You know that expression “I’m not looking for a handout”?  It’s usually uttered by someone who in fact is asking for something for nothing.  Seriously, that isn’t my goal here.  There is an offer embedded in this blog.  Keen readers will find it.  It may or may not be underlined to help the less keen of you.  

I’m already 90% sure this will not work, but I’m still young enough to believe the world is filled with more good than apathy.

There is a lot about this world that I do understand (commas, baseball, changing diapers to name a few), but there is an abundance of knowledge that I do not know nor probably will ever know.  I know this.  I know I won’t know it.  Okay..getting off-track.

I understand that people with money have worked hard for it.   That is, except for the “silver spoon” kids.  

I understand that perhaps the most sound advice taken from literature is at the end of the first paragraph of The Great Gatsby.  (look it up!)

I understand that taxes are necessary in our country to keep progress as a real and viable possibility.  

I understand that there are those who have taken the time to learn the system and have developed avenues or procedures to sidestep laws/tax codes that would prevent them from having as much as they have.  Most of these people employ gardeners for their summer homes.

I understand that the world’s wealthiest people probably do experience stress.  Maybe even a level of stress the middle- and lower-class cannot fathom.

I understand that there are those who have worked hard to gain fortune when just a generation or so ago within their families, they had next to nothing.  Savvy minds get rewarded, for the most part; I get all that.

So, here’s my attempt:

I understand that my older brother and I have immediately become characters in an Adam Sandler movie.  

I understand that, if the world’s top 1600 individuals donated $1 apiece to her, my mom would not face losing her house.

If you’ve stuck around so far and/or you know me at all, you might have shaken your head at the above sentence.  

I am the first to admit that I have mishandled money in my lifetime.  I have splurged irresponsibly and I have treated myself to far too many caramel frappucinos and an occasional sausage biscuit.  Please do not forward the previous sentence to my doctor or my mom.  They will be disappointed.  

Had I deprived myself of these far-too-frequent self-indulgences, perhaps I wouldn’t be inspired to write today’s post. In that world, perhaps I would have access to the funds needed to prevent foreclosure on my childhood home. I’m a fairly proud person, and I’ve debated whether or not to take the time to write this.  I am by no means in a unique situation.  However, the recurring advice from successful people does not include words like “keep your mouth shut” or “just have faith.”   I’m a father, a boyfriend, a son, a brother, an uncle, a teacher, and the grandson of one of the most remarkable women you’ve never met.  I want to leave this world in a better position that it was in when I arrived.  So…here goes.

I also fancy myself as a budding writer.  The problem, if it is one, is that I’ve been saying that about myself for 1.5 decades and have only a single sentence in a defunct writer’s magazine couple with about fifteen sales of an e-book I posted online over two years ago to show for it.  

This isn’t a sob story, though.

I feel like I make an average living, and as much as I like to write, I’m not aspiring to become anything more than published.    This isn’t about me, however.  It’s about an attempt to do something that perhaps no one has done.

This is the part you should be reading, Huffington Post.  This part now.

My family needs a little money.  I’m going with “little” here because anyone who ever reads this who has been to a Gala (no one in my family and probably not my small circle of friends) has the chance to do something heroic.

My aforementioned grandmother loved so much, but one of her favorite things in the world was to watch White Christmas during the holidays.  I, however, became an instant fan of It’s a Wonderful Life.  I’m no George Bailey–far from it, really–but this is a chance for my family to emerge from financial strain (at least a little bit) that will take a moment like the one in the end when everyone in town rallies to save the selfless hero.  

I’ve written a few books, and they are now for sale.  Well, the rights to them, anyway.  

If legally possible, I’d be willing to sell the rights to my e-book for $500.  Too much?  Just remember, publishers, this raw material is what the true hipsters will dig for one day.  The better stuff is coming up. 

I wrote a book about ten years ago shortly after my grandmother’s passing called Face Up for Luck.  It’s finished and polished (for the most part), but I’m flexible on the content.  Sale price:  $1,600 for all rights. Forever.  When people tire of Nicholas Sparks films, some wide-eyed youngster will want to put this on the big screen.  It’s all yours for the price of a ’92 Fiesta.

My second novel is called Twenty Bucks and is a loose, fictoionalized version of what my mom went through in a less-than-ideal marriage in the 70s.  I’m about 60K words in and can have that finished by Christmas 2013.  Today’s price:  $2,500.  That’s right, buying all three so far is less than $5K.  Sick! (as the kids say)

Did you know people like Donald Trump tip bathroom attendants more that this amount?  I just made that up!

My most recent novel is an experimental raw piece called These Oranges are Incredibly Cancerous.  I read a lot of Eggers and D. F. Wallace, so I went a little crazy with the title.  It feels about one-third to halfway finished.  It could be 600 pages by the time it’s over.  Price and time-frame:  Negotiable.

PUBLISHERS:  Seriously, has anyone attempted this before?  My experience with the publishing world consists of about a dozen how-to books alongside nine rejection letters I used to hang up beside my computer for motivational purposes.  Thus, if I’m just another amateur/hack who has wasted the last seventy-seven seconds of your life, please forgive me.  

I’m 37.  If I die unpublished knowing that Snooki had a book published and I didn’t, my future wife will have to explain some really insane things to our son.  

Fire sale begins as soon as I hit Publish Post.  

Friends Old and New:  Thank you so much for at least reading this.  Please feel free to continue your lives of sausages and frappucinos.  

Love, 

Steve