Connection: Richard Feynman and Hunter S. Thompson

A New York physicist who let his creativity guide him through life and a Kentucky journalist who straddled the line of reality to provide unique firsthand accounts of American culture, two men who followed a similar path even if didn’t appear so on the surface. There are obvious connections to make right off the bat, both Thompson and Feynman limited themselves to subject that only interested them and would both become infatuated in their work, obsessing about it, tweaking and adjusting to make it as good as it could be. They both also hit a major depression that almost destroyed them and hope for their work. For Feynman it was his part in the development of the atomic bomb. For Thompson it was the combination of drugs, alcohol, and the slow realization that he was no longer the great writer, his work had reached its peak. For these men to pull themselves out of their nosedives it took life changing decisions and the help of close friends. As these men struggled to pull their life back together they both reached the same outcome, working for fun instead of working for work.

           While there are the glaring similarities in the two men’s life there are also less obvious similarities that the men shared. Both Feynman and Thompson had divergent minds that blanketed a large variety of topics. Feynman loved everything from nature to the aerodynamics of a spinning plate flying through the air while Thompson was a lover of guns, drugs, American muscle cars. They chased down the rabbit hole to learn and experience their loves and interests and alloyed allowed their respective lists to grow and change. For me their lives spent chasing their interests and having fun doing it serves an example for how a life should be lived. Instead of throwing away a rare chance of being human they spent it how they wanted, breaking rules and raising hell. When life came back and bit hard they refused to let themselves be beaten, they picked themselves off the floor, unslumped themselves and kept right on kicking till their time on life expired or they felt that they had done enough and it was time for them to go.