The Trestleboard

I edit the Trestleboard -- a newsletter -- for South Haven lodge, Bloomingdale lodge and the Shrine club. A few months ago, my wife -- who is better at presentation than I -- took it over. I still edit the text the WM's send me, and help make it coherent, but she spends hours reformatting it and making it look good, then printing it, then folding it, then sorting it and taking it to the post office. Each group spends $200 a year on postage and supplies (I consider any extra costs to be a donation).

This year the WMs are writing a lot, which means a lot of paraphrasing and editing. There's only so much room. The first issue was on 11x17.

There's a lot going on in our lives, and it usually takes a while before we have the time it takes to do this.

The text is due on the 15th, and the Shrine club is usually right on time. Our WM is usually within tolerance of being on time (that is, Friday before the first weekend after the 15th). Last month I had a business trip from the 16th to the 20th. The WM of Bloomingdale never replied to my reminder, but everyone else was on-time. At the Fellowcraft degree on the 21st -- at Bloomingdale Lodge -- that WM assured me it would be there by the end of the day. It wasn't. We began editing and printing on the 22nd -- with only the information he gave me at the degree -- so we'd be done by the end of the week. We got his input on the 25th (Tuesday). So she printed his as written on a separate page of paper, and folded that in. Thanks to her heroic efforts, our newsletter arrived locally on the 31st.

Will this help our tardy WM deliver on time? We'll see.