Facing Retirement

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“Retirement,” which seemed so far off just last year, is now close at hand and remarkably easier than I thought it would be.


John’s Carver at its slip in Charleston, SC, on the night I boarded for our five week trip together.

Back in Spring 2022 — just 14 months ago? — I was on a cruise with Capt John on his 36′ Carver Aft Cabin cruiser on a trip up the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW). (You can read more about that in my Great Loop blog.) It was April and I was trying to enjoy the cruise while worrying about a bunch of work-related things back home:

  • Cherry season was coming up and I had all the usual concerns about the season. Would the cherry crop be viable? Would all my clients sign up? Would I get back clients who hadn’t signed up last year because of the frost? How much acreage would I have to cover? Would I need pilots in Wenatchee, Quincy, and Mattawa or just Wenatchee and Quincy? Would I be able to find enough pilots?
  • My helicopter N7534D, was aging and had just 20 hours left until a required overhaul that would cost $270K. I had already decided to sell it after cherry season, but was 20 hours enough for the season? What would I do if I flew that off?
  • Would I be able to sell my Part 135 charter business (which had become a pain in the ass because of the ineptitude and spite of inspectors at the Spokane FSDO) with a nearly timed-out helicopter? Would the guy who kept claiming he wanted to buy it all actually come up with the money?
  • Would I be able to find another helicopter to replace it without going back into deep debt? Or should I just retire from cherry drying? Would I be able to sell my cherry drying business to someone else who wanted to take my place?

All this was going through my mind as we cruised at 6 knots up the ICW, spending a few days at stops along the way. To be fair, my cherry season stress normally starts in March and April, but this year it seemed more stressful than usual, mostly because of the age of the helicopter and its upcoming need for an overhaul.

My idea of “retirement”

Wonder why I keep putting “retire” and “retirement” in quotes? It’s because my idea of retirement isn’t the same as most people’s.

I’ll never stop working. Whether I write or make jewelry or do odd jobs in the gig economy, I’ll always have something to keep me busy that brings in a few bucks. (Hell, this summer I’m even selling eggs from my chickens at $5 a dozen.) I’d already considered getting my boat captain’s license — yes, for a boat I didn’t even own yet — and doing charter cruises to earn cruising money.

I won’t stop working until either my mind or body makes it impossible. Working keeps us alive; you can ask my wasband about his dad’s short retirement to get an idea of what I mean by that. (I hope you’re resting in peace, Charlie.)

In general, although I had thoughts about retirement, it was still far off on the horizon. I couldn’t imagine being “retired.”

I did, however, have a rough plan for buying my own boat and cruising the Great Loop in it. I’d even looked at boats. But I couldn’t buy a boat unless I sold the helicopter and I still couldn’t buy a boat if I wanted to get another helicopter and stay in the business. So I figured the boat purchase would be sometime in 2024, after that cherry season. Maybe that’s when I’d “retire,” too.

Everything Changes

Everything changed with a phone call. A guy with a lot of money offered me a lot of money for the helicopter if I sold it then. He wasn’t interested in the charter business, but the amount he offered for a helicopter that I was hoping to unload in a few months anyway was too much to ignore. On May 6, I watched it fly away for the last time with the money secured in my bank account.


It was a lot easier to say goodbye to this helicopter when the money was in the bank and my thoughts were on the kind of boat I’d buy to replace it. Also, no more $20K per year insurance bills. Yippee!

I arranged to lease a helicopter for the season. (There were problems with that, but I won’t go into it here.) I got contracts, I got pilots. The season started off good and then fizzled out in mid June when it stopped raining. The season ended in August. I heaved a sigh of relief again.

I listed my charter business with a broker. I knew that I’d have to get a helicopter to keep my Part 135 certificate and I’d decided that I was done owning helicopters. The broker listed it for a lot more than I expected.

Meanwhile, with all that helicopter sales money sitting in the bank, I started shopping for a boat. By the end of August, I’d made a deal on one.

Around that time, the broker found a few buyers for my company. One backed out. The other was an idiot tire-kicker who called me directly with a crazy lowball offer. But the third was serious. As I was signing papers on DocuSign to buy the boat, I was signing other papers on DocuSign to sell my company.

And suddenly, I found myself with a nearly new Ranger Tug, a new company that offered just cherry drying and aerial photo services, and a bunch more money in the bank than I expected to have at the end of cherry season. I’d also shed a costly-to-keep helicopter, a charter business I no longer wanted, and the anxiety of dealing with unreasonable, demanding people at the FAA.

I celebrated by spending September learning to cruise in my new boat. Then I shipped it to Chicago and got it on the Great Loop.


While I’m home this summer, I can be reminded of my first day on the Loop with the new Home Screen on my phone.

I named my boat Do It Now. Frankly, I was done waiting. Hell, I’d been done way back in 2010 but had a husband to shed to move forward. It had taken me 12 years to get through the divorce debacle and become financially secure in my home — which I’d paid off in July 2022 — before I could get back on track for what I wanted out of life.

But I didn’t think that I was one big step closer to “retirement.”

Retirement Thoughts Kick In

It wasn’t until this past winter that I started thinking about the possibility of tapping into the retirement money I’d been saving in earnest since the late 1980s. I own some stock — including Apple stock I originally bought at $13/share in the mid to late 1990s that had grown substantially with numerous splits and stock price increases. And I had some savings. And my living expenses were pretty low since just about everything I owned was completely paid for.

I’d been under the impression that I had to wait until I was 65 to start tapping into my retirement funds. Or maybe it was 62? I asked a knowledgeable friend. No, he told me. 59 1/2 is the age you can start using that money.

Holy cow. I was there.

I had a great winter cruising on the Great Loop in Do It Now, covering 3000+ miles, mostly solo. I made friends, saw a lot of new places, and met challenges along the way. I took a seven-day captain’s license class and passed the test.

But as March and April came along, I had the same cherry season worries as usual, but with a twist: I didn’t have a helicopter to fly. How was I going to deal with that?

Various solutions came about and I explored them all. But it wasn’t until I started contracting with clients that I realized what a non-issue it would all be. One of my clients did not sign up again. Since he accounted for about 2/3 of the acreage I cover, my season would be a lot shorter with fewer pilots and less revenue to pay them. I’d be able to keep a lot less money.

At first, I was angry. But then I reasoned it out. I wanted to to retire at the end of the season anyway. I was hoping to be able to sell the business, but if I had a good enough season, I might talk myself into keeping it and doing it again. But this one client had helped me make two decisions that took a lot of stress out of my life:

  • Without the added acreage, the business wasn’t worth selling so I didn’t have to stress over finding a buyer (or dealing with the tire-kicker who claimed 3 years ago that he wanted to buy my whole business).
  • With less revenue coming in, it was less attractive to keep doing the work. I was no longer tempted to do it another year. Retirement at the end of the season was a definite.

And I’ll be honest here: the client who had backed out was a pain in the ass anyway. Now I wouldn’t have to deal with his antics.

No, I haven’t been drying cherries for 25 years. It was only 15 years. Before (and during) that time, my summers were ruined by book deadlines, mostly for Quicken Official Guide, which I wrote the first 11 editions of starting in 1998.)

I was looking at the reality of having a summer off in 2024 for the first time in 25 years. It took no time at all to imagine my trip up to New York that summer for the ultimate Champlain, Erie, and Severn Canal cruise in my boat.

And with that, I had scheduled my retirement: August 2023. I would be 62 years old.

The Money Stuff

The question was, could I afford retirement without changing my lifestyle? I have to admit that cruising in a boat thousands of miles over the course of months is not exactly cheap. If I wasn’t going to make enough cherry drying money this summer to cover the next year of cruising, where would the money come from?

The answer was easy: my retirement funds.

They’d been growing and shrinking and growing and shrinking but mostly growing over the past 30 years. If I continued to earn some income from other sources, I wouldn’t need much every year — probably not even enough to start getting social security anytime soon. After all, other than cruising my cost of living was modest. (It really pays, folks, to eliminate all your debt before you retire.)

I had a talk with my accountant yesterday and a “retirement specialist” at my investment firm today. I discovered that my lowered income would save a lot of money on taxes, get me a better ACA health care subsidy until Medicare kicked in in 2026, and enable me to make retirement plan withdrawals without huge tax hits. I also discovered that tapping into my IRA would be as easy as filling in a form on my investment website. The money would arrive within days as a direct deposit to my bank account.

Of course, the money I’ve invested in my retirement funds is not unlimited. I will eventually run out. How quickly that happens depends on the stock market and how much I take each year. But I still have Social Security waiting for me and can always sell my home on the next market upturn. I think I’ll have enough for the rest of my life.

That is the goal, isn’t it? To die with just enough money to dispose of your body and give your friends a big party to say goodbye?

Facing retirement? Yes, but also embracing retirement. I just didn’t expect it to be this soon.

Doing the Math on Art Shows

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I compare art show venues to see which ones really do give me the best bang for the buck.

I’ve got a sort of running debate with a friend of mine about art show fees and which methodologies are best for artists.

Fee Considerations

Clearly, in a beautiful, perfect, artist-friendly world, show fees would be low and shows would be full of art lovers with deep pockets and plenty of empty wall space or jewelry/pottery/other craft needs.

But that’s not the way it is. Show runners want to make money far beyond the cost of running their venue and the artists are the draw. They set their fees based on what they think artists can afford to pay, with the goal of filling every available spot.


Here’s my jewelry sales booth as it appeared at Leavenworth Village Art in the Park on May 19. I’m trying to display my work as serious and elegant; most folks seem to think I’ve done it.

Artists, on the other side of the transaction, have to consider fees when they decide which shows to apply for. The higher the fees, the more work needs to be sold. Is it possible to sell enough work at the artist’s price points to cover show fees? And what about other expenses, such as the cost of getting to and from a show, lodging, parking, and who knows what else?

In general, better shows — ones with good track records for attracting lots of shoppers and scoring high on artist satisfaction — command higher fees. That can also be said for shows that can attract shoppers with deeper pockets or ones where the quality level of the artist work meets a higher than average standard. In both cases, the potential to sell work at higher prices might make it easier to cover fees.

But in nearly all cases, it’s a gamble. And in the short time I’ve been doing art shows, I’ve seen that firsthand.

Two Fee Methodologies

There are several fees involved with doing art shows and it’s worthwhile to take a look at each one.

  • Application Fee. This is usually a small amount of money — under $50 but usually closer to $10 or $20 — that must accompany an artist’s application to participate in a show. It is non-refundable and is apparently used to cover administrative costs.
  • Jury Fee. This is also usually a small amount of money — again, under $50 — that’s paid to judge an artist’s work before acceptance. Artists are normally required to submit photos of their work and their booth and may also sometimes be required to submit one or more photos showing them actually making the work to prove that they make it themselves. This is also non-refundable. Some shows will charge just a jury fee, if the show is juried, and not an additional application fee.
  • Booth Fee. The booth fee is usually the expensive part of doing a show. Fees can range from $20 for a Farmer’s Market table to well over $1000 for a spot in an indoor venue showcasing fine art in a major city. Just about every show is going to charge a fee for your space, based in part on the size of the booth and its position. A 10×20 foot space that’s open on two or more sides — like in a corner — would usually cost significantly more than a 10×10 space in line with other artists.
  • Commission Percentage. In addition to the booth fee, some venues charge a commission based on artist sales. They could process the sales of all artists centrally or provide special sales slips for artists to fill out to record each sale or use the honor system for artists to report sales. Commission percentages vary and are usually higher at venues with lower booth fees.
  • Other Fees. In addition to all this, some venues charge extra for power, draperies, tables, lighting, local business licenses, and insurance.

I’ll give you two examples.

Wenatchee Apple Blossom Festival Arts and Crafts Show, a three-day show where I’ve sold my work twice in the past four years, has the following fees:

  • Application/Jury Fee: $30
  • Local Temporary Business License: $25
  • Insurance Fee*: $85
  • Booth Fee: $299

Leavenworth Village Art in the Park, a three- to four-day show where I sell my work on about five weekends per year in the spring and late summer, has the following fees:

  • One-time application/jury fee for season: $15
  • Per weekend Security Fee: $30
  • Booth Fee: $0
  • Commission Percentage: 21%

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* You can usually skip the insurance fee charged at an event by carrying your own insurance, which I do. It costs $375/year and covers all of my events.

The Debate

So the main part of the debate is this: which fee structure is best for artists? Flat fees or commission based fees?

First I need to mention one other thing: I’ve seen shows that have a relatively high booth fee — maybe $500 — plus a commission percentage of 20% or more. (I’m looking at you, Sacramento.) I avoid shows like that because I honestly don’t see how I can make any money. I also think those show runners are being unreasonably greedy and I don’t want to support them in any way.


Oh, this Seattle show! Although I paid the same as the artists in the main room with 10×10 booths, I was given a 10×7 space in a side room with six other unfortunate artists. The window behind my booth was old and drafty; on those November days, it was about 50°F in my chair. I didn’t lose money on this show, but sales were disappointing. I think I would have kicked butt in the other room, but who knows?

That said, the answer to the question of which is better really depends on the show. If it’s a great show and you have lots of sales, it’s better to avoid paying a commission on sales. After all, the more you sell, the more you pay.

But, at the same time, if the show is crappy and sales are low, commission based fees are better because you’ll pay less.

Let’s look at some hypothetical numbers, comparing the Apple Blossom show to the Leavenworth show. For the sake of argument, we’ll say the artist does Leavenworth just once so that one-time application fee doesn’t need to be split among multiple shows.

ItemApple BlossomLeavenworth
Gross Sales$3,000$3,000
Fees:  
  Application Fee$30$15
  Business License Fee250
  Insurance Fee850
  Security Fee030
  Booth Fee2990
  Commission0630
Total Fees$439$675
Net Sales*$2,561$2,325
Sales Cost Percent (Net÷Gross)14.6%22.5%

So in this case, the fixed fee event would be a better deal for the artist, allowing her to take home more money.

But what if the outdoor event was on a really crappy weather weekend? Cold and rainy and folks just didn’t want to come out? Say the artist sales that weekend were a disappointing $1,000. The story changes quite dramatically:

ItemApple BlossomLeavenworth
Gross Sales$1,000$1,000
Fees:  
  Application Fee$30$15
  Business License Fee250
  Insurance Fee850
  Security Fee030
  Booth Fee2990
  Commission0210
Total Fees$439$255
Net Sales*$561$745
Sales Cost Percent (Net÷Gross)43.9%25.5%

Totally different picture, no? Basically, the worse the show is for you, the less you pay in fees if your main fee is based on a commission.

This really comes into play when you have a totally crappy show, like the one I did in Spokane last November. Billed as a Holiday Arts and Crafts show where the show runners actually charged shoppers a fee to get in, most shoppers seemed more interested in buying $13 caramel apples than any sort of quality artist work. Between the show fees of $340 and the cost of making the 3-hour trip (each way) to Spokane, I wound up losing money on the show. (It would have been worse if I’d had to stay in a hotel, but I stayed in my truck camper on the fairgrounds and no one ever collected a fee.) Needless to say, I won’t be doing that show again.

But then again, if you have a great show that charges a commission percentage, it really costs you.

And that’s where the debate stands.

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*Net Sales does not include other expenses of attending a show, such as transportation, lodging, parking, credit card fees, etc. All those do need to be calculated by the artist to come up with a total cost for the show when evaluating it.

What’s the answer?


Sunday mornings are always slow in Leavenworth, no matter how beautiful the weather is.

We don’t know how a show is going to be before we attend so it’s impossible to determine which will work out better in advance. Of course, prior attendance at a show can give you an idea of how it might work out. But even that isn’t guaranteed. I did well in Spokane in 2021 so I assumed I’d do just as well in 2022. I didn’t. Not even close. And the weather is always a factor, especially at outdoor shows.

I’ve done three shows in Leavenworth this spring and the first two were disappointing while the last one was really good. I paid relatively low fees for the first two but was hammered at the third. Still, my cost percentage remained between 22% and 26%. The percentage I take home is pretty solid. There’s some reassurance in that. It’s pretty much impossible to lose money at a percentage-based show. Low sales, low fees.

So there is no answer. It all depends.

And that’s part of what artists deal with when they try to sell their work at shows.

The other part? Setting up and tearing down a booth. Buying and maintaining display equipment. Getting to and from shows. Parking. Sitting in a booth all day, possibly leaving work unattended during trips to the restroom. Dealing with often thoughtless shoppers who make audible comments to friends about how easy it is to make this or how overpriced that is. Seeing your work handled by people who then drop it back down to bang against the metal display. Watching kids with ice cream on their hands touching everything. Keeping an eye out for dogs lifting their legs on table draperies and tent sides.

But let’s not forget the good stuff, too. Being told your work is beautiful. Being complemented on your unique designs. Having a customer buy an expensive piece that took you hours to make and telling you how much they love it.

All that should figure into the costs and benefits of being an artist at an art show, too, no?

Stop Working for Free

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I get an email message from someone sounding pretty desperate for a job that isn’t going to help his career move forward.

If you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you should know that I occasionally get email messages or texts so outrageous that I feel a real need to share them here as a lesson to whoever can learn a lesson. (Admittedly, many can’t.)

This is one of those occasions.

The Email Message

Here’s the message that arrived via a Contact link on this blog:

Hey Maria,
How’s it going? I hope this message finds you well. I wanted to reach out because I’m a relatively low-time private pilot with around 400 hours under my belt. I used to own a R22 helicopter for several years, but I actually sold it a couple of years ago.
Recently, I came across an article about cherry picking and it got me thinking. I would love to be considered as a potential candidate to join your team. I’m willing to work for free and cover all my expenses, including food and lodging, until we both agree that I’m ready for the job. I completely understand that you have no obligations or liabilities when it comes to me, and I’ll make sure to have full insurance coverage. My main goal is to become a better pilot and find a true purpose in flying. If you have a moment, I’d appreciate it if you could take a look at my profile here: https://[redacted]. In any case, congratulations on your blog. I absolutely love your lifestyle and it’s truly inspiring.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Take care,
[redacted]

Tearing it Apart

There’s so much wrong with this, that I barely know where to start.

First of all, I have to assume that he means cherry drying and not cherry picking. I don’t do cherry picking. It’s hard work and better left for the professionals. The only cherries I pick are the ones my clients let me pick after they pick. I eat those. It’s one of the perks of the cherry drying business.

But what got me really fired up about this email is this guy’s offer to come here on his dime, cover all his living expenses, and “work for free.” He’s never really clear about what he wants to do, apparently for me, with his uncompensated time, but I have to again assume that it isn’t washing my cars or mowing my lawn. I suspect he wants to be a cherry drying pilot.

Even setting aside his extremely naive belief that a 400-hour R22 helicopter pilot can somehow get insurance to cover him for cherry drying work, the whole email reeks of desperation and ignorance.

Even if I had a helicopter for him to fly — and I definitely do not — what in the world makes him think I’d put him in it? I get first dibs on any idle helicopter that needs flying. And if I had a second spare helicopter, don’t you think I’d look for someone who had some actual experience in that make and model? I wouldn’t even consider using an R22 for cherry drying. It’s just too small.

Maybe he thinks I have a fleet of helicopters just sitting here, waiting for low time pilots to climb on board and fly them. I don’t.

But what tells me he didn’t do his homework was the simple fact that he seems to think that spending a summer as a cherry drying pilot will make him “a better pilot.” How much flying does he think there is? Although he offered “congratulations” on my blog — which turns twenty years old this year in October — he obviously didn’t bother to read much of it. Especially not the posts like this one where I specifically say that drying cherries isn’t for low-time pilots and is not good way to build flying time.

On my Contact Page
Yes, this is right on the page that he used to contact me. I guess reading the page contents was too much work for this guy looking for a job without pay. (This is a good reminder to update that page; Flying M Air has been sold and I’m retiring at the end of this cherry season.)

And no, I can’t expect him to wade through all 2500+ posts on this blog. Or do a search for “cherry drying” and read the posts that come up. Or click the cherry drying tag in the sidebar to quickly see posts tagged that way. But I seriously doubt he did more than watch a YouTube video of me drying cherries, find my blog, and click the Contact link to share his ridiculous offer with me. (He apparently didn’t read the paragraphs on that page regarding Career Advice and Pilot jobs, either.) He’s not the first lazy, ignorant job hunter I’ve encountered but I’m hoping that he’ll be the last.

Do I sound unreasonably harsh? Well, all I can say is what the fuck? I remember what I went through to get the various jobs I’ve had in my lifetime. Emailing someone with an offer to work for free at a job that doesn’t exist and that I don’t quality for anyway was never in my game plan. I have a whole series of posts titled “So You Want to Be a Helicopter Pilot.” Maybe he should start by reading those?

Stop Working for Free

But all of the above is not the purpose of this post. The purpose is to remind people that they should never offer to do a job for free.

No, I’m not talking about volunteering at the local Food Bank or Habitat project or any other charity operation. I’m talking about working for free — especially using highly specialized skills that you acquired at the cost of your time and money — for a for-profit business. Like a helicopter charter or agriculture company.

Believe me, companies have enough money to pay employees. If a company does not have enough money to pay its employees, it’s not a company you want to work for.

Any company that takes advantage of people offering to work for free — especially if that includes covering their own expenses — is not a company that you want to work for.

I firmly believe that everyone should be compensated for their work at for-profit organizations. That goes for pilots, writers, photographers, and any other job that takes a person’s time and effort or makes use of something that person created. Harlan Ellison said it best, and I know I’ve linked to this video more than once. Watch the video. Understand what he’s saying.

When you work for free, you tell people that your work is worthless. It’s not worth paying for. Is that the message you want to send? Do you expect to work for free for your entire life? That’s the path you set yourself on when you work for free.

Just stop it.