Me goo foffing

An announcement from my M.O.W.

Hi everyone,

My husband is going to take some time off. He’s too cowardly to tell you himself because he’s afraid you’ll be mad at him and never come back again to his blog and he’ll have no friends and spend the rest of his life sniffling in a corner and his writing will turn to twaddle and his publishers will ring the doorbell and announce they’ve come to take back all of his books and little kids will write him hate letters, so I’m telling you for him that he’s going to take two weeks away from the glittering lights of Blogville to goo foff. Yes, that’s what I said — G-O-O F-O-F-F. I swear I don’t think the man could even spell that.

The things I do for him! And he calls me his M.O.W. I think I’ll start calling him my C.O.H. (Cowardly Old Husband).

So there you have it. Sorry it had to come from me but he’s too busy cringing and having his little pity party to tell you himself.

P.S. He’ll post the July Word of the Month and maybe chip in a tidbit now and then. We’ll see how it goes.

Word list for Word of the Month

Hi everyone,

Here’s the list of suggested words for July. Did I miss anyone?

Sweat
Snakes
Percolate
Quintessence
Different
Oomph!
Phosphorescence
Fireworks
Undertow
Heat
Footloose
Siesta
Shade
Connect

I’ll pick one from the list to post for next month but I see several that will work well for months to come. Thanks one and all for the suggestions.

David

How do you reinvent yourself and your career?

Hi everyone,

Here’s another question for summertime discussion suggested by Jane Yolen. “How do you reinvent yourself and your career?”

Has anyone gone through this? I have twice, the first time in my fifties. I won’t go into details because I’ve told the story before, but during the six years I served on the Springfield board of education, from 1982-1988, my writing took a hit. I only produced one worthwhile story in those six years and seriously worried that my career was over.

At the end of my service I decided to change my direction as a writer and reinvent myself as a poet. It was a relatively easy decision because I didn’t think I had much to lose. I chose poetry. I already knew most of the mechanics and had published a smattering of poems but for the next three years I focused on writing nothing but poems.

I had no plan, no strategy, no general theme. I simply wrote, read about poetry, wrote, read about poetry, and wrote.

At the end of that period I shared my total collection of 100 poems with an editor at Boyds Mills Press. I was offered a multi-title contract, beginning with SOMEBODY CATCH MY HOMEWORK, which was published in 1993.

The second time I reinvented myself came in 1996, only three years later. Maybe this wasn’t exactly a reinvention but it did lead to new opportunities. I decided that I wanted to become involved with professional books published for teachers. I think the motivation came from the six years I’d recently spent on the school board coupled with the frequent visits to schools I’d been doing since the 70s.

I partnered with Bernice Cullinan and we wrote EASY POETRY LESSONS THAT DAZZLE AND DELIGHT. Since then I’ve co-authored with several wonderful teachers and professors to create a dozen titles and four others are in the works. That change nineteen years ago has led to finding a new niche plus numerous opportunities to address audiences of educators at state and national conferences.

Jane, I know that you also work in several genres and recently said that you yourself hardly know how to classify yourself as a writer. So there may be a down side to wearing many writing hats. Conversely, a new challenge can reinvigorate a writer, get the juices flowing again and, in time, perhaps lead to a new fan base and expanded opportunities.

What say you?

David

Another life

Hi everyone,

Yesterday Sandy and I signed a lease allowing a new company to move into my old office building in Springfield, where I worked for thirty-five years from 1973 to 2008. It was the home office of Glenstone Block Company. I was owner and president.

During the day my world centered on the manufacture and sales of concrete blocks for the construction industry. We had a plant in Springfield, one in Branson, and a stocking yard in Camdenton. At one time we also operated half a dozen True Value and ACE hardware stores in Springfield, Kaiser, Branson West, and Camdenton. At it’s peak, the company employed over one hundred men and women.

This week I pulled out a scrapbook created as a gift for me in 1993 by my secretary Dixie Nyer. Memories came flooding back as I turned the pages, pausing over faces I haven’t seen for many years. We were all so young! I’d forgotten about the newsletter I occasionally wrote (with ample help from several others in the company). A company survey had shown that employees wanted to know more about how business worked so I wrote a series of articles about a fictitious small businessman named Fernando who started a company to manufacture Belly Button Lint Cups. Poor guy had a heck of a time figuring out how to control his inventory, price his product, keep his expenses in check, and somehow make a profit.

It was another life, filled with meetings, decisions, trying to keep up with trends and stay ahead of competition. Several of the people who helped make Glenstone Block Company what it was are gone. I’ve lost track of most of the others. One, I’m happy to say, my former administrative assistant Elaine Gold, still comes to my house once a month to pay bills and do my filing. Okay, I’m spoiled. Another ex-employee, Karen Stewart, now performs the same duties at our gift store, Gamble’s.

Dixie, herself a writer, penned this poem for the opening page of her gift scrapbook. It’s over the top but Dixie never got over the fact that I hired her when she was down and out, cleaning motel rooms and barely making it. I hired her to do our advertising and picked her from several applicants with strong credentials. I chose Dixie on two counts: she was a writer and she professed to dislike advertising. I figured that would give her a reason to come at our ads from a different point of view, and she never disappointed me. I can still hear her squeal of joy over the phone when I called to offer her the job.

To the Main Man

Ever the gentleman
and the great scholar,
Ever the kind friend
if you should holler,
Never a harsh word,
never a frown,
Never a dark mood
dragging him down,
Full of good will and
spontaneous laughter,
Eager to help you find
what you’re after –
Spritely in step
and cheery in tone,
Making the work place
feel like a home —
Champion of children,
the needy and weak,
Defending the cause of
those who can’t speak,
Just and impartial,
whatever the cost,
This is GLEN BLOCK’S
most incredible BOSS!
— dn

When I sold my company, I became a fulltime writer after a lifetime of writing before work or after I got home. I was 71.