In this funny piece about searching for a kind of kinship with Melville aboard a cruise ship, this paragraph stuck out at me:

I did manage to make a list of what he and I shared and where our experience differed. I’d booked an inside cabin on the Star Flyer’s bottom deck, hoping to approximate his berth on the Acushnet. I had a gimpy left leg on the trip, just as Melville had as he struggled through the Marquesan jungle; it made me feel close to him. I was mutinous, refusing to snorkel. That was about it. He had had no sunblock, no mosquito repellent, no sorbet course, no piano bar, no steward to turn down his bedspread (no bedspread), no chocolates on his pillow. And yet he produced two bestsellers.

We do have a way of getting in our own way.