My bizarre relationship with money, plus more freebies
I've never been a good businessman and I should probably change that
[This is my first Substack post. I’m transitioning away from my old newsletter. More on that below…]
When I turned 11 years old, I got my first job as a paperboy. For seven days a week, 365 days a year, in rain, sleet, or snow, I delivered forty copies of The Buffalo News to my neighbors on my Huffy bike. I was supposed to make $40/week.
In reality, I made $10, $20, or $0 each week. That’s because I refused to charge my customers the full rate.
Every Saturday afternoon (this was the worst part of the job) I had to spend 2-3 hours going door-to-door to ask for each customer’s payment, which was $2 to $4 a week. (I’d receive $0 to $1 in tips, which would make up the bulk of my weekly income.)
But if I missed someone on collection day, their bill would increase to $8, $12, or even $24 in subsequent weeks. When I said, “$24 please,” the customer would often huff and grumble as they went looking for their wallet.
I hated causing huffing and grumbling! I learned that I could avoid all that if I simply knocked that $24 bill down to a $16. My neighbors never seemed to notice that I was shortchanging myself.
This is how I wound up working for three years as a paperboy, almost for free.
Ever since then, I’ve had a similar approach to making money. I enjoy performing many kinds of work, but I feel weird about the money side of things—working for money, asking for raises, haggling over speaking fees, even if I’m merely seeking a living wage for a worthwhile service.
I often say to myself, “Ah, this one’s for free.” And while this mentality has generated in me financial anxiety, I like this about myself. I like giving things away in the name of joy, the free exchange of knowledge, and generosity. Part of me feels like I’m stealing every time I get a paycheck. [When I got my first decent-paying job ($22/hour as a backcountry ranger), I was half-tempted to give half of it back.] Perhaps, unconsciously, I’m worried that something in me will be corrupted if I make more than a little bit of money…
This will make me sound naive and foolishly ideological, but I’ve felt it from the very beginning: I wish we lived in something other than a market economy. I’m turned off by the enormous and grotesquely square box stores, the omnipresent billboards, the galling amount of ads we must watch during an NFL game, the highways lined with car dealerships and unhealthy food, and even all those Main Streets crammed with small businesses, most barely performing a worthwhile service. In Edinburgh, 75 percent of these businesses could disappear and we’d be no worse off, as we learned during the pandemic.
Meanwhile, libraries, churches, free museums, cheap cafeterias, schools, and parks are, to me, something close to the sacred, as they represent a more noble ideal, existing as they do almost entirely outside of the realm of dirty commerce.
My website, ever since I started it in 2009, has been a sort of “commons,” open to visitors who could freely roam at their will. Giving away my writing for free was easy enough to do since I was living so lightly—in a van or living rent-free in friends’ basements.
But I’m no longer that 11-year-old paperboy who could manage to renounce his income for reasons of conscience, ideology, or fear of grumbles/huffs. I’ve since claimed a conventionally adult life and with it a long list of monthly bills, a 15-year mortgage, and a pre-school-aged daughter.
Reality compels me to enclose and parcel the “commons” of my literary life into commoditized private property. I feel like a once-benevolent landlord who has no choice but to turn his village of inebriated farmers into income-generating laborers, barking out, “Take up thy spade, or depart henceforth!”
This is now a Substack “newsletter”
Which brings me to Substack, which is a clever platform to help writers and content-producers make a living outside of traditional media.
I still plan on giving away some of my posts, but I’ll probably make my top essays available only to paid subscribers. I’m pretty sure I’ll also be publishing a podcast, and, if I do, I’ll probably increase the price to reflect the time invested.
So I shall end this inaugural post by saying a “goodbye” to the open roaming lands of my early writing career and a “you’re welcome” to all my Buffalo News customers and beloved readers of the past fifteen years.
And yet, more freebies…
Ten “slightly under the radar” movies that you should add to your to-watch list
Never Cry Wolf (1983, USA)
Junebug (2005, USA)
Margaret (2011, USA)
Night Moves (2013, USA)
Paradise Trilogy (2012-13, Austria)
Un Prophete (2009, France)
The Rider (2017, USA)
The Cakemaker (2017, Germany & Israel)
Elena (2011, Russian)
Daughters of the Dust (1991, USA)
It's cool to see you on Substack now!
Well all great things must come to an end--even to a loyal book reader of yours and blog reader and IG follower. You look just like that kid in the picture (sweet). Why don't you write another book? What is it with substack all of a sudden? It seems like, hey, it's going to save the day for everyone. A Hail Mary Pass--let me jump on board another social media wagon. I signed up for free b/c besides being frugal and in debt (ugly) due to covid and domestic violence, which I had to get out of--financially it has been downhill. However, I love you--even though we have never met. I live in horrid Texas--super-hot---and you've been through it near Houston. I can't believe you've walked it (states), but at the same time I can. Like I can't believe some of the states are pretty bad and gave you a hard time and others welcomed you in (that was nice). I would pay for your writing; however, because of circumstances like I had a hard time paying my rent--and I like you--for having done the opposite--lived in a van--got your MA--were a park ranger--lived off the grid--moved to another country that is neat==got married--had a kid--and grows veggies---and should write another book. It's nice you aren't in super debt. I myself hope for the same, but this town I live in San Antonio, Texas and this State and to a certain extent that Mexico nearby and the Rio Grande really have me and so many others in this hell hole. They like to jimmy rigg people pretty badly--like they did with the whole domestic violence thing--I never got help from anyone. Right now, I do not have a job--and why?' I haven't had a job going on two months.
Paper Boy--did you see the movie? Best to you and your family and I hope to see your next book around. FYI, I took a bookbinding class and created my own book (empty pages inside) I have a love of books and paper and will be creating books by hand. Peace 🎈 PS I also like going to Whole Foods (I like to search for the $2.00 or less stuff that I actually need) Really fun---plus fun looking at the $5.00 8oz. yogurts. The labels are really nice and colorful, but the employees and customers are not nice. Best.