Lost in Space

I have not written in this space for three months. There are reasons.

At first, I was disillusioned by how rapidly Substack and Notes were changing. What started as a small town turned into a metropolis overnight.

Then there was the Nazi thing, which seems to have thankfully faded away.

Finally, the swindlers were coming in with their get-rich-on-Substack schemes and all the rest of the trash that comes with them. I even had porn bots!

My work-in-progress, Journey, American continues. On February 4, the last time I wrote on Substack, I had 21,000 words. Two months later, I have 31,000 in and 13 complete chapters. I have learned a lot about my character; experiencing his life in 1920s and 30s Hollywood has been a wonderful experience. One of the goals of any writer is to have the characters take on a life of their own and that has happened for me.

Winter is nearly finished in Santa Fe. I will not miss it.

This is a strange time in my life. I’ve been without a partner for a long while now - the longest of my entire life - and I’m doing OK. For a few moments last weekend, I even thought I had beat loneliness.

I was wrong.

turned 64 last September and since then I have felt out of place. I am the oldest person in my office but I need to work. The few women I meet are either too young or too old or, if they are my age, we have zero in common.

Or they are rich. I’m not.

The best way to describe it is to imagine a sci-fi show from the Sixties - say Lost in Space or early Star Trek. A character would move through a passage of psychedelic color and strange noise and then find themselves centuries in the future or past.

That is how I feel about getting older. I am myself but I am not me. I am standing in the place where I am, but not here at all.

I wonder if anyone else feels this lost as they reach the end of the life they knew and begin the preparations (the Medicare signup, the deliberations of “retirement” and whether you will eat dog food or Kraft mac and cheese for the rest of your miserable life.

I used to view the future with hope and wonder. Now I feel sheer terror.