By Pam Caraway, ACN President
The posts started showing up in my social media feed like dispatches from afar. Who was this guy? Why were these posts so long? I glanced. Perused a graph or two. Went on.
Then I read one. Maybe it was about a kid in the hospital. No treacle. Lots of heart. Sprinkles of humor.
Then another one caught my eye when time was my friend. Maybe this was the one about selling his granddaddy’s fiddle. And the uncle who secretly bought it back.
Thanks to the algorithms we lovee to despise and rarely understand, those posts started showing up more often. Because I was reading them. Some days I wanted to gorge on them. But, generally, for the full experience, they should be consumed one rich bite at a time.
For Ag Media Summit 2025, however, we all can drink like wanderers in a desert from the literary font that is Sean Dietrich. And though I’ve never met the man, I suspect he’d hate that line.
Here’s why: he’s the son who survived his dad’s suicide, a high school dropout who eventually went to college – and finished in 11 years, a man rescued by the love of a good woman. He’s a diamond in the rough with the emphasis on rough. And his storytelling powers challenge every writer to do better.
Dietrich will be the keynote speaker in July in Rogers, Arkansas. He also will lead a session on Writing: The Art of Connecting with Readers. Did I say lead a session? That seems a bit stale for what you’re likely to experience.
More to the point, perhaps: Dietrich will share his unconventional style and one or two of us might pick up a tip or 12 that we can employ in our writing. This is a professional development workshop, so we use business-like ways of sharing the plan. We say that attendees will learn about storytelling. We talk about engaging readers. We offer tips on writing with emotional pull. Right. So, the reality is that I suspect each of us will come away with something that helps make our days – and perhaps our writing – better.
Maybe it will be that it’s OK to be something less than perfect.
Maybe it will be insight into how to turn a phrase.
When I read his posts – and these days also when I read his books – a single post or a chapter fills my mind and, frequently, my heart. Most take you from nearly crying to laughing to rejoicing, and you don’t quite know where it’s ending until it does. Which is why my best advice is to savor a single post or chapter, giving yourself time to absorb the experience. Again, that’s not going to happen in July at Rogers.
And so, my advice for all: Join us at AMS. And for those who take that advice: Come hungry.
– Caraway is editor of Farm Futures.