Summer of Strange Occurrences

Sharon broke her right arm three days before leaving Palm Springs this spring. Thus began a rather disjointed (pardon the pun) and disruptive summer for both of us back in Minnesota. Of course, her broken arm was her good arm. So, suddenly sporting a cast for more than five weeks, made her feel unbalanced and (understandably) it was difficult it for her to navigate steps and stairs. The accident also made it more difficult for her to continue her painting projects.

So began a summer of adjustments for Sharon’s new situation and a real challenge for her to continue painting as she had in the past. It also involved two trips weekly; one to Edina and another to Red Wing to deal with therapy and rehabilitation. You do what you have to do.

My Coffee and Chat sessions also went through some adjustments as a couple of folks disappeared entirely and others found more interesting ways to spend their time. The core friends that remained formed a tight bond over the summer. Over the ensuing months, we had some fabulous conversations; solving many of the world’s problems in just one sitting.

I finally got an E-bike and wanted to restart my beloved long distance Twin Cities bike rides. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to find a suitable e-bike carrying rack so I had to confine my rides to Apple Valley and its surrounding communities.

A sibling gathering up at Lake Vermillion proved a wonderful opportunity for Sharon and her sister and two brothers to finally find time for themselves sans kids and grandkids. A grand time was had by all.

Sharon and I managed to find time for a long weekend in Colorado. At this stage in their lives, Brian and Amy have three kids knee-deep in all kinds of school activities and sports. It was a quick taste of their crazy, hectic wonderful life raising three kids in today’s hurry-up lifestyle. Now we can just sit on the sidelines, cheering our grandkids on and enjoying their success.

A move script outline that had laid dormant for years finally rose above the rest of my other writing projects. Starting to write ‘Habitat for Humility’ proved much harder than I thought. Movie scripts differ from plays in their organic composition; demanding many more subtle nuances from both the characters and the subliminal story lines.

‘Broken Down Palace,’ My book of poetry, finally came out to great response among friends. It was a project six months in the making and I was glad to have it finally done.

My very personal play ‘Frenchy’s Eats’ took a lot longer to finish and is now in the recrafting stage.

My latest play, ‘By the Salton Sea,’ was not accepted by last year’s venue (out of 130 submissions) so I hope to present it to other venues instead.

After months of searching, I was finally able to meet up with a musician who seemed interested in helping me create a sound track of nine songs for my play ‘PTV.’ After our initial meeting, I have high hopes of collaborating with him to craft songs that fit the time, place and mood of my play. If that works out, I have more musicals to score.

Through my old illustrator, I am creating a second book in the Waleed series. This one deals with ‘being afraid’ and facing one’s fears. A friend encouraged me to do an audio version of Waleed, the Skinny Hippo. So, I hope to have audio versions of both books soon.

We’ll be returning to Palm Springs early this fall. Last year’s play ‘Widow’s Waltz’ has been nominated for six different awards by the Desert Theatre League. The awards banquet is October 1^st. It would be a real thrill to see my play win some awards.

After a summer like no other, I hope Sharon and I can get back to our respective passions of writing and art.

Sweet Pea has Three Mama Bears

It’s still quite early in the game but some rules and guidelines are already establishing themselves in my quest to create a comic strip. Going into this venture, I knew it would be a many-stepped process. The idea was simple enough; to create a comic strip entitled: ‘Sweetpea and the Gang.’ It would be based on the personalities, antics, quirks, and loveable traits of my five grandchildren at a certain point in their lives.

That would be back when Charlotte was three or four years old, the twins and Brennan about six and Maya older at eight or nine.

The first challenge was to find very close facsimile cartoon versions of the five grandchildren. Then create a storyline of three or four panels in a comic strip format. Next find an acceptable price to pay for 50 such comic strips. Finally, have an illustrator or comic strip artist create fifty or more comic strips in a limited amount of time (estimated 3-4 months).

That was just the first part. If completed, I then had to package the comic strips and coordinate a marketing campaign to expose the comic strips to as many eyeballs as possible. It would certainly take months to accomplish with absolutely no guarantee of any kind of financial return.

Budgeting the project was an important challenge to overcome. Neither illustrators nor comic strip artists come cheap. Their talent is essential and thus needs to be compensated. That being said, I only have so much money in my proposed budget for this speculative venture. If associated costs were more than my proposed budget, the project would stop before it even got started.

So why do it? If you have to ask, you’ve never been a parent or grandparent. Enough said.

The first challenge was to find the right illustrator to create cartoon versions of the five grandchildren. My editor and I went back to our fabulous illustrator of ‘Waleed, the skinny hippo.’  Shamina sent us several versions of ‘Sweetpea.’

Shamina’s versions of ‘Sweetpea’ were good but somehow lacking something. Vida found a comic strip artist by the name of Santijury (from Eastern Europe). His first version of ‘Sweetpea’ came a lot closer to the image of that loveable urchin that we had in mind.

Satisfied that this version (on the left) came pretty close to our imagined cartoon image of Sweetpea, we then asked for his cartoon version of ‘the gang.’

Again, he did a pretty good job of capturing the image I had in mind. After several revisions, I thought we were close to our final cartoon version of ‘Sweetpea and the gang’

It was during this initial phase that Sharon reminded me that I had missed one of the most important steps in the creative process. I would have defended myself and called it less ‘missing’ than ’taking for granted.’ But, once again, Sharon was right.  I hadn’t talked to my daughter and daughter-in-law and asked their permission to proceed with this idea. My assumption of their support was correct but it proved a very valuable lesson for me, the creator of ‘Sweetpea.’

Who better to know their own kids than the parents, especially their moms? Add an ever vigilant and watchful Nana and I realized there was a council of elders I had to respect and defer to. And a good call it was.

These were three Mama Bears I had to satisfy. I would not have it any other way. Fortunately, these are very intelligent, savvy, street-smart women who suffer no fools, especially when it comes to their kids. Add legal skills, interpersonal relationships, and social media skills and the trio was a formidable support system to have.

Both Amy and Melanie were most gracious and supportive of this effort. They gave me their full backing. I assured them that ‘if‘ the project actually took hold and I began the process of creating comic strips they would be the first to know. They would also have input into the comic strips as they were created.

Of course, the final judge, besides me, is the one with deep insight and a realistic perspective of this project. While she doesn’t have the final say, I sure do want her backing. Because if Nana says no, it is a NO GO.

I’m just hoping that fifty years of marriage gives me a competitive edge in any negotiation; slight as it may be.