How to Get Started... with Anything

 “Good Morning. My name is Denis LaComb and I’ll be conducting this workshop.”

I’ve done several of these (‘How to Get Started Writing’) workshops now and the response has always been very positive. I’ve tried to take the mystery and confusion out of writing by presenting an approach that focuses on the best techniques that work for each individual in my class. I stress that there is no one way, no direct approach, no simple technique to use for everyone. In other words, not one approach works for everyone. I try to hammer home the idea that ‘whatever works for you, go for it!’

Writing is a craft, an art form and a learned skill. But above everything else it is a discipline. Like anything worth pursuing, writing takes time and effort. There are no shortcuts or magic pills to take. It’s only the time spent with fingers on the keyboard or pencil in hand that counts in the end.

I think the same can be said for a lot of other ventures in our lives. It might be forging strong relationships, building wealth, raising kids right, or living a full and satisfying life. Too often we become distracted or bogged down by simplistic, trite clichés that substitute for solid realistic advice.

I tell my audience that you need three things to become a writer:

            Desire…you won’t know if you have it unless you give it a try.

            Perseverance…you won’t know if you have it unless you try.

            Talent…you won’t know if you have it unless you complete your project.

These three points can be the same for just about any other goal or aspiration you have in life. In my workshop I equate writing to building a house.

Building a House                                         Beginning to Write your Story

1.      Start with the foundation                              1. Decide what to write about - the topic.

2.      Build up from there with the framing           2. Gather up all the elements of your story

3.      Finish the project                                          3. Write out your elements in a story form

Some folks might see this correlation between writing and other goals in life as a bit of a stretch. Lord knows I’m no expert. I’ve stumbled more times than I’ve advanced. I’ve gone backwards as often as I’ve advanced a step or two. Yet I’ve been persistent and determined to reach that elusive, ever changing, ever-shifting nebulous goal in front of me. And it’s worked for me.

So to take that analogy a little further I’ve captured the main points from my workshop and tried to translate them into this generic approach to reaching one’s goals.

•  How to Choose your Genre (or goal)?

What form of writing and what style of writing is best for you? There are many forms of writing including journaling, poetry, memoir-writing, fiction, non-fiction or even letter writing as you discover your own unique writing voice, style and purpose.

The caveat here for writing or any other goal you have in mind is to answer: what is your passion, what drives you, what topic/s  make you want to get up each morning and write. Remember, you are not writing for anyone else but yourself.

So translated, what is it that you really want? A better relationship with someone, creating a comfortable nest egg for retirement, raising ambitious, stable children, finding a purpose for being here on earth, etc.

1.      Begin by writing down your ideas, helpful phrases, relevant facts, etc.

2.       Capture those thoughts and ideas that are central to your goal.

3.       Do whatever research is necessary.

4.       At some point, these ideas will organize themselves and give you clearer picture of exactly what it is that you want.

In my workshop, Points Two and Three deal with organizing those ideas, goals, aspirations. Finally it is time to build on your foundation. In the workshop, we move on to number 4.

•  How to Build a Treatment (or Plan of Action.)

Once you have enough information then begin to organize ‘plan of action’ with a beginning, middle and end or by chapters, or in chronological or sequential order. A few examples might be:

Building Relationships

            Make connections that bind

            Try to see their point of view

            Be kind and understanding

            Be patient

Creating Wealth

            Spend less than you make

            Make saving money an intricate part of your lifestyle

            Go above and beyond in your work (9 – 5 simply doesn’t cut it)

            Ancillary income is one approach

Raising kids

            Give them unconditional love always

            Push them to go beyond their perceived abilities

            Give them experiences in lieu of material things

Granted, these are overly simplistic steps but I think you get the idea. Nothing worthwhile has ever been accomplished without trial and error, hard work and bumps along the way. Persistence is the answer.

If you hustle harder than the next person you will succeed. Let’s face it, there is no better way to live your life than to do whatever it is that you love to do.

Hard Labor

Hard labor is a good thing…especially for kids.

I was reminded of that when a local contractor (and neighbor) removed my over-grown hedge this last weekend. He has a snow plowing, lawn service business on the side while still working a full-time job and acting as a volunteer fireman too. He often brings his two sons along to help him in his projects.

This particular weekend the temperatures were hovering in the mid-nineties with humidity plus. He and his sons labored for two days and got the job done. As they were sawing the twisted branches, yanking out stumps with a chain and hauling the refuse away I thought about my own experiences growing up and doing hard labor.

Me in grade school

Beginning in seventh grade, it might have been a paper route in the middle of winter and twenty-below zero temps that put a crunch in my step. It might have been summers working in a steel factory and stuffing paper towels down my shirt so the sparks didn’t burn my belly. It might have been winters unloading furniture trucks with a wind chill factor of eighty below zero outside which limited our time outdoors to ten minute stretches at best.

Whatever happened to making the kids work while growing up? I think what happened was too much screen time, fear of hurting the little ones feelings by pushing them and wanting to be their best friend instead of a parent with all the trials and tribulations that are a part of that job.

Florence's curio shop

Beginning at age six, Sharon was working alongside her father doing farm chores. She continued that pattern by working in her Aunt’s curio shop on the North Shore, summer waitressing jobs, and receptionist work all during college. After graduation, it was a series of extra tasks associated with her teaching career until local and national politics grabbed the lion’s share of her attention.

Brian and Melanie haven’t had a problem putting their kids to work with chores around the house and other assorted tasks outside. When Brennan and Charlotte come to visit Nana and Papa there are always projects to complete outside. Thus far, it hasn’t seemed to have hurt or maimed them in any way.

Whatever happened to old fashion hustle?  I’m sure I’m dating myself but it’s almost as if ‘old-fashioned’ and ‘outdated’ are dirty words now. The idea that the old way of doing things has now been replaced by algorithms and screen time is as outdated as the notion that ‘new’ is really new.

The Colorado twins were on skis while still in diapers and doing black diamonds shortly thereafter. Each of them following the lead of their older sister. Brian knew that if that’s what his kids wanted, they’d have to hustle for it…and they did exactly that.

Borrowing liberally from an excellent article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune by guest columnist Harvey Mackay:

“There are a number of attributes a person needs to succeed in life. Two of them are outside of our control – talent and luck. Hustle is the third component, and it can definitely be developed and cultivated.” He goes on to say: “Good things may come to those who wait, but only those things left by people who hustle. I’ve always felt that it doesn’t take special ability to hustle, just a burning desire to get ahead. Anything you lack in talent can be made up with desire.” That’s exactly the message I’m trying to get across to my grandchildren. ‘Thank you, Harvey Mackay.’

The past does repeat itself. New today is old tomorrow. But basic values like truth and honesty and real work are as basic as the oxygen we breathe every moment of our lives. As old-fashioned and outdated as we often saw our parents and grandparents, their simplistic take on the world still holds value today.

The only down side of hard labor are sore muscles and exhaustion. Both will pass but the knowledge that one hustled and persisted is something you can hold on to forever.  I want that for my children and their children. It’s a nice legacy to have.

Changing Perception

Aerial of Palm Springs

Sometimes if you’re too close to something, it can change and evolve and morph into a new stage of its existence and you don’t notice it at all. Palm Springs is a good case in point. This desert town, long synonymous with mid-century modern architecture, had been the playground of the Hollywood elite and well-heeled retirees for many years. Then gradually as tastes changed and old movie stars passed on, the city grew tired. Now within the last couple of years it’s become a hot spot for hipsters, telecommuters, and members of the LGBT community.

The changes were subtle and gradual at first. It was a transition as fluid and smooth as a river changing course. Other communities down Valley haven’t experienced the changes as much. Their miles and miles of gated communities are well established and reticent for any kind of major change. They’re content with their tee times, Four O’clock cocktail hour and early bedtime.

Palm Springs began its acceleration of changes after the recession of 2008. Sharon and I began coming out here in 2000 and have lived and experienced the changes as we ourselves morphed from vacationers to knowledgeable visitors to homeowners to being a part of our neighborhood and, we hope, a fabric in our community.

Photo courtesy of Melvin Hale

The village of Palm Springs was first developed in the 1930’s as a weekend getaway for the L.A. crowd. But it wasn’t until the 1950’s that it gained a much broader appeal when the Alexander Construction Company built more than two thousand contemporary, stylish and most importantly affordable tract homes. The key then as now lies in its affordability.

Granted, affordability is a strictly California oxymoron as far as housing is concerned. Past reports of outrageous prices for housing are not an exaggeration in many California cities and communities.

As of January of this year, the average price for a single-family home in Palm Springs was about $495,000 and a condominium unit for around $220,000. Compare that to the median price for a single-family home in Los Angeles at about $704,500 with a 2.9 percent projected increase by 2019. Crazy but true, it’s cheaper to live in Palm Springs than L.A.

The most visible changes are taking place downtown. In its heyday, L.A. had its Sunset Strip and Chicago had its miracle mile. Many cities across the country have their own branded tentacles of food, drink, lodging and entertainment. Now Palm Springs has done them one better with its own small-town village atmosphere cloaked as a 21^st century hotspot.

Back in its glory days, Palm Springs was a classic example of heighten expectations clashing with the reality of desert stargazing. In reality it was only the well-heeled or coastal-connected that got to hang out with the stars. For the average visitor Palm Canyon Drive was just a welcome respite from the normalcy back home even while it harbored high hopes for seeing one of their favorite stars passing by on the sidewalk. Over the last several years Palm Springs has slowly regained its panache.

West Coast hipsters, designers, remodelers, artists, musicians and actors are all rediscovering what their forefathers knew all along. They’re finding that wrapping those warm blue pools with a healthy shot of alcohol can bring out a hedonistic nature in the best of us.

Saguaro Hotel Pool

While the hint of change had been in the air for a long time, it took the turnover of an old motel to kick-start this new make-over process. Most observers agree it was the conversion of an old Howard Johnson motel on Palm Canyon Drive into the new hip ACE hotel that became the catalyst for the hipsters to start coming to town. Now there is a whole cache of hotels like the Saguaro changing hands and branding themselves as ‘hip.’

Aerial of the Coachella Valley

Palm Springs and its surrounding locales have always attracted an eclectic assortment of artists, musicians, painters and other veterans of the school of hard knocks. It’s a mecca for the rich, the famous and the enfranchised. This new Palm Springs fits in nicely to this new composite form of creativity.

Some chose to express themselves and show their wares in galleries in the valley or in the high desert. Others are off radar and like it that way. It’s as if there is another world just beneath the surface of shimmering pools, lush green golf courses and cloud-less aqua skies. Whispers come from the wastelands surrounding the Salton Sea as do siren calls from the high desert. Like a resistant drug, fatal attraction or sinful thought, it keeps drawing me back for more exploration. It is a world that offers the opposite of the known, contentment and comfortable

The high desert of the Morongo Valley, Yucca Valley, and Joshua tree continue to attract musicians now as it has since the turn of the century. Far from the crystal clear pools of Palm Springs and its emerald green golf courses lies another world of vast nothingness peppered with the sad remnants of past lives. It’s a place where stillness thunders louder than the wind and God did some of his finest paintings. A vast virtual sound studio for the creative musician.

Map of the high dessert

The Salton Sea

The footprint of the Salton Sea edges alongside nowhere which is north of nothing of interest…for the casual outsider.  It is a briny morass of faded real estate dreams and dead fish scales underfoot. The Salton Sea is California’s largest lake measuring more than 35 miles long and 15 miles wide in spots. It has a surface area of over 380 square miles and sits at 332 feet below sea level.

Today the salinity level of the sea stands at 45 ppt. Only the tilapia fish is able to survive in such waters. While fishing is still good for the tilapia, fish kills continue to plague the area with their harsh smells.

Salvation Mountain is one of the premiere examples of folk art in the middle of nowhere America. At least that was what all the travel guides say. The site has become a mecca for those influenced by and intrigued with this kaleidoscope of painted hills, crude cave dwellings, and religious scriptures.

Slab City otherwise known as ‘The Slabs’ is a snowbird campsite used by recreational vehicle owners alongside squatters from across North America. It takes its name from the concrete slabs that remain from an abandoned World War II Marine barracks of Camp Dunlap.

The artists at Slab City describe it as an experimental, sustainable art installation. East Jesus is a colloquialism for the middle of nowhere beyond the edge of services. Made from discarded material that has been reused, recycled or repurposed, East Jesus encourages visitors to imagine a world without waste in which every action is an opportunity for self-expression.

Intertwined with the remote outposts of creativity are other artist colonies such as the one up in Idyllwild or the other mountain enclaves in Big Bear and Arrowhead. Laguna Beach is two hours and a world away from the desert but offers the same kind of mind-expanding atmosphere in which to play.

There is still something magical about the surrounding mountains, desertscape, warm winter months and hip happenings all over town. Palm Springs is now a virtual cornucopia of cultural, artistic, sensual, musical and intellectual stirrings for just about everyone from the art culture-types to the more modest of minds. It all seems to be happening here.