*weekly cross post with my Substack Blog
Good thing I gave myself this new weekly blog assignment. Now I have a reason to hate Mondays again. You’d think a lifetime in the factory would be enough reason to stay the fuck away from Monday. But no. Here we are getting teabagged on our foreheads by Monday’s balls yet once again.
Here’s a little inside tidbit into my madness. In my 10 years of working at the Toledo Jeep assembly plant, they had a program where you could sign up to take Monday, Friday, or Saturday off, and a temporary part time worker would fill your spot on the line for the day. It was a controversial program that allowed the company to exploit and overwork underpaid employees that had a quarter of the union rights and benefits of full time workers. The program just ended a month ago at the Jeep plant, in fact, causing 400 temporary UAW workers to be terminated.
Anyway, I used to sign up to take off nearly every Monday. If we got a day off on the assembly line, it was usually Sunday, as Sunday was the only day they couldn’t make full timers work. When we did work Sundays, it was double time, and I bet I volunteered to work about half the Sundays in that 10 year career. So taking Monday off would either give me a two day weekend, Sunday off to be a Dad. Monday off, while everyone is at work and school, so I’m free to write and read, and wander. Or it would give me my one day to rest and be me, all alone, while everyone else worked. It was a winning formula for years. I still put in 55 - 65 plus hours a week, and got to avoid most Mondays of work. I’ve wrote a lot on Mondays over the years.
And here I am doggedly showing up every Monday with the same blue collar lunch bucket work ethic, in an attempt to build this weekly newsletter to serve as a way to keep everyone up to date on my shenanigans. Why do you guys care anyway? I don’t know. But I’m sure fucking glad you do.
Last week I got a lot of writing done. Finally finished a story about a reading in Portsmouth, OH from 3/15. See, I’m still weeks behind, but I’m catching up. That story is over on both Patreon first, then Substack, and it’s a story I’m proud to have written. Just like all of them.
I worked on some poems, punched the night sky, and lost a dozen fights battling putting together my first poetry manuscript. Also, I’ve been spending a lot of time arranging details and getting my life in order for some roadtrip tours and readings coming up. All these shows are arranged by me and other poets. All the spaces for performing, lining up places to sleep, couches and floors welcomed, making flyers, trying to promote it, mapping tour routes, all of that takes an extraordinary amount of planning, not to mention figuring out how to make sure I’ve got gas money, emergency hotel money in case a safe place to rest falls through. Making sure the spare tire is full, and all these things are not things I’m good at. I’m not good at planning. But reading poems in shows, traveling with other artists, and getting my work out there in front of a few new people. It’s what I love, so the planning has to be done.
Looking ahead to this week… I have my first reading of the month. Thursday April 11th in Toledo at Wandering Bean Coffee Co on Sylvania Ave. I’ll be reading with out of town poet John Amen, Detroit spoken word artist One Single Rose®️, and Toledo poet Timothy Geiger. This will be my first time reading in Toledo since last October when my last novel released, so I’m excited to see my friends.
Other than that, I’ll be trying not to look at the sun later when my area experiences a total eclipse of the sun and all reason. The local news has hyped this fucking eclipse up way more than any Super Bowl, although it’ll be witnessed by a quarter of the amount of people that the superbowl draws. Something to think about. Plus, protect ya eyes.
Lots of work to do on The Scrapes of Wrath my camper home. Lots of writing and working on a manuscript.
Later this month, in a week and a half, some artist friends and I are kicking off a performance and poetry tour. We’ll be reading in Kansas City on Thursday 4/18. Indianapolis on 4/19. Toledo (again! Yay!) on 4/20. St. Louis on 4/21. Portsmouth on 4/22. The Not Suitable For Television Tour. It’s going to be a doozy.
Saturday April 27th I’ll be reading at The Bard and Busker Fest in Owensboro, KY. They released the schedule of performances for the day, and I’ll share that later in the photos.
This week I’m working on finding the calm in the chaos. Often, during busy months like this one, even when they’re busy with good things like this one, but when I have more than one or two errands to do the same day, or more than two events to get to and be a part of in the same month, I can get overwhelmed easy, and when I get overwhelmed one of two things are likely: I shut down and have to spend all my energy making myself do the minimum to get by everyday, or I can’t sit still, and my body tries to keep up and stay as busy as my mind. Both roads have their own treacheries, but they’re familiar in my growing age. So this week, I seek calm each day, space to let myself play, and I won’t add anything else to my plate until I’m convinced I can do the food I already have to eat it’s due justice.
All my love
-Dan
Ps. There’s gonna be a fucking eclipse today. Be a shame if you missed this once in a lifetime celestial event.
Support local artists even during an eclipse
Flyer for the reading in Toledo on Thursday 4/11
Nettie Zan made this for our reading in Kansas City on 4/18
Lineup for the Bard & Busker Fest on Saturday 4/27
Ordered some stickers for my website. No. It’s not done, but the website is titled Poet. Worker. Writer.
This isn’t a meme per se, and I don’t give a shit about golf, but John Daly is a fun loving human that says funny shit sometimes. It’s good to laugh.
Laughed my ass off at the teabag Monday thing. Perfectly describes why I've always hated Mondays from kindergarten through my working days and it's still like a hangover now that I'm not working. Cheered up this April 8 for me. Good piece of writing and I thank you!