Where do you write? Do you have an office where you always go to do your writing? Or do you like to take pen and pad to a lovely spot somewhere for inspiration? Maybe you write using your laptop during your lunch hour, while watching your kids’ soccer practice or when you should be relaxing in the evening.
I’m on a weekend getaway vacation as I write this morning on my brand new laptop. Yes, I’ve entered the technology age to an even greater degree. After all of these years, I finally have a laptop. I look forward to using this mini-computer when I travel to Hawaii next month and I’ll take it with me as I travel to various book festivals and workshops throughout the year. I’m jazzed at the thought of using the laptop to flesh out articles and chapters during the down time that always occurs on work-related trips. And I’m especially excited about having the ability to stay caught up with email when away from home.
This morning, while contemplating how much freedom laptops and other technological gadgetry offers writers today, another question came up. Where is the most unusual place you’ve ever written?
Do you remember, as a child, hiding under your covers at night with a flashlight so you could write even after bedtime? I recall doing some of my best work sitting on my grandmother’s porch steps looking out over the neighborhood and toward the glistening ocean waters in the distance. As an adult—in the 1970s—I carried a tablet and several pens everywhere I went. And I wrote almost everywhere I went. I’d ride along with my husband as he made the rounds related to his job and I’d sit in the car and write. I’ve written in truck yards, out behind packing plants, in the parking lots at rubbish companies and other union businesses up and down California. Whenever possible, I’d walk to a park or other appealing area to jot down article ideas, write a poem or add to a book I was working on. And then I’d go home and type it all up using my electric typewriter. Boy was I high tech when I upgraded from the old, borrowed manual typewriter.
Probably the most unusual place I’ve ever written is atop a mountain in the Los Padres National Forest while on a horse pack trip with my family. Whenever we’d stop to rest the horses and have a bite to eat, I’d plop down on the ground, lean against a saddle and jot my thoughts on a small pad. Many an article was spawned from these notes. I even incorporated some of them in a book, Hints For the Backyard Rider (A.S. Barnes, 1978)—out of print.
Where do you write? Where do you get inspiration? Where is the most unusual place you’ve written?
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