"Nothing an Hour of Surfing Can't Fix" by Randell Jones

– “I hope it’s not Bry Dog”
He was excited, said he’d be back in touch.

 – “I hope it’s not Bry Dog”

He was excited, said he’d be back in touch.

 

Randell Jones is an award-winning history writer of the Revolutionary War and pioneer eras and North Carolina history. He is the author of Before They Were Heroes at King’s Mountain and In the Footsteps of Daniel Boone, among others. In 2017, he created the Personal Story Publishing Project and in 2019 the companion “6-minute Stories” podcast to help other writers. You can find his work at www.BecomingAmerica250.com and connect with the Personal Story Publishing Project at RandellJones.com . He lives in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

Author’s Talk

Randell Jones

In the spring of 2022 while we were receiving submissions from writers across the country for the collection which became “Twists and Turns,” I participated in an online program offered by the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning in Lexington, Kentucky. A few of our (PSPP) Kentucky writers participate in the programs of CCLL. Good people. That’s how I came to find myself on a Zoom call with John, the subject of my story. His wife was also participating in this memoir writing class of just five or six students. Not everyone lasted longer than the first few sessions. 

With a small group, we learned something about each other more quickly than had we been a larger group. John was an interesting character and well accomplished in the culinary arts. That was where he expressed his creativity, but he wanted to learn how to put down on paper some stories from his life. I suppose that is a motivation all of us can understand. Moments of our lives that we just know we will never forget are soon supplanted by a cacophony of other seemingly signature moments, all competing for the declining number of memory pegs we have on which to hang one good story or another. Thus does writing ride to the rescue and offer us a chance, if not to cheat death, at least to let us thumb our noses at it by passing along for our progeny or the world at large some measure of who we are—or were—and how we saw things, loved life, and made our own glorious messes as humans.  

I suppose that was what John wanted to do. And he got started with his first story, “There’s Nothing an Hour of Surfing Can’t Fix.” I’m glad he wrote it down. I’m glad we have this one. I’m sure he never thought—we never think—there will not be another.  

And so, we write. Every day. As often as we can. And “print it out,” I preach. At least those who find your work printed out will be able to read it. They will know what it is. And for those of us who have our earliest writings stored away on 3-1/2 inch “floppies,” good luck to future generations with finding the Rosetta Stone for that.  

Perhaps this anxiety over missing stories is more keenly on my mind this early March because we are on the cusp of releasing our latest collection from the Personal Story Publishing Project. The theme for our forthcoming 8th collection is “Lost & Found”: personal stories of loss and discovery—trials, serendipity, and life after.” I would hate to think that we might not have all these stories for you to read, to consider, and to respond in some way in your own life. And, if your response is to write a story, then we have accomplished our goal.

Be safe. Spread kindness.
Keep writing. That is the one important thing. —Randell Jones