Running into the Right Places: Reflections at Eighty-One

In two months, I’ll be eight-one. If you’re young, take a big deep breath. What seems unthinkable right now, you will experience too.

I’ve always labeled myself a loner, one of those guys who avoided society by living in a tiny cabin in the woods with a dog. While there’s a lot of truth in that for me, for the last forty-six years I’ve shared my life with another loner. We are two people who couldn’t be more different. He’s a deeply private man, an artist, sculptor, chef and can grow anything because nature loves him as much as he loves it. We’ve never been wealthy but always rich, surrounding ourselves with precious four-footers, second-hand finds and things we’ve acquired along the way. Art work of young struggling artists we’ve met in Mexico, where we spent twelve great years, fills our walls. Over our lifetimes, we’ve made few but very precious special friends.

I was nobody special, never made it through my first year of college and always ran away from situations and life when things got ugly. I’ve been writing since high school and thanks to a teacher who saw how I struggled without the proper tools to put words on paper, I’ve was able to begin telling stories.

I ran so hard and so often that something magical happened: I ended up befriending the most unique, interesting characters while ending up in just the right, and sometimes the wrong places at perfect moments. I’ve written several books filled with stories. One I’ve called an autobiography, others, novels, but the truth is, I’ve put myself in all of it. I chose a simple, matter of fact short-story style, linking things together. Someone once said; write what you fear the most. I’m still working on that. There are holes in my life that, for one reason or another, were too painful to put on a page, at least until now.

For my fans who are struggling writers seeking advice: Start by reading. Find a book you love and read everything that writer has written. Then find another and do the same thing again. The more you read, the more you’ll learn about storytelling. Buy a copy of Stephen King’s little book On Writing, a Memoire on the Craft. It’s a shortcut to avoid all the mechanical pitfalls and will make your writing easy for others to read.

To explore more stories of the characters and places mentioned above, you can find my latest work, Salt & Solace, and other titles at loukief.com.