"A Long Walk Home"

“The job of feets is walking, but their hobby is dancing.” Amit Kalantri

Just as words allow us to communicate and conduct the business of our lives, they also give us the freedom to share our dreams, our hopes, our passions, our fears, and as such, the excitement of being human.

It is not uncommon for people to ask me why I write or when did I know I wanted to be a writer? I tell them I knew I wanted to be a writer when I was fourteen and finished “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” written by Earnest Hemingway.

That’s what I tell them but it’s not exactly true. I didn’t have the desire to be a writer, I wanted to make people feel the way he made me feel when I read his book. If you have not read it, the story follows an out of work teacher from Montana who travels to Spain and joins in the Spanish Civil War. His name is Robert Jordan. Reading Hemingway’s words allowed me to travel with Jordan. What he saw, I saw and like him I marveled at the beauty of the countryside. Also like him, when he met the young “mujer revolucionaria” named Maria, I met her as well and when he fell in love with her, so did I.

While the book has been criticized by others, the dialogue is powerful. The phrase “Feel the earth moves” is first used in this book. Jordan asks Maria if she felt the earth move after they first make love in a meadow. The term has now become a cliché for passionate love making. Such were the imprint of Hemingway’s words.

That is what I wanted to achieve. I wanted to affect people the way Hemingway affected me, I’m just happy he did it with language and not drawing, as I am not an artist. I can’t draw two lines.

After “Dear Emma” was so graciously received, I felt emboldened by the compliments. More than anything, I wanted to write a full length novel. As I think back at this book, “A Long Walk Home,” I realized I used it as a learning process. While it encompassed several elements that I love: writing, history, baseball, the Cubs and the city of Chicago. It was also based on a premise I am uncomfortable with, time travel. I think H.G. Wells did it best but, and I don’t think any other writer has matched Well’s story of “The Time Machine,” but this story demanded I try.

The story also allowed me one other opportunity. I got to highlight a mostly forgotten baseball player named Henry “Heine” Zimmerman. He is also known as “The Great Zim” who referred to himself in the third person. He was most likely the first athlete to do so. He played for the Chicago Cubs. In 1912, Zimmerman won the NL triple crown by carrying a .372 batting average, hitting 14 home runs (remember this was the dead ball era), as well as knocking in 104 RBI’s. Sadly, he was embroiled in the Black Sox scandal a few years later and was forced from baseball. Another interesting side note, Zimmerman married the sister of mobster “Dutch” Schultz and after baseball, worked as a bartender in one of Dutch’s clubs.

“A Long Walk Home,” is the story of Joseph Dwight Denton, a pharmacist and Cubs fan, who lives in Chicago. He is uncontrollably traveled back to 1916, just in time to witness the first baseball game the Cubs played in Wrigley Field. Through, the eyes of Joe, we share in the first Cubs baseball game at the park that a few years later will be known as Wrigley Field. We also share his fear and his loss of control over his future. We share his worries about his wife, in present day Chicago as well as his attraction to a young lady from the 1916 era. We feel his conflict.

The format of the story also allowed me to use both first person as well as third person in the telling of the story. It was my “training wheeled” story, as it allowed me to experiment and, not only, find my voice, but also strengthen it. In many ways, the book is two stories in one, the first in the modern day Chicago and the second, the Chicago of over a hundred years ago. The disorientation Joseph felt when he woke to find himself in another world, the fear he must have suffered, the loneliness. I hope and believe I did him justice in telling the story.

I am proud of the story. In many ways, the telling of a story is like the weaving of a hot pad that we used to do at kids. Do I want it to be only blue and white, or do I want it more complex?

“A Long Walk Home,” is a complex story and in many ways, more complex than my later works. It served me well as my writing professor and the reviews told me I achieved close to full marks. While Hemingway took me to Spain in the 1930’s, I wrote my story with the desire to take my readers to Chicago in 1916.

Yes, “A Long Walk Home” is my first full novel and while my writing has improved over time, without this book, none of the others would be possible.

Go Cubs!

Check out "A Long Walk Home" on Amazon. It is available via Kindle, paperback or audio format.