I learn a lot from other writers. Some of Alex Stick’s pieces in the McKinleyville Press have inspired me to write with more vivid images. In January 2001, Alex lampooned the habits of local drivers. I’ll never forget the image of “manic mommies in minivans buffaloing their way through traffic like Dick Butkus at an all-you-can-eat prime rib buffet.” That roused me to write a short descriptive piece about the busses in Guatemala. A few weeks later, Alex discussed modern gizmos, and admitted that he’d be “just another Philistine” without his electric nose hair trimmer. Where can I get one?
         By the way, a friend of mine--a middle-school teacher--said that her students cracked up upon hearing the name “Dick Butkus.” I had to think a few seconds before I realized why it’s funny. I grew up watching the guy play football on TV--he was an especially brutal middle linebacker for the Chicago Bears, whose career ended in 1973 with a serious knee injury.
         But back to writers. Outside the local scene, I agree with Elizabeth Alves that Jon Carroll of the San Francisco Chronicle is brilliant on his good days. I deeply admire the curmudgeonly but gorgeously descriptive and tangential yet sharply focused prose in the essays of Edward Abbey, such as in his book Desert Solitaire. Abbey also wrote novels, but for me they don’t work like his essays--essays packed with passion and sardonic humor.
         My own essays could be called “expository writing.” I hate the term “creative writing” to identify poetry or fiction--all writing can be creative, whether it’s a groundbreaking novel or the minutes of a boring board meeting. I’d prefer “imaginative writing,” although nonfiction writers need imagination too. Whatever you call their kind of writing, I’m in awe of authors who create believable characters and gripping dramas out of thin air. I have no idea how this is done.
         One of my favorite novelists is Orson Scott Card. His books are classed as “science fiction,” but they’re not about rockets and robots, they’re about people--his heroes are good people trying to do their best in the gray zones of life, where any action is wrong or harmful in some way, but where no action is worse. Card puts you directly into the minds of his characters as they grapple with intense moral dilemmas, while the subtle nuances of communication between characters are laid bare. His best-known book, Ender’s Game, and its powerful sequel, Speaker for the Dead, both won the two major science fiction awards--the Hugo and Nebula awards. I love Card’s “Alvin Maker” series, which is a fantasy-scape of a midwestern American frontier where white magic works while white people continue to muscle their way west.
         I often cry with movies, allowing myself to be swept up by story, sound, and image. But books are usually less vivid for me. Orson Scott Card’s Songmaster is the only book so far that ever made me cry--the conclusion of this masterpiece left me sobbing for half an hour, and I cried again when I reread the book last year.
         I don’t expect I’ll ever write a novel, though I’m sure glad someone else knows how. But I’ll try to keep plugging away with an essay every few weeks. Fact can be stranger than fiction, and there’s no shortage of material--our world is infinitely interesting.