Just when I conclude that things can’t get more surreal, along comes 2026. It has been draining, but we squeezed in an excursion to Vienna and Budapest, and while I typically do little to encourage the notion, I’m an optimist at heart.
Really. The fact that all four Thai basil plants we planted unceremoniously drowned in the recent monsoon.
I’m airing the following here first, but it also will appear online at Food & Dining Magazine. 2026 is the 10th anniversary of my split from NABC (although the terms weren’t finalized until 2018). Two personally rewarding positions have come and gone since then (Common Haus was too brief to count), and now it’s back to looking for some way to contribute and make a few bucks.
But I need to put F&D to rest in order to move forward. Hate to do it; have to do it. I believe innings remain in the tank.
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My Present Coordinates
Readers who know me “’offline” will attest that when it comes to work, I perform far more effectively with (a) consistent structure, and (b) some sort of “cause” to advance by the force of my creative efforts. I’m a polemicist who cherishes the daily grind; it makes vacations all the sweeter.
Back in 2019, when the late John Carlos White first appointed me to the position of Food & Dining Magazine’s digital editor, I immediately made it my job to ramp up the program. I began posting Louisville area food and dining news at our website and social media feeds on a daily basis, as opposed to previously sporadic efforts.
Along the way regular weekly columns were added (Hip Hops, Edibles & Potables), and all in all, I believe the result was a positive improvement to my area of internet responsibility from what it had been upon my arrival ― which mostly was solid, but prone to inconsistency.
What we as a magazine needed was the same discipline that benefits me personally: a steady, regular presence.
Roughly 2,420 posts later, I’m very proud of what has been accomplished. Allow me to thank our readers, contributors and advertisers, both print and digital. Your patronage of the publication is appreciated, and always will be. More than anything else, we writers quite enjoy being read.
With F&D’s quarterly print edition, John created something of genuine local quality and interest. The magazine has remained unique and meaningful since its inception in 2003. When John died unexpectedly in late February, I resolved to continue our digital presence for as long as I could manage it; I’m a writer, after all. It’s something I enjoy doing.
However, our lives are a succession of roundabouts. Where to next?
Until John’s untimely death, my gig at F&D was a paying position; our periodic haggling over remuneration was affable and entertaining. The point is, it paid a bit, and at this juncture I need to find something else that pays me a bit, too. I’m absolutely confident John would understand my reasoning. After referring to himself for the 649th time as a “cheapskate,” he’d ask: “What’s taking you this long? Get a damn job, will ya?”
John was my friend. He also was my boss, and with his passing, the jobs he engaged me to complete no longer exist. I’ve kept the feed running daily for three months since John’s passing, even though the electronic portal no longer serves its fundamental stated purpose of promoting the print edition, since no sign has yet been given me that any hope exists for the print edition’s resurrection.
Unfortunately, facts are facts, and John may well have taken F&D with him to the Great Beyond.
He didn’t leave a will or last testament. I believe we all understand that when an estate heads into probate, it will take a good while to resolve. We also know that the materials going into a magazine of F&D’s quality are expensive, especially now. It wasn’t ever a realistic goal to rally around the flag and keep printing magazines, at least without a determination of who owns what, and how, and whether there’d be resolution to carry on (or, conversely, to sell the assets, a deliberation exceeding my own pay grade).
And, in reality, even before John’s death it never seemed sensible to me that F&D might viably be separated from his personalized, idiosyncratic stewardship. It was a solo gig, and he was the guiding force. His immediate family, while charged with sorting through his estate, couldn’t ever be expected to pause their own lives and take up the magazine.
John always assembled the hired help he needed, here and there, but the magazine was a direct extension of his own gregarious and inquisitive personality. That’s exactly why it worked for as long as it did, for so long as he remained here on the planet. Once he was gone, F&D could not continue as before, even had there been a clear succession plan.
A reformatting would be inevitable, and there’d need to be renewed commitment to whatever revised mission that a new and different generation of operators might choose to pursue.
Meanwhile, there are times in life when things just run their course. Regrettably, this looks like one of them. A consolation to me is that we went out on a high note. The team chemistry these past few years was inspired. All I ever wanted to be was the bass player or rhythm guitarist for a kick-ass band.
And I was.
As for me, my friends will tell you that a contrarian streak of stubbornness costs me dearly, time and again, throughout my adult life. This is why, in essence, I’ve been holding onto the F&D feed. In my own mind, my bass playing had a lot to do with the magazine’s excellence during recent times, and I simply detest the finality of letting it go.
Of course, there’s also a sizeable element of keeping John’s memory active. He deserves it the recognition, and to be remembered. Legacies are important to me. At the same time, it is futile to cling to something that’s over and done.
F&D no longer exists in any substantive form except for memories, back issues, the web site and social media pages, and my daily, ongoing, pro bono efforts to keep a few balls in the air, which I’m doing because I came to dearly love this amazing project of John’s, still wish we had a few more years left in us, and as yet hope someone or something might happen to make it possible to keep going.
Except that I know this is highly unlikely, if not impossible.
Consequently, bearing in mind that the future of the print publication lies entirely outside my control, beginning on June 1 you’ll begin seeing fewer daily posts at the website and social media. That’s because cold turkey isn’t my style. My Wednesday and Sunday columns likely will remain a constant, because I enjoy writing them. But eventually they, too, will migrate to my web site.
Maybe I’ll settle into a Sunday – Wednesday – Friday F&D schedule, or some such, as I begin weaning myself from the portal, with other days included here and there as merited.
This is a unilateral decision; frankly, I don’t know what else to do. Fact is, I’ve no clue whatever as to the resolution of John’s estate, or for that matter, anything else. I’ve received no communications of any sort since early March. For three months I’ve been in this cockpit, flying the plane all by myself, with blinders on, never knowing when the fuel will be gone and it crashes.
I can keep the plane in the air. Alas, I skipped the flight school session about landing it. But seriously, the process of letting go must commence. I’ve gotten on with my life before, after all. Since I left the New Albanian Brewing Company during 2016 – 2018, my two primary part-time gigs were not high-paying positions; luckily, this didn’t matter to me at all because it didn’t need to.
Rather, they kept me active and flexed my brain doing things I otherwise love: properly managing a classics-first beer program at the now defunct Pints&union (by the way, I know where he is, just in case any of you are owed money, too; message me), and writing about edibles and potables at Food & Dining Magazine.
P&u ended very badly; F&D sadly. It’s the sadness that I need to box up and relegate. It’s with me each day I post an article. However, my basic skill set is unscathed, if increasingly obtuse in this post-literate world we inhabit.
Speaking as someone who never displayed any aptitude for the humdrum everyday kind of job, it occurs to me that I’ve scraped by these past four decades by unconsciously emulating The Who’s drummer Keith Moon.
Moonie always denied being the “best drummer” in the world; rather, he was willing to accept plaudits for being the “best Keith Moon-style drummer in the world.”
In other words, by defining the parameters of a job that you’re ideally qualified to fill, in effect writing your own job description, you stand an excellent chance of being the best person for the job. It isn’t nuclear physics.
Damned if I didn’t color my own parachute, after all; somewhere, a high school guidance counselor is nodding in assent. Now I only need to muster up the adrenalin to do it all over again, again, conceding that the circumstances of profound loss surrounding F&D’s probable demise have left me mentally tapped.
As for beer, my stint at P&u (2018 – 2023) demonstrated the continued viability of “golden oldie” beer selections; take beer seriously, and you’ll be rewarded.
At F&D, I penned magazine articles of high quality, while at the same time contributing steady and distinctive web site stewardship.
More than ever, a work ethic matters. I’ll always be a slow learner and a late bloomer, but once I discovered my inner work ethic some 40 years ago, I can be relied upon to bust my ass, whether working for myself or others. And, as a pensioner (a social security recipient), part-time work is the ideal, or short-term consulting. I may be able to help you with something. I’m easy to find.
Your thoughts are appreciated. I can’t say it too often: thanks for reading.
