Climbing Out of Bed Chapter List

Hey ya'll here's a chapter list for Climbing Out of Bed:

 photo by Braden Gunem www.bradengunem.com 

1.     Climbing After Kerouac

2.     Untitled Poem, Inspired by Hartman Rocks

3.     Wide Eyes, High Times and Hard Times, a Story of Climbing with Mark Grundon

4.     The Way of the Couch Surfer

5.     Weird and Wheeled Encounters in Hitchhiker’s Space

6.     This is Buildering

7.     A Climber in the Winter of his Discontent

8.     Somewhere in Between Dreams and Smog is Love

9.     The Underwear Model Story

10.   Wild Mountain Honey

11.   Hammer’s Time

12.   Wild Tom Mally

13.   Real Mountain People

14.   Naked Disco Dance Party in J-Tree

15.   Home is Where the Climbing is

16.   Climbing Out of Bed

17.   A Year in the Heart of a Climber

18.   Mary Jane, a Climber’s Thoughts on the Legalization of Marijuana

19.   Trying to Hang with Ben Johnson

20.   The Black Canyon, a Poem

21.   Zen Dishwashing

22.   The Freedom Mobile

23.   Last Thoughts on Adam Lawton

24.   Indian Creek Reflection, Before it All Slips Away

25.   Dumpster Diving Rap

Climbing Out of Bed Photographs

Here's some photos from my upcoming, debut, book, Climbing Out of Bed. Much thanks to the dope photographers who took some of these shots. Climbing Out of Bed will drop as an e-book via Kinde, on Wednesday, July 4th.

Electric Lighting (5.7) Hartman Rocks, Gunnison, Colorado. photo by Mike Brenneman

photo by Braden Gunem. www.bradengunem.com 

www.bradengunem.com

www.bradengunem.com

www.bradengunem.com

www.bradengunem.com 

El Potrero Chico, Hidalgo, Mexico

Rejection (from a publisher) on Valentine's Day

I made a post this morning about staying positive about being single on Valentine's Day. In the interest of being honest (the job of a writer) the more I hear and read about V-Day the more I am negative about it. After all it's not just the celebration of love, it's very specific, it's about the love between people in relationships. What does this holiday have to offer us who aren't in a relationship? It's like people who wish everyone Merry Christmas during the holidays; not everyone is Christian or believes in Christmas.

Luckily I did go to yoga today, which always makes me more positive. It helps me open my heart, always a good thing to do. It also makes my mind reach a meditative state. Life is long, there is still hope to find someone to love. It probably won't happen today, but it could happen tomorrow; maybe it will happen with someone I've already met, but just isn't in my life on this particular day.

I also got my first rejection letter for Climbing Out of Bed today. What a bummer, they had to deliver it on Valentine's Day. I'm bummed. Kick me when I'm down, I think. But, this stuff is all part of the process. It took years for Jack Kerouac to get On The Road published. Jay-Z was rejected by the music industry, so he decided to start his own record label.

So that is what I think I'm going to do. I'm leaning towards self publishing Climbing Out of Bed. What do traditional publishers know anyways? Self publishing has been working well for The Climbing Zine Volume 3 so why not try it with my book?

Anywho, I figured I'd come clean about my state of mind on this holiday, honesty is the path for the writer. And like Jay-Z once rapped, "I drove through the fork in the road and went straight." It just might be my time to be a renegade in the world of publishing.