Remaining Life Goals

Posted on: 21 September 2008 /
Categories: Self Promotion

As if I’ve ever made a list before. The list is kind of restricted to stuff I feel like I control well enough to make happen also. Just FWIW.

  • The three-month, 15,000-mile road trip.
  • Become functionally fluent in at least one more language.
  • Spend at least a(nother) year living in a foreign country.
  • Get five novels published. Not sure it’d be at all beneficial to get more than five published — maybe it would be, maybe not. Just seems like most authors only ever wrote/have written one “necessary” novel and all the others are just derivatives of that one. Of course, The One Novel isn’t usually their first, so… Wallace Stegner, for instance, only ever needed to publish Angle of Repose. If Vonnegut had only ever written Slaughterhouse Five, the world would be not much poorer for it — the others feel the same, but less well-considered. I think if I get five published, one will be my necessary one and the other four might have elements of necessity. So there you go. (Bonus points if I get critically compared to Stegner, George Orwell, and Cormac McCarthy.)
  • Visit the remaining two parts of the world I’ve not yet visited (= Asia Minor/North Africa South Asia/Middle East/North Africa, Africa).
  • Own and live in a house situated on five scenic acres with an outbuilding workshop on-premise.
  • At least a three-day rafting trip down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon.
  • At least two days kayaking along the Na Pali coast, probably.
  • Teach a course at the college level (doesn’t have to be a permanent gig).
  • Get into good shape. I should make this one quantifiable, but I’m not sure what it means yet, ergo: not currently quantified.

I’ll add more as situations warrant.

bkd

4 comments

  • telkontar

    Some areas I might be able to assist:
    Would you take a 7-year old with you for part of the road trip?
    How functional? I do have some berlitz tapes.
    Would you self-publish? You may have to go mass-market.
    Asia Minor is the Turkish peninsula only. Do you mean the mid-East or really just the Lesser Part of Roman Asia?
    How about renting a house on 50 scenic acres, part time?
    You would take a guide, would you not?
    Cannot comment on Na pali and I refuse to do an internet search on anything resembling the French phrase, nes pas.
    Been there, done that. Even failed the student who didn’t show for the final.
    Bataan Death March Re-enactment, 2009. Or just go running.
    Am I the only frequent reader now?

  • bkdunn

    1. Well probably. Would it just be me and the seven-year-old? There would be some logistics to work out either way (I’m not sure how many seats will be open in the car for one), but nothing insurmountable I don’t think.

    2. More functional than I could get just by listening to tapes in the car…

    3. I’d self-publish if it came down to it, sure. Although I’m not sure a self-published novel would count against the required five.

    4. Corrected.

    5. Doesn’t qualify. Which isn’t to say I wouldn’t be open to doing *that* at some point as well.

    6. Definitely.

    7. n/a

    8. n/a

    9. Unless there are beheadings, starvation, and drinking from cess pools — and then if there *are*…

    10. Not really. But the others, inexplicably, tend to avoid the light of the comment box.