None of It Was Glamorous
Just the down and dirty....
Boozhoo, indinawemaaganidog! Aaniin! That is to say hello, all of my relatives! Welcome to another edition of An Irritable Métis. January is really getting away from us, isn’t it? I have a pile of subjects I’ve been meaning to write about while simultaneously reckoning with a larger pile of deadlines I’m trying to wrap up by the end of the month. My schedule on the road is picking up too; I’m typing this from a desk in a Holiday Inn Express in Chapel Hill, NC, in fact1, after a generally cool but also strange and emotionally exhausting weekend event out here. The weather was beautiful and the abundance of winter birds was unexpected and a necessary wonder to behold. Funny how grounding the bird relatives are when feeling out of sync and stranger in a strange landish….
This (more image heavy than usual) newsletter was intended to be written and delivered days ago because I always think I’ll get work done when I’m traveling but I hardly ever do and I’m trying to be cool with it. If there is one thing I intend to remember this year, which I largely failed to last year, it is this: things take as long as they take, for better or worse. The best thing I can do toward getting anything at all meaningful accomplished is taking more time than I think is necessary to just sit and do what looks like nothing. Maybe that is an important realization for you too, I don’t know, but it is essential for me, and easy to forget. There is a lot going on this year and a lot of my energy for showing up in this space gets burned showing up in person for people. That, given the general state of things, is more important than ever. I do intend to evaluate other things to make more room for this thing because the importance of this community has really entered my awareness, particularly over the last six months. I hope you’ll hang in here.
Which brings me to an IndigiPalooza MT update! If you recall, two friends representing two local organizations and I are putting on a celebration in Missoula this coming August 1st and 2nd, which I announced a couple weeks ago. For those new here, the current website is only a splash page so far but more will be unfolding in the coming months; what we need to be doing now is raising money for the festival. Donations are coming in steadily and I am amazed once again at the overwhelming generosity of you wonderful Irritable Readers. That said, we still have some ground to cover. To that end, it’s not too late to sign up for a wonderful online class called Native American Studies for Everyone, running February 10 - April 14, a pay-what-you-can-afford offering from which 100% of the proceeds will be donated to the festival. Or, just up and flat out DONATE. Finally, if you haven’t signed up for festival updates, the first one since the announcement will go out later this week that will share other Indigenous folks who have agreed to participate, as well as venue information. Signing up for those updates can be accomplished HERE as well. It’s worth noting that the entire reason we are looking for donations is that every event will be 100% free, but we still intend to compensate everyone appearing for their time and travel, pay for a venue, etc. This is all getting very exciting because we’ve reached a point where there’s no way this thing isn’t going to happen.
Finally, as always, as Irritable Activities ramp up your paid subscriptions are very helpful, but never a requirement for any of the stuff I post here. Miigwech!
With the release of the audio version of Becoming Little Shell allegedly happening on February 18th (you can preorder from Libro.fm HERE2), I thought I’d write about the experience of recording it in the first place, since that’s been requested by a few of you. Before I say anything else I want to say this: of all the aspects of putting this book out in the world, reading it for the audiobook audience was one of the most enjoyable and satisfying parts of the entire process. That was unexpected and I can’t wait to do it again in the future.
If you recall, I had to audition for the opportunity to read my own book. That might sound surprising to some, but anyone who has been to more than a couple readings knows very well that many writers aren’t the greatest readers, so I wasn’t bothered or insulted by that requirement. I was actually grateful that there was a standard, because a mediocre reader can kill the experience.3 I was also confident. To audition I just had a mic clipped to myself at one of my book event readings and recorded to a phone and sent it off. In the “good enough” world that I live in it turned out to make the cut. If I recall correctly, I think it was during the Bellingham event last summer where I did this, so those of you who attended that one are forever part of BLS history. Huzzah!
Months passed. Then negotiations erupted again and suddenly I found myself on the plane headed to Burbank, CA, for the recording, during a stretch of December I’d rearranged to have some much needed time off.
The smartest decision I made related to this trip was to not rent a car. I took a cab from the airport to where I was staying, just 1.5 miles from the studio. I’d also chosen to bring my rucksack with me; that’s a backpack designed with special pockets in it to carry weight plates. When I’m at home I carry a 45# plate in it, which brings the entire load to 50#. I didn’t want to risk being overweight at check-in though, so I swapped it out for a 30# plate, which weighed in at the airport as exactly 35#. With what I carried with me every day while in California, that meant my three-plus mile daily rucks were around 40#, which is pretty decent, and kept me from devolving into the slug I often start to feel like when I travel and begin sliding out of my usual routines.
When I arrived and checked into my hotel, the first thing I did was walk down to the studio to scout out my route for the next morning. The part of Burbank I was in was a little gritty (and yeah, ugly) and I loved it. Think mostly cinderblock-built single level shops that have been there for decades, and nary a chain business to be seen (with the exception of a couple ubiquitous fast food joints). That first outing I mostly noted how many studios there were: recording studios, dance studios, rehearsal studios, photography studios. None of it was glamorous, just the down-and-dirty behind-the-scenes places where people hone their chops. There was also an abundance of people out taking their very good dogs – of all shapes and sizes – on their evening walks. I loved it.
The next day started as most of the rest of the week would. I got up, had a breakfast of cereal and a banana and a couple yogurts and a couple cups of coffee then set out. I needed to be there by 9:30am and I left early enough so I could sit outside and relax a little before getting to it. It was a perfect beginning to each day (the weather was perfect too, by my measure) and the return after doing the work – between 4:00 or 4:30 – was also an excellent decompression period.
The first morning I also took notice of this little wink from home – that’s a Missoula County license plate on this jalopy!
Being on foot my world contracted and I enjoyed that. There were a few folks I encountered every morning and every afternoon and there were nods and greetings pretty much immediately. There must have been a high school not far distant because teenagers gathered at one of the intersections and headed in a perpendicular direction from my route. Notably, this was a place where people live. Besides the dog walkers there were joggers and bus catchers and shopkeepers. The street was lined with local shops: car repair shops, salons and barbers, veterinarians and pet groomers. Daycares and doctors’ offices. Martial arts studios and even a martial arts supply store. A comic book shop! Liquor stores and corner markets. Like this one!
And so, so many restaurants of various ethnicities. Per my usual habits, though, I settled on two that I visited over and over: a taco shop half-a-block down from the studio where I had lunch every day, and then a little diner place I came to LOVE that added another two mile round trip of walking every evening.4
I also loved that, unlike my home experience, white people and their English speaking were in the minority. And the entire time I was there I didn’t see a single example of Trump-related bullshit. No hats or stickers or flags or any of that garbage that you can’t toss a rock without hitting in the dominant cultural dumpster fire Montana has become. It makes me sad for the fragile identities of all the dudes where I live who have to flex allegiance to such an insignificant and petty and buffoonish and downright evil example of masculinity for all the world to see, but bless their hearts. Somewhere down the line they are going to need some redemption and I hope they are able to find it.
If there was any unifying theme at all shared by multiple people, it was a celebration of the Los Angeles Dodgers, who had just won the World Series, as expressed through caps and t-shirts and jackets. I’m not a fan but there are far worse things to build a shared community around.
The act of recording the book was easy and enjoyable. I was scheduled to do it over five days but I pulled it off in four. I’d received an abundance of unsolicited advice over how to take care of my voice because of the beating it would take but that was a non-issue. Reading all day multiple days wasn’t a challenge for me. Bellowing at the vocal mic every night on a blistering rock tour is a challenge, friends. I think my voice got stronger every day.
It felt good to re-engage with this book. Sometimes I forget what is actually in the book vs. stuff I’ve talked about related to it. By the time I was in the studio with it, it had been more than a year since I’d been in its pages. I found it interesting; I found several things I’d do differently. Bad habits, some repetitive turns of phrases, things like that. The types of things that are easy to overlook with regular and blurry editing that starts to blur at the exhausted end of such a big project.
The studio I recorded in only does audio books. I don’t know why that was a surprise to me but it was. Logistically, I was in a little room hardly larger than a closet with a desk and an iPad and a microphone. On the other side of the wall was the recording engineer with his setup; I wish I could remember his name. It was definitely a collaborative effort and it’s far better as a result of his involvement (he told me he’s personally recorded 400+ audio books). If I started to go too fast or made a mistake or anything we would stop and fix it on the spot, so we were essentially editing it on the fly. All of his suggestions were excellent. I’d forgotten there were some French words and names in the text too, which I likely butchered. Any mispronunciations or other flubs are entirely my responsibility. I kinda hope there are a few, in fact. I’m no fan of perfection.
I hardly saw anyone other than the engineer I worked with. I did encounter a woman who was recording a couple doors down from me. She was lovely and her accent was even lovelier. She was in the third book of a fantasy series – she is a voice actor and didn’t actually write the books – with 30+ individual characters. That sounds like a lot of work!
I figured I’d have downtime in the evening so I brought a bunch of work with me expecting to put a big dent in it. We know how that went. I’d forgotten how exhausting extended periods of focused attention can be. I’d get back to my room in the early evening and generally crash for more than an hour. Then I’d get up and walk back down the street a mile for dinner; by the time I was back in my room all I was good for was a shower and a little reading and that would be that.
Financially, I got a small deal for the publishing rights that I will get royalties against depending on how well it does, I think. I don’t really care. What the audiobook publisher5 paid me for recording it wasn’t enough to cover my expenses for a week in Burbank but it was close enough. I don’t really care about that either. It’s worth it to me because I got to have the experience of doing it. Generally my living as a creative person is like one of those puzzles where you slide pieces around with one open spot to work with. Some gigs pay me enough to allow me to do things that hardly pay, or don’t pay at all6. So far it’s working out, and so long as the speaking agent I signed with last year secures me gigs, and subscriptions here, despite the freefall of the last couple months7, continue, I’m still able to do pretty much everything people ask me to do. It’s precarious but also incredibly rewarding.
Finally, I was grateful to see that, after only having been there a week, the local hardware store I passed seemed to recognize my presence and honored me with a wood carving of … well, me! … out front of their parking lot. It’s quite an accurate likeness, don’t you think? Miigwech, friends!
And miigwech as always to all of you who support me! I hope this odd little edition was interesting enough for you. I’m not going to lie: as crabby as I often am, this is still a lot of fun and I am grateful for all the opportunities that continue to come my way.
Which leads to this Irritable Comment: in a world trying to herd us all onto the internet full time, if it weren’t for being able to use my phone as a wireless hotspot I wouldn’t get any of this stuff done at all on the road because hotel internet SUCKS.
Last I looked it’s not showing up on Audible yet but I’d rather you order from Libro.fm anyway, because Audible = Amazon = finger-in-the-mouth-with-gagging-motion. Also, Libro.fm is currently running a promo that states: Now’s a great time to shop indie. When you start a new one credit per month membership supporting local bookstores with promo code SWITCH, we’ll give you two bonus audiobook credits at sign-up. Click HERE to make that happen. Please consider it! I guarantee no one from Libro.fm was perched behind what’s-his-face during the inauguration grinning like a bloodsucking idiot.
Which is also totally arbitrary as well.
I also visited the In & Out Burger once, and the Denny’s once. We don’t have either one in Missoula!
Like being the MTPFL.
Based on the newsletters I read, this seems to be the case for many of us. I’m not overly concerned. I fully expect the entire enterprise to collapse at some point, I’m just hoping for later than sooner.
“but Bless their hearts”….thanks again; always feels good to read your words, and I gaze away feeling renewed and even hopeful in the midst of the unbelievable.
"I'm no fan of perfection."
Some things you simply need to see written down. Yes, I read this just in time to save myself from a day fraught with the search for perfection in its many forms. Instead, the little dog will get a ramble and then I'll see about the rest of it.