A Mother's Day bouquet, and how you can support my work

May 14, 2023

Peak balsamroot, on the rocks

Fourteen weeks and counting…and how you can help

Dear Friends of The Daily Rhubarb/Rhubarb Salon:

It’s been three months and change since the launch of The Daily Rhubarb and I hope you’ve been enjoying it. More accurately, it’s the almost Daily Rhubarb, as I need at least a couple days during a typical week to catch my breath, focus on research, and generally try to take care of myself. When it comes to generating content, I’m a one man band, which is not a complaint, just a bare fact.

I want to take a bit of your time today to give an update on the project and how you can help, if you are inclined to do so.

The Daily Rhubarb (TDR) is supported by paying subscribers. The Rhubarb Salon, which is where you’re reading this message, is a free version of the TDR which Substack encourages to introduce folks to this and other subscriber-funded Substack projects. Thus far, Rhubarb Salon has been a clone of TDR in part because there have been glitches in the subscription process. It’s been a real headache and I’ve wanted keep at least one avenue open for anybody who wants to see the full suite and scope of work. That will change next month (June), and while Rhubarb Salon will still exist, for free, the major reporting and essay pieces will only be available at TDR.

My pitch for your support is straightforward. I’m not a hobbyist.

For those of you who are just finding my work, I’m a veteran journalist and public interest activist who, for the past decade, has also evolved into a nature writer/photographer. As a writer I specialize in science, the environment, legal issues, and public affairs reporting. I’m the author of five books (epidemiology, white collar crime, a landmark civil rights case, and a photograph-laced vision quest in the scablands). I’m the recipient of three national journalism awards for investigative reporting and several major regional awards including a plum award from the Washington State Bar Association recognizing the quality of my reporting on legal issues.

I’m the son of a father who was a swim champion turned-science teacher. I’m born of a mother who offered me love and inspiration to her last breath. I am the father of two children, both in their twenties now: a daughter who is a poet/activist/artist, and a son who plays a mean saxophone and is an ambassador of kindness who warms hearts wherever he goes. I am only wealthy in that sense.

As I was working on my last two books “Tell” (2017) and Beautiful Wounds (2022) I was writing, often, on Facebook about a wide range of topics, from the personal to the political, but also offering a near daily dose of nature photography. We’ve been living through such a dark period. I’ve wanted to find the light and share images that offer a fuller appreciation of life as we know it on a blue planet that is incredibly rare.

I’ve also wanted to return to my reportorial roots. I moved to Spokane when I was 23 and was blessed to be taken in by an ensemble of fine editors and writers at Spokane Magazine. For close to three years I delivered one meaty, investigative story after another. Sadly, the magazine expired in the recession of the early 1980s. During the mid-1980s, I became the lead researcher in a major public interest project to exhume the dark secrets of Hanford’s plutonium factories which, incidentally, contaminated the milk and water at my mother’s home in Pasco. I later worked with the Center for Justice and a citizens group—Save Our Summers—to (finally) regulate dangerous smoke from agricultural burning in our region. I then worked with Tom Grant at KXLY-TV to expose the “Secret Deal” to illegally funnel millions of dollars to Spokane’s wealthiest family, at the expense of Spokane taxpayers.

The Daily Rhubarb and Rhubarb Salon are an offshoot of my website, Rhubarb Skies, which is a free and independent platform for my writing and nature photography. The website also offers easy and free access to ALL of The Daily Rhubarb content to date, so if you’ve only recently signed up you can access the earlier posts with a couple mouse clicks.

Today I’m writing because I’m asking you to consider becoming a paid subscriber. If you’re moved to do so, this will involve moving your subscription from Rhubarb Salon, to The Daily Rhubarb. Here are the steps:

1) If you want to continue getting Rhubarb Salon for free, you don’t have to do anything. You’re good.

2) If you’d like to become a paying subscriber, it can happen in two ways.

a) Simply notify me via email (tjconnor56@gmail.com) that you’d like to transfer, and I will do it manually. It’s very easy on my end, and I hope it will be easy on yours. Within a few days after I make the manual transfer, Substack will invite you to choose a subscription plan for The Daily Rhubarb. If you have any trouble selecting a plan or paying via credit or debit card, please don’t be shy—let me know ASAP and I’ll fix the problem.

b) Alternatively, you can go to https://timothyconnor.substack.com/

and you should see the following welcome screen, asking for your email.

When you type in your email and hit the Subscribe button, you should then be directed to a second screen, which gives you a choice of subscription plans and asks for you credit/debit card info.

Just to be clear, you cannot subscribe to The Daily Rhubarb from the Rhubarb Salon log-in as the two sites are independent of one another.

3) If you’d rather not pay by credit card, then please shoot me an email and we’ll work it out. If you’d like to add a tip to your subscription, from either TDR or Rhubarb Salon you can do so via Venmo where you can find me at @Timothy-Connor-60.

While I’m here, there are others way you can support my work:

a) Recommend and share posts with your friends, if you think they’d be interested.

b) Give a gift subscription to The Daily Rhubarb.

c) Order Beautiful Wounds

d) Order photography featured in one of the Rhubarb Skies on-line galleries

Finally, I realize you’d rather read other things than this lengthy appeal. If you’ve reached this sentence, thank you for your patience. I can’t do this without reader support, and I’m deeply aware of that challenge and the obligations that come with it.

sincerely, Tim