Category Archives: writing

Riding and Writing Rebooted

Well, my ten-year journey in higher education is over. I graduated from Purdue University Northwest, formerly Purdue North Central, with a Bachelor of Arts. I majored in history and minored in English, specifically, Creative and Professional Writing. My final GPA was 3.91, pretty decent I’m told, enough so that had I participated in commencement I’d have worn the “gold cord of distinction.” Big deal. I was also inducted into a history honor society, in abstention I might add.

If you get the impression I’m not totally enthralled with what I just finished, you’re on the mark. To be sure, there were benefits. The ten stories I’ve published in Rider Magazine would not have been possible without the care and instruction of some dedicated professors in the Modern Language Department. Had a writing major been offered at the extensions as with the Mother Ship in West Lafayette, I’d have gone with it. As it stood, I picked history because it offers ample opportunity to hone writing and research skills. As an aside, the editor occasionally admonishes me “more on the road, less on the history.” Now we know where the tendency stems from.

Which brings up another point. When he sent an email the day before finals requesting me to rush captions back for my upcoming Flint Hills feature, he was unaware I was even in school. He graciously gave me a day to cram for the tests. But the fact is, in the motorcycle adventure genre a degree isn’t necessary. The main thrust is the stories must be interesting and well-written. Bottom line: they need to help sell magazines.

I enrolled at PNC on a lark. I’d just returned from my first Alaska ride in 2008 and found that people liked hearing my road tales. I wondered if I could write about my experiences. Problem was, the sterling 1.67 GPA I graduated from Valparaiso High School with carries all the competence one would expect. I knew I needed training if I were to aspire to a writing career. My idea was to take a couple of English classes at the local Ivy Tech extension and be done with it. My wife pointed out since the mill I work at has a generous tuition  payment program, why not give Purdue a shot “. . .you know, in case you decide to go for a four-year degree.” Famous last words.

So here I am at Steak and Shake penning what I hope to be the first of many post-university blog posts. I just coughed up thirty-nine bucks for a spam filter on this already expensive page. The junk replies are a large part of why I’ve posted infrequently over the last few years. That and school. Well, those excuses are gone. The subject of the heroin recovery book I started as my English capstone recently contacted me. She wants to get it done. So, do I. It’s a story that needs to be told. Time to hit the keyboard.

 

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Advice from a couple of American masters

Two of my favorite American writers followed an all-to-common path of living fast and dying hard. Jack Kerouac’s work is still affecting American culture forty-five years after his untimely death at age forty-nine. Take a look at his Nine Essentials for Writing Spontaneous Prose.

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Hunter S. Thompson was a molder of popular American opinion for several decades. HST also wrestled with weightier questions of life. Maria Popova captures that essence in 20-Year-Old Hunter S. Thompson’s Superb Advice on How to Find Your Purpose and Live a Meaningful Life. It would seem Hunter gave up on looking when he placed his favorite .44 to his head and blew his brains out at the age of  sixty-seven.

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It’s a pity that substance fueled demons robbed us of a couple of American originals. But at least their writings live on.

 

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A little bit of reshuffling

Since 2010 I’ve used Blogger for my online writing experiments. Overall I’ve been very satisfied with the service. I even bought my domain name www.ridetowrite.com for a reasonable $10 per year from Go Daddy. Recently, I’ve been working with a site construction tool by WordPress. It gives a bit more flexibility design wise over the basic Blogger offering.

I’ve decided to roll my original blog into a host provided by GoDaddy. My aim is to expand my offerings while keeping my current content. As a side benefit, I’ll be able to provide links and better quality pictures. Eventually, video will be added to the mix. I’m looking forward to showing, rather than just telling about riding through places like the Yukon or crossing the Brooks Range. I’m thinking of using the new Garmin action camera. But I’m getting ahead of myself, another Alaska ride is a ways down the road. In the meantime, I’m going to play around with my Nikon D-90’s video mode. Now to find a willing monkey to ride in the side car and film the action . . .

Stay tuned.

 

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