Happy Birthday, Tom!

In the pic above (left to right): my father, Franco Bolelli, Tom Robbins and a younger version of yours truly.

Today is the ninetieth-some birthday of one of the giants of American literature. He’s one of my favorite writers ever and, more importantly, a human being of incredible kindness and generosity. He’s my friend Tom Robbins (not to be confused with Tony Robbins. The names are similar, but that’s where similarities end. It’d be akin to confusing Martin Luther and Martin Luther King.)

In the pic above, my mother, Gloria Mattioni, and Tom being goofy.

Growing up, I bought into a terrible idea. I was told that all great artists, writers and musicians pay a horrifying price for the sensitivity that allows them to create their masterpieces. In this view, creative talent is a curse. In Prometheus-like fashion, the artist steals the fire from the gods, smuggles beauty and passion to share among human beings, but is inevitably punished for it. In the myth of Prometheus, this means getting tied to a rock where a giant eagle comes to devour his liver, only for his liver to regrow and get eaten again the following day… for all of eternity. Matching this cheerful image, the artist pays for giving birth to their creations by being driven to near madness and despair. As much as I’d love to reject this depressing theory as a poisonous stereotype, a quick review of the lives of my creative heroes throughout history doesn’t help to dispel it. From Caravaggio to the 27 club (all the many, many fantastic musicians who died by the age of 27), from Bruce Lee to Nietzsche, so many individuals blessed with spectacular talent seem to have been cursed with a tragic destiny. As a teenager with some writing skills and an over-sized sensitivity, this discovery didn’t do wonders for my mood. It seemed to me that any kind of emotional depth inevitably went hand in hand with a mountain of pain fated to visit me every day of my life.  

Enters Tom Robbins.

I was sixteen years old when my father shared with me a copy of Tom’s novel Still Life with Woodpecker.

It was a wild time for me. Emotionally, intellectually and physically, I was changing at a speed I could hardly keep up with, and I was about to experience a nasty breakup with my very first girlfriend. In this messy time, Tom opened a whole other world to me. In the pages of his hilarious novels, I discovered something that changed my life. It was possible to be sensitive AND to be happy. Emotional intensity was not a sentence to unavoidable suffering. Not that Tom (or his characters) ever ignored the many ways in which life can hurt. He simply chose to have fun despite it all. When later Tom would introduce me to one of my favorite individuals in history, 15^th century Zen master Ikkyu, this lesson was reinforced even further. As Ikkyu wrote, “Throw me into Hell, and I’ll find a way to enjoy it.” What Tom (and later Ikkyu) taught me was nothing like the superficial “positive thinking” I had found little use for. As I once wrote in a book, “Neither Robbins nor Ikkyu are frivolous clowns who are blind to the misery and the suffering that stalk the world. What makes Robbins and Ikkyū unique is that they haven’t allowed pain to rob them of their passion for life. They have consciously chosen playfulness as a way to keep finding beauty even when existence turns unkind.”

Or, as Tom himself wrote, “My view of the world is not that different from Kafka’s, really. The difference is that Kafka let it make him miserable and I refuse. Life is too short. My personal motto has always been: Joy in spite of everything. Not just [mindless] joy, but joy in spite of everything. Recognizing the inequities and the suffering and the corruption and all that but refusing to let it rain on my parade. And I advocate this to other people.”

At sixteen years old, when Tom’s writings changed everything for me, never did I imagine that I’d meet him. The old adage ‘don’t meet your heroes’ definitely didn’t apply to my experience with him: he didn’t just talk the talk, but very much walked the walk. We spent some fun time together in Italy, and then again a few times back in U.S. At some point, he even wrote a blurb for the cover of my book Create Your Own Religion. Having his endorsement was definitely one of the highlights of my writing career. And in another case when, following the death of my wife, my life was quickly unraveling, one morning I went through my mail and found a letter from Tom and his wife Alexa with a check to pay my bills for a few weeks.

Besides being a wonderfully kind human being, Tom is an insanely gifted writer. His pages walk on a tightrope between hilarious and insightful. His mastery of paradox has inspired my own writing and approach to life. Among his books, my favorites are Still Life with Woodpecker and Jitterbug Perfume, but I have loved anything written by Tom. If Tom published his grocery shopping lists, I’m sure I’d read them and be happy.

Simply put, Tom is one of the greatest writers and sweetest humans to ever walk the planet. So, in occasion of his special day, I’d like say Happy Birthday, Tom! May champagne bubbles and sinfully rich cakes welcome the anniversary of your arrival on earth.