By Tom Robotham
We must learn to reawaken and keep ourselves awake… by an infinite expectation of the dawn. – Henry David Thoreau
As I approach the age of 70, I’m growing more acutely aware of my diminished capacities.
The physical limitations are especially pronounced. I never really cared for running, even when I ran track in high school, but for most of my life, I’ve loved walking and could happily stroll for eight or 10 miles, along city streets or mountain trails, without thinking about it. These days, walking a mile feels like a lot.
My sense of balance isn’t what it once was, either, and I’ve become more conscious of the possibility of falling—particularly when walking down stairs, which I never do anymore without holding the handrail.
I also used to love tennis, but that’s likely behind me. The last time I played, I lunged to make a shot and threw my back out.
These things are to be expected, of course, as you enter old age, although it’s disconcerting that they’ve hit so soon. I once met a guy in his 80s who was preparing to lead a weeklong trek in the Adirondacks—in January.
What I never expected was that there would come a point when I’d have difficulty writing. I’m not talking about the physical act, although I do have a hand tremor—likely a sign of Parkinson’s—which makes typing more difficult. I’m talking about a diminishment of motivation.
This is truly baffling, because I’ve loved writing ever since childhood. Many writers say they hate writing but loving having written. I’ve never felt that way. I’ve always loved the process of writing—the crafting of stories, essays, journalistic pieces and the occasional poem, line by line. I love playing with the rhythms of language and the sounds of words, and above all I love the life of the mind—the world of ideas about this extraordinary plane of existence with all of its beauty, humor, sensuality, pain, horror and possibility of transcendence.
I first discovered these pleasures before I learned to read, thanks to my parents and early teachers who read aloud to me. (See “Reading as an Act of Love” in the VEER online archives.) By the time I was 9, I was writing my own stories, and a few years after that, I started keeping a journal.
My love of writing intensified in college, when I joined the staff of the student newspaper and wrote short stories for a creative writing class. After college, my output kicked into high gear while working for a daily newspaper and attending grad school at night. At that point, a realization set in: Writing was the one activity in my life that made me lose track of time entirely. I remember one afternoon, in particular, when I sat down at noon to write a grad-school essay on Thoreau and before I knew it, five and a half hours had passed without a break.
This degree of absorption stayed with me for the 10 years that I served as editor of Port Folio Weekly in Norfolk. When I took the job, I decided to open each issue with a full-length essay, rather than the typical editor’s summary of contents, and from 1998 to 2008, I never missed a deadline or experienced a moment of writer’s block. The ideas and words to express them never stopped flowing.
For the last 17 years, I’ve had the same experience writing in this space for VEER. Last summer, in fact, I started a Substack column to provide an outlet for the overflow of things I wanted to say but didn’t have the space for in this magazine.
Then, all of a sudden—sometime late last year or early in 2026—the well started to run dry. I’ve yet to miss a deadline for this column, but I’ve found that the ideas for topics aren’t coming as easily. And that Substack column? I haven’t written anything new on the platform in months.
I’m not entirely sure why.
The drying of the well may be due in part to aging—the inevitable drying of the brain, as it were, and the accompanying loss of mental stamina.
I suspect, however, that it has more to do with the fact that for a decade I’ve struggled to keep my bearings in the face of our culture’s insanity and sheer viciousness.
For much of that time, writing about the ugliness helped me cope. As my blood boiled over each new outrage, I’d flip open my laptop and lay out my thoughts on the matter. The process was cathartic and energizing.
These days, though, I feel utterly exhausted. Thus, when ODU alum Renee Good was murdered in cold blood by an ICE agent, I found myself at a loss for words, just as I did more recently when Trump proclaimed that “a whole civilization will die tonight.”
I’ve written about many topics besides politics, of course, but increasingly that feels like playing the violin while the Titanic slowly sinks into the sea. I truly wonder sometimes whether there’s any point in trying anymore. More often than not, I’d rather just sit at home and watch reruns of Gunsmoke than take up arms against a sea of troubles.
And yet, even as I stand on the very precipice of despair, I feel a flicker of determination to keep going.
As I search for ways to rekindle my inner flame, I remind myself of people I’ve admired: Pete Seeger, who was blacklisted for 17 years but never gave up the fight—or hope; Nat Hentoff, my mentor and friend, who was still writing passionately about civil liberties almost until his dying day. And of course, Henry David Thoreau, whose blazing beacon shines again so wonderfully in a new PBS documentary.
The film serves as an important reminder that the father of American environmentalism was also a tireless advocate for social justice—especially in the face of slavery and a powerful establishment that supported it, not to mention his own chronic illness. His life story and body of work stand as testament to the power of words and to the resilience of the human spirit.
Tomorrow, I shall try yet again to follow his example.