Hemingway

It's the first week in August and I'm sitting in my office wearing a jacket and a sweatshirt, debating whether I should start a fire to keep warm. Didn't see this coming. 

As a cold rain streaks the picture window and a hard north wind creates white caps on the slough, I'm thinking about Ernest Hemingway. I don't believe any of my grandchildren even know who he was, but when I was their age, he was a stud. My dad was a fan, so for Father's Day one year I bought him a biography titled, “Papa.” It seemed appropriate and had the added benefit of being another book in the house for me to read. 

By the way, that's a well-known and sneaky move by book readers – giving a member of the household a book with the expectation that you'll get a shot at it as well. 

Anyway, I gave him the book about a half century ago and hadn't thought about it too much since, until I stumbled across it the other day and began rereading it. Oddly enough, over the past fifty years I've forgotten some of the details in the book. For example, when he gave career advice to a friend, Hemingway said, “Never confuse movement with action.” 

Five words. Granted, Mr. Hemingway, among other things, was famous for being a very economical writer, but to cram a life philosophy into five words is kind of an accomplishment. 

He was talking to Marlene Dietrich about whether she should take a particular movie role she wasn't thrilled with, just for the sake of staying busy. His point was that in every life there is just so much time, energy, and talent and you shouldn't waste any of it on things that don't really matter. 

Now, it's a little easier giving advice like that when you're a rich and famous artist who doesn't have to worry about putting bread on the table or putting children through school. On the other hand, Hemingway himself often talked about when his writing career was just starting. He'd quit journalism to write fiction, and his daily mail consisted of bills and rejection letters. He, his wife, and infant son lived in a cheap apartment in Paris. When things got tough enough, he'd take his son to a park in his baby carriage, catch pigeons, break their necks, and tuck them under the blankets until he had enough for dinner.  

He didn’t need to starve. He no doubt could have made a pretty good living writing advertising jingles and worked on “For Whom the Bell Tolls,” on weekends and evenings, so a diet of pigeons and stale bread certainly was putting his money where his mouth was. 

He had four wives and ended up taking his own life, so he wasn't always a great role model, but he was on to something with the line about not confusing movement with action. When I look around this world, I see so much real work to be done, so many important actions we should be taking, and I sometimes despair that as a society we've lost the capacity to see the difference between what matters and what doesn't. We all stay busy, but are we confusing movement with action? 

Just thoughts on a day when the breeze ruffles the feathers of the pelicans slipping slowly downwind. 

Copyright 2024 Brent Olson