We recently connected with Robin Hohweiler and have shared our conversation below.

Robin, appreciate you joining us today. Do you wish you had started sooner?

I would like to have started my creative career much earlier. Although I kept my hand in writing throughout the better part of my adult “regular job” life, it was usually confined to writing analytic reports, some scientific reports, correspondence, newspaper writing, and the occasional (very occasional) short story. I didn’t find the freedom to explore more my creative side until I got to a point where I didn’t have to stress about finances, etc. While I would definitely have wanted to start my creative work earlier, it occurs to me that one doesn’t really possess the life experiences necessary to successfully create (in my case – writing, filmmaking, humor blogging, and podcasting) until somewhat later in life.

I really began to hit my stride just before I moved from Northern Virginia back to my native Oklahoma. My contract position in VA ended in 2015 and I just decided to head back to the family farm outside of Fargo, OK. I had already started my humor blog, Cosmic City Blog just before coming back west. Although I was living in Virginia, I wrote as though I were living in Northwest Oklahoma. I approached the blog posts using Hunter S. Thompson’s style of subjective writing, blurring the lines between fiction and nonfiction, always in the first-person. If it confused the reader, but they enjoyed what they read, I saw that as a success. The blog became wildly popular which only encouraged me to write more. I published a book of the 2015 blog posts in 2023 and am currently at work on a second volume containing posts from 2016, which I expect to finish in the fall of 2024.

Since then, I have co-written and published two local history books, a novel (first in a series), another book of social media posts from a local museum (also, co-written). I became interested in the various aspects of filmmaking after attending a local film festival. I have written scripts and screenplays, produced and directed short films. Currently, I’m working to move into shooting short videos using drones. Most recently, I’ve moved into producing a podcast called, “Mr. Robin’s Hood Podcast” with a collaborative partner, Mikel Maureé Robinson. We’ve recently finished our sixth episode (dropped in mid-March).

I think the only form of writing that I wish I had started sooner is poetry writing. I’ve done it at various times over the years, but honestly poetry eludes me. Always has.

I’ve been very busy since moving back to Oklahoma. In 2018 I was diagnosed with cancer. I underwent treatment (surgery) and although it initially appeared that the cancer was gone inside of two years it was back. I’ve managed to hold it off to this point and am confident that I’ll come out of things okay. I am cognizant of the fact that it may very well have been my cancer diagnosis that spurred me on to being a more prolific and determined creative. Whatever time I have remaining in this life, I plan to use finding my modicum of immortality.

Robin, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m the best creative you’ve probably never heard of! I am master of sarcasm and snark (his superpower), I am someone you should get to know. You’re not likely to invite me to a meal in your home for fear that I’ll eat all the food, drink all the wine, and then turn my sharp wit on any of your random guests gathered around the table when they make a stupid remark. I am a blogger, a novelist, an historical writer, a technical writer, a poet (of sorts), an amateur filmmaker, and an accomplished ballroom dancer.

I am an unabashed attention whore who has not won any awards for my writing (the Pulitzer committee apparently lost my phone number). Still, I wallow in the praise of my growing entourage of rabidly devoted fans. My weekends are generally occupied with gigs at cheap motel lounges around the country performing as a crooner belting out old standards while dressed as Elmer Fudd.

My family has been ranching and farming in Northwest Oklahoma for more than 100 years. I and my wife, Mary Ann, and our three dogs of indeterminate ancestry (the dogs that is, I had the wife tested, she’s Irish) live on a fortified compound on the family farm just east of Fargo, Oklahoma.

As for inspiration:

Writing: Hunter S. Thompson (I cut my literary teeth on his work for Rolling Stone Magazine in the 1970’s); Ernest Hemingway (brilliant writer with an innate feel for crafting sentences); Victor Hugo (I’m a fool for 19th century French novelists. His seminal novel, “Les Misérables” should be mandatory reading for all humanity).

Sense of Humor: Lifelong subscription to MAD Magazine (yes, it’s sophomoric, but damned funny nevertheless); National Lampoon Magazine (curiously, I learned a lot about critical thinking reading this as a teenager); Laurel and Hardy films (they were geniuses of comedic timing, particularly in the realm of physical comedy).

Filmmaking: Francis Ford Coppola (I never fail to watch “Apocalypse Now” when it airs); Hal Roach (the brain behind the Laurel & Hardy films); Brian De Palma (absolute master of suspense); Stanley Kubrick (there is an odd sort of vibe in every one of his films that compels the viewer to remain no matter how weird it gets).

Poetry: Charles Bukowski (love this man’s work and legacy – from him I learned that rhythm doesn’t have to drive verse); Allen Katzman (it was an eye-opening experience for me to read his book, “The Immaculate” at the tender age of 17. There was something very subversive in his work – I loved it).

As for what set me apart: I have a natural rhythm in my writing. I’ve always felt that is something you either have or you don’t. I’ve always stressed that to anyone who would listen. Rhythm is as important to writing as it is to music. Without rhythm, the music begins to fall apart. It’s the same with writing… you can hold your reader no matter the genre if the writing has rhythm.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

From the minute I was born, things have been, at times, an uphill struggle. I wasn’t expected to live through the night when I was born. I spent the better part of 10 days in the hospital in an incubator. In the end (obviously) I made it. Throughout my life, whenever I felt things were at their lowest, I always managed to rebound. Starting in the 1980’s, into the 90’s, I was on a career path performing work that made me something of a target. I’ve had a price on my head by a German terrorist group. I was nearly blown up twice – once in London, U.K., by some really angry Libyans, and then in Buenos Aires, Argentina, by what was described as Argentine separatists.

I escaped death again following a horrific motorcycle crash in which I should have died, but I somehow bounced back. In the fourteen-plus years of constant traveling (often two weeks of every month), there were a number of times that I faced peril in whatever aircraft I was flying in. In fact, in all the years of my adult life, through the numerous stressful jobs, several failed marriages, countless other relationships, when it all blew apart, I emerged on the other side, stronger than before and perhaps a bit wiser. Perhaps it’s my own arrogance that has led me to think there is something/someone that picks me up, dusts me off, and points me in a new direction to charge off toward. I’m not a particularly religious person – honestly, I’ve seen too much of what humanity can throw at itself that causes me to question everything.

The real blow came when I was diagnosed with cancer in 2018. I initially threw myself upon the so-called medical merry-go-round after assurances that the cancer was easily cured. Less than two years later, I learned the cancer had returned… and worse… although it was detectable, the location in my body was and remains unknown. I’ve agreed to treatments (that are not without side effects, by the way) that extend my life for now.

I suppose I could have collapsed inside myself and curled up on the couch to spend the remainder of my days watching “Gilligan’s Island” reruns or some such nonsense… in essence waiting to die. But I didn’t. I found a will to live in a friendship and collaborative partnership with someone I’d not even known before 2022 when she took over the management of a regional museum for which I was executive director. In fact, I wrote a poem about her and about our friendship:

no regerts (for a friend)
robin hohweiler

you came into my life seemingly by chance.
i believed i was headed for the exits.
you were looking for a new direction in life.
i was waiting to die.

you possessed an old soul and remarkable resilience.
i had all but given up on everything that made life enjoyable.
you were looking for self-forgiveness and self-fulfillment.
i was filled with cynical self-loathing and resignation.

we soon found common ground in our love of
poetry
music
art
and the written word.
we shared our most closely held, sometimes darkest, secrets.
we found comfort, laughter, and inspiration in our convos.
we moved long shelved projects to completion with mutual support.

for me you were a breath of fresh air and a ray of hope.
i had long since forgotten the possibility of all that.
for you i was a patient ear and an offer of help without expectation.
together we found innate creativity and belief in mutual success.

you became my best friend and most trusted confidante.
i only wish i had met you earlier.
otherwise, no regerts.
i love you, my dearest friend.

That friendship has opened new doors for us both… we both have a good deal to learn from one another. I’m at least hopeful now that my cancer will somehow be cured, and I can live out the rest of my life without the scourge of cancer over my head.

That, I believe, would be the penultimate testament of my resilience.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

It pains me to say so, but I believe it all comes down to money. It’s difficult for creatives to create work that would have some beneficial or lasting impact on our society when they have to hold down regular jobs to earn enough to support themselves and their families. I don’t believe I’m actually speaking to monetary handouts… that would never work. Creatives are by and large in my humble opinion, lazy people (I hold myself up as an example). They would rather spend their day thinking through their latest project than actually doing the work it will take to get it finished. So maybe a system of programs, grants, or stipends wherein a product has to be produced.

And maybe this really should start in school where programs with a focus on the arts are the first to be cut when budgets get tight. Over the past 30 years or more, the emphasis in education has shifted from an overall enlightenment of what the world around the student may hold to one of standardized testing and a constant push to succeed in life both socially and financially. The arts have become an afterthought… a lower priority.

Image Credits
Mikel Maureé Robinson Robin Hohweiler