Letters from Steve

I just finished reading the book Letters From Steven: Stories from the first solo walk around the World. I found it to be good reading.

Mind you, the events written about happened in the mid 1980s, and the book was published in 1987, so I'm only a quarter of a century behind-times, but that's another story.

Steve Newman was a neighbor of ours, growing up. Well, he was mostly what we considered grown up, no matter how old (young) we were. He was older than even me, and I was the oldest junior person I knew. My sisters were friends (or friendly) with his sisters; some of my brothers with some of his brothers. I knew vaguely that he had aspirations of being a writer.

He fully fulfilled that dream of his, just as he did his WorldWalk.

I found the book to be amazing. The letters themselves (written to readers of Capper's Weekly) are well written and the tone is friendly and casual. The education in the letters is unsurpassed in any textbook. The descriptions -- well, let me tell you. I have looked back through the book for a couple of photographs to show my family. Only problem -- there were no photographs. The pictures were painted with words.

I am so envious.