On self-publishing

While I used to be able to publish textbooks fairly easily with traditional publishers, it is almost impossible to publish my more recent attempts at popular writing. For several years I have self-published. Most self-publishers are no more than "vanity publishers," appealing to those who like to see their name on the covers of books and are willing to pay for it. After one experience paying for publication, I decided this was really a rip-off. Why should I pay for someone to make money on my efforts? I switched to a publisher who does not charge me for publication but whose business model is to charge exhorbitant fees for the purchase of my books--even to me. I have recently switched to Create Space, an Amazon division. They do not charge me and sell me my books at a reasonable price. The fly in the ointment is that I have to prepare the copy for print myself on my computer. Computer skills are not my strong point and I wind up spending more time trying to get spomething ready for publication than writing the material. I'm not exaggerating.

So there are no free cigars. "Nightmare," a 400 page compilation of four Morrie Schwartz, psychologist (my alter ego) fantasies and "I dreamed I was a bluebird," advice to parents on explaining dreams to children, will soon be available on Amazon. If you should happen to read either of these (master)pieces and find typos, please don't tell me; just read on.

On participating at meetings

My boss at Elwyn, Gerald Clark, President, would often send me in his place to meetings, where I was to persuade the group to act in a way he wished. He could have ordered them to do so but it would be more powerful if the group came to the decision on their own. His advice, which I have used ever since at meetings if I wanted to influence the outcome, has proven to be extremely powerful. This is what he told me:

"Let everyone have their say. Don't say a word; just keep your trap shut. After they have all expressed an opinion they will become aware of your silence and look to you for advice. Tell them precisely what they must do and why. The chances are they will do as you recommend."

It has never failed. If I so desire, I can own a meeting.

On writing reports

Jim Diggpory, my doctoral dissertation supervisor, was dissatisfied with the long sentences in my dissertation draft. He wrote on the first page, "Marvin, there is no substitute for a simple declaritive sentence." I took that to heart. Gerald Clark, President of Elwyn also wanted brief, concise reports when I served as his assistant. "If you can't say it on one page," he lectured me, "it's not worth saying at all. "I took that to heart as well. I think poetry is often the very best writing (epigrams, Haiku, and the like). No one could beat Robert Frost for eloquence and economy of words.

Several years ago I left retirement to return to work part time for Interboro School District. They need psychological evaluations. I had spent many years doing psych reports and I knew what I was doing. But in Pensylvania the Department of Education dictates how reports should be written. Their cumbersome, redundant guidlines violate every rule of good writing. I refused to comply and wrote many reports the way I thought they should be written. "I'll be gone anyway before they catch up with me," I told the school psychologists I was working with. "No one wants to read twenty page reports." Several years after leaving Interboro for another school district, where I do not do psychologicals, I learned that the present Director of Pupil Services at Interboro was highly displeased with my old reports. When this was gleefully relayed to me I told the true story of being asked to paint a room by my new wife. I made a mess of the job and was relieved of my assignment after I stepped in the bucket of paint. She never asked me to paint again. So it is with psychologicals.

Return of Morrie Schwartz

I have been thinking for some time of redoing my books about my character Morrie Schwartz. The two published books, "Shrink" and "Finding Jackson" had typos (I am a trerrible proff reader) and some flaws in the stories. I have written a fourth story but did not publish it after becoming disenchanted with PublishAmerica. I own the copyrites so I am able to republish. I finally decided to act and did a compilation of the four stories under one cover. "Nightmare" is the new name for the volume and it contains the four stories.

The first story, "Shrink" is the original story without the autobiographical part in the beginning. (Morrie is my alter ego.) "Soul Search" was the second part of the original volume. Morrie goes on a time travel quest for meaning, encountering seminal leaders in the history of philosophy and psychology. "Finding Jackson" was published as a sequel. Morrie treats a man with intractible pain in his arm but no identifiable organic etiology. The man identifies himself as a reincarnated Stonewall Jackson. The last story, and final adventure for Morrie, is a case of identity theft. Morrie visits his future grave site and finds it apparently occupied, with his name and date of death on the gravestone.

"Nightmare" will be self-published by Create Space (Amazon)and should be available on the Amazon website in November. I will be announcing it on Facebook and Linked In.

Social networking

After having my email was hacked into a couple of years ago I stopped doing Facebook. I have now gone active again with both Facebook and Linked In and in one day accu,mulated a plethora of Friends. All of this is in anticipation that fairly soon I will stop working and need, once again, to reinvent myself. Writing will be an important activity. I am trying to publish a compilation of my four Shrink stories. Three of them (Shrink, Soul Search, and Finding Jackson) have been published but I own the copyrite and can re-publish them elsewhere. A fourth story, unpublished,titled Nobody, is a fictitious account of Morrie, now retired, who finds his gravesite apparently occupied with a grave stone indicating his recent death. I will announce when I have been successful in publishing this epic. In the meantime I continue consulting at Marple Newtown School district, where I counsel with about thirty adolescents, mostly girls who challenge me constantly. I have written some of their stories but cannot publish because of privacy issues. Perhaps in a few years, when these students and grown and no one remembers or can identify them, I'll put these accounts in print. I waited about ten years before I published poems about children in placement at Elwyn, in a short book titled "Oliver Twists in America" (Publish America). Hopefully, my renewed attempt at social networking will stimulate some interest in half a dozen published but unread efforts. Interested readers can also checkout my website: www.rosenshrinksite.com (I am also promoting my private practice in Chester Springs.)

No one uses Rorschach anymore

With all the rainy weather keeping me from working outside one might have expected I'd pay greater attention to this blogsite. No excuses. I just haven't felt the urge to share. I am back at work three days a week counseling high school kids--most girls (guys just don't want to talk about their feelings) who challenge me constantly, balking at my attempots to structure them into small groups dealing with self-esteem, family issues (of which there is no shortage),coping with stress and depression, and anger management. I am swamped with referrals of girls wanting to talk but sometimes overwhelmned by too much estrogen being dumped on me. However, I still enjoy working with these kids.

Speaking of rainy weather, I can appreciate the close interface between rain and depression. Both Lena Horne and Billy Holiday made hit recordings of the song Stormy Weather.

"Don't know why there's no sun up in the sky,
Stormy waether since my man and I ain't together,
Keeps raining all the time."

When I was a psychology intern at the V.A. Hospital at Perry Point, Maryland I was supervised by a psychoanalyst from Baltimore. I was doing therapy with a nurse with a diagnosis of Manic Depression (now Bi-polar Disorder). While she was in her manic phase she provided me with a rich source of juicy material for my mentor to interpret. I had to present the case weekly to a large group of psychologists and psychiatrists. One day she stopped talking as she passed in the depressive phase of her desorder. I became concerned that I would have nothing to present at our next supervision meeting.

"She stopped talking, doctor."
"She said nothing at all?"
"Only one sentence the entire hour. She said, It's raining out."

He quoted for me a poem I had learned in high school French class.

"Il pleur dans mon coeur comme il pleur sur la vie."

Translation: It rains in my heart like it rains on the city."

"Your patient is depressed," he interpreted, somewhat pompously.

(Brilliant.)

"I know she is depressed, doctor, and it was raining out at the time. What
do I do now?"

He chose someone else to present for the following week.

I did get a great deal of practice and supervision in administering Rorschach tests at Perry Point and later taught Rorschach interpretation to pschology graduate students at Brym Mawr College. Yet Rorschach is pretty much passe' today with more emphasis placed on more objective assessment instruments.

The Director of Pupil Services at school, who also had some training in projective techniques, asked me yestereday to use the Rorschach in a risk assessment with a new student who had a violent rage reaction towards his mother. Is this Intermittent Explosive Disorder?" Does he represent a continued danger at school? Rorschach testing might provcide some clues as to the intensity of his anger and potential for aggression at school. In Rorschach interpretation the use of color in forming percepts from the relatively ambiguous inkblots is equated with emotional lability. The perception of movement in the inkblots and the frequency of "good form" responses is considered a measure of emotional control. I'll do the testing next week and we'll see.










Sp

At the track

Recently we stole away for four days at Saratoga Springs, New York, for the season opening of the racetrack. Despite the sweltering heat, we found the city to be friendly and fun. Keeping indoors as much as possible during the day we enjoyed the Car Museum, where we examined vintage Maseratis, Karmins Gheas, and Alpha Romeas in an Italian sports car exhibit, and the dance Museum where we watched teen aged aspiring ballerinas rehearse for a performance. On Friday and Saturday nights we listened to bands at every corner playing every brand of music from Cowboy and Western, to Irish ballads, to '60s and '70s to hard rock. The peak experience was at the track. Neither Joyce nor I were knowledgeable racing fans but few people are. Saratoga Racetrack openings are the social event of the season upo there. Women adorn themselves in exhoritantly priced fancy hats, emulating Kentucky Derby outings. When our waiter at breakfast indicated that he was going that day, I inquired as to whether he had a favorite pick. "Yes," he replied, "Hysterical Cat" in the third race. When my gradchildren were very young we blamed all bad events on a mythical "Bad Cat," whom I concocted. When we stayed at a magnificant Hilton in Rome there were statues of black jaguars on the lawn. I photograhed one and told the grandkids that "Bad Cat" had followed us to Italy. "So maybe I'll act on that tip" I decided. Well, prior to post time "Hysterical Cat" was a thirty to one pick. "I'm not betting on a long shot like that," I decided and placed my five bucks on a horse named Freudian someting or other" to win. After all, I am a psychologist. Freud came in last." I should have known. Hysterical Cat who went off at fifteen to one came in first. "Why didn't I listen?" I remonstarted to Joyce. "I didn't want to tell you," she answered. "I bet Hysterical Cat to win but I only had two dollars. The horse paid $34.80.