The Van Dyke Zone!
Dick Van Dyke picked up computer graphics in his 70s. Not because some agent told him animation was hot. Not because he needed to “stay current.” The guy just wanted to mess around with LightWave and make some digital puppets dance. That’s creative gravity pulling you toward what you still find fascinating once all the noise fades out.
Let’s call this uncharted territory The Van Dyke Matrix.
If you’re staring down the tunnel of life’s third act and wondering what to do with everything you’ve learned, this is your wayfinder. Four zones that map the spot where late-career mojo lives. Not by erasing your past, but by fusing it with whatever’s setting you on fire right now.
DVD Zone 1: Mastery
Your deep craft. The stuff you could do while wasted, sans internet, during a blackout. For me? Transmedia architecture. Breaking stories across platforms. Vibing with a room full of scribblers. Grokking which creative battles are worth the blood loss and which ones are just ego, so let go. This is over two decades of hard-won expertise, locked and loaded, aiming at something critical.
Ask: What do you know how to do that the world still needs, even if the world doesn’t know it?
DVD Zone 2: Curiosity
The rabbit holes that keep you awake after hours. I’m chasing AI story tools, 360-degree cameras, WebToons, audio drama production, and anything that shoots a TOW missile through the fourth wall. I’m studying how Warhammer 40k builds lore ecosystems. I’m watching Gen Z creators forge IP on YouTube without asking permission from anyone. This zone doesn’t care if you’re good at it. It just wants you to play.
Ask: What would you query from Perplexity at 2 AM even if no residual checks were involved?
DVD Zone 3: Legacy
Where your scars become someone else’s shortcuts. Gen X creators stuck in reboot hell. Screenwriters exhausted by nonsense notes. Game devs trying to stitch story into gameplay without it feeling like homework. Can they be given a lifeline if I share my science of Modular Storytelling frameworks, ARN design templates, and blog my entire Scribbler’s Toolbox?
Ask: Who gets to skip the hard pain and time suck because you’re willing to show your work?
DVD Zone 4: Play
Unfettered creative chaos. No notes. No “spirit of the notes.” This is where you perform necromancy on a dead IP just to see what happens when it zombies out of the grave. Shoot short films with puppets in public spaces. Turn a grocery list into an ARG and call it a pitch deck. Monetization? We don’t need no stinking monetization! We feed off the slag from these experiments like Godzilla powering up in Fukushima’s exclusion zone.
Ask: If nobody was watching, paying, or judging, what would you still make?
Now, Find Your Van Dyke Zone!
Grab something to scribble on. Four circles. Brain-dump ideas into each one. No edits. No organizing. Just scribble. Then look for the zones where three or more circles collide. That’s the pivot-worthy playground for your next chapter, where you get unchained and go dangerous.
As a member of the last generation that remembers when there were only three networks, I have survived every disruption, watched home video formats, game consoles, and media platforms rise and fall, and outlasted more corporate gatekeepers than The Count can count.
Let the ferals chase clout and algorithmic fame. I’ve got maps to draw, IP to forge, and formats that are so ADHD even I don’t understand them - yet. What’s your Van Dyke Zone looking like?
PS: Any comparisons to Ikigai are entirely intentional.
