Blogging, Publishing and One Writer’s Perspective

 

Back in May, I wrote an article for my blog View From My Loft, the article Legendary Badass Bikers (https://daneladwig.wordpress.com/2012/05/09/legendary-badass-bikers/) is my perspective of what constitutes a “biker” and the biker lifestyle. Within a day of posting the article, I was receiving praise and encouragement. One enthusiastic reader said, “This should be published!” I thought, Well it is published. When I posted it on my blog, it was published.

This past week I was notified that the article was indeed published once again in Midwest Sports Review (http://midwestsportsreview.com/motorcyclesall-shapes-and-speeds/). After accessing the reasons why I did not submit the article for publication in the first place, and why I decided to post it to my blog, to my surprise, this is what I came up with…

 

Most authors would get their underwear all in a tizzy if their work had been published without “written consent and authorized approval.” Legal departments at conventional publishing houses would have a field day with unauthorized published work. As far as I am concerned, at this juncture in my writing career, it is an honor to be considered worthy of a mention, on any platform. Perhaps, if I ever reach the status of such greats as Stephen King, Clive Barker, Anne Rice, or J.K. Rowling, I may desire to protect my work a bit closer, but for now, publish away!

 

So why didn’t I submit the article for publication first, or the sixty-five other articles I have written and posted to my blog? It’s simple. My blog is my outlet, nothing more than a place I go to rant and rave, adore and admire, post and review. It sounds bad, but I do not put much thought or labor into my blog postings, I just ramble and write about what is on my mind at the particular time. That day it just happened to be about the origin and history of Legendary Badass Bikers.

 

I have written a about myriad of topics and people have said that is why they appreciate my blog, “it offers versatility”. The blog is my escape from the monotony of writing my manuscript and it offers me an escape from the daily doldrums, which causes many authors to contract writers block. If I am facing a moment when I am at a loss for words, and I feel I am not productive or my manuscript seems monotonous, I switch gears and head to my blog – like now – and I begin writing about something totally unrelated to my manuscript. It gets me back on track and this tactic has not failed me yet!

 

I started my blog one year ago. It generates approximately 1200 views a month (give or take). I have 200 subscribers who follow my blog via email. I try to post a new article every two to three days. I am very satisfied with the feedback I have received and more elated over the interest my blog creates. I really do not comprehend, in this high-tech fast-paced computerized day and age, how a writer, such as me, could not maintain a blog; it offers such a great platform for honing your writing skills and it also gives you plenty of contact with an audience and a place to exhibit your work.

 

I don’t believe I will ever submit my blog articles for publication, as they are meant for the (free) viewing of the audience they generate. To me, offering my articles (free of charge) to the interested viewer is very important, because it helps me to remember where I came from. I could be the wealthiest author in history, and you will still be able to read my blog, no charge, no fee, no hidden charges or twists. After all, if not for my readers, I would just be, as I am now, another starving artist trying to make his or her mark on society.

Good Reads My Friends…

 

 

Legendary Badass Bikers

Remember the days of the Big Hairy Badass Biker with the “Live to Ride Forever” attitude with the long beard and the long hair to match and a body full of tattoos? Those bikers who rode from sunup to sundown, from town to town looking for, well, nothing, just riding with no particular destination in mind. They were society’s outcast; the ones your parents said, “Don’t look at them,” when you were in the family sedan or station wagon, on a Sunday drive while you were stopped at a red light. They were mesmerizing and there was no way you could take your eyes off of them. The rumble and the roar of their motorcycles would make your guts shake, your eyes bug out, and your hair stand on end. They were societies rejects… the loners.

Those hardcore badasses, for the most part, have been replaced. Today, when someone admits to being “a biker” all too often they are white-collar middle-class urban clone conformists who are under the impression that simply owning a motorcycle qualifies one as a biker. I ask, does it? Does the fact that a dentist who graduated at the top of his class, married his high-school sweetheart, drives a Lexus or a Saab during the week, owns a four bedroom, ten room house, located on two acres of property, where his three healthy teenage children who have been on the honor roll since they were in pre-school have plenty of room for weekend pool parties, does he have the right to call himself “a biker”?

I suppose that all depends on what constitutes a biker! I grew up believing that if you were a biker, it was a lifestyle, not a weekend choice. At a very young age, I embraced the biker lifestyle. Sure, I had my moments of identity confusion, as everyone does. When I needed to “find myself” I jumped on my motorcycle and hit the road. I’ve been riding since I was nine-years-old. At the age of thirteen, I hoped on my dad’s motorcycle and, without his knowledge, and I took it for a spin. Yeah so it was a Honda, but a 750 for a thirteen-year-old kid was pretty damn huge.

I have owned motorcycles all my life, all kind of motorcycles, from dirt bikes, to crotch-rockets, to choppers and cruisers. For the past ten years, I have been riding an overpriced Harley, and I love it! Does owning a Harley make me a biker? No! I would like to dispel a couple other myths about bikers. Alcoholism and drug addiction are not a prerequisites to being a biker. I will not lie, I enjoy a good brew, and there was a time in my life I would “party like it’s 1999”, but hey, that happens. Alcoholism and drug addiction happens with a lot of people who have never ridden a motorcycle in their lives and have no desire to ride.

All old-school badass bikers are in biker gangs! I don’t know how many times I have been asked by non bikers, “So, what gang do you ride with?” Again, you’ll get the truth with me. Not everyone on a bike with long hair and tattoos rides in a “gang”, as a matter of fact, most do not. I normally respond to this query by saying, “I’m with GOA.” To which the reaction is, “Wow! That’s so freekin’ cool… what’s GOA?” I retort, “Gang of One!”

To embrace the biker lifestyle is to embrace the biker code established by motorcycle “clubs” not gangs, which was defined and popularized back when I was born in the 1950’s (the first club was actually the Triumph Owner’s Motorcycle Club in 1949, which spawned the rise of motorcycle clubs). The creed was a simple one; loyalty to the club, loyalty to the brotherhood, and above all else – honor before dishonor. Much the same as the creeds shared by servicemen; after all, the idea for biker clubs, and old-school bikers, are derived from the Armed Forces.

The real question one has to ask if he or she wishes to consider himself or herself a biker is; are they willing to accept and live by the biker creed – loyalty to ALL bikers, loyalty to their biker brothers and sisters everywhere – and are they/you willing to bring honor to the lifestyle of bikerhood?

Acting foolish and weaving in and out of traffic, speeding ferociously down the highway in the middle of rush hour traffic, and popping wheelies on a residential street where children play and pulling stunts, those acts when done void of consideration and respect, dishonor motorcycling and bikers. I have done each one of those things, but I now realize there is a time and a place for such cutting loose. If you wish to place yourself in harm’s way, so be it, but the deaf kid playing down the block who cannot hear you speeding down his happy little street, nor can he see you riding your wheelie because his head is looking at the ants on the curb where every little boys head should be, doesn’t deserve to die for your idiocracy.

To be a biker is to be “cool”, and cool is not being an asshole! That’s not to say you should take shit from anyone, I’m merely suggesting you don’t give someone shit undeservingly; that’s uncool! The coolest thing I had ever witnessed; there was elderly women with one of those pull carts full of groceries and she couldn’t make it across the street. Each time she took a step off the sidewalk to attempt a breakaway across the street another car would come by, scarring her back to the street. This went on for several minutes. Embarrassing to say, I did not pay much attention until a big burly beer-guzzling old-school biker tramp hopped off his ride, walked up to the frightened old woman, stopped traffic, and assisted her across the street. She smiled as he pulled away. Now that my friends… is the epitome of a cool biker. Perhaps you don’t have it in you to be cool, why didn’t I jump of my scooter and help the old woman? I can’t say. But my point, just don’t be an asshole!

And for all the non bikers out there… once you get past the stereotype; the leathers and long hair in contrast to the cardigan and manicured nails, the loud pipes on our two wheels compared to blending into a sea of four wheel gas-guzzling bumper-to-bumper traffic, we bikers really are regular folks experiencing the same issues as everyone else, we just have a better way, a different way, of dealing with it – we have our community, our hairy badass biker brothers and scooter tramp sisters, who are loyal to our cause!

This has been a… View From My Loft