It Just Made Him Whole

There is a vulnerability that never goes away if you are a writer, or I suspect a singer, painter, sculptor, or anyone else who creates. We hope you like it. Actually, we hope you love it–and us. And if you don’t, well, sometimes we listen to that inner voice that told us all along that we are frauds and need to hang up our dream, as painful as that may be.

For many years, I’ve cited master storyteller Harry Chapin’s song “Mr. Tanner,” the fact-inspired saga of a Midwestern dry cleaner who lo...