Meet Thomas Trabulsi of Pawtucket Fire Department in Rhode Island

Today we’d like to introduce you to Thomas Trabulsi.

Thomas, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
In April of 1992, I was reading the New York Times Magazine. It contained one of the only interviews Cormac McCarthy ever gave. “All The Pretty Horses” was about to be published, and after thirty years of writing masterpieces no one had read, this was set to be his re-introduction to the world. In this article, he provided a blueprint on how to write and the sacrifices involved. For a time, he lived in a barn with his second wife eating canned beans as she re-typed “Suttree” over and over.

I was a cook in college, and after graduation in 1992, I worked full time in the kitchens and started reading. If I wasn’t working, working out, or writing, I was reading. McCarthy said teaching writing was a hustle, so I set about teaching myself. At the same time, Whitey Bulger was a local folk-hero/gangster still basically unknown outside of Boston. Because of the city’s tortured racial history, especially with the desegregation and busing crisis of the 1970’s, I envisioned a novel about two kids, one white, one black, that become friends. The black kid’s dad, in order to support the busing of his eldest son to South Boston High School, moves his whole family to Southie, a white’s only neighborhood. Together, the kids grow up and form their own criminal syndicate under a Whitey-like overlord. Well, the whole book was awful. It was so bad I spent the next three years re-writing it front to back five times and only made it worse. By the time I was done it was an unrecognizable mess. But it was an important lesson. Even though I had done the research, and got chased out of housing projects in Southie and Roxbury, and even though I made contacts with different gangs and watched the process of cooking up large batches of crack, and witnessed the inherent dangers that come with street distribution, I was still writing about a world I didn’t know. It was then I realized I wasn’t the guy that could just put myself somewhere and write about a different time or lifestyle I never knew. But an answer to this dilemma soon appeared.

I left the kitchens and became a bike courier in Boston and New York City. I purposefully kept my jobs physical to leave my brain fresh to write at night. I re-worked the failed novel for years until finally shoving it into a box and, disgusted, didn’t write another word for years. Gradually, I started messing around with a few short-stories that would later become “Bearing Down.” I moved to Colorado in 1997, and while working construction, started “Sandaman’s Riposte.” Three years later I had an agent shopping it around Manhattan. Twice it was short-listed for publication, but in the end no one knew what to do with this cross-genre story. By this point, I had joined the Pawtucket Fire Department. One night, after almost getting killed climbing off a roof, I decided to self-publish it. Meanwhile, I had been writing “Forked Head Pass,” and while my hope of another three-year time frame turned into a decade, a pattern had clearly emerged. I was using my different jobs to backbone my stories. Currently, I am seeking an agent for “Forked Head Pass.” “A Man Called Joe,” a recent short story, was just published in the “Shoreline” anthology. Compiled by the Association of Rhode Island Authors. “The Fire Service of Sachem City,” the next novel, is almost finished.

Sandaman’s Riposte can be found at https://www.amazon.com/Sandamans-Riposte-Tom-Trabulsi/dp/1450273173/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1532001703&sr=8-1&keywords=sandamans+riposte

Bearing Down can be found at https://www.amazon.com/Bearing-Down-Collection-Tom-Trabulsi/dp/1475913796/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1532001799&sr=8-1&keywords=bearing+down+tom+trabulsi

Has it been a smooth road?
I always knew I could write, I just had to figure out a way to make a living while doing it. I had an agent in New York City for many years, but after he and I parted ways, finding a new agent has proved to be the greatest challenge yet.

So, as you know, we’re impressed with Pawtucket Fire Department – tell our readers more, for example what you’re most proud of as a company and what sets you apart from others.
Firefighters in Rhode Island all have to be nationally certified EMT-Cardiacs. In the historical mill-city of Pawtucket where I work, firefighters are expected to be able to man every position. Whether it be on an engine company, ladder truck, or ambulance, we take great pride in the fact that we can cross-man every apparatus.

Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
Boston will always be home. As a student, and later after graduation, I lived in Kenmore Square, Allston, Lower Allston, and Brookline. As a bike courier, I knew the city like my own backyard. I loved being on the street and working outside all day. Even through the worst weather imaginable, I took great pride in my work ethic, and the companies I rode for appreciated the effort. The city itself contains everything an inquisitive mind requires–an active arts community, a quarter million students, live music, theater, and a night life like no other.

Contact Info:

• Website: tomtrabulsi.com
• Email: tbt999@gmail.com
• Instagram: tommy_t999
• Twitter: Thomas Trabulsi

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