"Way Station" by Clifford Simak (1963)

**A time capsule back to the Cold War, still-relevant messaging, and my ultimate dream job**

First, a disclaimer:  It's possible that I only love this book due to sheer vicarious joy at watching the main character live basically my dream life, or at least have my dream job.  To the rest of the world, Enoch Wallace is a quiet loner, taking long daily walks through the hills of rural Wisconsin (the fact that he's been seen doing this for more than a hundred years is something that his neighbors just choose not to talk about).  In reality, he's the keeper of a galactic waystation, taking care of travelers who stop usually for just a few hours on their journeys from star to star.  He takes care of his guests' needs, chats with them to learn about their worlds and their lives, is appreciative of the trinkets and snacks they bring him as gifts, and then sends them on their way.  Absolutely amazing job, I'm so jealous

A beloved trope in Science Fiction, "Way Station" is an attempt to analyze and discuss human society from an "outsider's" point of view (beloved in other genres as well, Twain's "Letters from Earth" comes to mind).  Enoch Wallace, with all he has learned from his guests and the wider perspective afforded him, looks at Earth's society with an open mind.  Considering that this book was written during the Cold War, he's not optimistic about what he sees.  Enoch fought for the Union at the Battle of Gettysburg, he makes it very clear how he feels about war:

It had been in that moment that he had realized the insanity of war, the futile gesture that in time became all but meaningless, the unreasoning rage that must be nursed long beyond the memory of the incident that had caused the rage, the sheer illogic that one man, by death of misery, might prove a right or uphold a principle.

Somewhere, he thought, on the long backtrack of history, the human race had accepted an insanity for a principle

I loved this book for a number of reasons, notwithstanding my vicarious pleasure at watching Enoch's life.  But I especially loved it as a time capsule to the 1960s, when the whole world lived in fear of what would come from the skies.  Almost all literature from that time was written with a pretty bleak backdrop of, "gee, I really hope we don't all die in nuclear hellstorm."  And this book is no exception, as Enoch wonders if humanity can escape this path that seems inevitable, and wonders what his role can be in it all.

And yet, this book is not a depressing one.  Because although Enoch despairs at humanity, at the same time he sees what the galactic community has been able to create and accomplish, and he dreams of the day when one day humanity will be able to join that community

In perhaps my favorite scene from the book, one of his guests passes away while in Enoch's station.  He frantically queries his bosses at Galactic Central, who inform him that this nomadic race considers it a great honor to be interred in the customs of the planet on which they die:  "The Vegan must remain on the planet of its death, its body disposed of according to the local customs obtained on that plant.  For that was Vegan law, and, likewise, a point of honor.  A Vegan, when he fell, must stay where he fell, and that place became, forever, a part of Vega XXI"

And so Enoch goes to his barn and grabs some wood and his tools:  "A century ago, he thought, he had done as he was doing now, working by lantern light to construct a coffin.  And that time it had been his father lying in the house."  He digs a grave next to his mother's and his father's, and lays the alien to rest:

Standing on the edge of it, he took the Bible from his pocket and found the place he wanted. He read aloud, scarcely needing to strain his eyes in the dim light to follow the text, for it was from a chapter that he had read many times:

In my Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you … 

Thinking, as he read it, how appropriate it was; how there must need be many mansions in which to house all the souls in the galaxy—and of all the other galaxies that stretched, perhaps interminably, through space. Although if there were understanding, one might be enough.

Although Simak is writing from a place of fear and worry about the fate of his world, he deliberately chooses the path of optimism.  As he describes the conversations Enoch has with his guests, the connection and companionship created between beings from experiences as disparate as can be imagined, he is hoping that one day the humans on this planet can come to understand each other as well.  Can we?  I don't know.  It's more than sixty years later, and I don't know if we've significantly improved.  But Simak believed we have to try, and he hoped one day we would succeed.  And that is wonderful to read

Also, again, travelers bring him exotic snacks from around the galaxy.  How cool is that???

I loved this book

[ . . . ] there must need to be many mansions in which to house all the souls in the—and of all the other galaxies that stretched, perhaps interminably, through space. Although if there were understanding, one might be enough.