I wrote a two-act play, a book for a musical, and a novel before finishing high school. They are memories now; thankfully, none of their pages exist. Journalism was my plan when I started college, but for a number of reasons, some noble, some practical, and some a little cowardly, I changed directions. I am proud of my forty years in medicine. The only things better have been being a father and a husband.

A dozen years ago, I started writing again. A couple of short essays made it into the New York Times and several short stories were published in online journals. In 2015 I started a novel. I blame that on Mr. Slater, my 11th grade English teacher at Newton South High School, and on Robert Penn Warren. When he assigned All the King's Men to the class, I told Mr. Slater I had recently read it and saw no need to do it again. He told me to be quiet and pay attention and proceeded to open my eyes to what a novel can do - symbolism, foreshadowing, character arc, tragedy, the sweep of history, the individual moments that mark a turn in life. I have been hooked as a reader ever since.

My first novel is finished. I am into the second and thinking about the third. I need to work a little faster, though. If I take the same time with numbers two and three, I will be in my mid eighties before that last one is published.