Bonnie Schroeder started telling stories in the Fifth Grade and
never stopped. After escaping from the business world, she began writing
full-time and has authored novels, short stories and screenplays, as well as
non-fiction articles and a newsletter for an American Red Cross chapter.
THE RIGHT WRITING SPACE
Do you believe in magic? Do you
have a special space where your creativity blossoms?
When I first started writing
fiction, at age ten, I had a vision in mind: me, in a cozy office lit by
Tiffany lamps, tapping away on a typewriter (remember, I said I was ten) and producing page after page of
flawless prose, destined for publication and awards. Nowhere in my vision did
reality intrude.
A few years later, my mom gave me
that typewriter: a big black Remington. I thought I was really on my way to
becoming A Writer then. Since no office was available, I put the Remington on a
metal stand in a corner of my bedroom, taught myself touch typewriting from a
book, and churned out story after story about misunderstood adolescents searching
for . . . well, I’m not sure what they were seeking except my recycled versions
of popular television shows.
Fast forward a few decades. The
Remington gave way to a Smith Corona electric. More paper was sacrificed in my
quest for publication. Still my writing didn’t catch fire—with me or anyone
else. I plodded, and it showed.
In young adulthood, I bought myself
a big old oak roll-top desk. Maybe that would help, I thought.
It didn’t. I still have the desk;
it’s a lovely piece of furniture, and I sit at it to pay bills, make phone
calls, and write shopping lists. But I don’t write stories there. The desk
gives me claustrophobia, with its high sweeping sides and cubbyholes that block
the light.
Besides, my computer won’t fit on
that desk.
Yep, the Smith Corona is long-gone,
replaced first by a Dell desktop and eventually by a sleek little laptop. I
bought a cheap metal table at Office Depot and it barely holds the laptop, a
tiny printer, and all the electric cords and connectors. There’s not much room
for paper or anything else.
And I find it really, really hard
to sit at that computer table and write fiction. Ideas refuse to come.
It’s not like I need perfect
conditions in order to “create.” I wrote the first draft of Mending Dreams on a 14-passenger
commuter van (on the days I wasn’t driving it.) And for a while I wrote at a
local bookstore. That actually worked pretty well; the soft white noise around
me drowned out the omnipresent Critic who lurked behind me at home.
Then the bookstore remodeled. They
expanded and added a “café” to replace their tiny little coffee bar. The
clientele expanded, too, and with it the white noise turned harsh and
distracting.
Finally, I re-thought my work space.
Years ago, I shared a fairly large house with a roommate. The house had three
bedrooms plus an office: a wood-paneled room with a built-in desk and tons of
cupboards and shelves. My roommate generously forfeited the office to me, and
she put her metal office-surplus desk in the third bedroom. Ironically, in the
luxury of that genuine office space, I had trouble writing. The wood paneling
seemed to swallow light. I found myself gravitating to my roommate’s metal desk
when she wasn’t around, because there I felt able to breathe.
Maybe I needed the space and the light
because what I was doing—making up stories and creating characters, only to
plunge them into emotional pain and despair before they could emerge changed
for the better—was such a dark art that it had to be practiced in as much
daylight as possible.
I finally found my magic spot in my
current home: my dining table, a clunky slab of pine on skinny legs, from Ikea
no less. But you know what? It works for me. I can see the street in front of
my house, but not enough to distract me. I have room for my stacks of folders,
my drafts and notes and thesaurus, and they’re all within arm’s reach. I have a
couple of little good-luck tchotchkes there
too, and the chair is uncomfortable enough to force stretch breaks now and
then. The laptop comes and goes, depending on which phase of writing I’m in.
The downside is that, yes, it’s the
dining table, and it actually gets
used for dining a few times a year.
Mostly we hang out at the breakfast bar in the kitchen, but on birthdays and holidays,
I have to move all my paraphernalia somewhere else. But that only takes a few
minutes, and the trade-off is worth it.
Light and space and breathing room.
For me that’s the answer. But what about the rest of you? Do you have a special
place that makes you feel safe and creative? Was it what you expected it to be
at the beginning of this crazy journey? Please don’t tell me I’m the only one
re-purposing my furniture!
