Some thoughts on changing direction

The letter below is a response I wrote to Alan Gage on his blog. After writing it, I realized a few of my own blog readers might find it interesting. Alan is a young man whose family owns an automobile repair shop like mine in Estherville, Iowa. I’ve known his father Roy for a number of years online, and I’ve recently met Alan, who has set out to travel the country in his van. He’s got a blog about the journey here http://alangage.blogspot.com/2007/09/new-plan.html

To Alan:

I’m not surprised to hear that you want a new career. Having read your father’s stories for many years on IATN, it’s clear there more than cars in his own life and probably yours, too. Both you and your father have shown a talent for writing, and you obviously like going out and having different life experiences, so perhaps you’d enjoy reporting and writing. Maybe books, maybe newspapers, maybe online. There’s real promise in the storytelling I see from both you and your dad.

I too am in the midst of changing careers, or perhaps more accurately, adding a new career to the ones I’ve already accumulated. I’ve run Robison Service (my automobile shop) for 20+ years, but I always looked for something more. For the past ten or so years, I’ve told friends and customers that I wanted to get out of commerce and do something that benefits society. And I wanted to do something creative.

I took up photography but I could not see a good path to turn it into a living. So many photographers just barely scrape by. I thought of other things, but I just never got moving. And my commitments to my family and company tied me to the local area.

Then my brother, my friends and family encouraged me to write a book, and I decided to give it a try. The result, Look Me in the Eye, has been amazingly well received. It goes on sale everywhere in just over a week. My publisher has sent out copies to reviewers and booksellers and responses from readers have already started coming in.

Those responses, things like, “Your book is a window into the mind of my non-verbal child” have come to mean more to me that anything customers at our car company may say. Because I now see that cars are just cars, and a book that touches people and gives them hope or inspiration will always be more important in many ways.

The cars I fix will, for the most part, be recycled into lawn chairs, tin cans, and dishwashers in ten years. But my books will live on, in libraries, homes, and bookstores. Even online. If my voice is an inspiration to a young person today, it will still be inspirational to young people when I am gone. Given a choice, who wouldn’t choose such a legacy?

It’s hard to read letters from readers telling me how my story inspired them, or helped their child, or helped them be a better teacher, and then try to find enthusiasm for talking about changing water pumps in the shop. There’s a whole different level of caring from readers to customers, at least in those instances.

And yet the shop has brought many wonderful people into my life, and I’ve loved machines all my life too. So I’m not really ready to walk away from it, but I am ready to step back a bit. I’m ready to be an inspiration and a figurehead, as it were, while I let our younger staff take over the daily tasks. I’m ready to focus on the wonderful custom projects that I love – the six hundred horsepower Bentleys or the mountain climbing Land Rovers – and leave the routine service and repair work to our crew.

And as an aside, it’s those project cars that will be a vehicular legacy for me – collector vehicles that leave our shop and live forever, or at least a long time, in the hands of enthusiasts who love them as they would a devoted pet.

With that realization, I find the whole trajectory of my life is changing. Everything I thought was constant – career, places, people – all is about to change. My destiny, at least for now, is to be a writer. The only uncertainty is, how will I make a living? Will I sell enough books to support myself? We’ll soon see . . .

For now, it’s a real struggle, because I have to help the car company grow up and find its way with less input from me. It’s almost like watching a child growing up and leaving home. I don’t know what direction it will take, but with all the publicity that will soon surround me and my book, it will have many options. As will I, personally.

The people at the company have the biggest opportunity of their lives, but a lot of uncertainty too. So it’s an anxious time all around. But I think both they company and I will make this transition successfully. I’ll continue to be a source of inspiration and ideas, and I’ll meet and talk to fellow car enthusiasts, but I’ll be a step back from doing the actual work.

Now, to get back to writing . . .

The fact that this book sprang forth from me, at age fifty, should be an inspiration to you, Alan, and anyone else who wonders if they can change direction in their own life. My book is proof one can reach inward and change direction in very fundamental ways. It sounds like you want more from life, too, and I hope you find it in your travels.

Sometimes people change, and all of a sudden what they have isn’t enough. And many times, the “enough” is a spiritual thing, not a material one. One can be quite affluent, and still have little connection to humanity at large. Many folks become lost when that happens. Some, like me, are able to choose a new path and follow it. I think being Aspergian helps me in that regard.

If the “more” in your own life is indeed a spiritual thing, there are many paths to fulfillment. Creative work, writing, photography, film making . . . those are obvious directions. Some take up missionary work, and there are many causes one can support with missionary zeal – it’s not just about religion. There’s the search for cures, teaching our children, fixing our cities. There’s even politics. Others join aid organizations and help the less fortunate in the third world. The Internet offers limitless opportunity for creative expression. There are many possibilities, and you just need to find the right one for this point in your own life. The four careers I’ve had in my thirty year working life should show that choices like these needn’t be the “only one” or the “forever one.” I wish you luck with your search, and I hope you do make it to New York for my appearance on the 25th as you wrote me yesterday.