This week, I performed an exercise in social media interactivity and privacy that I thought might help you.

I took the time to divide better than 750 people who are my “friends” on Facebook into categories of access by creating three lists — gold, silver and bronze. The categories are easy to define:

• Gold — All access. No change. The person sees everything. This meant the person is probably related to me, is a close friend or that I’ve had multiple person-to-person or online interactions that resulted in something positive in my life.
   
• Silver — A friend or an acquaintance. I’ve probably interacted more than one time with the person, but don’t know them quite well enough to put into the gold category. However, they receive almost all the same access as gold people.
• Bronze — An acquaintance. Someone with whom I have had very little or zero interaction. Someone I know through an online forum, a high school friend with whom I rarely interact or someone who I bumped into at conference. You can’t see my posts and you have access to a limited amount of information.

Once I divided the people into the three lists, I went into the “manage account” tab of and set the permissions using the “customize” tab, selecting those lists. It took some time, but I could specifically customize access to a great many things, including posts and photo albums. The entire event took about three total hours, including writing this article.

In all of the above, the keyword is “interaction.” The litmus test question was a simple one: Do you comment on my posts, photos or other items placed on my wall? How often? What sort of quality? In dividing up people into these lists, I discovered that:

• There are 266 people on the gold list, 464 on the silver and 22 on the bronze.
• I exorcised about 20 people from my friends list. I also deleted about 15 pages that I followed.
• I know every single one of the 752 people on my friends list through an online interaction or a face-to-face meeting. Or, we’re related.

My proclivity is to continue to give people access to my Facebook information. Some would argue that the 266 are really the ones I should keep. The others I should purge. I disagree. All of the people here connected with me or I connected with them for a reason. Plus, networking is networking, regardless of the platform. Further, I don’t friend everyone who requests it of me and I friend a sliver of those “recommended” to me by Facebook. Meanwhile, I’ve created a “fan” page (or what is now a “like” page) for a more specific purpose.

And while this was a good exercise to take note of the level of interactivity I have with people (and that they have with me), my level of privacy is unchanged. That is, I take care of my privacy settings before I reach the keyboard, not after. There’s a whole litany of things I will not publish on any platform, even email. I’ll continue to that standard on my Facebook wall, on my Twitter feed and elsewhere.

For better or worse, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and other social media sites are giant marketing channels. You market yourself. Others market themselves to you. In effect, you become a brand; a product or service that is marketed to hundreds, maybe thousands. In turn, your followers and friends are marketing and branding themselves with you. You do that in physical space with the way you dress, talk, walk, smile, stand and interact at work and at home.

Meanwhile, those social media channels are now used by credit houses, employers and anyone else with access to find out more about you. Couple that with the flood of information sold about mortgages, addresses and so on as found on a site like Spokeo, and it becomes that much more important to safeguard privacy before I reach for the bullhorn and begin to talk.

With this exercise complete, I now need to see how it works and fine tune it. And again, I’ll emphasize: the lists are about interactivity, not privacy. Privacy is solved before I reach the keyboard, not after. I’m sure I’ll move some people from one list to another. However, this is probably the right solution for privacy and interactivity.

These are some wikipedia legs that look like mine.

Some of you may recall that when I returned from Washington, D.C., my ankles had swollen. I failed to move around enough on the flight across the ocean. I discovered the swelling when I got home.

However, without ever really realizing it, it never retreated from my left ankle. And yesterday (Wednesday, July 13), the swelling was pronounced. So, I saw a doc today. He looked at it and almost immediately referred me to a specialist at the local hospital. So, that happens in the morning.

Based on the amount of swelling, the fact that it’s only one leg and that there’s a lot of fluid from the top of the ankle to the base of my foot, I’m fairly sure I’ve got a month-old case of deep-vein thrombosis.

I am not thrilled.

That usually means there’s a clot in that part of the leg. And that clot could become dislodged and travel elsewhere like my heart, lungs or brain. However, I’ve played three softball games, biked almost 20 kilometers and roughhoused on this leg for better than a month since returning. So far, so good.

I am, however, concerned. It’s an unknown. Best guess is I’ll get some blood thinners. or something else.

Follow up on this Friday.

I know. I wanted to type ‘minotaur’ there, too. Alas, the word I typed is ‘mentor.’

It’s not a word I like, actually. For many years, there were too many people wanting to “mentor” me on how to wear my clothes, cut my hair or act in front of adults. The military is that way. I wouldn’t have minded, but these people were doing the process in reverse. They were, without my permission or interest, choosing to “mentor” me about those things. And that’s not a mentor. That just someone who wants to tell you how it is and then act like a doting father when the whole thing is done. “Look how I fixed him.”

A mentor is someone you find — if you’re lucky. And I was lucky to find three people in my writing career who fit that description. Now, this doesn’t discount countless dozens of other people who have influenced me in one way or another, in both good times and bad. However, these three folks provided the catalyst, the fuel and the flame.

The first was a military supervisor. She ran the military office where I was first assigned. She also wrote nonfiction feature material exceptionally well. I was 19. I wanted to do that, too. So, mostly, I observed and then gleaned what I could from her. Eventually, I stole enough from her writing coupled with a foundation education to start to “get it.”

My second mentor happened along at about the same time. A great writer, he also helped me establish a tone for what I did write and helped mold my attitude toward writing. He helped me try new angles, words, sentence structure. He helped me set up my “style.”

The third mentor came by means of being a newspaper editor. He oversaw about two dozen different newspapers within one military command. He knew quality. He could also spot crap. He also made no bones about telling me when I had the former or the latter (usually, the latter). He made me, at every turn, consider flushing mediocrity out of every sentence on the page.

The mentorship of all three allowed me to eventually earn about 150 different writing awards at a number of levels, military and civilian. I wouldn’t keep this blog or write much of anything at all if those three hadn’t taken some interest in me and what I might do. I think about them almost every time I sit in front of a keyboard and start typing.

I coupled that mentorship and on-the-job training with incessant research and found literary models, too. Yes, I was a dictionary reader. Yes, I was a AP Style Guide reader. And yes, you’ll probably find inklings of Mike Royko, Mickey Spillaine, Michael Moorcock and others flashes of others throughout almost any bits of fiction and nonfiction I pen.

The value of the right mentor can be measured in a number of ways. However, it’s probably best found ow much excitement, passion and life you put into your writing and, in turn, how much excitement, passion and life you give to your readers. There’s also the argument that no one goes it alone, a point with that I completely agree.

So, who’s your mentor and why, and how does he or she help?

All, I’ve created a facebook ‘Fan’ page that you can go ‘like’ and I’d sure appreciate of you would. Here’s the link:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Writing-and-illustration-by-Jason-Tudor/135183246510068

Goal is to try to keep the media happenings in my life in that stream and keep the personal stuff in my personal stream. I hope you’ll ‘like’ the page and give me a little momentum as I begin the query process for a number of stories I’ll have going out.

Thank you!

Carrot. Stick. Carrot. Stick.

There you are. You’re about to sit down and march through two hours of writing. Maybe 200 or maybe 2,000 words in that two hours. You’ll backspace, delete and tap through paragraph after paragraph. The characters will want one thing. You’ll want another. Until, when the cooking timer rings and you look up and, boom, another two hours of writing done.

So, what’s your reward for finishing those two hours? For that matter, do you reward yourself after a good bit of prose?

I do. Actually, I have two.

The first is that I gloat about what I’ve just written to my wife. She nods her head, points out flaws and gets me thinking about the next writing session. However, usually, once done, I get the carrot. The two hours with the keyboard and characters is the stick.

The second: five Oreos and a large, cold glass of milk. Really. That’s my material reward.

Now, I know. I’m not 9 years old. And five Oreos are the dietary equivalent of jamming a large cork into an artery. However, that’s my reward.

If I’ve felt I’ve done well. And, eight times out of 10, I usually do well. If I haven’t, then that’s what revisions are for.

So, fess up. Carrot or stick – what’s your reward for a good writing session?

There is, I think, a responsibility to writing. To some, it might be called a duty, like military service or serving with the Peace Corps. For others, writing might be nothing more than a hobby, time used to scribble a few poems or scratch out an essay or two.

Given what I’ve mentioned, the responsibility can vary by degree. Let’s look at some examples:

• For some, writing is a requirement. It is engrained. Writing is the means of communicating the ideas in their heads to whatever audience will listen. Therefore, those people must write. Given those conditions, that writer grinds away at churning syntax. Food be damned. Relationships be damned. Other interests be damned. The writer has become responsible to those ideas in his or her head, and there is no turning away from what must be done. Time, money and resources are all pointed at accomplishing those goals.
• From those most fervent (see above), we move to those people somewhere in the middle. These are many of my friends. They “write on the side” and much of what we hear via Twitter or Facebook postings that they simply do not have the time to write (at whatever moment) are usually those encumbered with other responsibilities. Those might include a career doing something separate, a spouse, children, illness both mental and physical, education or a number of other duties that gobble time and resources.
• Still others may like to write and do something else. Their passion for writing is as fierce, but they may have other passions like archeology, Warhammer and sailing. They like to write. They do write, but Rome will not fall if they do not finish those paragraphs this week. Their portfolios are replete with hobbies and adventures, and writing may just be a means of recording the memories of everything else.
• And don’t forget the quiet ones. They may be scared for success or failure. There’s also the idea they might be shy people, able to read and consume their own stories, but are reluctant to give them to others. A friend of mine in Colorado is  Julliard-brilliant classical guitar player. It took me two years just to get him to play one song for me. He plays for himself and his wife. That’s it. That makes him no less brilliant a player nor does it mean the fire isn’t there to play. We probably hear less from these folks because they are honing their skills without advertising it to us through a social media platform.
• Finally, there are people who just like to hang out with writers because they have  imagination, initiative and direction. These people say they are writers, too. However, they are probably writers in the same way that Justin Bieber a thoroughbred jockey. They talk a lot about writing. They even concede to be working on something now and then. However, it is rare that you hear about an actual query letter written let alone sent. Their responsibilities have nothing to do with communication of ideas to audience. Rather, they are clutching onto a dream, living vicariously through someone else’s success.

I find myself somewhere in between. My desk is littered with notes and outlines of ideas for stories. However, my budget of time and resources for writing, especially lately, is minute. I still feel a tremendous responsibility to get these ideas, plots, stories and anecdotes from my head into something everyone can see. I also have a burgeoning career, a spouse and a 4-year-old daughter. I discover that I must program the time or I won’t get it. Worse planners and those less assertive might have even worse luck in letting those other responsibilities gobble them up.

So, your turn. Where do you sit in the hierarchy above? Or, did I miss one? Tell me in the comments.

I’ve created an audio version of my blog post over at An Army of Ermas (Click the ‘play’ arrow below to start it or click the nearby link to download it). If you are listening and like it, then ‘Like’ it on to your Facebook page (see the button above?) or give the link to a friend. Be sure to tell a friend about An Army of Ermas. Enjoy!

It hit me like something of a sledgehammer after listening to one of my favorite songs.

Playing Sammy Hagar’s “Three Lock Box” gives me nothing but sheer joy every time it pops onto my music player. However, I never really knew what the song was about. I just figured it was a great rock jam with obscure lyrics often written by musicians while they are hysterically high. However, I found this quote about “Three Lock Box” by Mr. Hagar that gave me something of an epiphany about my writing. I’ve bolded the breakthrough:

“It’s got to do with deep sea diving, when you look for a buried treasure. The ultimate treasure would be a sunken treasure with three locks on it, because that means it was the most valuable stuff that the queen had on that ship. And you need three different guys with keys to open it, that way no one could steal it. So a ‘Three Lock Box’ to me is within yourself. If you unlock the treasure of your physical, and your mental and your spiritual potential – those three in balance – you are a real human being and almost godly.”

We heard different versions of this growing up in the military, too — take care of your physical, mental and spiritual sides. I’m a big believer in that, though I admit to not doing it as well as I could have over the course of my life. But it occurs to me that in writing — fiction and nonfiction, these three facets exist. Without at least two of the three, the writing fails. Let’s look at how all three work together.

Physical. The nuts and bolts of the manuscript have to be in place. Knowledge of language and vocabulary. Sentence structure. Spelling. Punctuation. Grammar. Rhythm. Pace. It all has to be there before I can even submit the manuscript for query to an agent or a publisher. Without those things, the writing will never get a sniff, let alone a review. The better the “physical workout” I can give to the manuscript — writing, editing, reviewing over and over again until it just cannot be done anymore — the better. This starts with a foundation of education and research. It continues when the thing actually gets written. For this bit, Harlan Ellison rings true: “People on the outside think there’s something magical about writing, that you go up in the attic at midnight and cast the bones and come down in the morning with a story, but it isn’t like that. You sit in back of the typewriter and you work, and that’s all there is to it.”

Mental. The work has to be smart. While there are no hard fast rules, editors and readers will uncover poor writing. So it’s about research research research because there are few things for which I am a subject-matter expert. That also means understanding my genre. It means understand police procedures, how a court of law works, how a B-52 flies, the ins and outs of military ranks, or whatever I’m writing about. There’s also the notion that being mentally prepared means a better than avreage plot twist, following the three-act rule or other notions (though I am a believer in the no hard and fast rules rule, as mentioned). Still, once you start laying down particularly colored paving stones in a specific arrangement, your readers want to know where you’ll lead them and they’ll want to to eyeball everything along the journey.

Spiritual. While not necessarily mandatory,I like my writing to have a certain passion. Soul. Mojo. There’s something to being invested so wholly in a work you get lost in it. Yep, there’s a mechanical process to writing (the physical), but there’s something about believing the work will matter. To someone. As author Jean Houston said, “Stories are living and dynamic. Stories exist to be exchanged. They are the currency of Human Growth.” Now, not every piece of writing will incur this sort of emotional tariff. However, I’m a believer that the more sheer energy I exert on behalf of a written work, the better a chance it has to see a reader’s eyes.

As always, I’d refer you to the Absolute Write forums for some guidance from agents, published authors and those who’ve bloodied their hands with this.  I’m a big believer that the best balance of all three of these things gives a work it’s best chance at success, and I’m glad the Red Rocker gave me a chance to say it.

So, what do you think? How do you see your writing habits fitting into this?

Just back from nine days in Washington D.C. It’s an 18-hour day to get there from here (Germany) and a 15-hour day coming back (go jet stream!). The journey included a car ride, two bus rides and an airline flight. Just a few observations from the trip, mostly done with tongue in cheek but I figure you’ll spot the ones I mean business on:

• From bum to hustler, from politico to pollster, everyone is D.C. has a wireless phone. EVERY FREAKING ONE. And the thing is, everyone seemed to carry it in one hand or the other. Not on the holster. Not in a purse. Right on the palm. That also meant that when people weren’t on their phones, their heads were down awaiting some text, Facebook update, Foursquare beep or scrolling through Twitter. Inevitably, if they hadn’t had phones in their hands, all of these people looked like their dogs had been run over by cars. And by the way, there just aren’t enough ads for wireless phones on television. A few more, please. PS, I did not have my iPhone for the week. It was refreshing.
• Better than a week in the U.S. still proves one thing: we ain’t gonna care for soccer anytime soon. We just don’t like it. Soccer to us is piling the kids in a minivan, taking them to a field and letting them kill two hours on an event where the score doesn’t matter. It’s easily played and easily won or lost with little consequence. We groom our children for football, baseball and basketball because, in the United States,  the money moves that direction. Further, we simply don’t have ahistory with it. Baseball history dates back to the 19th Century and football to the early 20th. There’s also this: the circles that control gambling on our big three sports have no hand in betting on soccer outside the United States, and vice versa. There will be no gentlemen’s agreement anytime soon on that. So, until it’s worth making a bet on, soccer in the U.S. is nothing more than less curious version of Michael Phelps every four or so years.
• If a first-class hotel whose namesake also gave Mitt Romney his first name is going to round out the full guest experience, then it should do one thing and not do another. The thing that it should do is have an Internet connection that is slightly faster than the 2400 baud modem I had in high school. This Internet connection made morning traffic on the Beltway look like a George Lucas-made pod race. Now, The thing that the hotel should not do is paint the building while it’s filled with guests. It smelled like a chemical bath in a woman’s nail salon and almost forced two of the people I was traveling with to get another hotel room for the night. It would have made “The Biggest Loser” dirty workout laundry bin smell like a flower shop.
• For the first time ever, my ankles swelled up when I got home from the trip. Now, this has nothing to do with our particular airline turning into the ‘Sanford and Son’ of passenger carriers. Nor did it have anything to do with the American side of boarding the airplane, from ticket counter to seat, which was surprisingly smooth. Rather, I forgot to get up and walk around. However, I blame two other things. First, I am a full 75 inches tall. A six fot three inch drink of water. My seat is apparently made toddlers, Hobbits and anyone Tom Cruise’s size. I have to fold myself like a patio chair just to get into one of the seats. It’s not pleasant. if and when my knees do fail me, I’ll have them removed below the ankle if only so I can sit comfortably on the next generation of economy seating. Who am I kidding? They will be stacking us like plywood and serving us nonpotable water with a ladle and calling it “service” by then. The other reason is simply that I did not drink enough water. In any case, my wife saves me again (elevate and hydrate). Be sure to do the same for yourself.

Also, thanks to everyone who made it out for the extravaganza Saturday night. I wish I could have stayed longer, but jet lag told me to go get my shine box. I didn’t have much of a reply.

Any similar experiences? What’s on your mind?

My blog will idle for a few days. I’ll be in Washington DC starting June 5. I’ll touchdown in the afternoon. That evening, we’re having a get together that will start at the Washington Marriott and go somewhere for there. It’ll be a meetup of Air Force folks and many writer friends, many of whom I’ve never met. I’m excited to meet you and look forward to whatever trouble we can cause. Wanna come? Info in two spots, here and here.

That week is also special because I’ll be part of a team showing off the democratic process of the United States to about 85 people from as many as 40 countries. We get to meet a Supreme Court justice (and see the Supreme Court), go to FBI, Department of State and the Pentagon, among others. I’ll be writing stories, print and video, throughout the week. I hope you’ll have a look as the U.S. federal government is revealed to these folks. I’ll be cataloging their impressions and attempting to show you, what we hope, is some transformation and or greater insight. I’ve done this trip once before, and it was fantastic. So, please be sure to visit the George C. Marshall European Center for Security Studies and its Facebook page for details.

Unless something transformational pops up, see you here in about a week.