The Talentless Writer

The Talentless Writer

The Wizard, the Algorithm, and this...

Whatever the fuck this is....

George Kalantzis's avatar
George Kalantzis
Sep 26, 2025
∙ Paid
2
1
1
Share

2005 somewhere in Rio with my house guards wasted.

They called him The Wizard. You didn’t want to be sent to The Wizard.

I left my journal behind. Most nights, guarding embassies by day. I’d started writing everything down because I didn’t know how to deal with it all.

That journal was real. My guilt. My anger. Names. Ranks. Dates. Things I saw while guarding secrets. Thoughts I wasn’t supposed to have. I wasn’t trying to publish. I was trying to survive.

But I fucked up.

Left it behind and the next thing I know, I’m back stateside. Ninety-day psych hold.They said they needed to make sure I wasn’t unstable. That I wasn’t leaking secrets.

They never said the word traitor. They didn’t have to.

Keep reading with a 7-day free trial

Subscribe to The Talentless Writer to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.

Already a paid subscriber? Sign in
© 2025 George Kalantzis
Privacy ∙ Terms ∙ Collection notice
Start writingGet the app
Substack is the home for great culture