Looking Forward Through the Rearview Mirror

Jeff—Saturday

I haven’t had time to reflect on 2015, and with the way 2016 is shaping up (TRANSLATION: Look at the US Presidential race—it makes Greek politics look downright progressive), that might not be a bad thing.  For sure, I don’t want to attempt anticipating how this new year will fare in comparison.

Yes, there were ups and there were downs (aren’t there always?) but reflection only brings to mind a song from Stephen Sondheim’s Follies: “I’m Still Here.”  Ain’t that the truth, though sadly one of the song’s most celebrated performers, Elaine Stritch, is not, but here’s her memorable 2012 performance celebrating Sondheim’s 80^th Anniversary.

All of which got me thinking about the good times. The grandkids for sure (their parents sometimes:)) and, though I got to spend less than my usual time on Mykonos, I did get to reacquaint myself with my farm.  

And I spent a lot of time on tour.

That’s when I realized how blessed I am to be living a writer’s life.  Not for the book sales, awards, movie deals, or wild sex parties (that fantasy was for you EvKa), but the camaraderie of the crime writing community. At least for me, that’s what this is all about.

After all writing may be a lousy way to make a living, but it’s a wonderful way to make a life.

So, for cheery thoughts I turned to my trusty bible of modern memories, aka my iPhone. Lo and behold, waiting for me sat smiling proof of what makes it all so worthwhile.  So, dear US Presidential candidates, please move your practiced smiles off stage for a while in order that this little corner of the social networking world can show some writerly faces representative of shared good times in 2015. 

It all began in September at Bloody Scotland when Caro and Allan plied us with a magic potion that kept us smiling all weekend.  They must have had a lot of it in reserve, because everywhere Caro went hysteria ruled.

A month later most of our MIE crew turned up at Bouchercon in Raleigh, North Carolina, and though Susan and Zoë missed this photo op, they were there to keep us on the straight and narrow.

We did catch up with Zoë a few days later at her signing on New York’s Upper Westside.

Then it was off to meet up with Tim Hallinan and Martin Limon in Orange, California and again in San Diego.

From there we made it to Portland, Oregon, and while waiting for Mr. Tim to arrive, stumbled into Powell’s, found the Eoin Colfer celebratory shelf, and paid proper homage to a buddy, be he ever so Fowl—in an Artemis sort of way.

And when Mr. Hallinan finally did arrive, the local asylum gates opened wide and out emerged the rarest of local strange birds, a living breathing EvKa (left, below).

Fleeing Portland we made it to Seattle, where along with the crew of Seattle Mystery Bookshop, we hung out with fellow author Ingrid Thoft (on left).

We spent a solo day in Denver at the Tattered Cover, but I’d grown used to sharing the load and so it was off to Tucson and a duet with Donis Casey, author of the brilliant, All Men Fear My Name, followed by teaming up in Scottsdale with David P. Wagner, author of the Italy-based Rick Montoya series. Sadly my photographer assistant sat mesmerized at those events and no photographic evidence exists.

Then came Chicago, at Christmas time at Centuries & Sleuths, and I shared the stage with madrigal singers.

But my best holiday present was a surprise visit from Leighton Gage’s wife, Eide, and daughter Melina!

And it all ended up in Minneapolis, where Stan and I spent the afternoon with Pat Volgrap of Once Upon a Crime, the legendary bookstore run by Pat and her husband, Gary Schulze.  I love that place, but sadly it’s closing.  We shall though always have the memories, and more importantly, the friendships.

Viva the writing life!

—Jeff

Guest Author Martin Limon

I first read Martin Limon when his publisher sent me a sampler containing first chapters from a number of their authors. His work impressed me so much that I immediately went out and bought all of his books.

His next one, Mr. Kill, will be his seventh, and it's scheduled for release in December. I can't wait!

Martin has studied both Mandarin Chinese and Korean and usually sets his stories in Asia, where he spent ten years of his life.

But, today, he holds forth on something entirely different: the United States Postal Service.

Leighton - Monday

The Last Full Measure

by

Martin Limon

            When I started writing I lived and died by the mail.  I would send out an article or a short story to some unwary publisher and wait day-to-day for their response.  For years the response was always the same:  a photocopied rejection letter.  One publication received so many of my short stories that when I finally received a small envelope from them stuffed with more than one sheet of paper, I figured it was a bill for all the man-hours they’d wasted reading my stories and rejecting them.  Instead, it was a contract for my first published story “A Coffin of Rice” in Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine.

            During all those years of mailing manuscripts out and having them returned to me, I never once lost a story.  In fact to this day I can honestly say that the United States Postal Service never once let me down.  Still, for some reason, there are some politicians who are determined to murder the United States Postal Service.  This is no mystery.  Their motive is clear.  They claim it is losing money.

            But the Postal Service is not actually losing money, not year to year.  The reason they appear to be losing money is because of the Congressionally imposed accounting requirement that they set aside hundreds of millions of dollars to fund their retiree health care benefits for seventy years in the future.  That means they have to budget for people who haven’t even been born yet.  And all this from a Congress that is constantly blathering on about getting government off the backs of business.

            What is Congress’s real motive?  We all know the answer.  Their goal is to privatize the U.S. Postal Service.  Why destroy such a venerable and successful institution?  That answer is also clear.  Because a few of their country club buddies want to form shipping companies and make fortunes charging us poor starving authors ten times as much to mail our manuscripts.

            The U.S. Postal Service was established in Section 8, Clause 7 of the United States Constitution.  Our founding father realized that an honest and efficient postal service was important to the growth of our nation.  By enshrining a postal service in our primary legal document they thereby mandated that it should be a public utility, available to all.  I’m old enough to remember when many things that are now privatized were public utilities.  I remember when television was free.  I remember when radio had to broadcast both sides of a political issue.  I remember when telephones were plugged into walls and--miracle of miracles--they always worked.

            Those days are gone.  I mourn them but I cannot bring them back.  But I do think it is time that Congress stop undermining the U.S. Constitution and stop trying to destroy the U.S. Postal Service.  I also think it’s time people stop bad mouthing our government.  One Republican president famously said that government is not the answer to the problem, but rather that government is the problem.

            I prefer to quote the first Republican president.  He was dedicated to the proposition that our “government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

            We the people must control our government and the instruments thereof and not let a few slick-talking “job creators” talk us out of what so many died to preserve.  Let us not betray those men and women who “gave the last full measure of devotion” so that our government would survive.  Let us not turn this cherished legacy over to corporations whose only “last full measure of devotion” is to lining their own pockets with profit, no matter how ill-gotten their gain.