“It takes twenty years to make an overnight success.” - Eddie Cantor
By this standard, Brent Miller is ahead of the game. With 18 years in Hollywood under his belt, and after trying his hand at acting, writing and event planning, Brent has broken through and made his mark as a co-producer of “Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You”, the new documentary about the legendary Hollywood producer which will be playing at the Traverse City Film Festival this week.
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Stephen King once wrote, “The road to hell is paved with adjectives.” But sometimes an adjective is warranted. Sunday was a magical day.
That’s the day we opened Traverse City’s new Fairy Trails, an enchanted forest (now full) of fairy houses. Despite some cool, damp weather, hundreds of people turned out to celebrate.
Heather and I spent the morning getting our fairy house installed and then putting up wood markers on trees near other artist built dwellings. In the afternoon we were so busy getting things set up for the Spring Fairy Fling event that coincided with the opening of the Fairy Trails that we didn’t actually venture back into the woods until close to 2 p.m.
It was (with apologies to Mr. King) magical. Children everywhere, scampering about, checking out fairy houses and building their own. Exploring, discovering and, most importantly, playing in the forest, which was bursting with creative energy.
There were nine fairy houses created for the start of the event. By the end of the day there were at least five times that many – some simple, some elaborate, all enchanting. It blew us away.
Special thanks to everyone who helped make this happen, but especially – all of the artists, Rachel Jezowski who created the beautiful wood carved signs for the event, my mom who not only built a fairy house but helped in many other ways with the event, Gary and Allison from The Little Fleet for quenching our thirst, the whole team at ELF for being awesome hosts and collaborators, and Pete Farmer and Hot ‘n Bothered for the great performances! Thanks most of all to all of the families who turned out and helped make the day so special.
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A couple of weeks ago Tom Nixon authored an excellent guest post that touched on the internal conflict and struggle he’s experienced over the years confronting the question of whether moving to Traverse City is the right decision for him and his family. It made me reflect on our own decision to take the leap, and more broadly on the issue of why some decisions are so hard to make.
First, a little background on our own mental and emotional gymnastics as we contemplated making a move.
Nine months ago we uprooted our family and our business, packed up our belongings, and started a new life 250 miles away in Traverse City, Michigan. It’s an idyllic town, although the process of getting here was anything but.
Selling a house, buying a new one, settling three girls (at the time all five and under) in a new environment and keeping up with the demands of a fast-paced business was hard.
But as it turns out, these weren’t the hardest things. It was making the decision to move – not acting upon it – that proved most challenging.
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About 12 years or so ago, I visited Traverse City for the first time in years for a gentlemen’s (using that term loosely) golf weekend. After a day and half, having golfed one of the most beautiful courses in the country and hitting some of downtown’s more enjoyable haunts, it me.
I could live here.
I could totally do this full time. Beautiful country, cool city, real people. There’s something for everyone up here. More importantly, there’s everything for me up here (everything I find important and fulfilling in life.) I could just…move here!
Except I can’t.
Today we are delighted to bring you a really fun post from a really talented person. Brittany Zeller-Holland used to work for us as a designer before going on to bigger and better things as an entrepreneur (check out her bio below for her impressive creative resume). Heather and I are planning a camping trip with our girls to the Upper Peninsula this summer and so we reached out to Brittany, who hails from the U.P., for some tips. Her tips turned into this post. We can’t wait to check out Brittany’s recommendations, and if you’ve been thinking about visiting the U.P., hopefully you get some helpful insights, too. Last thing: Brittany created the U.P. watercolor painting you see above specifically for this post. Amazing, huh?! You can purchase a print on Etsy – pre-order an 8×10 print here and 11×14 here.
Crossing the Mackinac Bridge from the Lower Peninsula still feels like going home to me. I consider the small towns, woods and quiet stretches of Lake Superior beaches of the Upper Peninsula the ideal place to have grown up. Though it’s been over a decade since I lived there and it’s contested whether I can call myself a Yooper (I lived on Mackinac Island for the first year of my life and was born in the hospital in Petoskey); I always roll the car windows down on the Mighty Mac and take a deep breath, remembering how those surroundings made me who I am.
When you spend your childhood in the Upper Peninsula you learn to endure long car rides, as many times visiting family or flight travel anywhere required a 4-6 hour drive to a major airport. There is an appreciation for getting new clothes, but also a frugality that comes from bi-annual school shopping and holiday trips to the closest mall 3+ hours a way. You take drivers’ training in blizzards without a second thought and wish there was a license classification for those of us that are allowed out when it snows in Lower Michigan. Most importantly, you learn that each season has adventures to look forward to, which make every frost-bitten finger and throbbing black fly bite worth it!
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Yesterday was one of those days – busy but not particularly productive. That kind of day eats away at me, and they happen more often than I’d like to admit.
As I’ve mentioned before, Heather and I work together from home. Working from home has many benefits, but also drawbacks. We have flexibility, there’s no commute, and it helps keep business costs down.
But there are costs, just not financial ones. And, ironically, the flexibility that comes with working from home is one of the main culprits of the costs we bear. The biggest challenge we face is focusing too much on work which leads to focusing too little on our personal lives. That challenge is multiplied by working together. It’s easy to be physically present, but not mentally so, when your office is your home.
It’s also easy to get distracted. It’s nice to be able to throw in a load of laundry or get dinner started when you’re at home all day, but if you’re not careful you can get consumed by household activities and neglect work. Bouncing back and forth between work and personal responsibilities means that neither get the attention they deserve.
Don’t get me wrong, I love working from home and don’t think I’ll ever go back to working at an off-site physical location. And I’m not alone. A recent survey by MoneyTips found that 86 percent of Americans who work from home love or like their set-up, and 67 percent report that they are more productive working from home than they are in an office.
Like most things in life, it’s all about striking the right balance. {tweet that} While working from home enables the type of life I want to live, at times it can lead to the exact opposite. I like to think that I lead a productive and purposeful life, but my vision of myself and my actual self are often wildly divergent – just ask Heather. Days like yesterday remind me how easy it is to get off-track.
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There’s something serene, peaceful and tranquil about Up North that is hard to describe to someone who’s never spent time here, but is instantly recognizable to someone who has. It’s a feeling, a smell, a breath of fresh air, and a peace of mind that is ubiquitous and lasting.
The point is that some places are more than places. They occupy more than physical space, they occupy space in people’s hearts and minds. You don’t have to be there physically to, in fact, be there, because such places embody a spirit that stays with you long after you’ve left.
Traverse City is such a place – one that empowers people to live purposeful, meaningful and active lives. But you don’t need to live here to live this way. Anyone, no matter where they call home, can Live North.
That’s because Living North isn’t just about living in Traverse City. It’s about a state of mind that values experiences over things, revels in the majesty of nature, and passionately chases big dreams.
At its core, Living North is about living boldly – in whatever you do, and wherever you do it.
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These words are undoubtedly still ringing in the ears of parents across the country who made the long drive south for spring break. Time crawls to a kid stuck in the backseat.
In fact, it’s not just long drives that pass slowly for kids, it’s life itself. When I was a kid summer vacation dragged on and on and some days seemed endless.
We’ve all heard that time goes faster as we get older. And it sure seems that way, doesn’t it? The days, weeks, months and years fly by, almost indistinguishably. Later this week, at a time when many of us are still getting used to writing 2016 on our checks, we’ll start hearing: “Can you believe it’s already April?”.
But of course time does not go by any faster than it did when we were younger. It just feels that way. So what’s the deal?
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