This week in my newsletter The Perennial Nomad: For Those Who Wander with Intent I discuss the value of visiting historical sites while traveling.
The concept of time travel has intrigued humankind for centuries. H.G. Wells popularized a device that could travel through time in his classic novella The Time Machine, and since then storytellers have come up with all sorts of permutations of the idea. Recently Marvel Studios has even gotten into the act with a number of films drawing on the multiverse theory of quantum physics. However, that’s not the type of time travel I’m referring to here. For a perennial nomad, time travel is a much simpler but no less intriguing process. It involves journeying to and becoming absorbed in museums and monuments and suchlike places. A sign I encountered at the Burke Museum in Seattle explains it thusly: “Objects speak to us and for us. We often think of them as living beings – their lives shape our own. With the help of objects, we can imagine the lives of people who lived before us. And, if we listen closely, our relationships with objects tell us something about ourselves.” Many museums highlight objects and artifacts from the past, and some even foretell the future, such as the exhibit called “Space: Exploring the New Frontier” at the Museum of Flight in south Seattle.
When I saw this book on the library’s Peak Picks shelf (comprised of new books that are in such demand that you can take them out only for two weeks with no renewals) and perused its introductory material, I immediately thought of one of my sons. Not long ago, he decided to get a dog. He had worked with large dogs before as part of a veteran’s program at Stanford University, and when he went to the rescue facility he didn’t go for a sweet, well-mannered lap dog; instead, he chose an adolescent Malinois shepherd. This breed is similar to the German shepherd; they are often used as police dogs, guard dogs, and search and rescue dogs. My son’s dog has behavior issues and needs extensive training, but at the same time, he is handsome (jet-black with a white patch on the stomach), affectionate, and a lot of fun.
Three Wild Dogs tells the stories of three different rescue dogs. Like my son, Zusak’s family has a penchant for adopting large, rowdy dogs with big personalities. He declares that “someone has to take the mongrels, the rejected, the unloved…none of that makes us special; we just can’t seem to help ourselves.” As explanation he says: “After all, what do you get a dog for if not for the chaos itself – to ask anarchy straight to your door? We all seem to covet control of our lives, but we unravel it with reckless abandon.” And: “They were a mirror, I suspect, to my own hidden turmoils – my wilderness within.”
Regardless of their initial motivations, though, the author and his family did not take in these dogs merely out of a sense of obligation; they loved them fiercely and were loved in return. This book is full of funny, touching, and often shocking stories of rambunctious beasts and their often befuddled owners. But what comes through more than anything is a sense of the deep love and affection between dogs and their owners. Often on my twice-daily walks around the suburban neighborhood where I live I see people walking their dogs, which vary from tiny little poodles to a massive Great Dane that makes his owner appear diminutive. At this point in my life, having recently become an empty-nester after raising kids for decades, I’m thankful that I don’t have the responsibility, not to mention the mess, of a pet, and I’ve sometimes wondered how my neighbors manage to put up with taking their walks at their dogs’ pace instead of their own, not to mention the disgusting task of picking up their poops. However, this memoir offers insight into the mindset of pet owners (Zusak also writes of the family’s two cats); as the story progressed, I found myself empathizing more and more with owners who develop profound bonds with their pets. It also made me consider Jack London’s fondness for dogs; his two most famous books, The Call of the Wild and White Fang, are both about relationships between traumatized dogs and the humans who take them in and love and care for them.
The relationships are often complex and perplexing. Zusak writes: “We take these animals in, often grudgingly, and all they do is love us (and, you know, all that other terrible stuff, like destroying book deliveries, attacking people, killing other animals, threatening your friends) – but that’s also why they get under our skin.” He adds that “a pet is totally ours. They stay. Only we knew them best. Only we really understood them. Only we could forgive them.”
I’m still not sure I would want to undertake the responsibility of owning a large rescue dog (especially in my present situation, living in a small apartment), but after reading Three Wild Dogs, I understand the mindset and fully sympathize with those that do. If you have pets, you’ll recognize a kindred spirit in the author; if you don’t, you’ll be more tolerant the next time you hear the seemingly endless barking and bickering coming from your neighbor’s house.
I’m a professional writer; I make my living by my words. I’m happy to share these essays with you, but at the same time, financial support makes the words possible. If you’d like to become a patron of the arts and support my work, buy a few of my available books or available stories. To send a one-time or recurring donation, click here. You can also donate via my Patreon account. Thanks!
This week in my column The Perennial Nomad: For Those Who Wander with Intent I discuss travel communities.
I made my second trip across the United States, Europe, and the Middle East to the Indian Subcontinent in the middle of winter. My first journey had been more relaxed, and although I was on a lean budget I was better supplied with funding. It was the mid-1970s, and I flew from New York to Luxemburg on Icelandic Airlines; it cost one hundred dollars for a round trip ticket. As a result, the plane was filled with young people intending to hitchhike around Europe or take the Hippie Trail to India and Nepal. I made a lot of friends that year, and I filled a small notebook with their contact information. The second time around, I was more broke and more desperate. I had metaphysical reasons for returning to India, and I wanted to get there as soon as possible; as a result, I didn’t stop to work here and there as often as I had in the past. Fortunately, most of the people I had met on the road were happy to put me up as I passed through.
The first I heard about the novel Orbital was when I read that it had won the Booker Prize for 2024. It seems I wasn’t the only one whose radar it passed under. The Seattle Public Library, usually top-of-the-line in its acquisitions, didn’t have a copy, or at least they had so few that the sudden demand ensured that it would be a long time before it was available. Even Amazon had run out. I could order it in advance, but the delivery date would be months in the future. In fact, the book appeared to be completely out of print, and after it unexpectedly won a major award, its publisher was scrambling to catch up.
I think that at least part of the sudden interest in it is that a book that appears to be science fiction so seldom wins a major literary award like the Booker. It isn’t really science fiction, but it comes close. It concerns a twenty-four hour period in the lives of six astronauts, four men and two women from five different countries, on the International Space Station. It’s a short novel, not much longer than a novella, and it has very little plot. It is more in the nature of a prose poem. It drifts from the viewpoint of one astronaut to the next, and there are extended passages describing the appearance of Earth as the space station revolves around it. In a twenty-four hour period, the station makes sixteen orbits, and the chapters are divided according to each orbit.
Harvey goes into the backgrounds of the characters, but ultimately what it amounts to is this: “Whatever they were before they came here, whatever their differences in training or background, in motive or character, whatever country they hail from and however their nations clash, they are equalized here by the delicate might of their spaceship.” The author also emphasizes that from their vantage point the politics of Earth have little significance. From space no national boundaries can be discerned; instead, the astronauts perceive the Earth as home to all, a home that needs protection. “Before long, for all of them, a desire takes hold. It’s the desire – no, the need (fueled by fervor) – to protect this huge but tiny Earth.” And: “Can humans not find peace with one another? With the Earth? It’s not a fond wish but a fretful demand.” As if the microcosm of the space station and its denizens from various lands working in harmony signifies what humankind in general could and should be like.
At heart this is a very personal novel. If you want to learn about the real intricacies of living on the space station, read the fascinating memoir Endurance: A Year in Space, A Lifetime of Discovery by Scott Kelly, an American astronaut who spent a year there. However, often as I read Orbital I felt that just behind the musings of the characters was the author Harvey, watching the International Space Station’s live stream and using it as a springboard to ponder philosophical and existential matters. Plot appears irrelevant when confronted with such grand ideas. I liked the artistic freedom that the unusually simple structure represented. Sometimes educators and critics put literary works into stringent categories from which, they intimate, authors should not deviate, when in fact writers should feel free to approach their art in whatever damn way they please. On the other hand, I grew up reading the so-called new wave science fiction of Roger Zelazny, Samuel Delaney, Ursula Le Guin, and others, and sometimes Harvey’s prose, in comparison, strikes me as slow-moving and ponderous. Ultimately, though, I realize that every literary work is different and has to be taken on its own terms. In the case of Orbital, you should settle in for a slow, stately, elegantly-written prose poem that provides insight into the human condition from a cosmic perspective.
Introducing The Perennial Nomad, a weekly Substack newsletter.
I began writing with a focus on science fiction stories. Many of the books I read as a teen and young man were science fiction and fantasy, and it was a science fiction story that impressed me so much that I felt I had to become a writer. As a result, my early efforts were in that genre.
However, more and more I began to see writing as a metaphysical experience, as a method of observing and defining our place in the universe. I developed a deep desire to give everything I had to the art of writing, and I began to make life decisions that would hurtle me into the realities of life. I couldn’t accomplish my goals by remaining ensconced in the city of my birth. I had to get out and live, to discover what life was all about so that then I could write of it. I sought that “one true sentence” that Hemingway spoke of. Inspired by writers such as Jack London, Jack Kerouac, and Henry Miller, I left my hometown and set out on the road.
Hitchhiking was common in those days or I would never have been able to get as far as I did. I traveled back and forth across the United States, through Central America as far as Guatemala, around Europe, across the Middle East, around the Indian Subcontinent, and eventually to Southeast Asia and New Zealand. But this was not tourist travel; this was total immersion. I never had much money, and when I ran short I’d stop and get temporary work. Sometimes when I went broke I’d keep going and trust in the vicissitudes of the road to somehow supply my needs. When I settled down with my wife to raise our family of five sons, we did it in Greece, not in the States. All together, I lived overseas for thirty-five years, only returning to the States when the Greek economy crashed and there were no opportunities there for my sons.
Somehow now I have found myself alone in Seattle, my starting point, as an empty nester, but for me it is not the same place. I see people around me who were born and raised and have spent their whole lives here. For them it is home, but not for me. I have no home. In the course of my wanderings I have come to realize that I am a perennial nomad. For me, the journey is never-ending. The truth is that it’s the same for everyone, whether you venture out into the unknown or snuggle up close to where you first arrived. We are all, ultimately, strangers and pilgrims in this life. We are all in transit. None of us are here permanently.
This newsletter, The Perennial Nomad, celebrates our transitory existence. In it I will share accounts of my far-flung travels and also narratives of my efforts to rediscover Seattle. Many of the essays will be previews of works in progress, and I will also offer excerpts from my already-published works. If you too are a global citizen and have an affinity with all of humankind, I urge you to subscribe.
Thanks so much for your support and encouragement.
I hesitated before deciding to go ahead and write and post this review. After all, my intention is to attract readers, not repel them. But then again, the type of readers I am interested in reaching is not going to be offended by the F-word, which, by the way, is liberally sprinkled throughout this book. (And in the book’s interior, an asterisk is not used when spelling f*ck.) However, to each his or her own. If expletives offend you, that’s okay; simply skip to the next review and book and give this one a pass.
One of the reasons I decided to proceed with this review concerns one of my sons. A passage struck me as relevant to his situation, and so I read it to him while we were video-chatting. When I had finished, he told me that he was at that time into his third reading of The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck via audio book. The coincidence was too unusual to be ignored. The main reason, however, is that though some of the advice Manson shares is tangential, much of it is sensible, relevant, and practical. As for the risk of offending bluenosed puritanical readers, I decided that I don’t give a f*ck.
Manson states that: “The key to living a good life is not giving a f*ck about more; it’s giving a f*ck about less, giving a f*ck about what is true and immediate and important.” He goes on to clarify that: “This book will help you think a bit more clearly about what you’re choosing to find important in life and what you’re choosing to find unimportant.” And: “If suffering is inevitable, if our problems in life are unavoidable, then the question we should be asking is not ‘How do I stop suffering?’ but ‘Why am I suffering – for what purpose?'” An important example in my own life concerns rejection. Everyone hates rejection and considers it something that should be avoided. And yet to attempt publication as a writer, rejection is inevitable, especially if you want to follow one of the traditional paths. For instance, I write a lot of short stories. I eventually compile them into volumes and publish them, but before I do that I try to sell them to magazines and anthologies. I have successfully sold dozens of them, but to do so, I have to send them out to editors. Every time I do, I risk rejection, and every rejection hurts. The only way to avoid that pain is to not send out the stories, but then I am waving the white flag of surrender before the battle even starts. Very few of my stories sell on the first try; I often have to send them out again and again before they find the right literary home. And every rejection hurts. Every damn one. But this is a pain I have chosen to accept because it aligns with my long-term vision. To take this analogy one step further: Recently I have endured what you might call failure’s perfect storm. I sold stories to several anthologies and was looking forward to seeing them appear in the completed books around now; at the last minute, though, the editors have informed me that they have cancelled the anthologies for various reasons – mainly having to do with finances. So in the publishing world, even after acceptance disaster can strike. Nevertheless, despite the inevitable wounds, this is a battle I have chosen to fight. Manson calls it: “The willingness to stare failure in the face and shove your middle finger back at it.”
For me, as a writer, one of the associated pains is the all-but-inevitable rejection. For you it might be something else. Regardless of your particular circumstances, Manson writes: “Everything worthwhile in life is won through surmounting the associated negative experience.” And: “It’s worth remembering that for any change to happen in your life, you must be wrong about something.” Ultimately, this book does not tell you to not care about anything, but to focus on what is most important to you, regardless of the associated pain. Since pain accompanies any endeavor, choose to endure the pain that will take you where you want to go. In my opinion, there is enough important practical advice herein to justify wading through the abundance of expletives to reach it. For this reason, I recommend this book.
When you think of iconic film makers of the early twentieth century few, if any, shine as brightly as Charlie Chaplin. The man was a comic genius and helped to define an art form. My personal favorite among his films is Modern Times. I consider it his masterpiece, but I am also very fond of The Gold Rush, City Lights, The Kid, and others. In addition, one of my favorite films of all time is Richard Attenborough’s Chaplin starring Robert Downey Jr. When I was living in Greece, I found a copy of Chaplin’s My Autobiography in a library and eagerly read it; later, I came across the door-stopper of a book Chaplin: His Life and Art by David Robinson (my two-part review is here and here), which along with the autobiography supplied source material for Attenborough’s film.
For a time early in his career, Chaplin was the darling of the cinematic universe. Charlie Chaplin vs. America, though, deals with the time later on, in the early stages of America’s Red Scare, when Chaplin began to be investigated by the FBI and the State Department. Postwar America was a strange place; many people, especially politicians, became ultra-conservative and rabidly anti-communist, and Chaplin got caught in the crosshairs. As Eyman tells it: “Chaplin became the most prominent victim of what amounted to a cultural cold war – a place where art always loses.” This book clarifies that so-called “cancel culture” is nothing new. Public opinion shifts according to historical and political trends, and in the late 1940s and early 1950s Chaplin went from being one of the most popular movie stars ever to being ostracized as a cultural pariah. It all culminated when in September 1952, soon after embarking by ship on a trip to Europe, Chaplin was informed that his re-entry visa to the United States had been revoked.
For years Chaplin had been accused of being a communist; J. Edgar Hoover had a notorious grudge against him, and his FBI file ran to thousands of pages of material. However, amidst all of it, no agent ever found proof of the accusation. Chaplin himself professed to being apolitical; it’s true that he had attempted to help raise support for Russia during World War II, but this was a period when the Soviets were American allies, and Chaplin supposed that promoting Russia would help bring the war to a swifter close. And of course, Chaplin was not the only well-know public figure the FBI went after; a quick internet search shows that the FBI had files on Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley, John Lennon, Groucho Marx, Bob Dylan, Jane Fonda, Mickey Mantle, Michael Jackson, and Martin Luther King, Jr. – to name but a few.
Chaplin was also accused of being a sexual deviant. It’s true he had a penchant for younger women, but it was one case in particular that aroused the authorities. A woman named Joan Berry, who had been not only having an affair with Chaplin, but also seeing numerous other men, accused Chaplin of being the father of her infant daughter. The trial that resulted became notorious in its farcical ridiculousness. Blood tests proved without a doubt that Chaplin was not the father, but the ultra-conservative judge ruled that evidence inadmissible; he also did not allow Berry’s other affairs to be mentioned in court. Chaplin ended up paying support for a child that was not his, and the public took the findings of this absurd kangaroo court as fact.
Of course the persecution he was undergoing affected Chaplin’s filmmaking and his personal life. Eyman details Chaplin’s efforts to keep working despite the pressure he was experiencing; the movies he made during this period, such as Monsieur Verdoux, Limelight, and later A King in New York and A Countess from Hong Kong, are drastic departures from his earlier work and reflect the changes he was going through. As for his personal life, in the midst of the confusion he met Oona O’Neal; his marriage to her, which endured and resulted in a family of eight children, provided stabilization in the midst of outward turmoil.
Once Chaplin was out of the country, journalists attacked him with outright lies; it reminded me of the disinformation that is rampant on the internet these days. Eventually, decades later, public opinion changed and when Chaplin returned to the United States to receive his honorary Oscar, he was met with great fanfare and adulation.
This strikes me as a profoundly contemporary story. In the media these days artists in music, film, literature, and other mediums have to face a barrage of commentary on social media, and fact-checking seems to be a thing of the past. I sometimes inadvertently, in the course of browsing the web, come across news of scandals and improprieties by this person or that, and it is often difficult to tell what’s true and what isn’t. The tendency seems to condemn first and verify later, if ever. This is a worthwhile story to read in the light of modern political and cultural realities. Recommended.
As I read of Jane Ferguson’s adventures in war-torn countries in the Middle East, I was reminded of my own travels in the area. During a narrow window of time in the 1960s and 1970s, it was possible to travel by road from Europe to the Indian Subcontinent through Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. This became known as the Hippie Trail, or the Overland Trail, and many young travelers took this route in search of drugs, thrills, and cheap living in exotic locales. Numerous tour buses decked out in psychedelic colors made the journey; however, when I followed this path, I hitchhiked with European truckers and sometimes local people as far as Kandahar, Afghanistan, before switching to public transportation. These countries and their peoples were fascinating but frightening. I felt most in danger in Pakistan, with Afghanistan as a close second, but overall during that period those regions welcomed budget tourists. There were even so-called Freak Streets, areas with hostels, restaurants, and cafes specifically designed for hip young travelers, in Kandahar and Kabul in Afghanistan. This route became effectively closed, though, in the late 1970s when the Shah of Iran was overthrown, and decades later, when Ferguson visited these countries, they were hotbeds of turmoil and war.
Early on, in Afghanistan, Ferguson realized that her motivation had been initially misplaced. She writes that “this obsession with being a war reporter was bullshit. It was a total distraction from the real work, which was capturing experiences of war.” Instead of a self-centered effort to prove herself, she came to understand that “the stories of the war were those belonging to the millions of people around me living through it.” She writes that sometimes it was difficult not to feel guilt as she captured the pain of others in images. The only way to maintain balance, she asserts, was to “be as compassionate and respectful as possible. To do that, you must allow yourself to be vulnerable,” and “by sending as much love to the person you are filming as you can. People recognize real empathy.”
On one occasion she was smuggled into Syria all alone to report on the insurgency efforts at a time when the government was capturing and torturing to death all dissidents and journalists. She writes: “I knew I was there because I was disposable and brave – my two greatest assets so far at this point in my career.” However, the importance of what she was accomplishing – letting the world know about the atrocities that were happening there – made the risk worthwhile. By the time she was ready to leave, the government had tightened its security, and getting out was even more dangerous than getting in. Concerning the situation at one checkpoint she says: “This was the first and only time in my career since that I felt quite certain I would die.” She carried the fear of that encounter with her for months, but it did not deter her from her chosen path.
What gives the book added depth is that Ferguson does not only write of her adventures in the field; she also shares the toll the constant travel and dangers take on her own psyche and her relationships with others. For a time she went on sabbatical, convalescing in an apartment in Beirut, Lebanon, but after a time she felt the call of her destiny and desired to get back out into the field. She also points out that despite the acclaim she received for her incomparable journalistic efforts, she was often low on finances and struggled with temptations to take on less risky reporting work because the money was better. Eventually, though, she would realize that war reporting was her calling, and she would return to the work for which she felt best suited.
I can relate to this memoir on so many levels. I have traveled for much of my life, and my wife and I raised our children overseas in Greece. In a sense I feel isolated, cast aside even, in my present situation in an apartment in my hometown of Seattle. I long to be back out on the road. I really do. At present, however, I have no resources for doing so. In the meantime, I feel a sense of kinship with Ferguson and great inspiration from her efforts to do her best in the work she feels compelled to do, and I highly recommend this book.
I’m a professional writer; I make my living by my words. I’m happy to share these essays with you, but at the same time, financial support makes the words possible. If you’d like to become a patron of the arts and support my work, buy a few of my available books or available stories. To send a one-time or recurring donation, click here. You can also donate via my Patreon account. Thanks!
This is an extraordinary, exciting memoir written by one brave badass woman. And when I use the word badass, I in no way imply disrespect. To the contrary. I mean it in the sense that the Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines it as “of formidable strength and skill.” Ferguson is a war reporter, and she has plunged into extreme danger in pursuit of stories in violent hotspots such as Yemen, Syria, Somalia, Sudan, Egypt, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, Iraq, and Afghanistan. During these adventures she is sometimes terrified, but she nonetheless remains steadfast in her resolve to do her job the best she can. In an author’s note at the beginning of the book she says: “I wrote No Ordinary Assignment with one main purpose in mind: to answer with total honesty the question, Why do you do this work?” The answer she provides is not only thrilling, but it exposes the horrifying human cost of war and the insane and selfish motivations that prompt the conflicts in the first place.
Ferguson initiates her tale with a tense prologue in which she is among the final group of journalists to leave Kabul in 2021 and is in danger of being captured and killed by the Taliban. She then flashes back to her youth in Northern Ireland, during which she and her family, relatives, and friends were in constant danger of being maimed or murdered by bullets and bombs. She managed to obtain a scholarship to study in the United States. Later, after a stint working in a filthy chicken factory and a brief internship at the BBC, an aunt provided the money to allow her to travel to Sana’a in Yemen to study Arabic. During this and subsequent stays there, she came to think of Yemen as a second home and as one of the most beautiful spots on Earth. As I read her description of the pleasant challenge of learning the Arabic language, I recalled my own stint of studying Bengali at Dhaka University in Bangladesh. I too had to learn a new alphabet as well as a new system of grammar, but at least Bengali reads left to right instead of right to left. And at that time in the 1970s and 1980s, I felt safer and more secure on the Indian Subcontinent than on the violent and unstable streets and cities of the United States. I think that at least some part of this feeling has to do with destiny, with where you are meant to be.
Ferguson’s first gig as a journalist was with Gulf News in Dubai. However, she quickly became disenchanted with her assignments to report on cricket matches, fashion shows, and celebrity parties. She had an epiphany moment while on a story at a car dealership in Dubai and decided instead to travel as a freelance journalist to Kabul, Afghanistan, which was in the midst of civil turmoil and attacks from the Taliban. She managed to obtain an arrangement as a freelancer with CNN, and after Afghanistan she headed to Yemen, which was in the midst of a civil war, traveling deep into the rebel zone to visit camps full of Yemenis displaced by the conflict. When she returned to Dubai she was fired by Gulf News after CNN aired her reportage from Yemen. This did not slow her down. She continued her freelance work, including a period embedding with African Union troops in war-torn Mogadishu in Somalia.
Throughout her accounts of these adventures, she is often frightened and vulnerable as she encounters life-threatening situations, but she never wavers from her determination to do her job of exposing the truth as best she can.
Not long ago I wrote an essay called “Panning for Gold in the Literary River.” It was about my ongoing struggle to monetize my words. I love writing. I do it whether I have hope of selling the results or not; I can’t help myself. However, I also love eating, wearing clothes, having a place to live, and a multitude of other things for which we need money – and a significant amount of it if we want to be reasonably comfortable. It’s a struggle, though; for every writer who makes a decent living through their writing, there are dozens of others who are unable to manage and have to fall back on other ways to raise the cash so that they can keep creating.
Another gold rush analogy came to me as I was pondering this topic, and before I wrote about it I decided to return to the Seattle Unit of the Klondike Gold Rush National Historic Park, a small museum located near Pioneer Square in downtown Seattle. On the day I planned to go, though, the temperature was around freezing, and there was a fairly brisk wind that made it seem much colder. I shivered as I waited for the bus to the light rail station where I’d catch a train to get me within walking distance of the facility. But when I reached the station, a security guard told me it was shut down for repairs. He directed me across the street to a bus stop from which, he said, I could catch a shuttle bus to the next station. I waited, shivering, with a few other people, but when the clearly marked shuttle bus passed by, the driver waved at us but didn’t stop. I couldn’t stand the cold any longer; I went back across the street and caught a bus back home. I’ve been to the Klondike Gold Rush Park on two other occasions recently, though, so I can remember its ambiance and most of its exhibits. And the cold causes me to empathize with those inexperienced gold seekers in the late 1800s who had no idea of the hardships that were ahead.
At the museum there is a game you can play, called Strike It Rich, to test your luck in comparison to other gold seekers. You spin a wheel that’s at least four or five feet across, and the object is to have an arrow point to a tiny inch-wide wedge that reads “wow, you struck it rich.” A plaque next to the game tells us that it is estimated that 100,000 people embarked for the Klondike, 40,000 reached the Klondike, 20,000 worked claims or prospected, 300 made $15,000 or more in gold, and only about 50 of those 300 kept their wealth for any length of time. Think of it. Only approximately 50 of the 100,000 who set forth with dreams and determination ever obtained the lasting rewards that all of them had sought.
This made me think about writing, and by extension any creative endeavor. How many creative writers are there in the world? I’d guess at least hundreds of thousands, and possibly millions who dream, at one time or another, of a career in writing. Like the Klondike gold seekers, many of them never get close, that is, they might try to write but never manage to complete anything; a smaller percentage of those who attempt to write actually finish stories or essays or novels or whatever; an even smaller percentage either send out their work to editors or agents or try to publish it themselves; a much smaller percentage make it to publication, at least occasional publication; and only a handful of published writers make a comfortable living at it. It’s the Klondike all over again. As an aside, a man who went to the Klondike seeking not gold but experiences he could turn into stories probably made more money after his journey than any of the prospectors who struck it rich. His name? Jack London.
The point of this analogy is that if the accumulation of wealth is the primary reason you’re a writer, you’re in the wrong business. Don’t get me wrong; it’s a wonderful thing when you get paid. I’ve occasionally received checks for story sales that have come at the right time and gotten me out of significant financial binds. But you can’t count on steady money coming in. Sometimes it comes, and sometimes it doesn’t. I can’t speak for everyone, of course; in fact, I can only speak for myself. But in my experience, writing is something I have to do no matter what else is going on in my life. It is essential that I use words to interpret my life. I cannot imagine existence, at least my existence, without writing. So odds be damned, I’ll head for the Klondike, or wherever else I feel compelled to go, and I’ll write about my adventures and hope that someday, somehow, it pays off. Whether it does or not, you’ll keep hearing from me as long as I’m alive. And even beyond, in fact, because my sons have assured me that they’ll keep my books available even after I’m gone.
In closing, let me emphasize that there is nothing wrong with your desire to become rich and famous as a writer, but that’s not what’s of primary importance. It’s the words that count. Your voice. Your art. Keep at it no matter what. Never throw in the bloodied towel. And eventually, who knows? Anything can happen.
I’m a professional writer; I make my living by my words. I’m happy to share these essays with you, but at the same time, financial support makes the words possible. If you’d like to become a patron of the arts and support my work, buy a few of my available books or available stories. To send a one-time or recurring donation, click here. You can also donate via my Patreon account. Thanks!
A collection of science fiction and fantasy short stories
Thoughts from the Aerie
Memoirs and essays on a range of topics
Silent Interviews
Stories about the mysterious Telepathic Guild
Invisible People
A thrilling novel of time travel, alien invasion, and mysterious portals
A collection of science fiction and fantasy stories
The Relocation Blues
A memoir of life's transitional experiences
Adriana’s Family
A novel about alien contact.
The Woman Who Fell Backwards and Other Stories
A collection of science fiction and fantasy stories.
Apocalypse Bluff and Other Stories
A collection of science fiction and fantasy stories
The Senescent Nomad Hits the Road
An aging science fiction writer abandons his apartment and hits the road full time.
Invasive Procedures: Stories
A collection of science fiction stories.
Heroes and Other Illusions: Stories
A collection of science fiction and fantasy stories
Bedlam Battle: An Omnibus of the One Thousand Series
A compilation of four novellas comprising the One Thousand series. Hippies and benevolent aliens pursue psychotic killers.
After the Fireflood
After the Earth's surface is obliterated in an apocalyptic firestorm, human survivors from the moon and outer colonies attempt to rebuild.
Caliban’s Children
Humans must ally themselves with true beasts to overcome a dark power that morphs humans into animals and binds them to its will.
The Fantasy Book Murders
Surreal and deadly hunt for a serial killer.
Opting Out and Other Departures
A collection of fantasy and science fiction short stories about wanderers and unlikely heroes.
Sunflower: A Novel
A woman's odyssey, first through America and then across continents, in the dark, post-Altamont days of the early 70s.
America Redux: Impressions of the United States After Thirty-Five Years Abroad
Memoir of my return to the States after thirty-five years overseas.
Fear or Be Feared: Fantasies
A collection of fantasy short stories.
Writing as a Metaphysical Experience
Essays on a life-long quest for voice, inspiration and excellence in writing.
Reviews and Reflections on Books, Literature, and Writing
A collection of book reviews and essays on books, literature, and writing.
The One Thousand: A Novella
Science fiction thriller. A man possessed by alien entities recruits convicts for a murderous rampage.
The One Thousand: Book Two: Team of Seven
Sequel to The One Thousand. A fellowship of alien-possessed psychopaths throw a party at which they plan to slaughter all the guests.
The One Thousand: Book Three: Black Magic Bus
Sequel to The One Thousand Books One and Two. In southern Europe, the Team of Seven hunt a busload of alien-possessed psychopaths intent on unleashing a deadly pathogen in a major city.
The One Thousand: Book Four: Deconstructing the Nightmare
Fourth novella in The One Thousand Series. The Team of Seven finally confront the alien-possessed psychopaths they have been hunting.
After the Rosy-Fingered Dawn: A Memoir of Greece
A memoir of my life in Greece.
The Misadventures of Mama Kitchen: A Novel
A hippy girl's adventures in a wilderness commune, Haight/Ashbury, and Woodstock.
Dark Mirrors: Dystopian Tales
A collection of dark science fiction stories.
Love Children: A Novel
Young people raised by aliens return to Earth to seek their parents.
Painsharing and Other Stories
A collection of science fiction stories.
The Dragon Ticket and Other Stories
A collection of science fiction stories mostly set in India.
John Walters 