USA: When desperation is removed from the equation

A grateful and hopeful post (from a place of privilege), an inside look at the complicated book business, and a tale of the Best Dog Ever

People will do some crazy things when they’re desperate.

Perhaps they need income to survive or safety from a physical attack, or maybe food to eat or air to breathe, or just love and attention. When they are desperate, civility and good behavior go out the window.

Necessity is the mother of invention, right?

Desperate times call for desperate measures, don’t they?¹

When we first got our dog Drake, he was a playful pup with piles of pent-up energy. At only 18 months old, he had already lived with four different families. Each one said he was destructive or wild or uncontrollable. Of course, we didn’t know any of that when we went to see him for the first time.

The ad in the newspaper (remember those?) just said:

BLACK LAB - 18 months old, friendly, $50.

I circled it, or marked it with a fluorescent yellow highlighter, or whatever it is we did back then. Having recently lost our previous dog, we were looking for a canine playmate for our two young kids. In only two months’ time, we would be moving from Washington to rural Montana. The kids would have to leave all their friends behind, so we thought having a furry friend might ease the transition. But we couldn’t afford much, and none of the dogs at the local shelter had caught my eye.

This pup in the classified ads sounded ideal, but a black Lab for $50? We figured there must be a catch.

Having arranged a meet-up, we entered a small apartment and were nearly bowled over by the exuberant young dog, all smiles, wagging his entire body with unbounded joy to meet a whole family of strangers. We were all immediately smitten. What a sweet pup!

The couple—his owners—looked nervous, perhaps chagrined, and a little sad. They insisted that they had really tried their best with him. Every evening when they got home from work, they explained, they would put him on the leash and take him for a walk around the apartment complex, but he still had too much energy. They just didn’t know what else to do.

I could think of a few things.

I took note of the mangled miniblinds on the front window over the sofa, the one with the chewed corner, and I tried to imagine this big dog stuck in an apartment alone all day, with only a stroll each evening to get all his wiggles out. Impossible.

We informed them we were looking a dog for our kids to play with around our new six-acre property out in Montana.

They turned to look at each other with wide eyes, then looked back at us. It was a perfect match.

Isn’t he handsome? If he’d worn a bow tie (which he did later in life) he would have looked like he was ready for the red carpet—cuffs and all. We could have named him Tux.

Welcoming Drake into our family went fairly smoothly at first. He was a quick learner, more intuitive than some humans I’ve known, and eager to please. But we quickly learned to be careful when opening the front door. If he managed to exit the house without a leash held by a sturdy adult, he would run. And run.

I had never seen a Labramutt run like that before.

He was a smooth blur of motion, a flash of perfectly coordinated speed. Whoosh. Drake could run like . . . like the Speed of Light herself had been challenged by Usain Bolt and wanted to feed him some long-overdue humble pie.

Drake didn’t tire easily, either. If he got out into the neighborhood, he would run the grid of streets for hours, oblivious to any distractions or attempts to rein him in before he finally decided to be done.

Fortunately, we managed to get him safely home every time. Once he had worked his wiggles out and had plopped down under some neighbor’s shady tree, it was just a matter of finding which neighbor and which tree.

Have you seen a big black dog running at full speed?

Oh, yes! He went that way. My goodness, he’s fast!

As soon as we pulled up to the curb and called to him, he would trot to our car and hop in, all smiles, panting wildly with his long tongue lolling to one side. Once home, he would lap up a gallon of water then pass out on the floor of the kids’ playroom for a well-earned nap, right in the midst of all their noisy activity.

It wasn’t until I began to work through the manila file folder the previous owners had handed us on the way out of their apartment that I learned of our new dog’s sordid past. He had been quite the mischief maker, surrendered back to the same shelter several times. As I read the reports, though, I noticed a pattern. He jumped fences to get free—if no one was home for hours on end. He destroyed furniture—when he was cooped up with no exercise.

Drake wasn’t a bad dog. He was just desperate².

When we are desperate, we expend whatever resources and skills we possess or can quickly acquire, whatever energy and strength we can muster, just to keep pressing forward, to survive another day. When we are desperate, we find a way, make a way, even if it’s not the right way.

Escaping to go for a long run was the only coping mechanism the pup had learned. I predicted Montana would be good for him.

I was right.

Once we had moved and he had time and space to run around freely every day, and kids to play with, and someone home most of the time to provide treats and pets and games of fetch, Drake quickly became a very good dog. He settled right into family life and learned all the routines. Even without a fence around our property, he understood the boundaries and obediently stayed within them.

Before long at all, there was no question of Who’s a Good Boy?

It was Drake, plain and simple. Drake was the Good Boy. He quickly became one of those once-in-a-lifetime dogs you hear people reminisce about, wistfully, with a sad smile and a faraway look in their eyes. Yeah. Draker-Boy was the best.

Once Drake’s needs for exercise and companionship were consistently and reliably met, he was no longer desperate to try to meet those needs himself, by any means necessary. Once desperation was removed from the equation, everything changed.

The thing with writers

Here’s the conundrum we writers face. I promise it’s related to the dog’s tale:

With the advent of modern computer technology, social media, and on-demand entertainment at every turn, the demand for print books has taken a hit. Generally speaking, people just don’t read as much as they used to—not by a long shot. And, for a variety of reasons, many who do read full-length books prefer e-books or even audiobooks. I am still a reader, but as a nomad and a minimalist, I am one of those people who rarely picks up a physical paperback book anymore. It’s sad, but true.

This reduction in market share for hardcopy printed material has created a serious budget crisis for many traditional publishers. With less funding to work with, they have become much pickier in which books they publish in print, and how much work on them they are willing to do in-house, versus how much they now rely upon the author to do for themselves.

In other words, your latest paperback book club new release was likely written by a trusted author with an already established presence—probably not a newbie. (And if it was a newbie, they are scrambling like mad to make this work.) In many cases, the publishers simply can’t afford to pick up new and untrusted writers. They’re a risky investment when considering potential ROI.³

How many paperbacks can a picky publisher pick, if a picky publisher still picks paperbacks?

Unless

There’s always an unless, right? If writers have already proven themselves trustworthy (i.e. they have a huge following on social media, or they have an enormous list of subscribers for their email newsletter), then publishers might take a chance on them, since they may be able to sell a lot of books to their already existing followers.

This is why, friend—for those of you unfamiliar with the industry—writers are always trying to get you to interact with their social media accounts and comment or share their blog posts. Not only do algorithms pick up on engagement and promote popular things more than seemingly unpopular things, but shares help build readership outside of the limited scope of the writer’s immediate friends and family. Many publishers want to see those stats before they will take a chance on someone new.

Basically, writers need to prove they are successful before they can get published. Convoluted and backwards? Cart before the horse? Ah, yup.

Now seems like the perfect time to ask you, dear reader friend, to share this thingamablog with your contacts, as some of them might connect with what I write.

Of course, writers don’t have to be published by traditional publishing houses. Self-publishing is absolutely an option these days. That’s another topic for another day. But the fact remains, if a new writer wants to see their work in print from a traditional publisher, they must already have a following before even pitching the book.

Enter LITTLE OL’ ME, stage left:

For as long as I can remember, I have wanted to have a paperback book of my very own in print. (Hardcover would be even better, but hey, let’s not get greedy.) Last December I came close. I had two short stories published in a paperback anthology of Christmas stories. I wrote about it here. But it wasn’t the same as having my own book. I am working on a novel or two—or at least I was before we traveled to Asia and returned to do the final push on our vehicle so we can hit the road. I’ll pick up the book project again later.

But here’s the deal: I don’t care anymore if I ever get published by a traditional publisher. It’s a dream I’m willing to release at this point in my life, as we set out in pursuit of full-time global travel. The travel dream is more important to me than the book dream. So, at least for now, I’m not desperate. I don’t need to grow this Substack-newsletter-thingamablog just to impress some potential suitor, er, uh, I mean, publisher.

And I no longer have any wild fantasies about paying the bills with my book(s)⁴. We were able to sell our Montana home when the market was ridiculously high without immediately buying another one. Simultaneously, we have embraced minimalism, simplicity, and slow travel as tools to cut our living expenses—by more than half. The math works. We are no longer scrambling quite so hard to find sources of income. It’s still shocking to us, to be honest. This low-budget travel lifestyle just doesn’t require much.

Like Drake the Labramutt suddenly finding himself with acreage and kids for running and playing to his heart’s content, I’m just no longer desperate.

Using our position of privilege to empower others

Instead, I have another reason I want to grow this nearly one-year-old thingamablog.

Last week I mentioned that there are some big changes coming to Beauty and Truth Weekly in mid-June. It’s no surprise. As I mentioned earlier, realizing you are no longer desperate has a way of changing everything.

The publication’s name will change, as will its overall design and logo. I also mentioned that I’ll be adding another segment—an interview feature—and that I’ll open up the option of paid subscriptions. I promised that you will not be pressured to pay for a subscription, but that many of you will choose to do it willingly, cheerfully, even excitedly. I told you more info would be forthcoming.

Remember when Andy and I went to Puerto Rico in 2022? We’d been planning a big 30th anniversary vacation, but when a major hurricane hit the island, we pivoted and turned our anniversary getaway into a service trip, working with a local relief organization for two weeks.

We asked our friends and family to contribute financially so we could bring along some needed supplies. You responded. We bought two enormous second-hand suitcases and filled them with essential household goods, hygiene products, construction materials, and medicines. Plus, we were able to purchase a huge set of brand-new power tools for the team there to use for assorted building projects. Normally, we are carry-on only travelers (usually just a small backpack), but for Puerto Rico, with your support, we filled a big luggage cart. It was amazing. You all did that.

Andy and me in Puerto Rico

For now, let’s just say the money that comes in from paid subscriptions here will be really fun to spend, and you, the volunteer paid subscribers, will thoroughly enjoy reading about where your dollars have gone.

If you were no longer desperate for something, what might you be freed up to do?

More details coming soon.

Preparing for lift off

In the next three weeks, I’ll be assembling a launch team for this reimagined, rebranded Substack-newsletter-thingamablog, so be thinking about whether or not you would like to help. There will be absolutely no financial commitment involved on your part to join the launch team, and the time commitment will be very minimal. I’ll just need ten to fifteen people who are willing to really believe in what we are trying to do here and help us spread the word. I’ll ask for a show of hands—with every head bowed and every eye closed—starting next week.

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International Signs and Wonders, aka I-SAW

Remember last week when I mentioned the new and separate quirky travel photo Substack that I’ll start on May 31?

Called International Signs and Wonders (I-SAW for short), this will be a highly curated weekly compilation of funny signs and things that make you wonder, collected as we wander the globe.

In this world of AI fakery, stolen or “borrowed” intellectual property, and no solid reason to believe anyone’s word as truth anymore, I’m committed to bringing you FIVE original, funny, clever, safe-for-work, quirky, oddball, and/or bizarre photos—actual images that I SAW with my own eyes and captured myself with my own camera. I will send them out *with bonus witty commentary* every Friday to start the weekend off right.

You know me, friend. You know I love to laugh, and you know I am filled with a child-like wonder at the most unusual things. The goofy things I run across don’t often fit well into my posts here at Beauty and Truth Weekly (which is soon to have a new name, of course), and they don’t really belong on our travel Instagram (@nomadic.midlife), so I never know exactly what to do with them. International Signs and Wonders, I-SAW, will be a place to simply laugh and shake your head in disbelief—a welcome respite from this crazy mixed-up life we live.

In honor of baseball season (GO DODGERS), here’s an example of the weird stuff I stumble across:

I saw these beauties at a thrift shop in Florida. They were my size, but I just didn’t think I could pull it off. Do you know anyone who would rock them?

If you think a weekly collection of five quirky and/or bizarre REAL photos *with witty commentary* might be fun to receive, please subscribe here in advance. It’s free, and you can always unsubscribe. The first issue will hit email inboxes on Friday, May 31, which happens to be my birthday.

I do hope you have a wonderful week. How can YOU use YOUR position of privilege—whatever form it takes—to lift someone up this week?

Until next week,

Sherry

Good ol’ Draker-Boy lived until nearly his 16th birthday—a remarkably long life for a dog of his size. In his golden years, he began to break the rules again—and without the slightest bit of remorse. He once ate an entire large pizza that had been left unattended and didn’t even cower when confronted about it. He occasionally wandered out of the yard to a neighbor’s house because they offered more and better snacks than we had. After so many uninterrupted years of winning Best Dog Ever, though, we forgave him every time.

1. Of course, these statements on the results of desperation also apply to things much heavier than stories about a dog’s misbehavior. Perhaps you’ve seen examples in history and in more recent news stories about what happens when people reach the point of desperation. We are keeping it light today, but you know there is more depth in this topic to explore.

2. Desperation always reminds me of the Langston Hughes poem:

What happens to a dream deferred?

      Does it dry up

      like a raisin in the sun?

      Or fester like a sore—

      And then run?

      Does it stink like rotten meat?

      Or crust and sugar over—

      like a syrupy sweet?

      Maybe it just sags

      like a heavy load.

      Or does it explode?

3. ROI - return on investment, or how the potential earnings stack up against the amount of investment and risk required

4. Most authors don’t exactly get rich from books anymore. It’s a tough way to make even a meager living.