Will Johnstone, Writer & Artist, West Highlands, Denver, Colorado
The Way of Learning is Natural ... The reason is internal ... The path is experiential ... The result is fulfillment ... |
Hey! What Do You Do A true story about a young family finding a fossil dinosaur in New Mexico. |
I am a writer, artist, silversmith, guitar player, singer and songwriter, poet, and Internet software programmer.
My first short story was published in "IF" magazine in 1967, "The Purpose Of It All". Frederick Pohl paid me $15 for 1500 words, a penny a word. Robert Heinlein, a friend of my father, said that if I wanted to make a decent living I should find a different skill.
At that time I had a small art gallery in Old Town Albuquerque, New Mexico, called the "Epicenter". I had been silversmithing since the age of sixteen when the father of my girl friend gave me the keys to the agricultural building at the local high school and showed me how to use an acetylene torch. I hammered out a lot of silver pendants and earrings and bracelets and made a lot of turquoise jewelry. And I had been painting pictures since I was fourteen, landscapes, later they were space paintings, and even later they were abstract. That is where I am now, abstract.
I played the guitar since I was fourteen, sang and wrote songs and poems and never was paid anything for any of it. I still play. I still write songs. I still am not paid for my music, songs or poems.
I am paid mostly for Internet software programming.
Will Johnstone