The Pen Is Mightier?
8.2.21
C. Derick Miller
Head Writer
Your Stories On Video
We’ve talked so much about who I am during these blogs, yet I believe I’ve failed to mention what I do with most of my time during a regular Monday thru Friday nine to five. Almost all full-time artists have a day job, which means we all really need to work two full time jobs if we ever want any of our creative work to see the light of day. It’s not an easy life, nor is it often rewarding. Still, we do what we do because we want to live the dream…and our brains won’t shut off long enough for us to live quietly otherwise!
My mild-mannered identity of Chad Dereick Cloud-Miller (yes, that is my real “legal” name) spends his time as a logistics coordinator for a fine art corporation. What does that mean? Well, let’s break it down into a very simple explanation. Have you ever visited a museum or sculpture garden? If so, did you ever wonder about where the art came from, how it got there, and who put it together? No, of course you didn’t, because neither did I until getting involved with this field! A professional must pack it, move it, and install it at the museum where you saw it, right? It doesn’t just magically appear there with the snap of fingers, or the wrinkling of a nose like in Bewitched. A professional art handler performs all this work. That used to be me. Now, I’ve been doing it for so long that I sit in a cushy, little office and tell others how to do it and where to take it. Make sense?
My point is, now that I’m considered to be a professional, others outside this field of expertise have reached out to me for my advice. Recently, a lawsuit came to be regarding a rather ugly backyard sculpture. Yes, I’m aware that art is subjective to interpretation, but this particular sculpture is ugly. End of story. No doubt about it. Just plain ugly!
A family purchased a home in the high and mighty section of Dallas, TX known as Highland Park. For four years now, they’ve accepted this monstrosity as part of their property and thought little of it. Now, the original owners of the property have poked the sleeping bear, wanting to take the sculpture back into the possession. So, who does the art belong to?
Well, I’ve heard my entire life that possession is 9/10ths of the law but there are always exceptions. Usually, those exceptions are determined by whoever has the most expensive attorney, so I wish them all the best of luck. Where I come in is when the legal teams need cost estimates and details on moving the sculpture off the property. Oddly enough, my expertise in this field is considered to be some high dollar information within a courtroom. Who am I to deny the legal system this knowledge? I’m no one, that’s who! Still, I needed to present these legal teams with an updated CV (aka resume) to show the suit and tie people that I know what I’m talking about. Man, what a wakeup call that was!
I honestly hadn’t updated my resume in nearly a decade because I never really planned on leaving my day job field! No, my dream was to make it big as a writer, do something outrageous and unexpected on my way out the door, and never need a list of qualifications again. No, the bookstore (remember those?) would be my CV. Now, it’s Amazon instead, taking the place of many brick and mortar bookstores in the modern age. Just type in my pen name and you’re whisked away to a list of my accomplishments. Don’t you think that’s all they’d need? Obviously not, because the legal teams involved in this case wanted so much more from me.
I broke my CV down into two different sections of expertise comprised of my professional career and literary accomplishments. That’s where things began to get impressive to me. I don’t believe I’ve ever looked at the bullet points of my writing career on paper like that before. Where in the heck did I ever find time to write all those books, articles, and songs while still being able to pull off the duties of a day job, of a husband, and of a father and grandfather? More importantly, how am I not dead? I should’ve collapsed from pure exhaustion five years ago!
The bottom line is…I refused to stop until I had earned my hometown’s most interesting headstone. Yes, this is a literal requirement of mine. I want to leave the type of legacy that my children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren will brag about to complete strangers for decades to come. To leave my mark, so to speak. I mean, in the end, isn’t that all any of us want? To be remembered.
This line of thinking is what made Your Stories On Video become a reality! Not mine, necessarily, but it was the brainchild or our founder and CEO. Now, his reason for creating the company is way less narcissistic than mine but, it’s all the same dream. What if your family had YOUR legacy caught on film for all future generations to see? A resume of your lifetime to be shared again and again!
Would you want your image and voice to live in a way that your family can experience it whenever they please? A comforting, memorable presence at their disposal to watch with loved ones? That is where we come in, ladies and gentlemen. We create the CV of your life and make it way more interesting than a boring piece of paper shoved into filing cabinet. We make “You: The Film”, and we do it in the most informative and respectful way imaginable.
Sure, the pen is mightier than the sword, but film always wins in the end, right? That’s why movie theaters always beat bookstores when it comes to sales!
I’m anxiously awaiting the day when YOUR film script slides across my desk as I help create your legacy. Wouldn’t you like to be immortalized on something more than stone?
Let us know at http://www.yourstoriesonvideo.com