May Day Musings
Thoughts about Morris Dancing, writing, selling books, not selling books, and the meaning of life
It’s May Day!
Good friends of mine will be out, bedecked in bells and ribbons, dancing in the glow of sunrise. The seasons will change, new crops will be sown, life will go on. Here’s a news report from a Philadelphia news station. My friend Jan Alter describes the Morris dancing tradition.
<A DIGRESSION>
When I think of Morris dancers, I frequently think of Stan Rogers and his introduction to his song The Idiot. If you are a Morris dancer who has not heard this; or if you have no idea what Morris dancing is; or if you just want to have a good laugh, you can listen to the intro here. The bit about Morris Dancing begins at :45 on the recording. And here’s another version—a live recording including the song and intercut with Morris dancers dancing.
<END DIGRESSION>
It’s been four months since I recommitted to writing regularly. The statistics on my Substack dashboard say that I’ve created 102 missives—most of them in the last four months.
Things have been slapdash lately—very hit or miss because I’m always working on deadline. That’s because my writing schedule is out of whack. Mornings are best for me, and you always want to be a few days ahead. That hasn’t been happening for me. Morning are filled with the moving of cars and a certain amount of angst about whatever phase of construction is going on. This is by way of explanation, not an excuse.
The number of posts, however, is encouraging. In the spirit of flow and stock, I have managed to keep the flow going and so, I have built up some stock. Unfortunately, the stock is disorganized. I’ve thought about trying to apply some organizing principles, but that hasn’t worked out yet.
Selling Books
I have a half dozen books available through various online stores. Over the month or April, exactly two volumes were sold: a copy of The Richest Man and a copy of the play, MuchAdoDotCom.
We are living in an interesting time for publishing in all shapes and sizes. Books—printed books—are still very popular. They have not been made obsolete by e-readers. And today, anyone can publish a book (Hey, look at me, Exhibit A). But the business of publishing—actually making money doing it, is still a big, complicated process.
Big publishing houses—well, that’s their business, they know what to do. So-called “independent” publishers like me: there are lots and lots of sources for tips, tricks, advice, and coaching on how to connect with audiences and sell lots of books. Some independent authors actually do make a substantial living. But the marketing and promotion side requires time and energy and I’ll confess I have not invested it it. Selling books, for me, is one of those “maybe someday” things that could happen in the future.
I did invest in Amazon advertising for a while, and it did work quite nicely. I was selling a dozen or more books every month. However, the cost of the advertising was two or three times as much as I was earning in royalties. So I’ve stopped that for the time being, though it was gratifying to know that if people became aware of the books, they would actually purchase them.
A Sense of Direction
My plan, when I finish drafting this post, is to dig out a copy of my original topic list—the ideas I had for things to write about. It will be interesting to see how much correlation there is.
I have found myself writing about things in the news that are bugging me recently, and I’m not sure I really want to go there. So much of it is political or close to political; and frankly, I am feeling burned out by all of that.
The Times had a story about the audience ratings for National Public Radio recently. It said that people were tuning out; listenership was going down. I’m a part of that declining audience.
Why? For me, it has a lot to do with the emphasis on political news.
When I started listing to NPR, Bob Edwards was a calm voice of reason telling me as much as I wanted to know about what was going on. The morning news was interspersed with audio essays and lighter content. I recall, for example, that they frequently aired new works by the “cowboy poet” (and former large animal veterinarian) Baxter Black. (He sounded like this on the air.)
And on Saturdays, I timed my day around listening to Dan Schorr offering his thoughts about the week that was.
I didn’t need a lot more than that. But the powers that be at NPR went in a different direction, and I’ve gotten off the bus.
I’m just one of those wimpy little snowflakes. I can’t take it any more.
Any Thoughts?
From the statistics on Substack, I know that I do have a few loyal, very regular readers. If you have any thoughts about this little enterprise, it would be great if you would share them with me. An “attaboy” would be fine, but critical notes or ideas for things I should think about—they would be even better.
I’m hopeful that as the construction winds down at Hedgehog House, I will settle into a better writing routine. I hope to share more bits and pieces from works in progress. I hope to engage a few more readers.
Your feedback would be very helpful. You can send e-mail directly to me at ridgek <at> gmail.com.
And thank you very much for reading.
Anon.
Ridge