Day: November 14, 2011

Kinney Road. The road of creation, and of change.

 

Bedlamfarm.com is precious to me, and I consider the website to have two partners – the gifted people at Mannix Marketing, who designed and maintained it from the beginning, the people who read it every day – you. The designers at Mannix are helping me upgrade the site and better reflect my media as a whole – the Journal, Facebook, the Photos, Videos, Blogs I Love, Fullmoonfiberart, and my writing life, books and book tours. Bedlamfarm.com is different than it was five years ago, and every step of the way, Mannix has guided me to the next level. They are also there 24 hours a day, seven days a week, to help out when there’s trouble. I can’t say enough about how I much I enjoy working with them, or how responsible they are for the remarkable growth of the blog.

So this is the first draft of the new design. We are already changing some things. Dropping the “All Things Jon Katz” line at the top, shrinking the size of the grey and blue graphic that borders the site, enlarging the main “Bedlam Farm Journal” photo and posting so that each days’ photo and comment has more impact. I love the interior design, the boxes across the top, the general graphic look of the Farm Journal. Mannix designers and I have a slight disagreement about how many posts to show at once. I’d say one or two so that they wouldn’t all be small and of equal size. I think the photos have a lot of impact – I hear this on the book tour, but we are very close to agreement, and we usually split it in the middle, and  I think the general idea is brilliant. I hope to see a second  draft this week, and I will also share it with you. Here is a link to the first draft, the new site proposal. Come and see. I’m very excited. This focuses all of my blog and website in one place and brings the blog clearly into the present, and to some extent, the future. The blog is not a supplement to my work, it is, in many ways, my work.

Our love for animals is powerful, transforming.

 

Animal Communicator and friend Jeannie Lindheim did a communication with Orson, the border collie (“A Good Dog”) who changed my life and who I decided to euthansize in 2005 after he bit three people, including a child.

Jeannie said she saw Orson as being free, by a big old brown barn, with other animals but no people. He said he loved the freedom in his new life, unbounded space to roam, and he appreciated being free of the expectations of people, with whom he could never get really comfortable, except for me. She said he showed her many painful images of severe fright and mistreatment in his life before he came to me, and he said he wanted me to know that he could not control himself, nor did he understand why he bit and harmed those people. He could not explain it, and had nothing but understanding for what I decided to do. (Jeannie’s communications do not contain human-style drama or confrontation, they are uniformly peaceful and empathic. And safe.)

Orson had been an obedience show dog before he came me and I know he was in some trouble there, so much that the breeder took him back. Jeannie said he came to me angry from a long “confinement,” which I have reason to know is also true. He told her he is very calm now, free and at peace. He showed Jeannie images of horrible treatment, much suffering before, but not now. Now she kept seeing a beautiful old barn, some other animals, but no people, no dogs.

When he came to Bedlam Farm he knew we were both going to go on a journey. He told Jeannie he loved looking at me, wherever he was, wherever I was. It was a soul journey, he said, and he was so glad to be with me. He was he said, alone now,
“I am who I am.” He enjoys his peace, his freedom. He knows I am fine, he knew I would be fine.

He wanted Jeannie to tell me “thank you for my life. Thank you for my life.” For taking me, for saving me, for trying so hard with me, for feeling so much.

He remembers the end, he showed Jeannie an image, when I was lying on the floor with him in the vet’s office, before he died, he remembers me, my face, he was looking at me, at the end. The last thing he saw was my eyes.

I totally understand, he said to me, I have nothing but appreciation. It was okay. I am very peaceful. Jeannie said to me, “he has a great love for you, Jon. A great love.”

___

Next week, communicating with Izzy.

 

 

My longest, and in many ways, most successful book tour ended this afternoon with a talk and signing at SUNY/Adirondack (where Frieda roamed before she was captured) in Queensbury, N.Y. It was a fascinating audience, composed of students, faculty, administrators and area residents. I talked about the life of the writer, creativity and technology, and the challenge of living lives of creative determination in a culture obsessed with warnings,  anxiety and money.

My trek through the Midwest seems a long time ago. More than 2,000 came to hear me read and talk over the course of the book tour, I gave scores of interviews, and the articles and reviews were uniformly generous and praiseworthy.  I was concerned that the tour and the talks would be depressing, but that did not happen. I said all over the country that I wasn’t really good at depressing book or talks, and I consider “Going Home” to be a gentle, healing and affirming work. From what I have been hearing, readers of the book are agreeing with me, and I am glad of that.

I don’t have clear information on sales yet, but I’ve never signed so many books on a book tour or gotten so much response. It feels good. I am happy that the book seems to be helpful to people.

I am cranking up some holiday book activity, continuing our drive to sell 1,000 signed copies of “Going Home” at Battenkill Books, and as we veer towards Christmas, I think we will make it. Connie is getting orders every day. Battenkill’s spectacular success with this book was one of the high points of the tour. I was exhausted last week, but am feeling stronger and getting anxious to finish up “Frieda and Me: Second Chances,” and to start beating the drums for “Dancing Dogs,” my first-ever short story collection, due out in October. Also my second children’s book, “Lenore Finds A Friend,” scheduled for later next year.

So far, this has been a very proud and productive year for, with m y first children’s book, “The Dogs Of Bedlam Farm,” “Going Home,” and my photos and videos (which have gone over the 300,000 view mark). I am re-designing bedlamfarm.com (or Mannix Marketing is, in Glens Falls) and I am loving every minute of the blog, my photos, my expanding work in social media,  and my life on the farm. Next year I will get to work on my book about Simon, and the many issues relating to mercy and compassion that his life and struggles have raised.

I thank all of you for your continuing support, your good words about my writing, photos and blog, and for sharing and supporting my life. We have a special thing going, this writer and the people who follow this particular life. I appreciate you very much. I promise to continue this work, and to openly sharing my own passages, good and bad. Every book tour, I learn that this is valuable work, and I re-dedicate myself to it.

 

People can enslave us, and we can enslave ourselves. I believe I am the choices I make. Every day, I resolve to renew myself. To choose my own life. Make my own decisions. Seek the light, color and love in the world. Support my friends, and accept the gift of friendship. To renounce fear and the people who would profit from it. This is, for me, emancipation, and like all emancipation it is precious, hard-won and in constant need of affirmation and renewal.

 

Heading to SUNY Adirondack Scoville Auditorium to give a noon talk on technology and creativity, and writing on rural life.  Resting up, feeling better. The tick bites got to me. I want to write about the movie “JEdgar,” and men and power, and the Orson communication I did with Jeannie Lindheim Friday, which was lovely. I love the chicken walk with Maria and Meg. Simon ate all the chicken leftovers this morning – grapes, chili, rice. He eats anything.

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Battenkill Books, which now has Paypal, is offering free signed Bedlam Farm notecards and/or a free copy of the “Going Home” video to people who order “Going Home: Finding Peace When Pets Die.” A good way to find an appropriate Christmas gift, and to support a great independent bookstore. You can find Connie Brooks online or call her at 518 677-2515. On December 2, 4 p.m., Lenore and I will be at the bookstore to support the annual Cambridge Christmas parade, take calls and meet people who want copies of “Going Home” signed. I hope we can support independent bookstores as well as large corporations. Nothing wrong with an e-book, but nobody wants to see bookstores going away. We are shooting for 1,000 by New Years. 400 to go. On December 10, I’ll be at Northshire. Thanksgiving weekend I’ll be at Gardenworks, Salem, N.Y.