I was sixty-seven and retired. I had spent most of my life in the real estate development business, captain of my own ship much of that time – yes, ouch! But for the past ten years, I had been engaged as a full time au pair for my daughter, Molly. Her three boys kept me hopping, but not continually, so I had some free time on my hands. I first began to think of writing on some level in early 2008. A close childhood friend - a professor of English Composition at a mid-western university - was having some difficulty getting published (an achievement so important in the world of higher education) and had resigned herself to merely being an excellent teacher. I was familiar with her professional activities and her myriad approaches to teaching. Among others, she taught composition in partnership with various business professors teaching those budding accounting students how to write – an obvious, but not often effectively taught, required skill for reaching real life success. Because of our friendship, I worked hard to understand the basic concepts of her profession so that I could be a bit of a sounding board for her. In that effort I lobbied her to write about that particular teaching approach, that is, blending composition classes with other vocational college class work. It is, of course, easy to see why composition is important in and of itself, but the learning experience would be turbo-charged when blended with vocational subjects. Alas, I could generate no excitement in her for this prospect. As a last resort in my efforts, I decided to try to write something, anything, and get it published, so she would see that even a noodnick like me could get published. After all, how hard could it be?
