Letters From the Deep End: What the Backstory Feels Like While You’re Living It

First published on my Substack, https://plungesociety.substack.com, October 4, 2025.

I call these Letters From the Deep End because that’s where I’m writing from. I’m all in on this dream path, no shallow water, and no easy way back. These letters are me sharing what it looks like from out here.

A few days ago, I woke up in a familiar headspace. Heavy emotions, sinking feeling in my chest, and old fears creeping in. The kind of energy that used to hijack entire weeks of my life.

Thankfully, this time was different. I noticed it early. Years of training myself, paying attention, increasing self-awareness, practicing how to shift my state of mind, have taught me to spot the fog before it swallows me. Back in the day, I’d sink for days or weeks at a time. Now, more often than not anyway, I can catch it and turn it around the same day. And a few days ago, I did just that.

By the afternoon, the heaviness had lifted and the world felt full of possibility again. I must say, it feels so good when that happens.

Seeing the Pattern

I’ve lived this cycle enough times to recognize the pattern: money gets tight, my dreams feel massive, and the gap between where I am and where I want to go feels impossible. It always threatens to crush me.

But patterns don’t have to be punishments. They can serve as clues. Each time this happens, I ask myself, “What are the common denominators? What beliefs, blind spots, or old habits am I clinging to that might be creating this?” Asking those questions doesn’t magically fix things, but it shifts me from victim to detective. And that shift matters.

When you hear the story of someone who’s already achieved their dream, the backstory usually sounds inspiring and motivating. All the setbacks, struggles, and obstacles get woven into a kind of heroic arc. But what we often forget is that in the moment, those challenges didn’t feel inspiring at all. They felt crushing, confusing, sometimes hopeless.

Recognizing that is crucial, because this is the exact point where many people give up. They mistake the fog for the end of the road, instead of a hard but necessary chapter of the story.

Fuel Meets Foundation

I know I have the fire, creativity, and persistence to make my dreams a reality. Even now, the signs are obvious. The question is whether I can build the scaffolding to hold the dream while it grows. Because big dreams need both vision and infrastructure.

That’s why I’ve been leaning into some concrete steps lately. Just a few days ago, I held a celebration of Valerie Doshier’s life, art, and book (Nowhere Near the Middle) at Mama Jo’s Pies and Sweets. It went beautifully. And lately, I’ve sold more copies of Valerie’s book than any of my others. That momentum is encouraging and it’s proof that the dream has legs when I keep moving forward.

Behind the Scenes of the Dream

Right now, I’m working on a new reel (I must get quicker at making these!) about Valerie and the book. It’ll feature her mother, D’Ann, standing before the tribute mural inside the Milburn-Price Culture Museum. The very mural where I first heard Valerie’s story back in 2019. For me, that’s a full circle moment.

I’ve also been putting in practice hours with my Lumix camera, pushing myself to get more comfortable with visual storytelling. I recently downloaded the free version of DaVinci Resolve, a professional-grade editing program and I’m about to dive into learning it.

A couple weeks ago, I worked with a film crew from Legit Productions, a company based in New York City that’s creating a documentary about the story of art in America. I later wrote an article about the experience, which was printed in the Vega Enterprise just a couple of days ago.

One of their videographers flew drones, capturing amazing shots from the sky. Not long after, Greg the Milburn-Price Museum curator, purchased a drone for the museum and handed it to me to learn. I’m still in the early stages (charging batteries, setting up the DJI account, watching training videos) but even that feels like standing at the edge of a something new and amazing.

And then there’s another thread I’m still working on. Yesterday I caught part of an interview with Jim Farley, Ford’s current CEO. He was talking about the intense shortage of automotive technicians — something I know firsthand. I was a Ford technician for 20 years, and the shortage was there my entire career. It’s only worse now. That’s one of the reasons I created From Bay Floors to Backroads: to draw attention to this very real need.

Farley described the problem as complicated. Maybe it’s complex, but I don’t think it’s complicated. A good start would be for manufacturers to listen (really listen, with the intent to act) to the technicians still in the field, and to ask former techs why they left. The insights are already there. It just takes the willingness to hear them.

I’ve been trying to get the attention of a particular nonprofit about this, but so far that hasn’t gone anywhere. If it continues that way, I may have to take matters into my own hands and try reaching out to Ford directly.

Finding Direction in the Fog

Even with all this activity, there are still moments where I reach out for guidance and don’t get a clear answer. In those times, I’ve learned something: the question “How will I survive this?”almost always locks me in paralysis. But the question “What’s the next small step I can do today?” opens my way forward.

Sometimes it’s as simple as writing an article for substack, which reminds me why I do what I do. Sometimes it’s pointing my camera at something ordinary and hitting record. Sometimes it’s opening up DaVinci Resolve and fumbling through the interface. The answers aren’t grandiose and ground-shaking, but they keep me moving and out of the dark feelings.

A few days ago, I woke in a dense fog, the kind that used to swallow me for weeks. This time, I caught it early. I shifted my state. The fog may roll in again, but so will the clarity. And I’m starting to see that this practice—catching myself, resetting, choosing the next step—is exactly what it takes to make my dreams real. These letters come from the deep end, but every time I resurface, I’m a little stronger, a little clearer, and a little closer to the life I’m building.