For some reason, this video popped in my mind to go along with the nebulous, partially formed idea for today's blog post. I've learned enough in my (almost) 53 years on this planet, to know that intuitive spark means my post, though not yet fully thought out, not yet written, will tie in with the message Peter Dinklage gives in this short, but incredibly powerful video. That's how the Universe works. It's cool like that.
"The greatest words on written page, only come to life when you're on stage."
- Me, line from "Actress," a poem a wrote for my sister's best friend in about 1995. That talented woman, a serious actor at heart, is now mom of two kids who happen to have some of the most successful channels on YouTube
The job, the real job, of writers, is to find new ideas that society needs at a particular point in time, and present those ideas in some form of text, so that the ideas are drawn out into society, and acted on... hopefully. That can be done in many ways, in straight forward non-fiction, in personal blogs or zines or self-published ebooks. Or those ideas can be woven into fictional stories and published as novels, plays or TV shows or movies. The hardest part of writing, I've found, is to simply be able to survive, preferably with a roof over my head and enough food, while doing the time consuming work of thinking, and then writing.
Yesterday was four weeks that I've been back in Southern California, and tomorrow will be 30 days, a month. For a month I've had a roof over my head, thanks to Rich at Block Bikes. I can take showers, I have a room nearby, where I can sleep inside, I'm not out in the elements, like I was for most of the last two years. I have a refrigerator and cupboards to store food. I'm doing work to promote the new Block online bike store website. But Block is a high caliber bike shop, it's not some huge corporation that can throw me a huge salary while building a brand new division. So I'm living on a very small income, as we build up the online store into a successful business. The Block Bikes online store, is a big, broad, major website, and it's going to take a solid year or year and a half to build something that large into a well known, popular, and profitable business. It's a long term thing.
So while I have a stable, but temporary, place to stay for now, I still have to build an income on my own, if I'm going to build my life back into something close to a typical life. I need to do that while helping Block get to where it needs to be. I've spent most of the the last two years homeless, to be able to focus on my main talents. I needed to live as cheap as possible, since there was no one willing to invest in me, to really build my art and writing into a business. Homelessness was the best option, as crazy as that sounds.
Most people think that homelessness ends when a homeless person gets a roof over their head. Actually, that's not the case. Homelessness, and the struggling mentaility that helps a person survive it, ends when a homeless person gets a room to rent, or an apartment, AND they have a stable income, high enough to keep that place indefinitely, barring an unexpected tragedy. Homelessness really ends when a homeless person is confident they won't be homeless again, unless something really crazy happens. I'm now at the top level of homelessness, similar to someone who's found a job, but is staying in a weekly motel or halfway house, working towards their own place, their own space. I'm almost there, but I need to build a big enough, stable income, that will allow me to get my own apartment, a car, the basic stuff needed, and finally (hopefully) stabilize.
The one thing that hasn't changed over the last month is my frantic, dawn to dusk work, to build a foundation, to build my own income, as well as building the awareness and online presence of the Block Bikes online store. This blog hit the 70,000 page view threshold about a week ago, making it my second most popular blog, trailing only Freestyle BMX Tales. Meanwhile, the Block Bikes Blog will be 2 months old tomorrow, and it has over 3,000 page views, more than 5 times what this blog saw in its first two months. I'm off to a really good start on those things.
I've also been building the Block Bikes Pinterest page. I got interested in Pinterest when I started seriously promoting my Sharpie art. I googled "Sharpie art," and saw that half of the pictures that came up were from Pinterest. I've since learned that Pinterest has 250 million viewers a month, and they are largely higher income, and they actually buy stuff. So while everyone is stroking their egos by posting B.S. on Instagram, the people who want to actually sell things online are learning the ins and outs of Pinterest, and putting it to work.
Once I started building a personal Pinterest page, which included my art, I found I just like sitting down in the evenings, and looking through cool photos, and adding to my collections, my Pinterest boards. Google my main hashtag, #sharpiescribblestyle, and you'll be drowned in images of my artwork. My Sharpie art now has a bigger online presence than most successful, mid-sized businesses, and I built that while living homeless, sitting in the libraries or at a McDonald's, on my old, hand-me-down laptop. In the course of promoting, and actually selling, about 100 major drawings, I got pretty good at social media marketing. There are a ton of things I still need to learn, and it's a continual process, but I understand the big picture of it now. This has become another skill set that I can use to make money. This is the skill set that Rich at Block tapped into, making it worth his while to get me back to California, and get a roof over my head. This skill set will help me earn more money, as I use it to build up the Block online business.
So, the night before last, I was able to finally do something I haven't been able to do for a couple of years. I took the bus to the big shopping area near here, where there's a Barnes & Noble, among other things. I was able to just relax, take some time off, and "catch my breath," so to speak. I didn't have to worry about where I was going to sleep that night, or if my clothes and art supplies would be stolen, like they were in Richmond. I've been an avid reader my whole life, and simply wandering around a book store and browsing magazines and books, is a thing I love to do now and then. For the first time in several years, I had enough money to actually buy a new book, if I wanted. As simple as it sounds, it was wonderful. I browsed through magazines for maybe 45 minutes, and then wandered the store for another hour or so. It was wonderful.
But I didn't really find anything I wanted to read. That spoke to the writer in me. After wandering for a while, I started to ask myself, "What do I want to read these days?" There are a couple of business oriented books I do want to read soon, but they're both $20 or more, and I didn't really want to spend that much. The store didn't have either one, anyhow. In fiction, the last novels I really got into were the original Lisbeth Salander books, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, and the two follow-ups. The original author died, and the two new books with her character didn't interest me. I was a big fan of Michael Crichton, and there are a couple of his novels I never read. But those didn't seem right, right now. Neither did any of Clive Cussler's novels, though I always find them a good read. Dean Koontz' books have some of the greatest characters, but I wasn't feeling his vibe right then, either. Maybe re-read Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land? They didn't have that either, which was fine.
I ended up buying the $8 version of Robert Kiyosaki's Rich Dad, Poor Dad. That was the only book that called to me, and was a price I didn't feel bad paying. I've read that book 4 or 5 times, and I knew the new, 20th anniversary, updated version would refresh his ideas to me, helping with my work at Block on with my own stuff. But still, I asked, "What to I REALLY want to read right now?" That basic question is why BMXers started their own companies 30 years ago, and began to completely re-design the classic, double diamond hardtail, BMX bike, into the new, modern, much stronger versions. That basic question is why people like me made zines in the 80's (and 90's and 2000's, and even today), and while people blog, and why we started making our own BMX freestyle videos in the late 80's and early 90's.
That basic question, "Why doesn't somebody make (do, write, produce, build, film...) ______________?" That's the question that leads to creative progression. I realized that the book I REALLY wanted to read, was an idea I had in my head, to write, for a long time. So I headed back home, and the next morning, I began writing it. It'll be a big, fat zine soon. I'll let you know.
So that's where I'm at. I was finally able to let go of the frantic struggle to survive, the homelessness survival mentality, to some extent, and relax a little. That's a good thing. And mixed in with all the other stuff I spend 15 hours a day doing, I'm writing a new idea, one I've had in the back of my head for maybe 15 years. It may be a really cool zine. Or it may completely suck and fail. I'm OK with that. If writing it didn't scare me, it wouldn't be worth the trouble. That's the nature of creative projects. You gotta take chances. Now go do something you think needs doing. And light up the night.
What are the biz books?
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