WHERE TO WRITE

When Somerset Maugham wrote, and he wrote a lot, he had to have no distractions. In fact, like Ray Bradbury and me (well if no one else will mention me alongside Maugham and Bradbury, then I will), he wrote every day. When on vacation, he would cover whatever windows in the room with blankets.

I think he might like this dingy room pictured. I don't know about Mr. Bradbury, but it wouldn't do for me. In fact, I marvel at those people whose home offices have no good views. Tucked away into windowless rooms, the office is totally unattractive to me. I saw a house one time like that. Huge, wooden office furniture. Wrapped around computer desk and printer, the desk with the more modern keyboard hidden when not in use, all matching. But to me dismal.

This same house had just inside the foyer a game room with a billiard table and two video game machines. All looking out into a mountain top setting.

Now to me, the concentration on the pool and games would diminish any view, making it secondary. But for writing, give me the view for expansion of ideas.

I heard today that some AZ schools no longer teach cursive writing to their young students. Instead, they teach keyboarding. But, you know what? Writing is not going away anytime soon. And, of course, I know writing is perhaps best taught on a computer where cutting and pasting and revising is easy. I used to teach that way in a computer lab.

But as I said, writing the old fashioned way is not likely to go away very quickly. There are too many codgers like me who still crank out some ideas on paper. All we need is a view.