The passing of a good friend and the comments of her husband gave me that pause this morning.
It was 3:30 in the morning where I live, when I read of the passing of my friend and I was gutted.
A lively, wildly loving gal, Sue Woodhouse made everyone who knew her smile. She loved goofy animal videos, especially if they were of cats and she made everyone she touched feel wonderful, special and loved. Her husband Mark, a great guy and the man Sue shared her life with for 32 year was looking back on their time together and wondering if he had done right by his love throughout all those years, if he made her feel special...put her first enough.
I watch the fires in California that are affecting friends, consuming homes and memories and my heart breaks a little more.
I watch the encroachment of Sharia Law around the world and I wonder to myself why are we allowing it? What will the fate of strong willed women like myself be when Sharia Law is enforced around the world?
I look at the way electronic communication has altered our society and not entirely for the better and I long to be hugged, to hear the voices of my friends instead of just reading their words.
I see the way our Veterans are treated, the jobs they are sent to do and the indignities that so many suffer when they come home and I wonder why they defend this country.
I read daily of the deaths of fellow motorcyclists right around the world and I wonder again...
My life has on some levels, become overwhelming, between the situation in my family, the disgusting nuisance lawsuit from Sturgis North and a host of other set backs, I have never felt so vulnerable, so small, so insignificant. And yet... I know that it will all work out.
I love my job, the one I created for myself after a huge set of changes in my life a number of years ago.
Being the editor of the Busted Knuckle Chronicles, helping charitable causes and riding clubs to market themselves, telling the stories of the riding community, it fills me in a very special way.
But there are huge costs to what I do. There is the toll it takes on my husband, the time away from him, my daughter and how one dimensional I have become. According to my daughter I don't know how to talk about anything but my work and motorcycles. I can't say she is wrong.
This lawsuit that Sturgis North started against me chaps my arse for a lot of reasons.
And it has made me look at the community I live and work in, in a far different way than I have until now.
All my riding friends and the people I serve in the riding community talk about freedom.
Our country is broken - yes it is better than a lot of places, but that doesn't mean it's healthy.
Our "justice" system is a legal system - there is little about it that is just.
Freedom, what is it, really?
Freedom of the Press, Freedom of Speech - these are two "FREEDOMS" that are the foundation of our country and yet, here I am, having resources and time consumed fighting a lawsuit that is truly a nuisance suit.
I have been fighting this suit for 5 months now. I can't tell you the hours, the agony and the money it has already cost and how much more I and my family have to face.
If my counter offer to settle, which should go out next week sometime after the draft letter is revised, is not accepted, then I am looking at $50,000 to see this thing through. The only thing to be gained by this case going all the way to court, is having my name cleared. There is nothing to countersue for and there are so many suits ahead of this one that even if I did countersue and win, it's just throwing good money after bad.
I wonder, is it worth it? I really do.
I have mulled a number of ideas around in my head...
Perhaps it is time to sell the business, maybe if I didn't have to spend the many hours a day that it takes, I'd have the energy to fight this suit and raise the funds it's going to take to prove that I have only shed light on the facts about the owners and management of Sturgis North and that everything that was found and shared came from public domain.
Hell, if I sold the business, I might be able to fund this fight on my own without being reduced to flogging tee shirts and asking for donations.
But as my husband pointed out in one of our many long conversations about this business of mine, I love what I do, helping people, networking, supporting and eating, breathing this community.
And if I didn't do it, he knows I wouldn't be happy.
I have gotten a lot of support from the riding community.
I have gotten almost enough to keep lawyers bills and research assistant bills fully paid for.
I have gotten letters of support and lots of prayers being raised and I know they are working.
I know that there are people who value the work that I do and as long as it has value, then I am happy and grateful to do it.
It is after all because of my job, this business, that I got to be friends with a gal like Sue Woodhouse and her man Mark.
It is because of this job that I am connected socially to over 13,000 people on Facebook, many that I have been blessed to ride with, hug, talk to...
It's hard to balance everything, my husband at times feels cheated by this community and rightly so.
I can't tell you the number of times I have been on the phone helping some event coordinator or mediating for different parties, reaching out on behalf of new riding clubs and making introductions while my husband has fallen asleep in front of the TV waiting for me to be ready to go out for supper or just spend some time with him. Then there are the hours and miles I get to put on my motorcycle.
As a man that loves to ride, he has moments of envy that sometimes turn to resentment and I fully get that. Last summer he was a motorcycle widower for 92 days.
If I had a team of more than two supporting me in this business, then maybe I could find some balance in my life and be able to do right by my husband, my daughter, myself and my community.
I need sales people, I need a marketer and a graphic designer and another web person to support the gal I have before she burns out from the workload.
The business is too big for the team we have, for us to be able to look after our customers and advertisers the way I'd love for them to be cared for. I need sales people to help grow the business so I can afford the other support staff I need.
So, the best way for me to strike balance is to put out the call for sales people.
We need people in every province of Canada that are interested in selling advertising part time or full time.
They need to be strong communicators, good with computers and people.
They need to understand the power of social networking and be willing to use it to help our advertisers.
They need to love helping this community grow and prosper.
The pay is 25% commission, and I offer training, support and leads.
Our paper also needs reporters, community minded people who like to write and want to help this community, it's charities, it's riding clubs, it's tourists and businesses get the exposure they need to grow. There is no pay other than the satisfaction of helping out and most times free admission to events. The ideal person is associated with a group, riding club or association that wants exposure OR a person who attends a lot of rides, rallies or just does a lot of touring.
In some cases we trade advertising for articles.
There are those out there, I know, who like both sales and writing and those people would be ideal for the positions we have to offer.
Until I can get a team behind me to help me grow the business and its revenue, I will have to continue fundraising to fight this lawsuit, and I will have to cut back on some of the other things I do in order to make my husband feel the love and value I feel for him and be successful in defending myself.
I finally took some time to contact Global News and share with them the information on the lawsuit.
After all, the suit could affect all reporters if I had to default because I couldn't pay a lawyer.
I am burning out and I need to face the fact that I am not getting any younger.
I want to attract the right person to manage the business, to one day take over the business, ideally a national rights organization for riders would be the right candidate to buy the business and have all of the support tools we have already developed be available to a larger portion of the community and help fund the organization.
I love this community and I love my husband and daughter and while I know that I won't always make everyone happy, I want to make as many as I can, happy, starting with my family.
If I had a team it would happen all the faster!
If you are interested in joining the Belt Drive Betty Media team, reach out to me at
bdbetty @ gmail.com (fix the spaces)
If you live in the Edmonton, Nisku region of Alberta, I hope you will join us for the Freedom of the Press Defense Fund Run on May 24th at Blackjacks in Nisku.
And if you don't live in the region but would like to support the cause, you can buy a teeshirt through Tee Spring: http://teespring.com/SupportBDB2 or donate to my defense fund: http://www.beltdrivebetty.com/community/bdb-defense-fund
I hope your day is filled with love, family and friends and that when you pull the covers up at the end of the day you can smile with satisfaction over the day you've had as you drift off to sleep.
If you are blessed to be riding today, please ride like everyone around you is blind and cannot see you.
Belt Drive Betty
Edito & Rider
