Commentary: Alternative Approaches (The Newspaper Column) Turns Five!

Jeez! Can it really be five years since this column first appeared in the pages of ESP Magazine, a weekly entertainment paper published in Greensboro, North Carolina? Five years since ESP editor Ogi Overman asked me to write an article on the Tarot, the mystical “fortune telling” cards which are a love of mine, leading immediately to a column on alternative ideas. Five years of deadlines never missed, if sometimes pushed back a bit. Five years of biting fingernails while I tried to figure out what the heck to write about this week. Five years, four computers and five word processing programs later we're still here. Who would've thought it possible? Certainly not me.

When we started I figured that, at best, the column would last a year. The focus in those days was on the New Age movement and we did articles on witches, magicians, medicinal herbs and crystals. Certainly after a year or two, I figured, we'd exhaust the subject and the column would be dropped, leaving me with some fond memories. Who knew that after two years I would discover that the surface had not yet been mined, that there was still a rich lode of material still waiting to be unearthed? Who knew that after two years I would still have three years in front of me with no end in sight?

At the end of the first two years I patted myself on the back with a self-congratulatory column like this one, which was when I came up with the idea that this space covered “the weird, the offbeat and the sublime.” That actually brought a shift of focus to the column, for I realized that a column headed “Alternative Approaches” didn't have to be confined to New Age thought, but could go anywhere where things were different, out of the ordinary or an alternative to the status quo.

Since then, most columns have still been about the New Age approach to mental and spiritual health, but other approaches have been added to the mix. For Black History Month there have been articles on the Black Panthers, Fred Hampton and African-American history you won't see on local TV. There have been articles on the hippie counter culture, the Internet, computer programs and anything else that could conceivably fit under the Alternative Approaches banner. There was even an article about a little country store that I found to be charming and unique.

I never know when a column will hit a responsive chord. For example, about two years ago I had to write a quick column when I found out on deadline day that I had a column due. Using the recent death of my roommate's grandfather as inspiration, I banged-out a column on the Taoist belief in the importance of honoring ancestors, using an beautifully written article I'd found by Derek Lin on the True Tao Home Page as illustration. “...one should never, ever take one's own existence for granted,” I quoted Lin in the article. “Without your ancestors you would not be here. If they hadn't lived, loved, struggled, fought and survived, you would not exist. Just as you cherish your own life, it makes perfect sense that you should also cherish your forebears, for they are the ones who paved the way for you.”

I was more than a little apprehensive, since the column had been written quickly with little forethought. However, I was soon pleased when Ogi said it was, perhaps, the best column I'd written. Several months later, I received an email from Derek Lin. Evidently, someone had sent him a copy of the column. I'm happy to say that he was pleased with what I'd done.

The column that received the most response was called The Great Psychic Sweepstakes, written after I'd received mail from psychic fraud Raylene Van Worth. She'd sent me a computer generated letter that was not-so-cleverly personalized. “Would you believe I was glancing at a list when your name practically flew off the sheet?” the letter said. “Well, after thirty years of practice, I knew something big was up. And, as you may already know, I feel it’s my duty in life to help the people I love, so I did a reading. I needed to know nothing bad was going to happen.” The letter, designed to play on people's vulnerabilities, went on to suggest that I needed her help, which she'd be glad to offer for a “reduced” fee – just to help me out.

For about a year after that column appeared, I received emails from readers who'd received the same letter. Most said that they'd been about to take the bait and send Ms. Van Worth a check when they'd seen my column. It was (and is) gratifying to know that my work here made a small difference in people's life.

As I begin year six, I hope there will be other columns that make a small difference in people's life. Making a difference is, indeed, an alternative approach!

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