Go Where Tom Goes—a Road Travelogue for Those Who Aren’t Fussy
December 05, 2022
“Travel is like a box of chocolates,” Forrest Gump would have said had he thought of it. “You never know what you’ll get.” A road-guide for those who aren't fussy on range or who love the people, places, and things of New York, PA, and a smattering of elsewheres. Chat up new people, see new things, explore new paths, think new thoughts, and spin new stories. Do history, concerts, and car shows.
See what's to be seen and hear what's to be heard in Binghampton, Buffalo, Dryden, Honeoye, Ithaca, Jerusalem, Kinderhook, Lake Placid, Little Falls, Lowville, Norwich, Onieda, Perry, Rochester, Saranac Lake, Smyrna, Syracuse, Trumansburg, Tryon
in PA, Gettysburg, Hershey, Jim Thorpe, Wilkes-Barre
Cincinnati and Toledo, Ohio
In New Jersey, Morristown and Union City
Harpers Ferry, WV Charleston and Hilton Head in South Carolina Savannah, Georgia
Sigh—as always, it took some time to get the bugs out. As always, I said, ‘There! Perfect!’ only to find it was far from perfect.
But now it is—not ‘perfect’ as in perfect, of course, but perfect as in error-free, assuming you’re not some picayune anal person who lives to ferret out blips. These days it’s rare to find even a professional work without a typo or two. It’s possible you won’t find any, though. If you do, I don’t want to hear about it.
You could even call it a guide to informal witnessing. Few chapters are without reference to spiritual things, in the way I wish there was more of—seamlessly weaving the secular with the spiritual, rather than speaking, as it were, in two separate modes, ‘normal talk’ and ‘witnessing talk’—almost as though two languages.
It is also the first book that I can freely gift to friends without fear any reactionary ones will suppose I am ‘trying to make a name for myself.’ It is the first book entirely non-controversial. Only TTvtA is actually controversial, to my mind, but to some of our people even a defense of Jehovah’s people is suspect because it admits to criticisms against them—other than the ‘safe’ ones we acknowledge: rebuffing the holidays, denying the trinity, and abstaining from blood.
None of it here. Go Where Tom Goes is just the pure pleasure of going to new places, seeing new things, and chatting up new people. I even dropped the subheading, ‘Think What Tom Thinks’ You don’t have to. The book even has a shameless lie. Since it is a compilation of spruced up posts spanning several years, the introduction admits you might go to a given destination and find things not just so. However, they would doubtless be minor points—a new building here, an out-of-business enterprise there. Instead, my southernmost chapter, Fort Myers Beach, barely exists today. The wharf my wife and I strolled several times was completely demolished by Hurricane Ian.
****** The bookstore
"But now it is—not ‘perfect’ as in perfect, of course, but perfect as in error-free, assuming you’re not some picayune anal person who lives to ferret out blips."
o_O
Way to call me out, Tom. :P
[Reply: Not you. Of course not you. Someone else no doubt. :) ]
Posted by: T | December 06, 2022 at 11:59 PM