Deer In Headlines II
By Gery Deer
“The story so far – In the beginning the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move.” – Douglas Adams, The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.
My story this week begins very simply with a book. It is a wholly remarkable book called, “The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy,” written by the late British author, Douglas Adams. Of course, if you know the author and his work, then you may also know this has been a sort of holiday week for Adams fans as we celebrate, “Towel Day.”
Every May 25th, Towel Day participants pay tribute to Adams, who began the Hitchhikers legacy as a BBC radio play followed shortly after by the novelization and its sequels. Sadly, he passed away unexpectedly on May 11, 2001, at the young age of 49. Just a couple of weeks later, distraught fans organized the very first Towel Day celebration.
A towel-focused memorial might seem odd to the non-fan, but it was chosen because of the bath linen’s prominence in the Hitchhikers story. As Adams put it, a towel is, “the most massively useful thing an interstellar hitchhiker can have.” He then details its practical value in any number of ways such as a facemask, sail, weapon, and, of course, something to dry off with – if it’s still clean enough.
On Towel Day, fans around the globe carry a towel and share photos and stories online to express their love of the books and the author who came to mean so much to them – and me. In 2022, I was fortunate to have been chosen by the fans to be their Intergalactic Towel Day Ambassador, a title I used to raise money for children’s literacy.
I first read Hitchhikers when I was in junior high school and I remember being captivated by Adams’s style and skill for satire. In fact, if not for Adams’s work and a foul-up during a book signing in the early 90s, there may never have been a “Deer In Headlines” series nor my eventual career as a writer.
At the book signing event, I had a chance to speak with Adams. During our brief encounter, he was kind, polite, and thoughtful. He asked me about my interest in writing, which was waning at the time. But he encouraged me to keep going. “Whatever you do,” he said, “just keep writing.”
Years later I learned how Adams often struggled to put pen to paper, suffering from anxiety and severe writer’s block. It was at that point that his advice became even more meaningful.
It might seem like a silly sci-fi comedy on its surface. But, there is great wisdom and insight written into the Hitchhikers Guide series, more so than I would credit most other similar contemporary works. Adams used his space-going comedy series to make broad statements about modern life, technology, and self-awareness.
His vision of society as a whole is one that I typically share. Adams was an avid fan of technology, a “radical atheist,” often angered by how religions treat the faithful and he truly valued nature and the environment, using his talents to help protect some of the most endangered wildlife from extinction, like the White Rhino.
Through satire, drama, and comedy, Adams showed us our egocentricities, ridiculousness, and obsessions with the movements of small, green pieces of paper as a way to achieve happiness. Then he reminds us that it wasn’t the green pieces of paper who were unhappy in the first place.
We all need inspiration, something, or someone who helps us see the world in a way that feels right and lets us be our best. I was lucky to have had a host of inspirational people in my life, even if they weren’t aware of it.
Sometimes we don’t recognize those people when they’re right in front of us. Open your eyes today and see who inspires you. Thanks to Adams, I kept writing and it gave me a livelihood. So to all of you I say, remember that the answer to the ultimate question of Life, The Universe, and Everything is “42.” Now go figure out the question for yourselves.
The Jamestown Comet 