Weird—the guy in the stripey shirt looks familiar
Judge a Book by Its Cover? Heck Yeah!
For a nice boy, I wasn’t that nice of a boy. While my older siblings labored at some entry-level jobs, I labored at entry-level shoplifting. As with much work, with practice, you get better. I became skilled enough at shoplifting—tape players, tapes, records, clothes, liquor—that it became my income source in high school. All the years of high school. And for some time after.
That this conflicted with my nine years of Catholic school (and yes, I was an altar boy), was an issue I wrestled with—when I wasn’t busy shoplifting. I had some run-ins (read: jail) with the law, with store proprietors, with my conscience.
Some of the stealing situations I got into—and out of—were memorable; some were unbelievable. So I wrote a memoir about the time, and about my thoughts at the time, and at this time. The book is basically finished, and for the past couple of months, I’ve been working with team of designers, at Studiolo Secondari, on the cover.
After a number of iterations, what you see above is basically it, at least for the front cover. They will work on the spine and back cover soon, for which I’ll give them the blurb, bio and other blather.
Righting the Rights
I won’t publish until mid-summer at the earliest; I’m working on some marketing matters now. One of those will be offering a free download of Flowering, my old book of short stories, in exchange for a pre-order purchase of the memoir. I’ll let you know when that happens.
I recently bought back the publishing rights from the original Flowering publisher and am going to remove their pub info in favor of mine, make a few minor changes to the book, and republish. I was happy to have one of my books out from a small commercial publisher, but just as happy to have it returned to my hands.
The memoir cover is a bit of a play on the Stones’ “Sticky Fingers” album cover (remember them?) and the lettering is somewhat of a homage to a Sex Pistols cover. I think the whole is evocative of my five-finger period, which was mostly in the 70s.
You know, back when shoplifting was a high art. Let me know what you think about the cover.
Linking for Thinking
Continuing the "make your inner and outer worlds better places" theme of these curated links, here are the latest. We've had many servings of sourness lately: Covid, Ukraine, political corruption, climate hell—may some of these articles provide some sense of solace and self-care.
"Catch yourself when you’re using the old pattern. You’ll usually know because you feel discouraged, you’re reaching for distraction, you are avoiding or putting off, you are feeling mad at someone, you are feeling victimhood."
Destroy What You Know
"Seek out exposure to uncertainty. Seek to do things where you don’t know what you’re doing. Be open and public about your messiness, your commitments and your failures."
25 Micro-Habits That Can Improve Your Life With Just A Few Small Changes
"Schedule short downtime times in between work throughout the day. For example, for every hour of deep work, take a five minutes break."
Here’s Why You Should Let Your Mind Wander - And How to Set It Free
"Mind-wandering can also invite opportunities for serendipity and awe. “The world around us is filled with clues, opportunities and possibilities,” Dane said, but we can take advantage of them only “if we’re able to loosen ourselves from the grip of autopilot.”
7 Myths About Meditation That Seriously Need To Die
"Don’t complicate meditation. It’s so simple as to be embarrassing to teach someone how to do it. It’s elemental. It’s fly fishing in Yellowstone. It’s walking on the beach, being aware of your steps. It’s sitting silently in meditation until you forget you are sitting."
