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8.10.2014Extreme Unction
My writing career is now old enough to get a driver's license...
In
the Spring of 1998 I took a little motorcycle ride. To San Antonio,
Texas and back. It was fun. I had some interesting experiences there and
back again. I did not have the good sense to shut up about it.
My
friend Marge Abbott started pestering me about writing the stories
down. As Christmas rolled around I decided to write the story and make a
few copies for my nearest and dearest as Christmas presents. My
daughter Emily, a senior in high school, did the interior design and the
cover for what became Extreme Unction: Christ and the lure of the open
road. I was fond of the cover then and and still am today. I made the
books at LazerQuick. The first run was about 20. The recipients were not
discreet enough to keep it to themselves.
I
made a batch of a hundred, and asked for money. I figured that would
dry things up. Then I made another hundred, or two. Then I got tired of
that and refused to make any more.
Barclay
Press publisher, Dan McCracken, and one of his board members took me to
breakfast at the Donald Cafe, and told me that it was good. And with
work, publishable. But not by Barclay Press, because motorcycle
travelogues were not really their thing.
At their insistence I put together a book proposal, which was ignored by many. I was relieved.
I
was doing more preaching, and I never write sermons down before the
speaking of them - very bad juju. But people thought I did, and kept
asking for the messages. Bob Rodriguez, editor of a small town
newspaper, offered to edit them if I would try and write them down after
the fact. Marge thought this was a good idea. Alivia helped me print
and mail them out.
Then I ran off to Africa, which generated a couple more stories.
I tried the blogging thing, which had the advantage of not involving late night runs to LazerQuick.
In
the winter of '06 Pamela Calvert forwarded me a call for writers.
United Press International wanted a broad spectrum of weekly religion
writers for a spirituality page to appear on line. I sent them a
column-length piece, expecting to be ignored. Within 24 hours I heard
from Larry Moffitt, VP UPI. I had a gig.
I tried running off to Africa again, but Larry just sent me off with press creds, and I posted from the field.
When
I had two years of columns done, I quit. But 100 columns makes a pretty
good book, so I had it printed up by a real printer. Batches now came
250 at a time. I think I did it three times.
People said they wanted more about Africa - so I did one about that.
I
tried making a book of ten years of sermons. Alvia painted me a very
pretty cover for that. But people like motorcycle and war zone stories
better than Gospel sermons and that one did not sell as well.
So I ran off to Africa Again.
When
the 15 year anniversary of the Texas ride rolled around, I thought I
might re-issue it. Now I had a day job, and some spare change, so I
hired and editor and a designer. Kathy Hyzy, is pretty good at the
double-dare-ya thing. She challenged me to make it much bigger than a
one-ride-story. She dared me not just to write about weird stuff and my
courage in face of it, but to actually tell the truth about the source
of my courage. The whole thing got out of control.
Now I have a Summa Theologica Motorcyclica on my hands.
And
yeah, its got the 1998 story, and a bunch of those columns and blog
posts. But it has a whole lot of stuff I have never had the nerve to
write before. And now it seems to have a story line under and through
all the other stories that is much more important than the stories. Its
got subtext - geez, when did that start to happen?
And
now I can do it print-on-demand, and you can get it at any real
bookstore, if you know what to ask for, or that under-cutting, on-line,
behemoth that starts with an A.
And it makes me a little nervous.
But the cover's pretty, don't you think?
(I still like Emily's)
If it gets too big, I'll be picking up my mail in Bujumura.
I am blogging mostly at Unction.org - these days - and yes, you can order a book there if you really want to... sheesh
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