I want to thank my “mentors in absentia”—Virginia Woolf and May Sarton who wrote so eloquently about the woman alone—the life that writing offers of voice and exploration.
As autumn wends her way to winter, I write on a chilly October morning with a window view of orange and sepia-toned maple leaves.
My workspace has had its first makeover in twenty years, the old faux mahogany desk carted out for trash. I feel a sense of renewal, as I contemplate thoughts and reflections to celebrate the 10th anniversary of our Women’s Writing Circle. I search for a title. In time it will come.
One day in a woman’s life. Yesterday, lunch with my sons, a harvest salad of grilled chicken, cranberries and apple slices on arugula with balsamic vinaigrette dressing. Alex and Daniel had put together my new desk and so lunch was on me. L-shaped, black with large glossy surfaces to spread out...books and papers, the watercolor presented to me by our Slants of Light authors.
I bought the desk from a photo I saw online on the Sears website. I wanted to support Sears, America's last great department store. Several days later, packaging, weighing 720 pounds arrived. So many steps to put it together that by step forty-five, the person who wrote the directions joked, “Rome was not built in a day.” As my sons labored, they were not amused. They toiled over drawers and pull-out keyboard. Patience…following directions...screws and latches and sliders. They had inherited engineering skills from their father, certainly not their mother. I must write more about my sons, my story, not theirs. They have a right to tell their own story.

The week before they built my desk, Alex and Daniel installed a new Dell computer for me—it moves so fast, not like the laptop, a poor lagging machine never quite the same after a computer store tech messed with its registry. The screen glows translucent, inviting me to begin writing these words ….
As Virginia Woolf said, a woman must have money and a room of her own and I have had the fortune of both. Woolf also said that a woman needs privacy in order to write. This is the advantage I have, which so many women do not, although it was by design. I could have been married several times over by now but need for privacy and the writing life away from the demands of an ailing or needy man won out. I must write more about this. The keyboard beckons.
How about you? Is your workspace one that inspires you to write?
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