas to others. I am a writer, so I need to write; and believe it or not—I’d like others to read what I write.
Yesterday, I made my bi-weekly trip to New Sharon and then, Rangeley. I’m managing a grant related to aging in place. I thought about tweeting about it, but refrained. Knowing your demographic is important, at least that’s the wisdom offered by social media gurus, and other marketing “experts.” A good chunk of my demographic is 60-years-old, or older. Since they’re not on Twitter, tweeting does no good. I could use Facebook, but even Facebook has a limited reach, at least from my own experience with the demographic apt to read my blogging.
Press it!!