Some insight to a writer’s life

Being the wife of a newspaper columnist involves a level of public

exposure that might make some people uneasy. Friends who haven’t

heard from me in a while tell me they are able to keep up with my

life by reading about it in my husband’s column. Fortunately for Joe

Bell -- and our marriage -- I don’t have a problem with this.

I figure that giving Joe carte blanche to write about personal

matters in “The Bell Curve” gives me more latitude to have my say --

at home and, now and then, in public. Like today, when taking over

his column gives me a chance to give his readers an inside view of a

writer’s life.

If you read Joe’s column regularly, you probably either: A) agree

with almost everything he says; B) disagree with his opinions but

admire his writing; or C) just disagree but want to know what the

other side is saying. Although those in the third category are the

ones most likely to write letters, Joe enjoys hearing from all of his

readers because there’s nothing more depressing to a writer than the

suspicion that his or her words are going into a black hole.

Like many of Joe’s admirers, I am amazed that he manages to write

a column every week. He’s been doing it for three years at the Pilot,

and for five years before that he wrote a column twice a week for the

Los Angeles Times. Somehow the ideas and the words keep coming. This

requires a rare combination of qualities -- being both extroverted

and reclusive.

Joe goes out to breakfast and lunch fairly often to nurture

friendships (some of which started with letters responding to his

column) that have proven to be a rich source of ideas as well as

information. But he also spends a great deal of time in a form of

solitary confinement that he dearly loves -- sitting at his desk in

his home office overlooking our shady backyard, seeking the words

that will bring his ideas and opinions into focus.

Sometimes, Joe draws inspiration from a baseball game on the

screen next to his computer, or from classical music or standards

from the ‘40s. Periodically, he emerges to rough up the lazy

dachshund stationed at his side or tend to basic needs. Since I now

work from home, too, as a freelance writer, we hold brief conferences

in the kitchen or hallway during these breaks, then return to our

separate offices.

I have learned that sometimes Joe is still mulling over an idea

even when he is not at his computer, so I try not to introduce

important subjects during these encounters. It helps to be a writer

myself. Sometimes, we are both rather hazy, though we usually manage

to look like we are listening to each other even when we’re not.

There are a few things that Joe’s readers should probably know

about him, to help put his words into perspective. Joe was

politicized during the McCarthy era, after being raised in a

conservative Midwestern town where his father was a closet Democrat

in a Republican family. Joe was outraged by the McCarthy hearings,

and they set him on a decidedly liberal course. His instincts will

always veer in that direction, but he is not a “knee-jerk liberal.”

He listens to all points of view, evaluates and comes down where it

feels right, which, of course, is usually on the left.

Another important thing you should know about Joe is that he loves

this community, even though he has at times been its harshest critic.

He has lived here since 1959, when he brought his family from Chicago

to Corona del Mar to escape the brutal winters and write about

Hollywood celebrities and films for national newspapers and

magazines. He also wrote a great deal about Orange County, including

an article called “America’s Kinkiest County” that appeared in Look

Magazine and drew a lengthy editorial response from the Orange County

Register. He has lived in Santa Ana Heights for the last 20 years,

and even the noise of John Wayne Airport hasn’t kept him from feeling

very lucky to be here.

Now that my son has graduated from college and started his own

life in Los Angeles, we’ve often talked about moving to a quieter

place where the cost of living is lower. It’s only talk. Neither of

us wants to leave. Although transplanted from the Midwest, Joe has

become as true a Southern Californian as any native. He loves the

weather, the diversity of people, the ocean, the mega-movieplexes,

the neighborhood we live in, our nearness to the great minds and rich

cultural offerings at UC Irvine and our easy access to Edison Field,

despite all the hurt the Angels have caused him over the years. As a

writer, he particularly appreciates living in an area that, over many

years of growth and change, has been a rich source of material for

social and political commentary.

Joe left his teaching position in the English Department at UCI

some time ago after 20 years of mentoring young writers, and he has

stopped writing for national magazines. But every week, he writes

another column for the Daily Pilot, which is a powerful reason for us

to stay in this community. Almost every day, he also works on the

Civil War novel he started more than two decades ago.

Someday, he will finish that novel. But I hope he will never

finish writing “The Bell Curve.” I know it’s a large part of what

keeps him so vital at 81 -- and makes him speechless when he’s asked

to talk about his retirement. It may be the only subject that Joe has

nothing to say about.

* SHERRY ANGEL is married to Joseph N. Bell and writes in his

column space every so often.