Personal Log: Rick Clogston

Well, I see that everybody's blogging right now, so I can slip mine in under the radar.

There's been a lot happening lately. Also, my life seems to be a bit different from many in Frontier Fleet. I'm pushing 50 with a family and I have fond memories of my college days, but they were quite a while ago. Those of you in your late teens and early 20's can read this and think, "Dear God, this will never happen to me!"

I recently got promoted, which I'm pretty tickled about. I work for the glorious, beloved United States Postal Service. I've had a weird couple of years in my job. I was a letter carrier for 13 years, and a budget cut eliminated my mail route. I got shuffled into a clerk position, which was pretty cool in itself, because it got me out of a real nightmare of an office into a very good one. Given the change in career tracks, I decided to start trying to move up into the ranks of Postmasters.

Well, I made it! I got my official posting last November, and they've finally hired my replacement in my clerk job, so on April 1 I took over as Postmaster of Enfield Center, NH, 03749. It's a tiny office. I'm the only employee. And, it's exactly what I wanted!

The USPS is a huge beaurocracy, of course. Lots of internal politics. In spite of that, it's a good place to work, and I actually like my job. It may not seem that exciting, but I like people. In my little out-of-the-way, barely-on-the-map out-of-the-loop corner of the universe I can do the job the way it should be done.

Plus, I keep a guitar on a stand right in the middle of my workroom floor. If I feel like plunking away, hey, I'm the boss! If I feel like working through lunch, who's going to stop me?

When I was in college (Uh-oh, here we go. Yeah, you had to walk ten miles to school, uphill both ways, through 17 feet of snow, right?) Ahem! When I was in college, I was a music major. I was going to be a rock star. It was inevitable. After all, I'm a genius.

You've got to remember, this was the early 80's. I graduated high school in '73, took ten years or so to "find myself," which in my case meant the following:

1) Do a lot of drugs.
2) Have a lot of sex.
3) Work up the nerve to actually do what I most wanted to do, no matter what anybody in my family thought of it.

I'm a musician. I sing, and play guitar, and write. I eventually got to California, where there is nobody with my last name or accent. I enrolled in Sacramento City College and took classes that I wanted to take. Music Theory. History of Jazz. Creative Writing. History. Speech. Theatre. Made some friends, wrote some songs, found Jesus, and gigged everywhere that would let me get my axe out of its case.

In the end, it all came to nothing as far as a musical career goes. By that time I was 30. I had two kids and an ex back East, so I came home. Tried to patch up the old relationship and failed. Fell in love with another woman, who's not nearly so jealous of my guitar, got married and had two more kids.

It may sound like my life is over by that one paragraph, but it's really just getting going in good shape. Sometimes it's frustrating, and sometimes it's confusing, but I've learned a lot.

One thing that I've learned is that, while I actually have a fair bit of talent, I'm a lousy salesman. I have absolutely no business acumen whatsoever, especially when the product I'm trying to sell is myself. I've tried working in sales, but it never pans out. I can do the spiel just like I mean it, but if the customer says he doesn't need what I'm selling, I always have to admit that he's probably right.

So I do my music for fun. I'm in a band that plays semi-regularly, and even works on original material from time to time. I also play as a solo act. And, now I have Frontier Fleet to keep my edges sharp in regards to writing prose. I have developed a philosophy of marketing; Peter Pan's Lemonade Stand. I even wrote a song about it, but I'll let you wait until the CD comes out. Basically, Peter Pan is the boy who will never grow up. He takes that which he creates, sets up a little table in his front yard, and anybody who wants some can have some.

I've got enough
I can sell a little bit,
And give a little bit away
I'll grow up
I promise
Right after Judgement Day
If you come by,
I'll help you out
Any way I can
Look for the sign
I'll be sitting right there
At Peter Pan's Lemonade Stand.

Enough for now. Back to your regularly scheduled blogs.

r