The Hitchhiker's Guide to Nostalgia

Artwork courtesy Dean Petersen

My friend Dean Petersen in Wyoming is a talented writer and filmmaker. He once joined us at Jeana's Dining Room Table Writers' Group in Cheyenne, Wyoming. He has many stories to tell, as he showed in his novel The Burqa Cave. We critiqued each other's work with other members and sipped tea and gnoshed on baked goods. It was helpful and civilized and almost all of our members, past and present, have multiple published books. 

Dean always has a new project, his latest is an intriguing podcast, "That Doesn't Happen Every Day." He has profiled sand sculptors, Laramie's lone ska band, WYO nukes, and this hitchhiker. I imagine myself as the guy with my thumb out in the illustration, although it's been awhile since I hit the road in the 1970s. Dean is from the generation younger than mine (Gen-X?) and he notes in the episode that in school and at home they were lectured often about not getting into cars with strangers. 

Boomers received the same warnings but thousands of us ignored them as we hit the road to see America and Canada and the rest of the Americas and Europe too. My sister-in-law hitched around Europe with a woman friend in the '70s. My brother Dan hitched around Florida and the East Coast before he got a haircut and joined the USAF. My wife Chris ignored all warnings as a teen and hitched A1A from her house way north in Ormond Beach to party with friends in Ormond and Daytona. 

It was a great way to get around especially if you had no car or motorcycle. Go to Dean's podcast and check it out.

So that's what gives the Vegas Strip its unusual glow...

Just finished reading John D'Agata's book, "About a Mountain." It's a nonfiction account of the on-again, off-again status of Yucca Mountain, where the U.S. wants to store its nuclear waste.

But, in the tradition of creative nonfiction, D'Agata combined this journalistic journey with his own Las Vegas story -- and that of a young man who committed suicide by jumping from the observation deck of the Stratosphere Hotel.

Seems like an odd juxtaposition of subjects. But the author ties it together neatly with facts and speculation.

Nevada Sen. Harry Reid comes off looking like a bad guy. It's odd that Reid recently faulted Pres. Obama for not being tough enough against Republicans, especially when it came to the battle over health care reform.

Burying tons of highly radioactive nuclear waste under Nevada rock won't impart many health-giving properties to Nevadans. It will bring jobs, no doubt about that. Those jobs will have health insurance, which is a good thing. There will be accidents in shipping and handling, which won't cost you any extra but could cost you your life.

Sen. Reid did a pretty nifty job of rolling over for the nuclear power conglomerates and home-state cheerleaders for Yucca Mountain.

But Harry has enough problems, what with Nevada Tea Party types hounding him at every turn.

The book's most compelling sections are these:

1. What happens when a truck carrying radioactive waste wrecks on the overcrowded Vegas freeways and catches fire?
2. How do you make signage for a nuclear repository, a sign that will be understood by humans 10,000 years in the future.

The answer to number one is: Shitstorm.

The answer to number two is a thoughtful treatise on human communication. A panel of artists and linguists and teachers and scientists were asked to come up with effective signage. The challenge was a huge one. Where was humankind 10,000 years ago? Battling sabre-tooth tigers in caves and trying to stay warm during the Ice Age. They weren't doing much recreational reading -- nor consulting any signs.

In 10,000 years, we may be back in caves. That cave may be in what used to be Nevada. There will be a sign that warns of terrible danger if you go any further into the cave but humans may not understand the sign. They may say to themselves, "Hey, this cool sign says there's a nifty surprise at the bottom of this cave." "Great -- I love surprises."

John D'Agata's book comes at a good time. The U.S. is now contemplating building more nuke plants. Uranium is being mined again in Wyoming and Colorado. Turck and rail shipments from the East Coast will have to come through either Wyoming or Colorado.

Read the book for its angst-producing sections. Read it for its fine writing.

"About a Mountain" is published by W.W. Norton, 236 pages, $23.95.

To read the L.A. Times review of the book, go to http://articles.latimes.com/2010/feb/14/entertainment/la-ca-john-dagata14-2010feb14

Fellowships aid writing communities

I was on the road in Nevada last week so didn't get to write any posts. I was working as a consultant to the Nevada Arts Council in Carson City. In the six weeks leading up to the trip, I read 42 creative writing manuscripts and had to decide which were the prize-winners and which were destined to finish out of the running. The NAC awards three creative writing fellowships of $5,000 each and three honorable mentions of $500 each. You'll have to await the NAC press release to discover this year's winning writers. But the fellowship panel process is an interesting one. I encourage writers to participate some time during their careers.

I know -- not all writers believe in these kinds of prizes. Elitist, they say, a chance to shower money on those boring academically trained writers who know how to work the system. Or it's just a way for poets to pick up a little cash to feed their habit. Others don't apply because they want a career in children's writing or want to write mysteries that show up in the best-seller charts. And who can blame them? They're shooting for places in the more lucrative and ultra-competitive world of commercial publishing.

In my role as literature specialist at the Wyoming Arts Council, I've seen a number of writers whose careers were jump-started by government-sponsored fellowships. Wyoming has two fine mystery writers -- C.J. Box and Craig Johnson -- who won fellowships before they were published. Box's game warden, Joe Pickett, and Craig Johnson's sheriff, Walt Longmire, are now almost as famous as they are. Page Lambert was a bank teller and a ranch wife before writing what were to become fellowship-winning manuscripts. She's now well-published and a leader of writing workshops around the country (and drat the fact -- she no longer lives in WYO). Mark Spragg's wonder novel, "An Unfinished Life," was transformed into a movie of the same time with some big stars. Tim Sandlin writes comic novels ("Jimi Hendrix Turns Eighty") and comic scripts for the likes of Drew Barrymore. Until recently, Mark Jenkins wrote a fine column for Outside magazine. The Laramie-based international adventure writer now concentrates on book writing (he already has three to his credit).

Many fellowship winners, no matter what state they live in, will ever gain this type of status. Most writers never support themselves with their creative work. But their writing deserves recognition, so that's why I do this and why I believe in being part of the greater literary community. Sure, I get paid for being a consultant on my own time. But it's at about the level one would suspect when you work for a state agency that gets funding only after roads, medical care, and education.

When I worked for the National Endowment for the Arts in Washington, D.C., in the mid-nineties, I went to a reading and book signing by one of my favorite authors, John Calvin Batchelor ("The Further Adventures of Halley's Comet"). He read from his new novel and then signed books for the modest-sized crowd. I wondered why his darkly humorous work had never caught on. As he signed my book, I told him that I worked in the NEA's literature program. He paused, looked up, and then launched into a rant against the agency and how a bunch of monkeys locked in a basement could do a better job of granting fellowships. The NEA gave out $20,000 awards back then and still does.

I was taken aback. I mumbled something about the process being fair and balanced (that was before FOX News stole the term). He just snorted and shoved the book in my hands. I walked away, a bit pissed, somewhat shamed. The next day, I looked up Batchelor's name on the list of NEA awardees. It wasn't there. I've since found out that his objection was probably more ideological that personal.

Not everyone who deserves a fellowship gets one. But many do.