Just finished reading The Deep Blue Good-By, the first Travis McGee novel by John D MacDonald.  Not only is a great read – and very brutal for something written in 1962 – it’s also filled with philosophy.  McGee isn’t just a guy who finds things, he’s also a thinker.

Here’s a really evocative bit about youth and the American Dream.  It’s a bit long, and a little bit out of date, but the message behind it really resonated with me:

“… But most of the wistful rabbits marry their unskilled men, and keep right on working.  And discover the end of the dream.  They have been taught that if you are sunny, cheery, sincere, group-adjusted, popular, the word is yours, including barbecue pits, charge plates, diaper service, percale sheets, friends for dinner, washer dryer combinations, color slides of the kiddies on the home projector, and eternal whimsical romance – with crinkly smiles and Rock Hudson dialogue.  So they all come smiling and confident and unskilled into technician’s world, and in a few years they learn that it is all going to be grinding and brutal and hateful and precarious.  These are the slums of the heart.  Bless the bunnies.  These are the new people, and we are making no place for them.  We hold the dream in front of them like a carrot, and finally say sorry you can’t have any.  And the schools where we teach them non-survival are gloriously architectured.  They will never live in places so fine, unless they contract something incurable.”

Brilliant stuff.  I heartily recommend The Deep Blue Good-By.  I myself am going to make a point of finding the other 20 or so McGee novels.