Tim Cahill is not a scary man. In fact, he reminds me of an uncle trying to melt into the armchaired wallpaper during a messy family reunion. Tim does not like applause. Nor does he willingly grab microphones. This is all quite off-putting when you remember that he is a man who pioneered adventure travel writing, and drips with awards, books, deals and general fame and notoriety. I suppose he really is more at home tracking down jaguars to rip off his flesh. I got a kick out of closing my eyes and losing myself in his Tom Hanks sound-alike voice. It’s all velvety, comfortable and warm, like wrapping a tired, overstretched cardigan over my knees. He gives his scratchy beard lots of attention when he talks, almost without noticing, and when he likes something, which he does a lot, his eyes twinkle beneath his inappropriate sun-bleached sports hat. When I Wikipediaed him, in readiment for our introduction, it said that “he was friendly in college with Steve Miller and Boz Scaggs.” Prompted me to think Wikipedia ought to be more closely monitored. Then again, maybe he was friends with them. Who am I to judge?
Tim Cahill, very reluctantly speaking on what place moved him…
What is most interesting about Tim Cahill is what turns him on. Like how he set a world record for speed in driving the entire length of the American continents, from Ushuaia in Tierra del Fuego in southern Argentina up along the Pan-American Highwayto Prudhoe Bay, Alaska in twenty-three days, twenty-two hours, and forty-three minutes - material for his book Road Fever. He compromised a Christian cult by going undercover to gain material on them. He said he just let them pick him up in the road. I counted 10 books under his penmanship, as well as plenty of fascinating interviews, articles and stories for a coffeetable book of titles like National Geographic Adventure, Esquire, and the New York Times Book Review. He wrote the backpage for the newborn, Afar magazine (on shelves August 2009). He won a National Magazine Award and two Lowell Thomas Gold Awards from the Society of American Travel Writers. He says he’s been to 100 countries. He is the father of adventure travel writing.
It was at last week’s Book Passage Travel Writer and Photographer Conference in Corte Madera that I stopped googling Tim and started watching him. The event teemed with world-class editors, reviewers, publishers, writers and photographers. It broke all the rules, as these teachers expressed an insatiable urge to listen, open up, share log cabin stories over the cheap plastic patio tables in the sun. They were available an approachable and it was almost overwhelming. How very uneditor-like.
At this event I discovered that Spud Hilton, editor of San Francisco Chronicle Travel Section looks like Drew Carey, and is “the cruise guy“. Pauline Frommer tends to get off the beaten track with her tendency to wander off topic during panels and launch into her passionate views on the current political front. Rolf Potts is intense and reminds me of my brother. Jen Leo is a professional blogger and media socialite. (I want to say more, but she will find this in seconds and rap me over the virtual knuckles). I wanted Jeff Pflueger’s life and Linda Watanabe McFerrin’s face. But it was Tim Cahill who’s pocket I really wanted to climb into.
He spent 3 hours a day over the course of the week with a select group of “advanced” travel writer’s he’d hand-plucked from applicants for his intensive class. I liked feeling hand-plucked by Tim Cahill, although it made me neurotic during simple 3-minute exercises. He gave me to-do’s. He said he really liked my writing. He praised it. He made me want to own it.
Tim swears at sketchpads and sets silly rules like “Tim is not always right”. He responds to emails in snail mail fashion, and wears fluorescent Hawaiian shirts. (Then again, that appeared to be either the joke or the uniform of travel editors at this conference.) His photo that appears on jacket covers looks like it was taken moments after Woodstock ended. He made a name with a name as common as Tim Cahill. He broke into the writing world with a book on serial killers – my secret passion. He has friends like Bill Bryson.
In my pre-class research (that in any other age would be recognised as stalking), I also read that he lost his wife last year in a tragic traffic accident. I wished I hadn’t read that on a website because it made me want to hug him constantly. Which is not good for networking with a famed pioneer at such a conference. It made me seem scary.
And now it’s back to my desk for this touched-by-magic (and Tim Cahill) travel writer before I do something else that’s wildly inappropriate.
Luce, this piece is just plain, dammed magnificent. For a moment as I read I was back at Steenberg Village in the sunshine hearing you talk (this piece had your VOICE in it …) about why you love writing. Well done, my friend!