Thank you, Ray!

Just the other day, I checked the Internet and my heart literally skipped a beat. Ray Bradbury had finally left the planet. I felt like my father or grandfather had passed suddenly, and for good reason. This guy wrote words that carved their way into my heart and my consciousness.

Reading Bradbury was such a moving and transformative thing to me, it was as if someone had reached out and grabbed me and dragged me along for amazing rides into the future, the past and into the red skies over Mars. I can remember the time and places where I sat and first read the works he gave us. It is like when one thinks back on the first meeting of a great friends or lovers. One day, I climbed into my parent's horse pasture and sat under an apple tree and cracked open the book Fahrenheit 451. I was playing hooky on a late spring day. When I finished the novel that evening, I sat there with my thoughts and only came down as the moon began to rise over the sky. I was a different person.

I hope that you will give Ray Bradbury a chance to reach out and grab you. I believe he will live on as a master of the 20th century, a true American Romantic, a mythologist and a fantasist of the highest degree. These are some of my personal favorites:

"The Toynbee Convector"- a short story that shines with Bradbury's brilliant optimism. Read on the steps of St. Johnsbury's Atheneaum.

The Martian Chronicles- a true sci-fi fantasy that makes me nostalgic for he red planet. Read this one on summer evenings on the front porch.

Something Wicked This Way Comes- A gothic marvel (more poetry than prose) about love, loss, youth and wonder. I read this one on my grandmother's couch.

and of course: Farhrenheit 451- the dystopian allegory of the cave that turned out to be pretty prophetic.

Thanks, Ray, for everything, and may your further journeys only give you back the wonder that you gave all of us!