In addition to being natural story tellers, we human beings are, and always have been, drifters, wanderers, seekers, and searchers. In a global sense, we are drifting through space on a large sphere of water and rock. In a more specific sense, we move from place to place, or simply from one village to the next; sometimes it is just wandering -- with no direction, no purpose -- and other times we know exactly where we are going. And it is often from this searching and wandering that our stories, whether personal or communal, are developed and passed along. Drifters is a book about searchers, drifters, and -- basically, travelers of all stripes, each with a unique set of outcomes. Some have found what they were looking for, but most have found something unanticipated, as it not only is with most of our travels and searches, but with a good short story as well. We continue to wander, and we learn to expect the unexpected.
About the Author: Before he began writing short stories, Tom was an academic, teaching for many years at a community college and then later serving as a university administrator. With his graduate work being primarily in the field of adult learning and continuing education, Tom's professional career eventually culminated in his becoming the Dean of Lifelong Learning at a major midwestern university. While following that path of college professor and dean, he, himself, became a lifelong learner and avid reader, studying not only the works of the famous but also the ways of the not-so-famous, the everyday people he met along the way. He loved to explore how people absorb knowledge, how they find their way in understanding and living in their world, and how they relate to the people around them. It was this interest that took him on journeys around the world and throughout the United States. In the process, he also began to see how adult students found new ways to learn using innovative technologies and creative learning strategies. During those travels, Tom watched, listened, and wrote about what he discovered. And from those explorations came a host of stories that he loves to share with others. And, it is from those various encounters and experiences that he developed many of the tales that appear in his first book, Drifters. Tom now lives with his wife in Columbus, Ohio, where he continues to indulge in his passion for words and for traveling, writing short stories, exploring new levels of knowledge and understanding, and developing his love of poetry He welcomes your feedback and can be contacted at tashostak@gmail.com.