Life. February 2025. Portland

I should be working on a book right now…should.

I believe in the stories, I think people would enjoy them but…I have no belief in myself as a marketer. Zero. And that’s what it’s all about in 2025, marketing. I’m good at the writing part, not so good in the whole marketing thing so…

I am not as productive as I could be on the writing front. I have three days off in a row which is rare. There’s an enjoyment in doing nothing or doing little. Just…being a lazy fucker, really. I practice guitar every day. I have this list of real songs I play through, practicing for gigs that are imaginary for the time being. There are two guitars, the Jazzmaster needs to be taken to a luthier to be set up properly. I put it off in part because I will be spending money on a two week vacation later this month. I also put it off because I think of getting an acoustic (maybe a Taylor). I contemplate that but then feel guilt about spending money on a new guitar…I mean, I play every day, music is one of the centers of my life, I probably could justify it but…

You know how these things go. I am very careful with money. I don’t eat out, haven’t been to a concert in months, same with movies. Only buy clothes when it’s highly necessary. My one luxury is going to the bar on my days off. I sit there nursing a booze drink and a beer and reading. To me, it’s enormously enjoyable, this simple pleasure. Just sipping my drinks and reading.

The past haunts me, not necessarily in a bad way. Sometimes these spirits are pleasant to have drift in and out of one’s life. I think about my time on the road a lot, all the places I saw. All this is covered in my book, No Signal, but I am always adding to that book—in my head, at least. I want to see my places again. I have a dozen places I fell in love with in a few different states. It really was an amazing thing; the cliche that comes to mind if that it was “a life changing experience.” If you can do it (live out of a vehicle), it changes how you see simple things like parking lots or tourist centers. I love my apartment, enjoy having a home base with indoor plumbing and a kitchen and all that stuff I used to take for granted. Not anymore. It is still fresh in my mind, all those mornings in 35 degree weather opening the van so I could vent the propane ring to make coffee, freezing my ass off…but in a beautiful place with quiet and trees and birds with their wariness watching from the trees. If social security still exists in five years I may begin collecting it. I can envision a future of building a simple camper on the back of pickup truck and just rambling.

I have no idea what the fuck is going on with this country. Like many folks, I get sucked into the news: Elon Musk basically taking over the government and—

I force myself to walk away, put my phone down, walk in the other room and pick up one of the guitars.

There is a solution to everything, even this, but it requires being clever, it requires reshaping the way we spend our money…not just doomscrolling and ranting on social media.  As I don’t have a clever solution, I am leaving this topic at this: Find simple pleasures that make life worth living, tell those you love how you feel about them. Don’t give up hope but understand that conventional protest does not work in this situation. We are dealing with a new beast, we need new ways of confronting it.

I’ve got around twenty years left if I’m lucky and I embrace that understanding; I embrace it because I want to have a sense of urgency, to not waste time on bullshit. Right now, I have not made it possible to live on my art shit. I need more time to travel…I need to make people aware of all the books I have available on Amazon. But I also need not to stress myself out because stressing yourself out means nothing gets done except binge watching Deadwood, drinking to excess, and eating a lot of unhealthy yet delicious food.

So, this is my life. It’s very low key here in downtown Portland, Oregon. I walk everywhere. I’ll have a car soon but I will still walk to the grocery store, to work (when it’s not raining), the library, and the bars. It’s a healthy sort of life, walking everywhere. If I lived somewhere else I would have to rely on my car more. But I miss the quiet and having a yard. I think about my little yard in the campground all the time, just sitting on a picnic table watching the sunset and the birds circling as another day ended. Someday, possibly. I need to be more social, I spend way too much time alone and I can feel it effect me—yet another thing I need to come up with a clever solution to. I see people hanging out with their friends and I miss that, having friends. I have one friend here in Portland; I’m not sure how to get more. It gets harder the older you get, it really does.

A blog is supposed to be a marketing tool, keywords, SEO and all that. On brand. Catering to your targeted audience but…I just…can’t be bothered, I guess...