About six years ago, my wife and I founded Perelandra College. So far, it’s an online set up with MA degree programs in Creative Writing and Counseling. A couple months ago, after plenty labor and expense, the college became accredited

My friend Alan warned me several years ago that this college might be so much work it would cut into my writing. Of course, I realized he could be right, but my hope and intention was to be more involved in the creation than in the running of the school.

Fast forward. I’m running the school, and finding that after decades of trying to build my writing career to a point where I could concentrate my efforts on novels, I’m needing to step back into what’s essentially a day job that shoves my novel writing down on the priority list to somewhere between yard work and healthy eating.

That’s okay. Deranged as Donigan may consider me, I feel that God has assigned this chore. Such assignments are worth doing well.

But something bothers me, which may be of interest to someone. Because thoughts about the college, how to tell the world what we have to offer and how to make the business part of it function more efficiently, how to cut costs and treat the staff and faculty with respect and concern, how to expand and improve our curriculum, all that consumes so much, there’s precious little time to engage with or even notice thoughts that may come from my spirit.

Which alerts me all the more to our need to shut down, maybe part of each day, or a longer part of each week, or an even longer part of each month, and open ourselves to ideas, revelations, to stuff that has not a whit of practical application.

Maybe I’ll get a week in September.

A few weeks ago, I downloaded to my I-pod a Janis Joplin song with the refrain “Looks like everybody in this whole round world is down on me.”

I could identify. My wife was acting disgusted, my elder daughter wouldn’t return phone calls, I had recently suffered through a bombast of abuse and accusations from somebody connected to Perelandra College, of which I’m a founder and currently President.

Long ago, I had noticed that what people appear to fault me for isn’t doing stuff, but not doing stuff. So, my dilemma has been, do I work myself into the grave trying to do what folks want me to do, or do what I consider most important and put up with their anger and active or passive abuse?

Now, last week, a publisher of my books let’s me know the sales numbers are disappointing. And, after a few days stewing about that, the answer to the whole issue comes clear.

Money. It’s all about money (keep in mind that this is a rant, not a close, objective study of all nuances).

Okay, to claim ditching high school upset the vice-principal because of money might be a stretch, but it’s a fact that schools get docked money for students’ unexcused absences.

And my wife wouldn’t contend I didn’t do enough around the house if I could afford to hire a gardener and maid to do it. And my ex-wife’s disposition might’ve brightened might’ve if I’d provided better. And I believe on reason my daughter wouldn’t call me back is she didn’t want another reminder about the money she owed me, which I needed. And it’s certain the person at Perelandra College would’ve sung a different tune if I had raised lots more money or more rapidly built the school into a thriving business.

Okay, I should’ve known from reading Jane Austen, if not before, that our world, or at least the part with which I’m familiar, is essentially a commercial enterprise. Okay, I’m slow. But now, with the root cause of the dilemma identified, a thorny question remains: how does somebody who wants to create stuff cope with this state of affairs.

One answer is to get somebody to support you along your artistic way. But, though I’ve learned through friends of problems with this answer, I’ll decline to comment and instead stick to the plight of those of us who need to support ourselves and perhaps others.

Though I’ve wandered in this brier patch for lots of years, looking for a way out, all I can see are two paths.

One of them, putting art above commerce, generally leads to poverty (which in turn means if anyone depends upon you, you’d best expect disdain or downright anger). Even if you only create part-time while working a full-time day job, the creative process has a jealous habit of demanding most of our passion, which then can’t be spent on our day job, our investments, or our families or friends.

The other path, turning our creativity to commercial ends, which in the case of us writers means writing what editors and publishers think people want to read, can bring us prosperity (and with it, perhaps, the affection of those who prosper because of us), but only if our talent, our timing, and luck (or providence) work in our accord. And even if the long-shot pays off, if we’re creating what other people want, then we’re not creating what we believe in, which can turn a joyful process into dull labor.

Some of us attempt to trudge through the briars, to make our own path, and find way to create on our own terms while attending to commercial realities. But most of us we get lost and disappear.

I’ve been thinking about Graham Greene, a favorite novelist of mine. He broke his fictions into two categories: the novels, and the entertainments. I’m going to review and think more about them, but in my recollection, I don’t buy the labels, because the novels entertain me better than do the entertainments.

More on this later, provided I don’t disappear.