Thank You and an Invitation
Laura’s Trip to Hawaiʻi; Wednesday, September 25 at 7 pm CDT
A big THANK YOU to everyone subscribing to “For the Birds” for making my first year-and-a-half on Substack a success. (I have almost 1,500 subscribers, paid and unpaid, when I’d never reached 500 in the 16 years I was using Blogger.) To show my gratitude, you’re invited to a live Zoom presentation about my February trip to Hawaiʻi.
Laura’s Trip to Hawaiʻi
Wednesday, September 25, 2024, 7:00 pm CDT
As many of you know, I started producing this blog on Substack in March 2023 when the cost of emailing posts to subscribers was about to mushroom. So I want to give a special thanks to the people who have gone above and beyond the call of duty: my 136 paid subscribers.
From the start in 1986, I’ve done my radio program/podcast as an unpaid volunteer except for 1988, when Michael Goldberg of KAXE secured a grant that paid me $300 a month for producing “For the Birds.” My annual income from writing and speaking has seldom exceeded four figures, and it must cover all my expenses (paying for the lauraerickson.com domain and hosting service, software, Zoom, etc.) and hardware (computer, audio, and photography equipment).
Russ has always kept me fed and housed on his income and has never objected to my devoting my time and income to advocating for the natural world. But after my position as contributing editor and columnist at BirdWatching came to an end when the magazine folded, and as my speaking gigs dried up since the pandemic and then my new bout with cancer, it really is true that your generous financial support is what now makes my work possible. And a special shout-out to my good friend Paula Lozano, who will be doing all the co-hosting tasks Wednesday night. She’s been a rock for me for decades.
Russ and I went through tough times financially as we worked our way through college and then raised three kids on, essentially, one income (a couple of brief periods of full-time employment, at the Cornell Lab and for what was a local optics company nothwithstanding), so as I have promised from the start, I just don’t have the heart to deny access to my work, including this Zoom program, to anyone just because they don’t, or can’t, pay me. So I appreciate beyond measure those of you who do contribute out of the goodness and generosity of your own hearts without any special perks. Thank you so very much!
I will be traveling on the 25th and I think that I will have to miss the program. I will be looking forward to viewing it when I return home. Laura, I am so grateful for the work that you do now, and for your past work. Your work is informative and of great value to me as a birder and as someone who works to gain knowledge of our changing environment from reliable sources. Your work is not influenced by sponsors, something that is very rare these days. Thank You!
Wonderful opportunity to learn more about our birds there! I'll make sure I'm not as vociferous as my blog replies, if I say anything, rest assured. I can't learn if I'm talking!! Sorry again for my long replies 😔.