The Hidden Costs of the Writing Life

Substack

Perhaps this is a foolish or perhaps an arrogant and ungrateful Lament. Were I living even a few centuries ago, I would have been dead or in agony long ago, but in our time, I'm still here as I close in on my 86th birthday. My brain works. All right, some other parts—they do not work so well or at least not without...assistance.

I don't know about you, but as for myself, I am having a hard time Keeping Up With It All.

First, there's the perpetual upgrades on my iPad, cellphone, and computer. I have drawn a line in the sand and simply refuse to learn any more New Things. And let's not forget all the new apps. I've already turned down some very tempting ones, but how many apps does one woman need? I refuse to purchase Spotify, but I do watch all the classical music and opera clips available on Instagram. I share the best ones with a cherished opera singer and with the man who interviewed me for three years on NPR's "At the Opera."

Then, there are all the doctor and dentist visits. Their offices call you at least twice to confirm your appointment, after which one must go to real offices and wait your turn and then get the various prescriptions filled, after which one has to lay them out in plastic med strips. It all amounts to a part-time job, and I am jealous of my time. Luckily, most of my health care is covered but not all of it, not by a long shot. This too is a hidden and mounting cost.

I have at least fifteen (15) paid subscriptions to magazines, journals and newspapers, both online and hard copy. I could not write without access to all of them all but they are expensive and steadily increase in price. For example, this includes The Atlantic, Commentary, The Free Press, The Jewish Press, The Jewish Review of Books, The London Review of Books, the online and hardcopy of New York Post, the online New York Times, The Spectator (UK), The Times of London, the online and weekend hardcopy of The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, etc. God bless Tablet, for whom I've written. They have sent me a complimentary copy.

I have about fifteen (15) streaming platforms, which are also essential to my writing. I review films and documentaries—and, yes, even some Common Culture nightmares—not horror shows but what passes for meaningful entertainment today. I admit it: I also watch (and re-watch) some great old movies and series when I can, but that's a quality-of-life issue. Gotta keep the thinker fit. God bless Chai Flicks, for whom I've also written reviews. They, too, have comped me.

Then there are all the new and growing Substack subscriptions. Everyone has monetized their offerings. I have sometimes asked to be comped, and sometimes I am. I am often turned down. I understand. A freelance writer needs to be paid, however minimally. But here, again, I need access to at least ten (10) such sites.

Count 'em. I just have. Forty in all. Plus what I've forgotten.

There. That's off my chest. I needed some diversion from the events of the day, the week, the month, the year.

The times are darkening evermore. The lights have, long ago, gone out in Europe; and in parts of the United States too. The denials that this is so remain staunchly in place. I monitor the Jihad terror attacks; the Jihadic persecution of infidels, especially Christians and Jews; the femicides, the rapes, gang-rapes, and the sex and human trafficking; the death of what once was an inspiring feminist movement; the increasing use of AI even by the super-educated; the betrayal of Israel and of the Jews.

Ah that. But even my eyes have begun to glaze over the non-stop really Bad News. The likelihood of a Fourth—or is it a Fifth?—World War. The betrayal of the West by the West. We are assuring our own destruction. We are our own Trojan Horse. Not me, not my readers, perhaps not many of us. The families who do not want Mayor Zohran to attend the 9/11 Memorial Service are a bright spot in an increasingly dystopian reality in New York City.

It's become so bad that I find that I cannot continue reading the prescient 1933 novel The Oppermanns by Lion Feuchtwanger and as introduced by my late, dear friend Ruth Gruber. John Podhoretz recommended it in Commentary. It concerns a wealthy, cultured, and long-settled Jewish family in Berlin before Hitler's national socialism/Naziism killed most of them. I read the first 40 pages with growing anxiety and then skipped to the last 30 pages. This is something that I've never done. By the way, the great Varian Fry rescued Feuchtwanger among many other artists and notables.

I thought about Jean Raspail's prescient novel The Camp of the Saints, which concerns an attempted immigrant invasion of Europe by barbarians, one and all, who finally land in France, are welcomed by do-gooder. The immigrant flotilla then proceeds to take France right down. (60,000 Moroccan immigrants invading Spain anyone?) I sigh as I remember that Raspail was roundly demonized as a racist and that conservatives were shocked—shocked—that the likes of me had written positively about Raspail back in 2005. For the record: Raspail himself insisted that he was not political, not at all, that he was essentially a man of letters, only concerned with literary matters.

Well, on the smallest possible level, there is some surprisingly personal and interesting news. Google tells me that I am being quoted quite a lot, but they do not tell me what book or what article they've plucked these snippets from. Here's one that I like. Somewhere, at some time, I wrote; "The West has funded the war against itself by buying Arab oil. It is as simple and as tragic as that.”

A reader—a lawyer—has written to me All About Angela Davis. I am considering asking him to post what he's written as a comment or even as an article. It casts some suspicion on her trial. But it's also based on hearsay. There might be a smoking gun but I havent' the time to track it down.