Summary

In Chapter 5: The Search: The South Pacific, 1978, Finnegan describes leaving Los Angeles in 1978 after having worked as a brakeman on the Southern Pacific since 1974. He loved the job, including the mental and physical demands of the work, the language he used at work, and the paychecks. Bryan Di Salvatore, whom Finnegan had met in Hawaii, was his partner. Bryan, who had attended Yale on a scholarship, was a novelist and truck driver. They had taken long road trips, including to Montana, where they both wound up later going to graduate school in Missoula. After earning his master's, Bryan taught English at the University of Guam. Finnegan was dating a professor named Sharon who was 7 years older than he was and with whom he had been on and off for 4 years. He did not even give her the chance to veto his trip. Finnegan had...