Writers......

For any passionate reader, there are fiction writers who stand out for a variety of reasons. (Non-fiction writers also stand out, of course, but often for different reasons....)

Writers whose technique you admire; writers whose characters you identify with; writers whose books you simply enjoy.

Then there is a shorter list of writers, much shorter: those whose work has had a profound effect on you. Whether their work has moved you deeply, or taught you something, or been associated with a particular time of your life; whether it has been there for you when times were bad or whether it has made you laugh hysterically when there wasn't much good around you, these works and their writers are etched more deeply on your soul than most of what you read.

Some of those writers---Louisa May Alcott, for example, or Laura Ingalls Wilder---have lived and died before you were born, or at least old enough to read. Some of them may have overlapped your life, but died before you discovered them: C. S. Lewis comes to mind.

And then there are the ones whose work you were well aware was entrenched into your being while they were still actively writing; writers whose death leaves you with a very real sense of personal loss. Asimov. Heinlein.

And this week, for me, Robert B. Parker. The world is just a bit dimmer place without him at his desk in Boston. He brought us a few series characters: Spenser with Susan Silverman and Hawk, Jesse Stone, and Sunny Randall spoke to us in a contemporary setting; Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch from a century back or so. There were other characters that had no series.

But his people all had something in common: their view of the world, and how it works, and what a person owes themselves. And I appreciated that view and learned from it.

I will miss you, Robert. May your soul and all the souls of the faithful departed, through the mercy of God, rest in peace.

Reviewing Stuff I've Learned Last Year......

I don't function in chaos.

By that I don't mean that I need everything perfectly tidy and orderly and regimented; I don't have OCD, and yes, there's such a thing as TOO orderly that can make me twitchy as heck.

But I need things and processes and routines and plans to be reasonably orderly and predictable....even if the "predictable" part is "we're going to do this, that, and free-float on whether to do the other thing."

And it's not a judgment issue: some folks appear to thrive in chaos. They do wonderfully well in an environment where everyone does whatever they want to, working at cross-purposes, ignoring each other, no communication, as if each other isn't even there.

More power to 'em. But I've learned that I don't. And I don't mean "don't function well"; I mean "don't function" period.

It depends, of course, on how chaotic the situation is. I can slowly cease to function, or I can freeze almost immediately, if it's chaotic enough.

And it's not the appearance of chaos that I react to, as near as I can tell. I've been in situations that appear to be utterly chaotic, but a few moments watching the people will tell you that you're seeing an orderly but intense multi-tasking organism. I've even been a part of some of those---try backstage at any functioning theatre.

It's a combination of non-predictability and lack of communication I react to. The "nobody has a clue what's going on, what they're doing, or what anyone else is doing, and they don't give a damn that they have no clue, or see why you'd want one" syndrome.

It doesn't matter WHY I don't function in it. What matters is knowing that I don't. It's not good, it's not bad, it just is. And so I learn how to avoid it as much as possible, and how to extract myself gently when I happen to find myself in it.

It's a good lesson to learn. And I'm happy with it.