I love seeing where people write! You can tell a lot about a person based on what they choose for a workspace. So I thought it might be fun to give you a little tour of my office. (Keep in mind these pictures were taken before I threw myself headlong into a double deadline. It does not look so tidy at the moment).
This is where the magic happens. In this chair. At this desk. The latter was a gift from my husband. It’s an antique teacher’s desk salvaged from a one room school house in Tennessee. It’s about one hundred years old and is the first and only desk I’ve ever owned. I love it! Every time I sit down to work I wonder about the men and women who rested their elbows on the edge. I wonder about the stories they told their students. I wonder about the stains and the cracks and the notches. I hope they’d be proud that it has been put to such good use. I’ve now written four novels at this desk (I Was Anastasia, Code Name Helene, When We Had Wings, and The Frozen River).
My husband built the bookshelves and cabinets behind my desk. It was one of his quarantine projects and I was not sad to lose his undivided attention for a couple of weeks. It still needs a final coat of paint, along with cabinet doors but that hasn’t stopped me from putting it to use. Pro tip: get you a man who can build anything.
Most days I keep my research notes spread out behind me and then swivel any time I need them. My mother made the stained glass hanging in the window long before I was born. It’s hung in every house we’ve ever owned. Eventually the wall across from my desk (above) will have floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. But for now the prefab ones we bought from Home Depot ten years ago work just fine. When we bought our house this was a formal dining room with a door on the right that led into the kitchen. But since we’re not very formal, and because I claimed this space as my own, my husband closed off the door. So now I have this little, light-filled pocket of space to work. There isn’t a day that passes that I don’t walk in here grateful for my job and my husband.
Like I said, not so tidy. But creativity is always messy and cluttered and never looks a picture on Pinterest. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.