“Fame is the sum of the misunderstanding that gathers about a new name.”
– Rainer Maria Rilke
The minute hand hovers at fifteen past the hour; the seconds run out fast. But faster still is Joe-the-Plumber, now Joe-the-Writer, whose book about being Joe-the-Plumber will arrive before Christmas, with delivery time to spare, even at the media rate. In time, he hopes, to beat that expiring fifteen minutes.
How did that soap opera epigraph go? "Like sands through the hourglass of time..." Whatever. No point in piling up the cliches. We're probably in for a few more before the year expires, or Joe's fifteen minutes.
Joe must have been home scribbling away the day John McCain stood at the podium, calling vacantly into the throngs at his rally, “Joe, where are you? Where’s Joe? Is Joe here with us today? Joe, I thought you were here today.”
But he wasn’t. Perhaps the muses had called.
Yes, indeed, Joe the Plumber: Fighting for the American Dream will be released on December 1.
As a fellow laborer in the vast and fickle fields of writing, I can only stand in awe.
And if a new book weren’t accomplishment enough for this 21st-century renaissance man, there’s also a new blog and maybe—hope against hope!—a new country CD.
If President-Elect Obama doesn’t restore the American Dream, Joe the Plumber is standing by to show us the way, if the clock doesn't run out.
