More Than Ordinary Lives

Kit and I have endured a hectic spring. Recently, we traveled to Washington’s Skagit County on a novel-selling expedition and are grateful to have sold 120. Our policy has always been to try tacking on something fun to the hundreds of work-related trips we’ve made.

In this case, we visited Holland-like bulb farms. Here Kit is in one of many locations. After a trip, we frequently just want to just go home. But purposing to add something extra has almost always enriched our lives and given us memories and pictures to enjoy. 

Drew 

Dear friends,

Kit and I are busy doing good things. Please endure one more eccentricity blog. Better stuff soon.

Drew

I’ve always enjoyed solving difficult problems. But like athletes’ physical ability declines as they get older, so does everybody’s cognitive ability. Einstein recognized the principles of physics, for which he is famous, in his early twenties. My older brain certainly can’t handle complex problems as well as when I was younger. I can’t add or multiply large figures in my head anymore. Juggling and correlating multiple facts is hard.

I can still focus on a single task though, which has led me to games and puzzles. My eccentricity is not only a need to solve problems but that I set goals then track and record my results in a contest with myself. Solving the hardest Sudoku’s is relaxing and emotionally rewarding to me. I have a computer file with hundreds solved and a few not yet solved. I’ve managed to win old-fashioned playing-card solitaire seven times in a row. Remembering where needed cards are and figuring when not to make a play are the keys. Managing to win a hundred consecutive games of two-suited spider engaged me for two years.

Indulging my problem-solving eccentricity requires intense concentration. Experts debate the value of mental exercise for keeping oneself sharp. If nothing else, I know that solving challenging puzzles and winning games make me feel smarter.

“Maybe I’m being a bit optimistic for a seventy-four old,” I said aloud after planting a four-foot redwood tree on our Washington property.  Yes, this is the type of redwood that can grow to be over 300 feet tall and have diameters of more than 20 feet. I am a tree hugger. Not necessarily in the broad use of the term to describe an unrealistic environmentalist. But I mean real trees. In the manner of C.S. Lewis, I love trees and care for trees on our property like family members. We now have trees over five feet in diameter on our property.

Frequently, I nurture small trees in a little nursery before planting them. The little redwood was only one foot nine months ago. But like many others I’ll enjoy watching it grow, talk to it, and affectionately touch it. This is undeniably eccentric behavior.

A couple of weeks ago I posted a blog about Tilting Windmills which concluded with the possibility of God working miracles. Kit and I have seen God do many wondrous things. I’ve noticed that God most frequently acts when faith is demonstrated by thorough preparations.

Our first ad for novels starts March 17th at Christianity Today using the graphic shown. We’ll also run a concurrent campaign with the same graphic directed to Christians using BookBub.  We have carefully planned a series of subsequent ad experiments, printed and digital, with different titles in mostly secular media.

Our hope is that through experimentation God will give us an effective marketing strategy. If not, then we will have tried. And then on to the next windmill.

For Valentines Day, Kit rented a cabin on a bluff overlooking the ocean within Olympic National Park.  Both photos were made within three hours on the same day. 

After forty-three years together, having a getaway is more fun than ever. This is a great joy and a privilege we don’t take for granted.

Kit and Drew

The email program Kit and I use is becoming erratic.  I determined to replace it and licensed the highest rated product. The new program receives but won’t send with our email address which is in all our contacts’ address books.  I’ve spent a dozen hours desperately trying to get it working before our original email service becomes untenable.

AI plays a role. The company who provides the highly-rated program has transitioned to an all AI help-desk.  You CANNOT talk to a person. I won’t name the company, but they have profits of $90 BILLION a year.

AI works by searching the internet and answering with previously posted instructions to your help query.  Because  the product has evolved over the decades, there are many out-of-date versions and several current versions of the product. Apparently AI can’t distinguish between them because it continually gives instructions that can’t be followed. I’ve been down scores of step-by-step instruction trails that dead-end when my up-to-date version can’t execute them. AI does frequently offer me additional products from the same sorry company.

If you haven’t wrestled with AI yet, I predict you will.

Drew

Kit and I are enjoying writing as our fourth career. We started with major disadvantages. We’re old and dated. My last composition course was in 1968. We had not even the foggiest understanding of the publishing industry. We tend to mix genres. We have no platform. Moreover we’re wholesome. I read reviews of “The year’s best novels” recently. A reviewer praised a novel, “. . . begins with sex and romance and leads to violence.” Sadly sex and violence sell a lot of novels. Kit and I don’t read or write these.  (We do include romantic subplots.)

Despite our handicaps we’ve managed to sell about 6,000 novels. Hardly bestselling stats, but a slice of the market loves our stories. To find readers, we’re embarking on a publicity campaign at which we are novices. Queries to advertisers led to a flood of publicists offering to promote our novels for us. One promised to coach us for only $1,000 a week. He, nor any of the others, offered any sales projections let alone assurances.

So we’re going the do-it-yourself route. This puts us into direct completion with millions of would-be writers and full-time professionals who have decades of experience at every publishing house. The task seems insurmountable.

I’m reminded of Don Quixote an older fictional medieval knight who attacks windmills thinking they are giants. His character says, “To dream the impossible dream, that is my quest.” The story, first published in 1605, still speaks to many hearts. I really do think that quests, even impossible ones, enrich our lives.  And just sometimes impossible dreams come true.

Drew

I’m bored.  Kit is in California visiting her family. Unfortunately, while she’s away some sort of trouble  usually manages to find me. Last year I got locked out of our house in frigid temperatures and let the pipes freeze. The year before I got stranded on the roof when the ladder separated and fell. Kit always leaves a list of “to dos” and precautions. But I forget to read it.

There are advantages to staying alone. I can turn up the football volume loud enough to hear it anywhere in the house.  I can use the dishes several times before washing them. More importantly, the mishaps make me grateful to have a partner sharing my life. I’ve come the realize that needing someone is not a weakness but an advantage for me.

Right now I’m hoping to remain bored. It has a certain comfort value.

Oh!  And I finished the college football playoffs predicting 11 for 11 correctly.

Drew

This is the first year of college football’s twelve team playoff. Ten games have been played and I’ve predicted all ten correctly.

That doesn’t mean I had rooted for the winners. The teams I preferred won less than half the time.  But I predicted those I thought would win rather than those I hoped would win.

Decision making in life has more consequences. Sadly, we humans have the propensity to decide based on what we hope will happen rather than carefully thinking likely outcomes through. “I hope this person will make a good spouse.” “I hope this investment is sound.”

Kit says that I have a high-percentage record of making good choices. Those choices have been based on the likely outcomes and consequences rather than what I wished would happen.

By the way, I’m picking Ohio State in the National Championship but I’ll be pulling for Notre Dame.

Drew

During December I posted five “Embrace Your Eccentricities” blogs. My resolution for 2025 is to identify more eccentricities and embrace them.

More seriously, Kit and I annually create a bold plan for the year ahead which helps us to do a lot.  Progress has always seemed like two steps forward then a step back.  As we get older, progress seems like five steps forward and four back, sometimes six back.    

The picture of young Kit and Drew is posted in gratitude for the youth we enjoyed. But we each experienced old-age afflictions in 2024. In the context of getting older together, Kit located a promise and a reminder which we have chosen for our 2025 verse. 

They will still bear fruit in old age, they will stay fresh and green, proclaiming, The Lord is upright; he is my Rock, and there is no wickedness in him. Psalm 92:14-15

We wish you a productive and joyful 2025.

Drew