I think heroic deeds were all conceiv'd in the open air, and all free poems also....
—Walt Whitman, "Song of the Open Road"
Is this Schumpeter's creative destruction at work? SDSU told over a hundred people they no longer have jobs this week. My Web friend Tasiyagnunpa Livermont is among them. Her response to this unpleasant turn of events: an epiphany... and a roadtrip:
I've decided to follow a path that has the trappings of destiny.
Why?
Because, I've had the epiphany that I'm not a secretary (or fundraiser or other profession), I'm a storyteller.
True to that, I am following God's leading into the literal between leaf and sky place&ndashthe open road with my sidekicks and launching a place-specific sustainable living website.
We're travelling all summer, visiting real people of the prairie who are doing amazing things in sustainability at the local, grassroots, home-grown level&ndashbuilding content for the site with stories via word, pictures and video [Tasiyagnunpa Livermont, "Between Leaf and Sky Literally: Goodbye Cottage, Hello Open Road!" Between Leaf and Sky, 2011.04.11].
You are not fully American if you do not feel some tingle at the prospect of an adventure on the open road. I've waxed poetic about travelers and Walt Whitman previously on these pages, and I look forward to seeing Livermont's journal of her peripatetic summer with her two sons.
But that tingle is tinged with honest fear, the visceral twinge we feel watching someone leap off a cliff. Livermont is rummage-saling most of her stuff and setting off at the end of May for a summer under open sky, sleeping with her family every night in a tent, and hoping to find great stories, an audience, and advertisers who can cover her expenses. This leap is a gamble, a huge gamble, a risk very few of us would take.
Tip your hats, neighbors, to this brave storyteller. And Tasi, when you're in Lake County, we have a lakeside cabin for you.
Related: SDSU is cutting its parks management program. Retiring park management professor Russ Stubbles says the program currently has 40 students and a 100% job placement rating. That's 40 more students who will have to leave South Dakota to get their education.
Wow, Cory! Didn't know you'd covered my launch into nomad's land, until I started seeing traffic over on my blog. :) Thanks.
To be clear, I do not know for sure if my position was terminated or not. I, along with many other career service professionals, still do not know that.
Unlike my fellows though who are now waiting for the ax to fall or not, I happened to make this leap days before we found all this out. Turns out I had a plan, before I knew I might need a plan.
May definitely have to stop by Lake County one of these days. :) Take care, and I hope you enjoy my upcoming work, as much as I have enjoyed yours.
--Tasi
P.S. Yes, you're right this is somewhat crazy. But, as I tell my poor mother, it's well-planned crazy.
"well-planned crazy"—sounds like a title for a great business book!