Retire from Retirement

Posted on 14/04/2024 by Grumpa Joe

I’m just sitting here talking to myself and thinking how easy it is to critique someone’s work than it is to do the actual work. Writing a book is a lot harder than reading a book, but criticizing a book is a lot easier than readng it. Enjoying a good movie or video is a lot easier than making it. Editing a book is harder than reading it. I am learning that getting an idea to write a book is a lot easier than writing a book. In my current work, I got a single idea of what I wanted a story to be about, but developing that idea into a full fledged story is another matter. An idea can sometimes be expressed in a few words or sentences, but developing that same idea and expanding it into a hundred thousand word story becomes work.

I enjoy a good story with solid characters and a good plot. In my story, I’m not sure I am doing enough to develop strong characters, and the plot seems to be weak. When writing, the principal thing to remember is to show the story and not tell the story. I am great at telling stories but weak at showing them. In fact, it took me a long time to know the difference between the two. By the time I learn that difference and apply it to my writing, I’m afraid my body clock will have worn out.

I often wonder how many books being written actually get published and how many of those that get published make money. What I do know is that the time I spend on writing a post or a story that it really isn’t worth the effort in income production. If I stood on a street corner holding a sign saying, “Please help a starving writer,” I think I would make more money than I would if I had published a book.

Even with all the ways I can think of to avoid wasting my time writing, I am determined to complete the work and send it off to a publisher. One way to tell if your time was worth it is if it is actually published. The second way is to make money on it. If you make some money, it is the measure of the story’s success.

If my book is published and it does make some money, then maybe, I can retire from being retired.

Filed under: Education, Motivation, Writer | Tagged: , , , | 2 Comments »

Writing Does Not A Writer Make

Posted on 14/11/2023 by Grumpa Joe

Many friends ask me to write something for them and preface the request with “You like to write.” My Lions Club will assign writing duties to me even when I am reluctant to do them. These requests have given me the idea that I may be a writer. When I analyzed my life and my interests, I learned this about myself: even in high school, I liked to write stories. In college, I hated classes about English authors (Shakespeare, Keats, Yeats), but I loved classes that required writing essays.

Ten Best English Authors

When I transferred from Saint Joseph’s College in Indiana to the University of Illinois, I had to prove English grammar and punctuation proficiency by writing a qualifying essay. The subject matter was to be chosen by me. In my classes at St. Joe, the Prof suggested we list things that interested us and then pick a topic to write about. He also indicated that you can shift to something else once you begin writing about the topic. I use this technique often. The same professor encouraged me to continue writing by selecting my essays to read before the class. Talk about an ego boost; he knew how to supercharge mine.

I got into the University of Illinois without having to take remedial English. Because I transferred to advance my career in engineering, I had few opportunities to write creative pieces, but I worked overtime writing lab reports. After a successful career in Engineering, I chose to start this blog. Writing became creative again, but my writing sounded like lab reports.

After retiring from the engineering world, one of my goals was to write my biography. I began by making a list of memories. SIngular recollections of things that happened to me, people I met, or projects I worked on. The next step was to write about one of the topics from my list by hand in a composition notebook. I filled three notebooks with stuff and realized what a tremendous job it was to transcribe all those cursive words into a word processor. I hired my former secretary, who could read my handwriting, to do the job. She was a very dynamic and talented lady. I had to warn her not to change what I wrote. I suspected she would rewrite everything to make it readable and sensible. She did exactly as asked. Later, when I began to edit the document, I realized what a mistake I made by not allowing her to correct my shitty writing. That is when I researched AI programs and bought one to help me become a better writer.

Biography-Jun-e-or

Using the AI editing program, I could write a readable biography. After completion, I stopped using the tool because I thought my writing had improved. When I began writing my book recently, I realized I needed help again, and now I know for sure that I am not a natural-born writer like I thought I was. I don’t have enough years left on this earth to learn to write as well as I do in my mind, but I will die trying.

Filed under: Biography, Memories | Tagged: , , | 1 Comment »

Four Score and Five

Posted on 04/08/2023 by Grumpa Joe

years ago a thirty-four year old lady from Hungary, and living in Chicago gave birth to a boy. He lived. Back then many new borns died at birth, but this boy survived. His father who was also from Hungary named him Joseph. Two years earlier this father lost his first born son Joseph Junior, age six, to scarlet fever. This new son was a replacement for his namesake and first born.

The sadness associated with these circumstances has always placed a damper on my birthday celebrations, and throughout the years I have spoiled many a celebration on this day with my sullenness and refusal to show a hint of happiness. This year seemed no different, even though my friends came, and we drank wine, and we had a seemingly great time. I shifted my paradigm however, by claiming it was not my birthday because my birthday was the next day. Instead I told them we are celebrating a going away, I am leaving 84 behind and going toward 85.

My three kids all called me to wish me a happy birthday and that made me happy. My oldest son has reached the age at which I had retired from my job to live happily ever after with my wife Barbara. He will not be able to retire yet for a number of years, and it is the same with my daughter and youngest son. They all live lives raising their children and working like we are all supposed to do. My grandkids are all responsible citizens, and that makes me very happy.

With each passing year I develop a new sense of urgency. As my time on earth shortens, the fire to complete my goals increases with intensity. Like my current intarsia art project burns inside me. I keep telling myself that I can’t leave the planet with an unfinished pile of wood pieces which my kids would not know how to deal with. At least a completed work could become a reminder of who I was, but a pile of wood?

The next project on my list before I start a new intarsia work is to complete the manuscript for my first novel, Space Rod. As with many projects I put writing a book aside when my second wife Peggy needed my help to negotiate Alzheimer’s dementia. She has been gone for four years now, and I either have to finish the work or find a new reason to use for not doing so. Unfortunately, finding reasons to blame are a whole lot easier to come up with than putting in the hard work and time to finish. My story line has had a lot of time to fester and I’ve had many ideas for how to change the story, but in the end I think I will proceed with my original line of thinking. I always thought it was a good story idea so why should I change it now. I can’t rest until I send the manuscript off to be published.

So many things to do, and so little time.

Filed under: Aging, Biography, family | Tagged: , , | 2 Comments »

Work = Force x Distance

Posted on 07/06/2023 by Grumpa Joe

Today I explored several blogs from recently signed up followers. What amazes me is that most of them are selling something. Grumpajoesplace does not sell anything. My blog is a place where I can vent about almost anything or everything. For me writing is a cathartic drug. In times of grief writing allows me to express feelings I cannot express audibly. Writing relieves my stress when that is my issue. Writing allows me to communicate with bloggers who have become my friends over the internet, and whom I miss when they don’t comment or go missing.

I often thought about selling, but selling has never been my thing. In order to sell, I’d have to go back to work subscribing to blog sites for the simple reason of getting attention to my product. If I wanted a job, I would apply for one. Of course I am a hypocrite in this regard because I offer my books for sale on my site. In the twelve years I have done so I have sold two copies of my life story as told in games I played as a child. Today, if you actually click on the button that says “buy my book” it will lead you to Amazon Kindle books and the price is $0.00. So you will see that I can’t even give my book away, so why would I make a concerted effort (work) to subscribe to followers for the purpose of selling my free book?

On my to do list of big projects I have listed finishing a book I began writing when my wife Peggy was still alive and lucid about ten years ago. The working title is Space Rod. It is a story of a man who loses his wife and in his grief he buys an antique pick up truck which he intends to restore. Of course restoration is work, which he likes to avoid. He meets a man named Mort whose interest is also in street rods. They become friends, and before long Mort introduces the widower to Trey a man whose business it is to restore old cars. That is when the story finally gets interesting, and that is where I stopped writing to care for my wife full time. Peggy has been gone since 2019, and I am first now getting a tickle of an urge to finish this story. I picked up the manuscript a few months ago and read it to refresh my memory about the characters and the direction it was taking me. Throughout I kept mentally editing passages to clean up the grammar and to make it more readable. It occurred to me that this project is huge and will be considerable work. Do I really want to spend all that effort on something that no one will read?

Filed under: Biography, Cars, Fiction, grief, Hot Rods | Tagged: , , | 10 Comments »

100,000 and Growing!

Posted on 25/08/2014 by Grumpa Joe

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Six years ago, when I began blogging, I never dreamed that my writing would have been seen and read over a hundred thousand times. This morning I passed the 100,000 views milestone. Thank you WordPress for allowing me this terrific venue for exposing the contents of my mind. By the way, over 90% of what goes on in my mind is X-rated so don’t look for it at any time. They say the mind is the last organ to go.

I learned too late, even though WordPress recommended following other bloggers, to build up my own followers, and I now have 440 followers. I have posted over 1260 articles, essays, cartoons, jokes, garden lies, and personal tidbits, so there is a variety of subject matter to amuse anyone who wants to know what goes on in the mind of a seventy-something old man.

THANK YOU followers and readers.

Filed under: Biography, Conservative, family, Garden, Government, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , , , | Comments Off on 100,000 and Growing!

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