What's Up with Nimble Spirit

I’m sure that many of you have noticed that there hasn’t been much new activity at Nimble Spirit lately, so I’d like to offer a bit of an explanation.

As you may be aware, Nimble Spirit is largely the work of one person — me. I have help from a handful of volunteer writers and friends and contributors, but getting it done depends on my being able to find the time and energy to pull it together.

Over the past several weeks, going back to November of 2006, I have been preoccupied with the task of finding a new job. Back in 2003 I relocated my family from Minneapolis to the Boston area to take the job of editorial director of a publishing company owned by a small religious order based in Cambridge. The order was yearning to grow its audience, its sales, and its offerings. All of which were good goals. It took some time to get all the pieces and personnel in place to effect the company’s turnaround. But a year into the 3-to-5 year turnaround that the monastics had so deeply desired, at a time when the work of the staff was beginning to bear noticeable fruit in sales figures and in the company’s raised profile, the monastics suddenly changed their priorities. Rather than work hard to grow a vital business, the monastics decided to focus their efforts on quickly raising millions of dollars through donations so as to make infrastructural changes to their buildings, as well as add on to those facilities. So the fewer-than-twenty men who make up this monastic order, which is financed by a rather healthy endowment/portfolio and has its donated HQ on a piece of donated land that would command a price in the many many millions if it were to be commercialized, put four hard-working professionals out of their jobs, alienated dozens of authors, sold their inventory and most of their forthcoming book contracts to another publishing entity, canceled other contracts, wiped their hands of it, and put their noses to the grindstone of getting money for nothing so they can improve the manner in which they live behind the cloister wall.

So I’m looking for a new job.

The past few months have been filled with that activity, along with working for the monastics up to the bitter end to effect as good a transition as possible for the sake of the books and their authors. My time has also been filled with an intense experience of grieving, of dealing with the utter sense of being betrayed by colleagues while trying to maintain a professional demeanor with these individuals just the same.

I consequently have not had much energy for adding material to Nimble Spirit, and I apologize to readers who have come here hoping for something new. I hope to get back on track soon, and I am also working on a business plan with the goal of taking the site to the next level and perhaps create something really quite special, with more interactivity and a variety of additional types of content. All of this goes on in the context of staying sane and making ends meet — and going through my resume umpteen times and writing umpteen cover letters to go with it and viewing site after site of job listings, etc., etc. I hope to be able to report soon of success of some sort or another, as well as get Nimble Spirit moving again. Thanks for your patience, your interest, and your support.