Hi, welcome to the All Things LGBTQ Interview Show, where we interview LGBTQ guests who are making important contributions to our communities. All Things LGBTQ is taped at Orca Media in Montpelier, Vermont, which we recognize as being unceded indigenous land. Thanks for joining us and enjoy the show. Hi, everybody. Welcome to All Things LGBTQ. I am guest hosting this evening. My name is Susan Moyn and I have with me here Kim Ward, who is a local poet and playwright. And we talked about this, I think I can call her a friend or somebody I know we can admit that we know. Okay, great. So tell us a little bit about yourself, Kim. Yeah, so I began as writing as a play as a poet, but I've always been interested in theater. And as I got older and realized that you could perform poetry on stage, that was sort of a natural progression for me. So I've written poetry and plays and even a musical. And I am the founder of Vermont Playwright Circle. I also work with a lot of local theaters and some people might recognize me because I have also substituted on All Things LGBTQ before. Yes, I got my letters. You did, you did. Yeah, that's great. And we've been on stage together, have we not? And I'm pretty sure I was in that musical. We can show a clip of it. Oh, oh, I don't know if we want. I'm not sure. I was gonna say that was maybe not one of my finer moments. Only because like the hat, the Elmer Fudd hat anyway, we could, yeah, that was, but that was, that was a lot of fun. And I, I appreciate what you were saying because I was thinking back on that and the kind of the creativity to be able to not just write things that are lyrical, you know, poetic, creating the lines, but then also setting things to music that blends in with the theme. So to take a very short play in that, in that case, that was a 10 minute play and be able to combine a narrative with the sound, put it all to music and have people dancing around with, you know, little guns and stuff. That's, that's a lot in a 10 into a 10 minute, you know, but it was very action packed now. Yeah, thanks.  Plays in poetry tend to be different ways that I come up sometimes with ideas, but sometimes they overlap. Sometimes it can be an article in the newspaper or a funny headline. Actually, the musical I wrote, which was called Man vs. Squirrel, I wrote after hearing a clip on NPR about a guy who got upset because there were squirrels in his walls and he put firecrackers to get the squirrels out and he burnt his cabin down. So I thought, my God, that's got to be a comedy musical, right? Was that under one? No, it's a national public radio. I was going to say, but we could all see it happening in these functions. Some of my relatives. So sometimes it's that other times it can be conversations.  And we had a long conversation about, for him, I was wasting electricity, but for us as women, we wanted the lights on when we came home because where I grew up, no light on was an invitation to get mugged or, you know, robbed. So he didn't understand that difference. And after that conversation, just poem poetic play just kind of came. So it depends. Interesting. And did life imitate art? Did he get the message? He got it. He was like, oh, I never thought of it that way because he was like an eight foot tall, not really eight, but he was over six feet tall man, you know, white man, I might add. So a lot of privilege and a lot of ability to just feel safe wherever he was. Interesting. And so was that something that you blended poetry with? Yeah, that was an ensemble piece I made. And it had a lot of poetic monologues mixed in with it. And so it was in poetic lines and imagery and metaphor that I might not put in a regular straight musical, straight play. Oh, interesting. Did you have props and things or was it more just? We had a bare stage and actually Moxie Productions produced it many years ago. So it was like a one act and we had a bare stage. And my image was that this was, it was set in this sort of museum of light, museum of the history of electrification. So the idea would be that if you did have money, you might have gadgets and G-Jaws to represent, you know, inventions of light, you know, and lamps and things, but it was pretty much a bare stage. That's cool. I was just, I was picturing like a bare, one bare light bulb. A bare light bulb hanging from the ceiling symbolizing, you know, being in the dark. Yes. What do you think is like one of the most important skills that a playwright should have? What are some of the skills that you think really? I think you have to have the ability to think about a story as it can be told through dialogue and action for sure. I think there's a very big difference between a fiction piece or a poem oftentimes and something that can stand alive on stage. And also the ability just to work with other people and realize the biggest difference is you're creating something that's not finished until the director and the actors and the producers all get their hands on it. Yeah. Well, actually that's one of my questions we're going to talk about that a little bit later. Yeah. What do you think makes a good play? What are some of the ingredients that you, I know you've done a lot of, and I've read a little bit as a reader for the playwright circle. When you're reading the submissions for folks that want to perform, say at 10 Fest, which is your annual summer festival that you do, what grabs you when you're reading a play as a reader? How do you know like, aha, this is a keeper? I think as soon as you hear a character that feels really real, and I think as an actor you probably get that too, you start to read the character and you're like, oh my god, this person is so fun and so real, I want to play them. And I want to see them on stage. Or I know somebody like this. You know people like that. I know people like that. And it's like somebody who's interesting and engaging and flawed. And also, as soon as the piece has something that tells me the audience member that I know what's going on, and I'm going to expect to be entertained, whether it be funny or serious or suspenseful. Does that make sense? Yeah, I mean I think people relate to things that they see in their life and when you feel like you're in the know, right? And it's sort of like, I've been doing a little bit of stand-up and it's like when people are leaning in for the punchline and you do callbacks, right?  Yeah and some of the 10, some of those, some of the 10 best plays, you have to do that pretty quickly. Like there's the introduce the characters, what's the action going to be, what's the conflict, what's the resolution and we're out. Like so you really have to do that in pretty rapid succession to get the curve and the arc of the story, right? Right, that classic, you know, three-act arc that we all learn about in English class, where's that punchline, you know, the pinnacle has to come in five minutes as opposed to the full play could be at intermission after 45 minutes. Right, yeah. Yeah, what do you think this is something that I know you thought a lot about? What is the difference between, we talked about this a little bit, but spoken word performances, say poetry readings or poetic plays and some of the things we've been talking about that are just sort of more standardized formats of narrative plays with, particularly in a condensed version, not a lot of room for action. You have to really have that quick arc and quick resolution. What, what is the difference, would you say, between the more poetic versions of plays versus more straight up narratives? Well, I think that the one thing you're using the word narrative, sometimes there's not narrative in a poetic piece at all, and it can still be engaging. Boy, if your regular, you know, Neil Simon play has no narrative, people aren't going to want to keep listening to that. It's just everyday people talking to themselves. But when you do spoken word, it's more condensed, it's more heightened, you're using metaphor and analogy and hyperbole, so much more than you do in everyday pieces. But there's a blended, right? Does that make it more challenging, do you think, for the audience to get it? Sometimes, sometimes it does, sometimes they're like, I don't want to sit through that. I often have a tendency also, because my master's degree is in performance poetry, so I was very much into setting poems to dance and movement, and people oftentimes would say to me, why do you need so much? Why do you need the poems and the movement? I can't follow it all. And, and so like having to adjust and find that fine line where there's just enough, I mean, in Shakespeare, as the person comes to mind, right? Very heightened language, but we clearly know that Macbeth is going to kill somebody. You know, there's like, there's a lot of that action that we want, but then all this heightened language is juxtaposed, so it can be really challenging not to say that I'm comparing myself to Shakespeare at all. No, no, but I mean, when you're, when you're using multimedia or different techniques, my, my worry is you have to really convince people to go along on that trip with you, because they may not get it, right? And so some people, some people are like, this is really interesting. I have no idea what I'm watching, but I'm going to stick with it because I want to see how it ends. You know, and I just, I imagine, I don't know that. Yeah. And I don't know the answer yet. I mean, I probably never will, maybe, but I think there, there is that fine line. And sometimes you find it when you do Hallelujah.  What do you do? You know, bring me in more like you're saying into the know. Do you, do you workshop some of these pieces that you're working on at the Vermont Playwright Circle? Yes, yep. You get back like you lost us in. Yes.  Like, I imagine that would be really helpful to have a venue to, to share your work and get feedback. For me, it is. And that's because I feel very much like I'm a collaborative writer, when especially when it comes to theater, I might sit down and write poetry on my own, but I still am used to bringing poetry to a workshop and having people go, love this metaphor, why doesn't it come earlier? But some, for some playwrights, that's just not the case. They just want to get it all done. And then they might workshop it live and then they might tweak it themselves. So yeah, I have workshopped Man V. Squirrel. I brought it in. I don't know. I did change some stuff. The director said, hey, we need a new song, actually, you need to introduce this with a little bit of a song. And we added that. So yeah, definitely have done that. And my biggest piece that I did called Angel in the Fire, I have workshopped and then it was part of my thesis. So I have plenty of teachers, you know, giving me input to that. And then later, small workshop performances where we said, well, does this work this way? No, no. There's too much. They're talking too long. Yeah. All right. Well, I'm skipping ahead because that's a good segue into what do you do when a director or say, I don't know, a diva actor has a different interpretation.  You're in the audience or you're in the backstage saying, how do you, like, how does, you know, how does that handle that? How do you handle that? Yeah. When somebody disagrees, when you, you know, especially if it's something you're fairly passionate about and somebody is not getting the characterization right or they're not getting the, like, some of the nuance of what you're trying to build in the character. How do you manage that? The nice thing about a performance is it's a one live performance or a few live performances. And if, if someone interprets it differently, you can always go out and stage it again in a different way. So it's always changing. It's very ephemeral. But I would say I oftentimes, because I also direct would put on my director's hat and try to do some characterization and give them some background into why that character is like they are. And I have, at times, when I've directed said, when someone was really stubborn, because I said so, like I'm a parent, you know, I don't get that way so much. I haven't had to do that with playwriting because I think my stuff is pretty straightforward. But I try to be flexible because like I said, it's a group piece. So what if the diva actor or the director or someone has a different idea? Let them run with it because maybe it's something I never thought of. I might like it. So I tend to be a little more flexible about that than maybe some.  I just have to kind of let somebody take that and run with it. So yeah, very adult of you. It's very adult. But I also think it's because I don't know everything. I know what I was thinking when I put it down. But what do you think that it's collaborative? And I think it comes from like literally doing theater since I was in fifth grade. And so seeing that process and having a high school teacher, by the way, drama teacher who was very much into collaborative theater. Yeah. I just, you know, speaking of poetry, I was just thinking I took a poetry class writing in college and I wrote this poem that, you know, my 20 year old punk self thought was pretty profound about the changing of the seasons. And I had to sit there while someone else read it and then critique it.  I was having a good day. Oh, wow. Yes. And I think it's so interesting when it happens because they're getting whatever they're getting from it and and it might not be what you wrote. But then, you know, it's just that that's a growth experience to go back and say what, what kind of language was I using that somebody would have that that type of interpretation stuck with me. Anyhow, what tell me a little bit about like what kinds of plays do you like what are some of your favorite plays or playwrights or authors? Yeah, I have a show and tell in that one of my the most influential playwrights I ever read was Entezaka Shange. She wrote this play for color girls who is considered suicide when the rainbow is a nut. And I love the fact that it's such a long title. And if anyone's never seen this, they just recently restaged it. It was written in the 60 late 60s early 70s. Wow. And it is an amazing ensemble piece of model and it's monologues all spoken. And there's very poetic language. And when I saw it and read it in college, I said, Oh my God, you can put poetry on stage. I know his name Tyler Perry is directed a movie version with which he worked with her just before. And the way he represents the colors of the rainbow in the play, the rainbow is you know, each woman is wearing a different color from the rainbow. And they tell their stories. And in the movie, he adds that color for that character throughout each of their scenes. It's just very well done. Wow. There's a film version is a film version and it's called just for color girls because in the movies, you can't talk that long people don't pay attention. And it's quite amazing. But you know, she wrote very heightened language. It was definitely poetic and it was something that struck me Oh, I can write stuff for the for the stage. So that's a huge thing. I grew up I have to say my biggest influence is growing up or Shakespeare and Rodgers and Hammerstein to totally different musicals, musicals, musicals, musicals, right. And, and Shakespeare. Beth the musical, make Beth the musical is my favorite tragedy actually. But I loved it again, because it was theater with poetry, but it's Shakespeare, how could you not. And the first play I ever saw live was a lyric theater play. They did the musical Gigi and my mother brought me to this live show and I thought Oh, yeah, this is what I have to be doing. This is just amazing. But I there's a ton of people I love I like Carolyn Gage who's a lesbian poet. Paula Vogel who wrote the kiss.  I've heard of Tonya Barfield fiction as well. She may have written movies as well. Yeah, okay. I think. But she wrote Breck Half Life, which I directed for Pride one year. Two ladies their whole life, you know, sort of cycle of their relationship. Well, maybe that's why I'm remembering the name. Maybe that's why she's familiar. And there's just so many good playwrights out there. Jeannie Beckwith and Dvorah Zipkin, who's also a local playwright. Those are two of my favorite playwrights right there. If you get a chance to see their work do Jeannie is going to have actually, but this will be her third main stage show at Last Nation Theater this year during their season. It's called Sam and Jim and Hell and it's about Beckett and James Joyce. Oh, right. They did. Didn't they do a student version of that? Like they did an online workshop of it. Or NVU. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was really interesting. That's cool. So those those gals alone are just two of my favorite playwrights. So yeah. All right. A couple more questions I had for you. Yeah. Speaking of people that we know in the theater industry, I've been pondering this and actually I was just talking to Dvorah because she called and said, I can't make it. Why do you think so I want you to solve the Vermont theater problem? Why do you think that we're not that we're not seeing more LGBTQ themed plays and productions here in Vermont? You know, we did Pride Theater for many years. It was very popular. That's a good question. I think one of the things you're seeing in theater right now is people certainly post pandemic are oftentimes being very conservative with what they choose. If we're going to do a show, we're probably going to do Annie because it's got a million kids. It's popular. It's a musical. We'll get people through the door to see what we do, for example. I think that's one thing right now. I think you know, I actually went to see Paula Vogels the kiss down at another theater company, which has gone right out of my head. It's a southern theater company. They produced it after after it won some awards on on Broadway and was popular enough that people would hear about it. And that's got a lesbian themed, you know, a couple of characters who are lesbian. But it is rare and I don't know, you know, if it's that people are worried people won't come because certainly like, you know, here in Montpelier, for example, at least it's a pretty liberal town and has been for a long time. But I think oftentimes the reason isn't like if it was a big Broadway hit, most of the time it's not going to be LGBTQ as soon as musical, right? Yeah, as soon as one Tony's it was being done across Vermont. So really that's the issue. How popular is it so that I can make tickets so that I can do more theater because it's really hard to get people in theater at all. Yeah, I mean, I, you know, as you know, I'm part of the Valley Players Theater and we struggle for exactly what you said. We try to do something that's going to help fund us to take to make more of those creative. Let's see, we'll do one kid's show and we'll earn enough money that we can take a risk and do something that's maybe not heard of or not well known or whatever, you know, whatever that might be. It's just, you know, it's always been a conundrum to me and I was, I was so grateful when we were doing the Pride Theater that we could at least have this chunk of time or something. This kind of, yeah, and in the end I was, I was excited and I don't know if you were aware, but I, they started up in Montpelier, this company Shakespeare. Yeah. And I was involved in that and it was a queer version of Romeo and Juliet and we sold out the Plainfield Opera House and then one of the cast members got COVID, you know. Well, you know, I heard about that and I wanted to see it and I was like, well, COVID. Yeah, but it's good that they're doing that because you get that opportunity. Just like on Broadway they're doing things like they did an all female cast for 1776. Let's see how that plays. Just trying to get more people the opportunity to do some of these amazing classic roles, right? Change the dynamic and the, and the intention. I was interested, you know, some people were uncomfortable.  And I thought it was really liberating and I just, I hope that they do it again. But I always, but I'm also curious why we, like why we don't see more of that, say in Burlington or some of the larger populated areas. And maybe we need to, I was saying to DeVora, apparently we need to write something. We need to write some things. DeVora's writing something right now. I said that. I said, no pressure, DeVora, but get right on that so that we can. She's got a full length play she's working on that I'm dying to do a reading out, which I hope we do.  So it's, it's a great opportunity to do that. What I think is interesting is that you say people were uncomfortable with cross-gender casting and Shakespeare in which during his time, most art men played all the roles. Right. No, I thought that was my take. Like, what do you care? Right? Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Yeah, I'm still very highly interested in the idea of putting together more festivals and what I was about to say as we talked was, I think that's the key when you have someone dedicated to say, let's stage these pieces about this or from this community's point of view. That's how it gets done. Otherwise, it's all Annie and Fiddler on the roof. Yeah. And I agree. And I do remember several years ago, we did out of the closet. We did the series of LGBTQ 10 minute plays. I would love to do, I would love to do something like that again, just to kind of have a sampling rather than not that people shouldn't be exposed to plays. But you know, I loved the idea of that because it really made an effort to be inclusive. And some of the plays were about men and some were about transgender folks and some were about women. And I think we tried to be thoughtful about picking plays that might appeal to different members of the community. Yeah. I don't know. I've just been pondering this. Like, why? And I know it's not mainstream, blah, blah, blah, but we are Vermont, right? So it's a little more common in Vermont. And it's a little more accepted to be like, yeah, LGBTQ people are out there. And we have certainly have enough organizations out there advocating. It would be interesting to just put out a call and say, who's got a short play, you know, with an LGBTQ theme, or at least with LGBTQ characters, because I'm seeing more and more on television where characters just are gay or lesbian or bisexual. And there is not even an issue.  Which is something I've talked about on this show before, that discovery, Star Trek Discovery has the most queer characters of any Star Trek ever, ever, you know, and the doctor and his partner just happened to be gay and they happened to be on the on the spaceship, right? There's no question about who they are, for example. There's not a tragic backstory where one of them has to die or be disowned from their family. They're just like a that's this is, you know, my dream is to have healthy, healthy relationship. I mean, healthy and air quotes, because, you know, you need some, you need some conflict of some sort.  I'm wondering, did you ever read Vito Russo's book on the celluloid closet? No, but I did a movie version of that, right? Talking about it. Yeah, he wrote this book back in the 80s now a long time ago, but it was really compelling because he really talked about how gay characters were marginalized in Hollywood, you know, and, and he had these great photos. I recall that, you know, you're just looking at somebody's elbow and it's like, what is that?  And just like to cut out the whole rest of the scene and all the, you know, stereotypes of the effeminate man or the butch woman or all those, those things and, you know, the Hayes commission and movies being censored and all that. So I mean, we have come a long, long, long way. It's, you know, I love the idea of just mainstream TV having characters even when they're, even if they're stock characters, at least not having to explain the, you know, their gayness, the gayness, the gay angle.  Yeah. So my other question or I'm going to read you a quote and I'm sort of related here. This, this came from Terrell Alvin McRaney who wrote Choir Boy musical and he said, if I don't continue to try and write down and pin down the conflicts, the loves, the hates, the things that we want most in and from our community, people can easily say we don't exist. And so the question is how, how do you think your identity identifying as you do infuses your writing or impacts who you are as both a poet and an actor and a playwright? How do you bring that into your writing and into your performances, Stephen? I think what's really interesting about that question is that for most of my life, in my poetry, it has come out very strongly because poetry, oftentimes you write when you're either in love, falling in or out of love, you know, and emotions around those conversations I have to write about. It's, you know, it's very important to me. In my playwriting, I have had a really hard time figuring out how to write about who I am, especially because I'm not either straight or gay, right? I am bisexual, pansexual if I'd known that word when I was younger, right? Oh, yes, it doesn't matter to me that whenever I have presented things, here's this character, people have said, this is too complicated, just make this person straight or gay and you're like, okay. But I think the way it infuses, the way I think oftentimes comes through. And I've been trying to figure out how to write about it, like how am I going to write a play that's got queer characters, which is the weirdest thing to have to do when I'm, you know, totally accepting of this and I want it more. It's more in my directing and my casting, you'll hear me say all the time, I don't think it matters if it's a man or woman in this role and people are like, whoa, whoa, yes it does, you know. So it oftentimes in the production, the way I want to put a scene together will come out there or the way I want to direct and I'll say, no, I want to write, I want to direct this play, write Half Life, because it's about these two lesbian characters. So I'm just now trying to figure out how to fit it into the writing and make it not be.  I couldn't figure out how to do it and make people not feel like I was putting too much into a play or, you know, so that's a new thing for me actually. Right, so how do you, how do you kind of get that message in there without being so overt that people are like, okay, we get it, the character's gay, you know, how do we represent without the sort of overkill and we do see that. I think we see that. Great playwrights can do it. I'm not sure I fall into that category. When it comes to we've also seen it done badly. We've also seen like here comes the gay character and there we go. Yeah, and there they go. Yeah.  Or if it's all non-binary people, you know. Yeah, it's a tricky, it can be a tricky thing for me anyways. I didn't grow up in a time period where I was living within a really strong queer culture. And that's another whole episode that we could do with Keith about queer culture and how it kind of, we get acceptance and now we're kind of diffused into the culture. That's good, but where's the story? I know you guys talked recently about, I'm forgetting the long name, standing in this place, right? Standing in this place. What was, so what was it, the switching gears? Tell us a little bit, I know you talked about it in another show, but tell us a little bit about your involvement in that, because that was kind of a really cool piece that I thought was representative of our community in a lot of different ways, a lot of different people that had different life experiences. So many icons from our community were in that play and Mark Campbell is such a great writer, having, you know, hearing that she was going to put something together and interview us all and then put our own stories into this play. That was so exciting and to have a group of people who were just saying their truth on stage and not only that, but sort of representing the arc of, you know, becoming equal in Vermont, right?  It was a very powerful thing and I think we all really bonded in a different way than you would if you were just doing on Shakespeare and Annie, because it was a story we were able to tell our own stories and you're sharing so much of yourself that you really become close quickly. Yeah and it was cool from an audience perspective to see, you know, 20 odd people all in this big semi-circle on stage telling, as he said, telling their truth, but also sitting literally kind of shoulder to shoulder with people hearing their stories. It was very moving to hear all of the different experiences and it was really geared towards people having grown up here in Vermont, which in the day was not quite as open-minded as it is today and that could have been a lot more challenging for some of the more mature folks and then to also see like, you know, the Josh and the Grays and the folks that are younger generation also interesting, not just saying their own piece, but playing people who were younger in the 80s when some of that was evolving, you know, so to have people of the younger generation playing those I thought that was really interesting. Yeah, it was a good show. Yeah, we enjoyed it. And I think we have to do a shout out to DeVora, since she's not here, and talk a little bit about Table for One because that was my first, I think that was my first 10-fest experience, maybe, let's say. And I remember, and I know it had been performed before I was in it and it's been performed a couple times afterwards, I'm pretty sure. And I'm curious what your recollection is, but also just wanted to say that for me, that was right around the same time that I was getting involved with Pride.  And I just remember having that moment where I read it and it was like, oh, thank God, somebody has finally written something that I can relate to, that I can actually potentially act in without having to like, you know, play straight. I'm sure you have a different experience because you've known D'Bora for a long time, but what, you know, what was your experience when you first read that? Well, my first experience for that actually is that she workshopped it with us. It came out of a Vermont Playwright Circles prompt, which was, let's all write something for Valentine's Day. And have her write that piece when I have seen the Valentine's Bandits hearts all over town. That was lovely. And I agree with you. It's so nice to see, like, that's one of those plays we're talking about where the two characters happen to be women, but it could be anybody in those roles. It's not about coming out or anything. It's just about how people feel where they're at with the relationships and Valentine's Day and how frustrating that can be. And so that was very refreshing when I read that piece. And I immediately said, oh, yeah, this is something that would be fun to do and how fun to get to do it several times. And we did it in two different, we did it for 10 Fest and for pride because we did the out of the closet shorts. And I just thought it was fun. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. And I guess for our Montpelier audience members shout out. Yeah, the Montpelier, the Valentine's Bandit, as everybody knows. And did they go on hiatus for a couple of years? I saw them last year. I don't know. At one point, the person who founded started that pass away. And the year that happened, some high school girls went around and said, oh, what do you mean? There's no bandit this year. And they started it up again. And I think maybe once during it seems like I did it all through the pandemic. I actually got to help out one year. I got secret envelopes to put on my window. So it was exciting. Yeah, it's a great tradition. Right. So and the premise of the play is that somebody is sort of anti Valentine's Day. And as you said, it wouldn't matter if they were gay or straight or anything in between or bi, but it just so happened that it was two women. And again, the idea I love what I appreciate about that play is it wasn't like mushy Valentine's ish. It was sort of turning that on its head. But there was sort of this understanding that we're all human, we're all people, and this is an experience that everybody shares. If you're not in a relationship, Valentine's Day is not a day that you look forward to. So I thought it was great. It was a sort of a reclaiming of Valentine's Day in a way. And I appreciated that piece. Yeah, definitely me too. And I'm always I'm always excited anytime DeVora comes out with a play because I know it's going to be fun and because she does write from her truth. So of course, she's going to write about two ladies in the play. And that's where it easily comes through in a good writer. And this new piece she's writing, which maybe I shouldn't reveal anything about, but it's I just keep nudging her to we're hoping to do a reading over the winter. So we'll let you know about it if we do it. Sounds great. Well, I did I did tell her that I will put in a plug to Ann and Linda and Keith to do a follow up interview. So that would be yeah, that would be a fun thing to do. You know, if she's looking for a forum to workshop that or to do that, we can certainly get get the word out. Yeah. Yeah, great. Is there is there anything else that you wanted to share? Well, I will be doing a reading. There's a new reading series going on at the front in Montpelier, which is a small gallery on the very street. It's founded by Bob and Joy. And it's it's a it's a they do two poets a month and Linda has read at this. And in May and May, I'll be reading at it. So I'm kind of excited to be going back to doing some poetry and doing it right. What is it near the the pizza place?  Okay, so near the the burger place or wherever that yeah right right across from there. That's exciting. I know Linda's doing some sort of poetry reading coming up. Oh good. He did the front last month, which was lovely with another person and then she I'm sure she has more. So you get a chance to hear her read. She's a good poet. And are you working on any plays? No, I am actually currently writing and rewriting some poetry and also I've been writing more and more spoken word poetry stuff that I do at Poetry Slam. So it's going back to that root of liking to perform nice poetry. So that's what I'm doing right now. It's awesome. Maybe after this I'll end up trying to write something with a with a by character you never know for play. Hey, you know, why not? You know, yeah, you'll have to figure out is there a subtle way you know how do I how do I rent right the musical rent does a very good job of that. If anyone's ever seen that because Idina Menzel's character is by and she's with a woman and there's there's some great music around that. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good one. We'll see. All right, and then summer. You're going to be involved in 10 Fest. Do you want to Yes, this summer right circle or 16 10 Fest is coming up this summer in August 16. Technically, we did one of them online during the pandemic. So it was more of a conference, but we did a little bit of 10 minute plays. We are also working to produce finally and get out onto podcast. Some of the plays that you were involved in recording, we did some audio recordings. Yeah. So you wanted I could send you the link to our podcast because that actually has the play that you and Cynthia were in. And I'm editing mine, which was the just as long a title as this other play how to extirpate from your yeah, preserve. So we're working on getting some of those out. So we're always looking for playwrights or actors. So that's what I would say. Have you put out your request for submissions yet? Or is that coming up? That's coming up shortly. We're right now wrapping up the request for submissions, which is going out in the next week or so. So we're calling we have a call for scripts out. We have a theme again this year, which is right about an aha moment. And that could be like Eureka. I just came up with something aha. It could be represented in the text. It could even be something as simple as a light coming on on stage. It's a moment is the theme this year. So 10 minute plays. If people are interested, how do they get a hold of the playwright? The best way to do it that to tell you online is to go to vtplays.com. And that's our website and our email is on there, which is a little longer drawn out. But go to vtplays.com. The the call should be up there within the next week or two. And so people just people that aren't familiar with the process, you can submit a 10 minute play and you have a group of readers that will read it to make sure it fits within the time constraints. And then the top 10 plays are chosen. And the authors will be notified. And then you have the pleasure of watching your production staged in the summer. This is the third week of August. And maybe more. We're working on that. But it's a great opportunity for I always say to folks, if people are listening and saying, I need to get on stage and play and in a person of indeterminate gender sexuality orientation and ethnicity, I need to do this. I need to embrace all those letters. Your auditions are typically in June. Is that correct? Yep, usually in June at the Valley players. We love them. They have hosted us for all this time and it's been a great venue to use. Yeah. And yeah, and I'll put out a plug for aspiring writers. Check out the Vermont Playwrights. And you heard it from me. Please, people continue to write for our community.  We've done a bunch, haven't we, where it's like, I remember, remember Susan, shout out to Susan Buckner. She wrote that lovely play about the two elderly people. And then we flip one of the. We made that into a lesbian couple, yeah. We're like congratulations, they're lesbians. So that happens. And that's kind of fun. And I appreciate the flexibility of the Playwrights folks. And, you know, when people audition, you can be in more than one play, for example.  And it's just a great opportunity. So I would highly recommend it to folks. Yeah. And also, if you haven't done a lot of acting or for a while, it's short. You can do one and you don't have that. I went off on this. But that's what I was getting at. We have folks that have done shows with us at the Valley Players and they've said I can't, you know, I can't commit to doing another full-length play, you know, they may have, you know, obligations or whatever. And I've said to a bunch of people, you need to check out the 10 Fest because, you know, it's a 10-minute play.  You know, you're only rehearsing for what, four to six weeks or something at the max. And it's only an hour at a time. And it's a great way to get your feet wet, if you haven't, as you said, acted in a while. A lot of people, I think, come and come to the Valley Players as well and say like, I was in a play in high school. Yeah. Other in their 40s and you're like, come on down. And that's a great way to build community, I think. So. Definitely. Yeah. Cool. Well, thank you so much. I feel like we had a trip down memory lane. Yeah. Well, thanks for thinking of doing this. And I hope the more of these kinds of interviews, it's really fun. Whenever you guys, all things LGBTQ, interview the community for whatever reason. Yeah. So, yeah, I want to, on behalf of all things LGBTQ, you know, Heath and Anne and Linda, thanks for trusting me with the mic and the video.  And I want to thank my guest, Kim Ward. Thank you so much for spending some time with me. And we will definitely circle back and talk to some of your colleagues. And I eagerly await the shows that are going to be in 10 bests. And maybe, maybe we'll just write something and submit it. I love it. It's a challenge to all of us. All right. Thanks so much. Thank you for joining us. And until next time, remember, resist.


A review was published recently on Demoic Acid, a potent neurotoxin found extremely rarely in seafood that can cause seizures, coma, death, like the paralytic fish toxins, but most interestingly causes amnesia, permanent short-term memory loss. If anyone's seen the movie Momento, that's what they're talking about, anterior-grade amnesia. So here's kind of a prototypical case. Prior to muscle ingestion, the patient was entirely self-sufficient small business owner. After supper, he started to get nauseous, up all night vomiting, but then he started to really deteriorate. 10 days later he's in a coma, in a ventilator, but then he recovers. Three months later, he's back. Normal language, judgment, social skills didn't know where he was or what day it was. In fact, he doesn't remember anything since getting sick, but from then on was unable to retain any new information, though he could remember everything in his life before that fateful meal. The toxin targets the hippocampus, the part of the brain where memories are laid down. Years later, when he died, at the autopsy, there was complete neuronal loss, nerve loss in that part of the brain. This amnesic seafood toxin has been found in tuna, anchovies, mackerel, soul sardines, halibut, and the diatoms that produce the original toxin that bioaccumulates up the food chain into the fish appear to be increasing in frequency and toxicity, thereby presenting a continued threat to human health and seafood safety. The toxin is heat stable, so it's clear that cooking will not increase the safety of the products, contaminate with democ acid. It does cross the placenta, can enter the brain tissue, and accumulate in amniotic fluid, so a particular concern lies in infants and children that may be exposed.


Live here on the independent investor channel live stream and take this opportunity and welcome first and foremost subscribers to the independent investor channel your your devote's subscribership and Really being an ambassador and an advocate for the message here doing your part as a as an independent Investor is part of this community your success In in no small part is really the success of what we're trying to advocate for here a little bit different approach This is the fastest 60 minutes on YouTube for me. No doubt about it I just want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for allowing me the opportunity to come on and talk to you kind folks About the investing opportunity how it's an evolved over the last five years. I've been doing YouTube now It seems like a shot in the bucket man. The time has gone by so fast The investing portfolio has done its thing, you know I go back just five years and I look at where we were financially in the accounts less than six figures total net worth and now Well over the half a million dollar mark. We've digressed a bit over the last couple weeks. That's totally fine I've been somewhat off the grid to be honest with you Looking to turn over a new leaf. I think in my application I've admitted a few times and for you guys that are with me a little bit you you'll know Straight up. I do wear my heart on my sleeve. I am a human being first and foremost I don't come on to YouTube to profess to have any of the answers or be anything special Other than the fact that I do acknowledge that you know good on me for want to come on and Share a testimonial that of which would not be possible without the power of social media number one. I get it to offer candid and robust talk about Holding people's view of money in check and and holding people accountable To not always buy in to what people tell you What you need to think about money? Okay, I've said this many many times The more independent you can be with your thought your application investing How you assess risk? How you deliberate on on taking certain positions? How you look to justify the investing opportunity as a whole is Going to really define your degree of separation between group think and your ability to be independent. Let's just be real, okay? So the robust and candid discussion Make it under some people skin. It's totally fine. I don't apologize That's I retain creative control on the independent investor channel. That's what people enjoy about it Because at the end of the day people really want to look in the mirror and retain some level of creative control over Not only they're investing application But they're spending discipline and they want to feel like they've got some level of control make no mistake about it these are the avenues that we teach upon right to Coach you up if you get a little light on your application to provide a little bit of motivation and Some some some feel good Right an opportunity to come in for a few minutes and I know for a lot of people 60 minutes is a huge deal I used to do this live stream for two hours Some of the devote folks that have been supporting of the message for a long long time understand my angle looking at my approach And what I what I'm trying to do Know that I could come on and talk six hours about personal finance because I think The topic is infinite. Yes, but I think at the end of the day a lot of people need to understand a lot more about Money they need to understand a lot more about the forms of money Okay, what does it mean when you see that number in your savings account or your checking account or your other established buckets of invested capital Do you have invested buckets of capital? Are you scared of starting in the stock market Ryan stock markets like gambling? Right It's gambling in so far as you can't justify putting $50 to work in an investment Profile for yourself remember when I started this independent investor channel journey Some five years ago the landscape was extremely different than it is now You can invest for free So all barriers have been absolutely destroyed with regard to your entrance to the market multiple buckets that you can participate in To satisfy even the most conservative investor profile and strategy out there And of course those opportunities which do take on more risk with more of a reward type of profile as well Profiles out there to conserve wealth right later on in life Whether or not you want to enter into some of those diamonds of the stock market that we all know and love You know when was the last time you thought of Costco as a phenomenal investment opportunity, you know One of my favorite stores to even go into I'm like a kid and it's Home Depot I love going into Home Depot and walking around when was the last time you thought about that as an investment profile I own the full suite of the Google Facebook. I just think the internet of things is quite frankly a very intriguing Area to be in the stock market Amazon had a very nice week this week We will get into and and walk through the portfolio reviews as I always do I do also want to take this opportunity to welcome there Maybe a few guests in here that are as a result of me frequent ding Somewhat of a of a gossip thread. I guess through YouTube There's some sources of phenomenal information in there and that's quite frankly what I gravitate to There's some entertaining material. Obviously it is open for them and it's free of charge to enter So you never really know who you're gonna get in there. Hey, no no problem man at the end of the day Even the people who go in there and troll some of those threads man. Sometimes I feel like those people might have the You know need the greatest amount to tutelage in their in their life their application. Maybe they just need help I'm not really sure Maybe they know exactly what they're doing on the on an online forum. You really can't tell From next to another but I I do typically I know verge Drop some questions in there wanted me to engage a little bit on the highly on discussion I haven't dropped the video through the independent investor channel for a while Albeit maybe five six weeks anyway since I've uploaded one There's a reason for that. I was coming out with them pretty frequently because that you know $7 and 68 cents I felt like it was laughably oversold. I believe here in the low tens. It's also laughably oversold But it doesn't have the potential to return back to those laughable laughable levels certainly and I don't want people to Misassociate their own risk stumble into the independent investor channel opportunity Misconstru what it is that I'm saying not understand the totality of my risk evaluation of a highly on for example And how I'm probably more apt to buffer those Those volatile swings from day to day in the stock Which quite frankly I made a post the other day about the stock and I made the point of investing in the company and not not the stock All right, I think a lot of people look at the price action day to day and they you know Allow their emotion to get kind of kind of caught up in those day to day price Fluctuations and really don't acknowledge look if there's nothing going on with the company, then there's nothing going on Okay, but they're not going to revolutionize trucking overnight and and they've come out and they've echoed the same sentiment and I Think it really does take or provide an opportunity for you to sit back and say What what is the real play here in this opportunity? Do I have unrealistic expectations of of a specific stock in my overlevered? Have I have I stepped outside of my risk tolerance and and stepped into a position where I was only looking at one outcome as being the outcome that was going to satisfy What it was that I was looking to get out of entering into the position right and now it's done the opposite That of which it does a lot of the times in stock market investing a stock will Inevitably do something that is Unpredictable to do I always say that there's either one of two outcomes either it goes up or it goes down And a stock that has a weird way of doing sometimes neither one of those two things But it's stock market investing there's no doubt about it and to understand the risk reward profile Is an interesting one and I'll give you kind of an example. I've owned Exxon mobile for over five years, okay? Society would say Ryan you're good. You're in that. It's a Dow component, right? I think it's actually just moved out of the Dow I might be right on that But Dow component for a long long time. There's always an old saying. Hey, you'd never lose money with Exxon mobile Well crude fell on its ear. You guys remember a price of crude I believe dipped almost near 20 if not below 20 a barrel all major oil suffered, right? Started the discussion really at that time of looking at alternatives now 10 years ago in the alternative fuel craze and the solar craze Came out it caught fire and then it died out. Okay. I think the Electric vehicle market right now is is here to stay I do I think that there are trends that are emerging that are mega trends and multi-year trends that are going to be around forever Do I think fossil fuels are going away? No, I don't I actually think there's going to be a place for for Bev I think there's going to be a place for short medium term applications in the commercial space for Hauling our goods. I think people are really going to look at it From a solution standpoint and look to pick the solution that is number one available and number two economically feasible because The grounds well that people don't really acknowledge a lot is that big institutions out there that have built companies on the precedents of efficiency efficiency efficiency Getting goods from point A to point B as quickly as possible Have have now been almost forced into a corner to acknowledge look maybe maybe there's maybe there's a smarter way to go about said business plan of moving goods from point A to point B some of our goods need to be moved long distances and Those moves require a lot of horsepower to get them those longer distances, right? In other words, they need to be able to power those longer routes. Okay, so in certain capacities There are certain solutions out there that might work Hydrogen fuel cell right is the other solution out there and then and then of course some of your solutions that highly on is actually really the the industry stand alone on With regard to the compressed natural gas and the renewable natural gas element, right? So it's exciting time I think we're slightly premature a little bit in just jumping in with both both feet especially especially if we can't stomach the volatility from now until inevitably when these opportunities tend to work out so Some robust and candid discussion I would invite invite your comments to drop into the thread here This is 60 minutes that I open up here over the airwaves to engage in a Q&A with you Fine folks, I would not want to spend my time which is absolutely invaluable Like yours is in any other place other than with you kind folks on the independent investor channel live stream So welcome to the show Friday 9 o'clock. It's gonna be robust Of this opportunity and what it can mean for individual investors certainly and I've got Valencia Andres, thank you, you know it could the stocks do that they go up and they go down Right. There's no surprise here and I think you guys are gonna be extremely encouraged by my demeanor I've been investing a long long time and What I was gonna say about the comparison between how An investment like Exxon is somehow socially acceptable It's within my wheelhouse is a real retail investor if I wanted to dabble in the single stock arena To go ahead and enter into shares of Exxon Which five years ago I did it entered into a pretty large position and over the last five years I've taken it into some extremely deep water Here I am sitting on the precipice of coming back into the black for the very first time in other words I've held the stock for five years haven't made it dime haven't made it dime in the eyes of society That's somehow socially acceptable, right? But when you look at a higher risk higher reward type of scenario like a high highly on which is not for the faint of heart, okay? If you want to call it speculative you can do that, okay? If that's what makes you feel good to put highly on in somewhat of a box here I put it into just a unique category of a company that I have shares in early Iran In the evolution of a story that is really the first inning of its story Okay, now when I say that I say that tongue-in-cheek because as a shareholder in the company and a rather large one at that I'm actually extremely satisfied at The timetable that's been kept. Yes, but some of the pleasant surprises that seemingly are breezed over now I'm not going to argue the fact that the stock has been Disappointing to say the least okay, whatever that means now My assessment or the fun opinion that I dub on the stock You shouldn't really have anything to do at all with your investing thesis on the company Okay, if you think the company is going out of business then therefore the stock will cease to exist etc etc And and you'll be either right or wrong on your application. I totally get that okay but I think it's important really to understand that Stock market investing needs to be understood from a multifaceted strategy in application In other words, do you do passive investing right? Do you do dividend growth investing? Okay, do you invest at all is highly on your only holding right? Somebody said if I invest in this stock I could get rich right so where's the riches I've been investing in the company for three weeks Ryan I hold on to cheers what gives you asshole like where it show me the money. Let's go And I think some of that like these aren't bad people that are coming up with these right you can say what you want like if you're unhappy with the performance of this company because You had a bullish thesis like I did and you're disappointed in the stock performance Lovely at the end of the day all this back and forth and all this deliberation comes down to one very very simple Simple question that you'll have to answer for yourself. Do you invest in the company or do you not? Very very simple. Okay highly on for me and the opportunity that it presents here at $10 and 36 cents 39 cents today at the close Represents an upside potential that I cannot dub to let's say an Exxon mobile. Okay furthermore Highly on presents an interesting risk reward proposal in that if you're going to Realize those big profits those big potential moves You're gonna have to get into the company while there's a few X factors going on In other words highly on is not gonna put a neon green bow on top of it and give you an Invitation card VIP to go ahead and tell you the exact number of shares to buy at the exact price that you'll need to buy it at Nor is it gonna come with a neon green Crystal ball which tells you exactly when said stock is gonna go up to X on a target price Okay, that's just not realistic at all the greater the amount of risk that an investor is Willing to take is going to render the maximum amount of profits mark my word If the stock doubles from 1039 and goes to 20, okay, which could very very easily happen There's gonna be more people excited at investing in the company Over $20 then they are excited about investing in the company here at 1039 if you can explain that to me Okay, you're probably better than me, but this is just the game that we exist in okay a lot of inexperience across the retail Arena getting in way too over their head really not understanding what it's going to take to turn a company like a Highly on into a positive positive investment and It was all the way back in the inception of early 2020 when the SPAC rolled out the investor presentation Detailed their forecast out to around 2024 2025 It was one of those very very first elements of deliberation that I looked at and I said look if I'm gonna invest in this stock It could go up fast it could go down fast none of that really should be a criteria to enter the stock now Unless I'm bullish on the company and willing to keep the stock For as much as five years now this was in 2020 so You need to be very very careful with that application Sometimes when you look at that you think okay well five years down the line I'm gonna hold the stock it can sometimes be an excuse to enter into a stock that You may be missing some due diligence on okay now there are no perfect Applicators out there okay in other words this investment could like any investment turn on its ear Okay is ExxonMobil gonna be around 50 years down the line Are they on the front of the leading technology or the back end? Okay, you could give a nice bull bear thesis on where you think fossil fuels will end up 10 20 30 40 50 years down the line Some estimates say that a Petro is going to be fueling our trucks indefinitely in some capacity going forward Right, it's just gonna be that sweet spot on where this supplemental on the green initiative comes into place to Start to allow these companies to not take such a black eye all the time for Leaving such a negative footprint on the environment and I think the the bottom line is gonna have to to stay okay as long as companies are not being Forced and their hand is not being forced to do that transition at all costs Then they're gonna keep the status quo. It's just very very simple. It's a very very simple Decision for companies to say look this is what's working. This is what's reliable This is what's currently efficient. Yes, but the reliability element is is the key and You know, if you don't have that catalyst and you don't have that ability to really transition and leverage into Something that's much more efficient for these companies out there Then the status quo will remain the same and Hylian's looking to challenge the status quo in a way to provide the solution Anybody who's done due diligence on the company knows exactly what I'm talking about And I'm not my job is not to come on here and and sell you on a specific company. That's not my job I'm open and honest with my position. I'm not trying to influence the stock in any way I have conviction on the stock to know that it's gonna be at X Price target somewhere down the line Talking about it now so premature in the game is somewhat feudal Right if in fact my conviction on the stock had me looking at the prospects out into 23-24 and 25 and we're looking seven weeks away here from the hyper truck ERX rollout We're talking about a hyper truck innovation council representing a hundred thousand a fleet owners guys I I just the writing is too heavy on the wall and and yes My dollars are at risk right now in the company But my definition of a risk and and the reward profile that exists therein Hopefully you can take a little bit of an element of insight because I yeah No, I haven't done highly on video for about six weeks or so But I was pumping those out when the stock was at 730 745 eight dollars a share I was loading up on put contracts and I was making a small fortune doing so I was also buying common shares in the stock I bought 400 today just because it was fun and and I can God bless America, baby investing as an opportunity guys and If you ever lose track of that and you start to look at investing as a detriment Take a step back Re-evaluate your program and really really be honest with your capability I tell you what a lot of the substantiation justification that I can Muster to enter into a stock like this right now and and and do so in a strategic manner I'm throwing hundred share bullets at this thing basically today was a 400 bullet fire away. It was totally fine The way I substantiate that is because I have multiple buckets of wealth guys built up from zero Over time a lot of swing trading profits, right? Established in not only tax protected accounts But I don't disclose and I don't I haven't come out this year with my swing trading profit But in the brokerage account alone, I'm already supplementing my Day job, which I do have for you guys that don't know $14,000 just in the brokerage to swing trading profit, right? So that helps kind of Buffer if it makes you feel better Me I could give two shits either way that doesn't matter to me what the day-to-day fluctuation is here.   You're ill prepared to understand You don't have confidence in the due diligence, right? Sorry for the robust and candid discussion there, but sometimes people really need to recalibrate Recheck what it is. They think they understand about the stock market. The bottom line for me Obviously is I'm an investor in the company, okay? I think at $10 and 39 cents for a lot of retail investors This will be that opportunity to get in on the ground floor of a company and put yourself in a position To look back and say I did it and not look back and say I should have done it Right. You ever done that before sure if you've ever been involved with stock market investing You'll know that opportunities will come and go and you'll be that investor and any more I win a lot of the time with my investments. I lose a few and pick a few lemons Here and there it happens, right? But I have a very very short memory about the stock market investing But if you're not paying attention to say good grief, where was I when Apple was at X price or where was I when? Microsoft I remember looking at the ticker tape when I started investing when I was a young boy and it was at $20 a share, you know Apple In those low amounts remember Amazon at $7 a share when it first started and it's like man What was I thinking? Well, it's easier now to say that stuff and in retrospect and Typically, you're not provided a whole lot of validation when companies and especially stock are in those positions and In all fairness to any stock investor out there going through a deliberation That in fact from a risk reward profile is the very toughest time to pull the trigger and Establish the position for the long-term in a company I just so happen to have that established right now in highly on and and I'm happy to share the journey with you guys It's totally fine win and And and how it ends up getting to my price target I think you guys are going to be pleasantly surprised to know that I won't change my demeanor one bit You guys that have been with me a while know I don't change my approach for anybody and good on me for being open and candid with my position It's right there at the top of the thread if you're wanting to understand like where my conviction lies, but You know, it's to each his own on the stock and I only provide my my tutorial on the stock Just aimed to help people because you know 100 shares in the company here at a thousand dollar investment if it gets to my price target That's a ten thousand dollar bill for you Who couldn't take that accelerated start intent at a ten thousand dollar bill, you know for for risking a thousand dollars? Look guys, I'm gonna be kind of real with you a little bit here If you invested and bought a thousand shares in the company right now, you'd be you'd be investing ten thousand Okay, if the stock went down a dollar, you'd be so pissed off at me It wouldn't even be funny But how come the vast majority of society goes out there now you can't find a car for ten thousand dollars? But if you could drive half a car down the road, that's the justification that society is Absolutely, exceptive of you In your deliberation on a purchase that's one hundred percent justified When in reality five to ten years down the line that automobile is gonna turn into dust and it's gonna be worth nothing in Five to ten years, where could ten thousand dollars of highly on be worth? I'll leave that rhetorical question to you only to strike a little bit of perspective at this deal Because society is not gonna help you out. Okay now one of my most respected youtubers came out made a pretty controversial statement about financial security and wealth being the all The the the all-encompassing reason to put the middle finger up to society and say if you you know I made it I did this and that that to me constitutes a little bit of insecurity and quite frankly some anger issues I won't I'm not gonna change a bit. I'm doing this really for The sake of the the the investment, right? That's where I get off as an investor is is in the strategy the application The ability to take everything in my god-given power, right in Expertise in reading doing due diligence understanding themes and trends Understanding what industry demands, right? Is there a need for the product, right? Those types of things where the leadership lies What type of internal team exists on the leadership team? All those things are right there at your disposal To either discredit or you know put in the positive category the negative category, whatever it may be I see blood phantom in the group here if you guys haven't subscribed to blunt phantom 81 did a really good tutorial and highly on actually just this week and So one of the few guys Alex's runs are fantastic channel. Please go over just subscribe I know he's a lot like me and that he's like if you like me great if not get the hell away I'm good And he's one of those a few channels that actually I very vocal with the fact that I don't watch YouTube, but Alex is one of those guys that I really respect and does a great great job a very very Diplomatic in his approach kind of gives you somewhat of the real talk, you know kind of admits sometimes that maybe he's wrong Which is what I do which is in line with the way a lot of investors actually should approach this gig Okay, you're not going to be right all the time But I just think he did a good job and he Delivers the video from a technical perspective, which I appreciated So you'll get a little mix of my fundamental application I I think some of the technicians right now trying to do technicals which which Alex did a good job walking through the Technicals on the video. I think it's is really difficult on a company like that that doesn't have Historic precedents. It's got a mountain at 58 and it's got a base here over the last six months at $10 Let's be real and and it really hasn't provided the technicians any type of Historical ranges to work off of and I think sometimes that can skew the averages in such a tight amount of time frame But that's going to become more predictable right once the revenues start to flow Once the orders start to flow in the stock is going to start to react to some of those Injects whereas right now it doesn't have any it doesn't have any there's nothing really holding the stock up I mean if it comes out with a positive Article the stock pops 50 cents if nothing comes out the following day it falls 50 cents, you know There's really nothing it's kind of being traded right now in a vacuum and and I think that's You know, that's indicative of a company like this that's in the first innings Really of rolling out and looking to revolutionize the commercial vehicle space class 8 so Very very exciting stuff, but I wanted to give a plug plug to blood phantom. He's one of my favorites One of those that I if you've won my respect You're probably doing something right And I don't mean that to toot my own horn But I just don't have a lot of time to listen to a lot of people that blah blah blah and talk as if they're They're their discussion is the all-knowing everything On youtube because in stock market investing. I don't think there's a whole lot of place for that I think there's a lot of place for Deliberate conversation debate.  I don't know probably not. I've never been lucky in my life. I've worked for everything I've got It just so happens to be the timing is such that I'm rolling out the investment of a lifetime And living it with you kind folks. So we'll we'll continue to roll it out We'll continue to chronicle the hold guys So I'm going to jump in real quick and I'm going to cover the portfolios We were down just a touch again We're in summer. So I spend a lot more time Paying attention to other things other than the stock market. So not a lot of moves Amazon went bananas. That was a Really nice some really nice work on my end To pick back up on those five shares on that swoon low a couple weeks ago I talked about that a little bit But back in amazon with five shares So we're up handily in the stock now I was I was tempted to swing trade that is just the easiest thousand bucks That that you could make in a two-day swing on a company. It's just gone gangbusters But amazon is really a company where I want to be so We kept it in here It takes up a nice lion's share of the discretionary space in the in the total portfolio Which i'm satisfied with Vti we had a half the position there were 50 shares I did liquidate and put that money to cash. That's where that 7% cash comes from The highly on position I I bought 400 more shares today. Um Crazy Ryan. Yeah, what's new? I'm crazy I sleep well Um, I had the most fun today. I bought the highly on shares right at the end of the market A couple minutes to spare anyway Then I came home and threw the football around the pool with the kid for a little bit Yeah, I'm crazy But uh doing really really well otherwise no changes in this portfolio at all to speak of Nothing too crazy to note either Just the action in all of the fang stocks was Remarkable this week. There's just no doubt about it. These are just some powerful companies in uh facebook and google and amazon as well Apple and microsoft and they're they're heavily in the black as well for me And we've got some big positions there now moving on. This is the roth number one This is fully invested Not a whole lot of um of cash to speak of The the facebook position there is an awful big position. We're down marginally week over week. Nothing too crazy Um, I have a weird feeling about the stock market. Um, it doesn't it doesn't feel right with me I I think I think my hesitation on the stock market is the looming roll-off of forbearance and a a bubble Not a pocket bubble but a bubble across the us created by some Some specific price and demand issues with the supply chain lumber specifically and I I think it's um It's unfortunately pushing up some prices On housing to levels that it shouldn't be at And I think there's going to be some people who have taken advantage of forbearance if they're not careful, they're going to end up in trouble come this august And I think that could be a systemic shock to the stock market We will see uh, so right now i'm continuing to dollar cost average to the buckets I'm being aggressive in saving to cash I'm certainly not being aggressive on my stock market Application except for highly on because that's where I see the risk reward profile is like screaming at me Hit me on the head see for me. It is one of those neon bows. That's right above the stock and I'm like That's what I want to buy. That's what I want to buy. So that's what I did the rest of the positions are fine They're not going anywhere. So that's roth number one This is roth number two um Ali Baba very disappointed in the action there. I thought it was uh, it had run up off of its base It ran right back down through its 210 price where I thought support was Uh, it came back a little bit today, but but very disappointed there, but um google Very very nice action in exxon mobile today speak of the devil very very nice And then the other positions there you can you can see Um marginally up in the small portfolio that could this sucker just keeps on chugging along Make a little dab of profit hundred dollar here hundred dollar there Little dividends here little dividends there. Um, this is one of those portfolios that I spend zero time Uh stressing out about um, I don't end up in a in a yahoo thread Talking about my specialty etf portfolio. It's just busy making me a little dab of money every week Here and there a little dab of money man passive investing It's legit The guys that have been tuning in for me a long time know that i'm a staunch believer in passive investing and Hell the market was up 500 points today It might have come off a touch at the end of the market, but My passive investing my s and p 500 from vanguard is Jesus christ just to make um make a make a person wealthy It's really nice. I can't promise that that's going to Remain true over the next five years ten years, you know, what is the risk reward profile from You know a startup company on the wave of some really exciting technology like highly on Compared to the s and p 500 right from here going forward you'd say man It looks attractive looking back you would say you'd be crazy to do anything other than invest in the s and p Because the last 12 years has just been on absolute on an absolute tear um s and p has just Really made some crazy wealth and um, I'm an example of that to some extent Guys that know me and gals that have followed my channel for a long long time knows that I've been kind of cautiously optimistic on this market for many many years And uh, has it cost me? Probably Probably going against the old onus not to try to time the market Just spend your time in the market and more importantly maybe spend your time doing other things rather than Manifesting over the day-to-day moves in the stock market. I don't know That that that that's some candid and robust talk right there that if you can really adhere to in the majority Capacity within your uh stock portfolio. You'll probably be better off for it, right? I just not only adhere to diversification within the portfolio, but also strategy diversification Right, I deploy a pretty good element of different strategies And I i'm very very my conviction in each of the strategies is pretty strong Like I I love dividend growth investing for what it is Is my dividend growth portfolio going to give me the renderings or the profit potential That one holding and highly on can give me Yeah, probably not right, but it's going to continue that inflow of dividends for that bulk of wealth That I have devoted to that element or or that strategy within my portfolio The growth the growth element with amazon facebook google Some apple microsoft even though they pay dividends right can be put into that higher growth big tech category right so A lot of different facets of the portfolio and I think if there's a takeaway for you guys that are looking to get involved in investing It's relative. You don't have to start with you know Millions and millions of dollars. You don't have to start with hundreds of thousands of dollars You can start start with a few grand start with a few hundred bucks But again when you start to dabble in the stock market with a few hundred dollars I would question your devotion to the craft Yeah, yeah Yeah, it's it's only going to be profitable if you really do kind of buy into the element of the more that you have the more that you're going to make all right, so Here's the 71 just marginally down week over week This is a 71 stock portfolio that I have through m1. I think it's up to 72 now Actually, that's it's a fun way of investing. I put this in my dividend growth category It's an element. It's an angle of said strategy It complements some of my larger holdings in the larger portfolio proctor and gamble 3m Right, some of those large kimberley clark pepsi coca cola Those types of of elements of the portfolio, right? You notice how sometimes I don't even call them stock that they're elements of wealth building, right? You know or at least Historically have been proven that coca cola at least for the last 58 54 years has paid a dividend So it's Really, I'm pretty sure that it's going to pay next quarter, right? so Although I don't want to say that there's certain guarantees in the stock market if you collectively put the dividend growth strategy for example in a bucket You can kind of put some expected Rates of performance and also it kind of allows you the opportunity to use your imagination and not expect too much out of that strategy Right, like my expectations and my range for what to expect from a company like highly on Compared to my dividend growth completely different and that's the mature Advanced mindset that I would expect each and every one of you try to achieve in your stock market application in that You know my thrift savings plan that I've got I don't apply the same level of thought or monitoring strategy in that Okay, I don't Provide the same level of active monitoring within my three larger accounts Then I do in my m1 account this account, right? I dollar cost average this it's totally fine Okay, my american express my master card Eli lily Right, nike some of these companies that I don't really want to hold in a large amount. Amgen is in this 71 awesome portfolios I roll this out pretty frequently on the channel and I share the link openly with you guys on on how I kind of break this down across the The 10 sectors minus real estate and s and p 500. It's a fun way to invest. I enjoy it. It's it's cool If the sucker gets up to a hundred grand, which i'm one fifth of the way there. I'll be there eventually It's all about time And the about time value of this money as I dollar cost average it I've owned this account for two years Jesus guys like What is your expectation about the stock market if you don't tune into somebody like myself and be like He's small time.  He doesn't know what his his wealth doesn't his wealth actually goes down Two weeks in a row. He's a shitty investor right That's like I'm a realistic investor, man. Like this is real. I don't have all kinds of You know working come to flow in here and manufacture all these and pump them up and show myself as the greatest investor On the earth. I've been around the block a few times I'll just save you the time and effort and tell you that that doesn't exist It doesn't exist You want to adhere to a program? You want to be robust and get candid talk about stock market investing? Try dollar cost averaging to your buckets every month and live to fight another day Because that's what's going to work for you Okay, trying to aspire to wealth That ryan on the independent investor channel comes and just declares to you every week is going to be feudal Okay, I've got caught up in this a few times where it's been like and been like man Do I need to do I need to go this we got a second guess my program my program's kicking ass, right? But this the human can I do better can I do better? You know and people start answering it's like right is ryan really is is he really worth following? It's like no, man. You're missing the point. I advocate for how I roll this out I would expect that each and every one of you guys look at what's going to work for you And look to make sense of it for you. Okay Don't allow me to manufacture that motivation for you, man The stuff has to make sense to you and why you roll out. That's why it makes it easier If you have multiple strategies that way I'm passive ryan. I'm a passive and but I'm happy. Well, it's been easy to be a passive investor the last 10 years Okay, come and talk to me about vti and voo in a down market.  This is my markets down 30 40 percent my accounts getting crushed ryan. This sucks, man You've been talking about vti voo the last five years. God dang it. It was like It made you a fortune while it was making you a fortune. Okay, I've said many many times when these ETFs are down What do you do? Oh dang. I got pissed off at ryan. No, that's not what you do. You buy more It's really really simple. All right.  It's okay.  I don't mean to be so candid and forward, but Yeah, I kind of do All right Here's the tsp chugging right along very cool stuff The options contracts i'm running the risk of having some Five highly on contracts Put to me, which is fine. I'll buy them at 11. No big deal You see how much i'm concerned about him. I bought the stock out right today Because I I actually think it's going to be above 11 by the 16th And that's just my call. We'll see what happens. All right, but um What we live to fight another day those are my long contracts there The 10s at 10 and the 8s at 12 50s until 2023. I still hold the wish Puts at 750 and the highly on puts at 11 respectively. So that's that's the options action For all you options gurus out there And there's the portfolio marginally down a little bit again second week in a row here I'm fine I would expect that you do the same be fine. It's okay. I haven't changed my application No, it doesn't change the thing These are invested dollars that i've asked to behave like invested dollars and you want to know something I don't get surprised. I don't get excited. I don't get fired up I don't lose sleep when these invested dollars act like invested dollars. Okay That's just the perception that you've got to have Stop looking at your wealth and thinking that you can control everything. Okay The reason why people justify buying that half a car for $10,000 Let's say they opt to buy an entire entirely whole car for 25,000. It's completely Justified to enter into a transaction like that. You want to know why? Because it's predictable It's predictable Okay, the problem that people have with an investment like highly on Even though the risk reward profile is there is that they watch it go down one day and it's like they freak out Okay, because because it's not predictable. They don't know if they're gonna lose everything they have Right, right. You start to lose track if it goes down four out of five days in a week You start to lose track of that long-term vision. Yeah, dang it. Ryan talks about 2024 That's so freaking though. I might not even be here. God dang it, you know That that that $40 that I just blew on highly on this week, man I could have went out and bought a half a car. God dang it Ryan you ask all So much fun, man. We gotta have a good time on this gig man. Let's get to some questions I got 10 minutes left. I said it was the longest 10 minutes It was no doubt about it, man. Hey, man. All right. Got an og on the channel I'm sorry man. I've been kicked over on another screen man. Very cool What's your email? I would love to shoot you an idea fantastic Well, my email is ryan.independentinvestor at gmail.com that is ryan.independentinvestor at gmail.com So I'll get a bunch of spam. I have a thousand people pick me up and emails Ryan.  You taught us how to buy half a car That'd be awesome So anyway, it's great great great to see you man. Great to see you've been staunch supporter of the message and you fall into that category of channels that I absolutely look to support and just a just a good person very sincere in the message I'm looking to advocate for retail investors and spread the word about how Yeah, lucrative this opportunity can be at times It's not going to be lucrative all the time But that's investing, baby And I think the more retail investors can buy into this idea to stop trying to apply What it is that you know about a stock market investing to this gig? because It's different Your mental aptitude your mental application, man. It's got to be Defined within the wheelhouse of investing and investing alone. Okay You're not going to be able to apply a motion to this gig That's the worst thing that you can do and that's what a lot of people opt to do Is they default to what they know? Okay instead of try to um try to put yourself in a position or a mental evolved state in In in a place where you don't know right And and this is a lot of what I find when they come back to the channel And I think a lot of people are looking for that Little bit of substantiation a little bit of support man a little bit of coaching a little bit of motivation No problem, man Then don't take this the wrong way man because Nobody out there nobody out these say the financial institutions man that they're the all knowing well, they're investing your money Okay, they're not investing their own money. We as independent investors are investing our own money That's why we have more stock. No pun intended in our independent investing program, right? That's why it it it hurts more. That's why it it feels really really good when it goes up. Okay Psychologically, we are much more in tune with losses than we are gains. Okay, so Uh pretty pretty interesting stuff. There's no doubt about it. So a palaster room is lucid So he's got a couple really good ones that he's covering here Jason's popped in here at the bottom of the gallery and I'm obviously not going to get to all of the Questions. I was obviously on a tangent tonight, which is pretty typical of the independent investor channel live stream and This is really a special treat for me to come on and roll this out, but Jason's on a few hot ones there for sure Um, we we need to we need to get some heat in my portfolio Jason. What do we do? What do we do? Do I cheer lead? No, man. I actually think that the element of success is going to be time And it's going to be time that that's just and I think he would agree with me on this as well So it's just made every bit of sense every stock every share that I've bought In these companies that I've got thus far and you guys can see the lack of change over in the portfolios from week to week Not a lot of changes at the portfolio set. I got it on autopilot right now. It's doing what it needs to do I'm good to go. I I'm fine Um, I'm really taking a nice nice break from youtube. Obviously the constant uploads to the channel Excuse me are easy enough to make Just because I enjoy those portfolio reviews But I can do them with with very little time commitment and it keeps the message fresh You guys can check back in with the message and um, quite frankly, that's what I want to do right now So that's what I that's what I do. I'm focused in on my work and um, just turned over a new leaf there, but we'll leave that alone for now and Hopefully keep our fingers crossed man. Things are Absolutely looking up man. You guys um, know I am absolutely a staunch believer in hard work Um, I believe at the end of the day hard work sometimes doesn't pay off But at the end of the day that that's really kind of the fuel that fires me In that, um, I need to have meaning In what I do I need to really enjoy what it is that I do and I just had a recent shake-up which is kind of Lit a fire in me and it's felt really good And uh, you know it it it feels really good because I was down there for a while You know as a bit down You know when you work that hard at something and it doesn't work out quite the way that you want it to work out And um, you're kind of like man alive. I can kind of do away with this feeling You know what I mean? It's it's not cool, but it it brings you home Let's you realize that um If things were just great and hunky dory every day, maybe that would get boring Uh, I I think the feeling of when you come out of that you really realize that things are better than you think that they are You allow yourself to slip into that mental funk and you you find a way out of it That's a good thing. It's a good thing for sure and I appreciate the opportunity for you guys to Come in and share the opportunity with me as well, right? Sarah's in the group. Sarah loves stag stags a good play right here 30 37 38 dollars a share. You bet nice 4 yielder. You bet nice reet. I like it. I don't own it here, but uh It's it's a good one for sure jammin in a Roth IRA Wait, we No, I'm not all in I had a big position is the biggest position I've ever had I've held a couple 50 thousand dollar positions in stock before and I hated it like and I've I've held this for a long Long time double that for crying out loud. This is easy. This is easy to hold this company More we're good to go. I'd feel a little more comfortable. I think it's up to end of the you know high teens Which all the price targets have it as I'll have really a lot of pay dirt a lot of sleep easy I'll be sitting on profit and then the game won't be necessarily Um, you know my conviction in the company It'll be like from there making the decision Which will be the toughest to hold to my targets to hold to the decision point because I just think the the bulk of the profits with this company are going to be made later on down the line They're going to be made later and I I'm sorry if that comes across as a scapegoat, but that's just like There's nothing really that exciting going on from the production standpoint now To really sink your teeth into and I think the potential to make that happen is right around the corner It's going to happen and when it does I think the dynamic of the company changes immensely And I think the potential is gonna gonna I mean they're they're looking to go after domestic market What happens when they start to go after international? Which quite frankly the green initiative is more socially acceptable internationally, so That's where I think the sky is the limit and it's going to be encompassed upon me to make um, the the life and investing decision that's um indicative of what I should do Based on what the company's doing at the time of my Recheck and and due diligence when it reaches my first price target, but um, we're not there yet when we get there I will do it all chronicle the whole thing. I have no problem with being transparent about what I'm looking at Stock market is not scary.  So Says I'm here from at Ryan. You betcha man. Thank you. Jay. I hope you're enjoying your new house, man That's pretty awesome. Super stoked for you. Super stoked man. That's got a freaking feel good.  I'm here for Jason I love these guys man. They're my friends through social media. I've never met them in person too for sure, but um There is an intangible benefit to this project that we roll out here Yeah, we gain a few subscribers here and there we we're helping people which is a very noble message and I You get my best message every single friday I roll this out very consistently every friday and I've been kind of taking the reins here for the last few weeks Because I I think when I have more guests on the channel It kind of takes me out of my element and then I can't get in my zone Very good because I end up, you know balancing the conversation between a guest and I like doing it. I like doing it. I thank you guys for the For the opportunity to come on guys also join the highly on discord sure. So thank you rick I really appreciate that and um, there was a guest in the very very beginning the verge Who was asking me about the highly unholding wanted to know and that's where some of my retort Look, he was the first one in the live stream or she I don't know if it was a he or she I shouldn't do that through social media But um to give my response man that that was the question asked of me and I have no problem Given my insights to the best of my ability, but certainly There was some guests in the in the live stream tonight From the discord group the highly on investors discord So I know there's a lot of bulls here in the community that are interested in the company if you're interested in that Kick over and check that stuff out man. It's very very cool. I'm kind of scanning through man A little bit jay says he loves the highlight. This is a million. I make no doubt Jesus, where do I go with that in 30 seconds? I'll leave that one alone We will see I I don't know I don't know when but I would agree with Jason and saying that it's inevitable. I really do It's going to be fun to be an investor in this company and if you go get in the ground floor of a company right now Doing some exciting things at ten dollars. I ask yourself is it worth the shot? If you don't want to buy the stock outright buy the buy the buy the long calls, you know what i'm saying Don't obligate yourself to the shares obligate your shares Self to the shares at the price that you determine Buy some ten dollar calls the 2023 right at ten dollar strike Now what the heck lots opportunities man. We do the best we can to footstomp those opportunities I am with jason on this. I just want to be careful with the deliberation and If if if and when the stock does what I think it's going to do I will be there and It is what it is. It's totally fine And I'll give it all to my kids anyway It'll free me up to do what it is that I need to do maybe give a little validation to the project Allow me to hit the road and do my do what it is. I want to do and that's speak at venues That's what I want to do. I want to speak at venues and there's no better Resume opportunity than what I provide every single friday At nine o'clock eastern standard time on the independent investor channel, man I would invite you to be frequent on the channel If you're new to the channel to make certain subscribe to get notified the videos I put through on the channel, man This was a very enjoyable live stream. I want to thank all the guests certainly But most importantly, I want to thanks the subscribers to the message who in fact Own a piece of the channel right their successes Just helped me as an advocate to the message your message in Really proving one investor at a time that this stuff absolutely works and it's it's just an absolute honor for me To be an ambassador of the message bring people together for once a week every 60 minutes On the fastest 60 minutes on youtube guys. Take care. Have a great weekend. We'll catch you next friday the independent investor channel live stream