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"Come into my web," said the spider to the fly...
Ever since I first started writing, over 30 years ago, I dreamed
of having a place where I could leave my typewriter up (now it's my computer where it's available at the drop of a hat, yet
hidden from view to the general public), a place where all of my books could be where I could easily get at them and they
would all be in order by subject, where I could put some "special" personal things I wanted to keep near me, and a place where
I could stash all the little "extras" we all need. You know, things like paper, stationery, envelopes, printer ink, etc. Well,
finally, I have that!
When Billie sent me a hand-drawn floor plan of my house, I knew in an instant that the smaller
bedroom would be mine and the bigger one would be my very own office. I'd like to invite you to come in and sit a spell. I
hope you won't mind if I keep working. I just love it in here. It's where I spend the biggest part of my days--writing, editing,
communicating, recording my radio programs, you name it. This, to me, is the epitome of "home"!
I purposely made this picture a little bit bigger than most of the others. Why?
Because my computer is, in many ways, the center of my life. I know most of you can identify with that. It is through the
means of one little machine--which can be as frustrating when it doesn't work right as it can wonderful when it does--that
has given me so many wonderful friends from all around the world. To each of you, as I have journeyed down this completely
unknown and untried territory, you have my deepest gratitude. I don't know how I would have made it without all of you. "Thank
you" doesn't begin to express what I feel in my hearts for each of you.
And yes, now I can look out the window instead of barricading myself behind it. And yes,
I can now get out. No more box prisoners-of-war! Thanks, Billie!
Just in case you are curious, the notebooks on the top row of the computer desk are all
genealogy records of our family trees. I guess I still have a lot of tales to tell!
Some of my books. The old oak bookcases were the original ones from the Law
School at the University of North Dakota. In the course of remodeling, they were going to throw them out. Ivan rescued two
of them. Each section is separate, and I'm sure that originally they had the old closing glass doors on each shelf. The hinges
are still there, but the glass was gone long before we got them.
Another section of the University of North Dakota's Law School bookcases. I
thought this would hold all of my encyclopedias except the separate one the Encyclopedia Britannica set came in. Ha! There
are still more of them on that first section of shelves! But each set is different and serves a different purpose! Honest
they do! The Britannica is best for European/British history, the Americana is best for early American history, the children's
sets tell facts you won't find in the "big people's" ones, etc. I would be lost without any of them.
Notice that all of the books line up very neatly at the edge of the shelf. That is thanks
to Billie and her bugging me. No, she only mentioned it once in passing, as she started to pull them all out so they were
even just on one shelf. It was just the idea that kept bugging me until now they are all that way, except for the few volumes
that are too big to stand up on the shelf and they stick out when they are laid down.
The Encyclopedia Britannicas and the file cabinets. The doll on the one cabinet
is my version of Maria, a little girl in Venezuela who made an "apple pie house." She had a pet monkey, Henry, and a little
red wagon, which all figure in the story I wrote about her that was published a long time ago from one of those "big time
publishers" anthology of Girls to the Rescue. I'm sure it's long since gone out of print, but one day I will get around to
linking the story to it here. See? That just gives you a reason to come back again!
The final section of books. Notice in the closet behind it is the shelf unit
where I can put all the stuff I don't want to stare somebody in the face when they first walk into the room.
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