Mentors and Mentees, Good n' Bad

I never had a mentor.

I never had someone say to me, "Hey kid, I'm gonna take a chance on you, show you the ropes, provide you some guidance, introduce you to some interesting people, give you a shot."

I never had someone who took any interest in me or my career or my hopes and dreams. No one ever showed me the way. I've always done everything on my own, unguided, unmoored. I guess no one ever thought I was worth the effort.

But I'm not bitter -- because mentors aren't always a good thing.

Take the example of Roy Cohn and Donald Trump. Roy Cohn was the lawyer for Joe McCarthy, the consigliere of Red Scare of the early 1950s, who also oversaw the prosecution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Cohn moved back to NYC after McCarthy's death and spent the rest of his life (he was disbarred and died in 1986) representing all sorts of corrupt figures and people in organized crime. He also worked for Trump's company and was a mentor to the young real estate developer in the 1970s and '80s -- and much of the viciousness we see every day from this loathsome POTUS is the product of his mentoring by Cohn.

And yet ... mentors can be a wonderful thing. 

Lou Reed, one of the greatest singer/songwriters of all times, was a poet at heart. His lyrics were as poetic as his music was harmonious. That's because, as a young man, was mentored by the great poet Delmore Schwartz, a Beat poet turned college professor who taught poetry to Reed as a young man -- and was a lasting influence and inspiration to the then young man.

The mentor/mentee relationship can be, at heart, a wonderful meeting of minds and energy or a toxic brew of egos and darkness. They can give us amazing art -- and ugly politics. They can inspire us -- or drag us down. 

So if, like me, you've always craved a mentor, then, like me, you can feel the lack of one in many ways; and yet, at the same time, you can be glad that you've never let another person have so much power over you -- or your fate.