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There’s something special about a labour of love.
By it’s own description, you do it for more than the immediate reward outside of personal satisfaction.

I have so many labour-of-love projects that it reads like a laundry list.
I’m only now realizing that the acronym of that is LOL Projects. Certainly, the world of paid journalists and talents are laughing out loud at me while I toil away at these things.

My list of unpaid fun: (I love lists)
CBC Radio Windsor – Weekly Culture Column
Squeezebox Podcast – Weekly podcast
Show Up Podcast – Indefinite publishing of weekly cultural interviews
CJAM Radio Show – “Not In My Backyard” – Weekly Windsor/Detroit cultural conversations and interviews
The Ampersand (National Post Arts & Culture Blog) – RARE blog posts about Windsor cultural folks
TomLucier.com – Duh. This blog.

There’s clearly several of these commitments on the chopping block.
Jhoan and I have a child due to arrive in late February. God knows I’ll be super-obsessed with my new role as Dad, and that these free projects will disappear indefinitely or forever. But in the interim, I still need to feed my wife and child during her year off, and hopefully save money throughout the life of this new, perfect person.

This reflection catalyzes all kinds of realization about other talented people in my life, community, or professional circle.

Jamie Greer has recently sworn off writing about music. This is a tragedy. Plain and simple. He’s the most knowledgeable, intriguing, and hilarious music writer anywhere near these parts. And he’s stopping. I used to be in a position where I would try to light a fire under him, and push him to keep it up. But now, I don’t blame him.

He’s been writing for little or no money, for far too long. And he deserves to be paid well for his contributions.

With the recent six-year anniversary of Phog Lounge having gone by, we set up a projector and flashed photos of Phog regulars from years gone by. While nostalgic, this was a tragic reminder of how many gifted people we’ve lost to the big cities around the world.

As much as we want to keep these gifted people within the city limits, we will continue to bleed talent if we don’t pay for it.

This all leads me to an understanding that you can only do so much for free before you begin to resent those that profit (in one way or another) because of your willingness to give.

2009 was a year of free. From me to others. February marks the end of that gifting. It feels exciting to prepare for that end, but super-sad because of the fun that will be missed in playing a role in the Windsor cultural community to the level that I have tried to play.

Without being compensated for the efforts I feel that I’ve developed sufficiently beyond where I was in 2008, I will be respectfully saying no to most projects, unless they call to me on a one-time basis for something I love.

And to finish this piece, I’d like to shortlist a group of at-risk contributors who I fear Windsor is also at risk of losing when they eventually hit that wall of frustration from non-compensation. These are off the top of my head. Basically, these are people who I’m aware of and who I think are underpaid (or not paid) for what they do in Windsor’s cultural scene:
Michael Poirier (film)
Jolie Inthavong (film)
Sean Tighe (film)
Murad Erzinclioglu (music, art, film)
Owen Wolter (photography, reporting)
Gus Morin (you name it)
George Manury (music)
Dan Bombardier (art)
Stephen Hargreaves (reporting, music, art)

Okay, getting depressed. I’m stopping.

Question to leave you with.
When do you know you’re giving away something you shouldn’t?

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