In praise of … Ray Dolin

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/jun/12/in-praise-of-ray-dolin

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It must have seemed a brilliant title. The Kindness of America: just the right kind of subtly uplifting name for a hitchhiker's memoir. Until, that is, Ray Dolin was shot by a stranger. The 39-year-old author was in the Montana countryside last Saturday when a driver pulled up. Dolin broke off his lunch in the hope of a lift, but was instead shot in the arm. Dolin will live – he was soon whisked off to hospital – but it would be only natural for him to rue that titular hostage to fortune now. He shouldn't. The author falls into a long line of on-the-roaders. Consider Woody Guthrie, who left his family to freeze in the desert, and get locked up for vagrancy – and still went on to write This Land Is Your Land. Just as oysters need grit to make pearls, romantics need reality to fortify their dreams. We wish Dolin well with the rest of his travels and writing. Although he might tweak that title: The Kindness of America, Most of the Time.