Techno babble, and song birds

The Blog has been down for a few weeks due to technical problems. Blogspot switched over to another “Beta” system, which left me completely confused. So I sent it over to Jill, the President of the BD’s, since she is much more savvy at this stuff then I am, and I believed she’d know what to do…And she did, so we’re up and running again. My own blog spot, Writerrants, is down for the same reason, I can’t get into it. So I’ll have to either get a new site, or just let it go. I haven’t decided yet…Which brings me to all this technology I have developed a love-hate relationship with…

Admittedly, I’m not techno savoir-faire at all. Computers not only give me headaches, but can send me into a vertigo episode…So I rely on my kids to fix my problems. What they get out of it is a Sunday dinner to die for, with all the fixins. Then I’m up and running again, happier and hopefully saner as I marvel at the fact my grandkids will live with even more advance technology that will cook the Sunday dinner and serve it up on the table, with a push of a button. I don’t find it appealing at all. It brings up images of the Jetsons.

As much as I don’t like technology, and “like” I use the term loosely, I rely on it. I need it to write, since I can’t spell worth a darn, spell check has saved me some embarrassment. I use it to communicate. I can e-mail my family back east everyday. The web is invaluable when it comes to research. And I’ve even made friends in other parts of the country and world through different writer’s loops. So yes, as much as this computer can frustrate me into a tizzy, where my husband will fight it out of my hands before I chuck it out a window, I need it.

The one thing I don’t do is e-books. Not that I don’t believe there isn’t a place in the world for them, it’s just not for me. I admire authors who got their start there. But for me, I have to break away from the computer, I-pods, and palm pilots and hold something sold in my hands, and smell the scent of the printed page. And as an author that is my goal, to have my story held in someone’s hands, as the print pulls them into another world away from all the techno stuff that has invaded our lives like aliens from outer space.

The smell of words on a page and bookstores filled with paperbacks, hard covers and newspapers was a gift given to me as a small child, when I walked into my great-grandfather’s house. He lived in an old Victorian on 59th street in Duluth Minnesota. Off the entrance hall stood his mysterious den filled with books lining shelves from floor to ceiling. The room’s scent surrounded me, filling me up with furniture polish, leather bound books and newspapers. It was comfort and warmth, mingled with his pipe tobacco. His desk was an old battered antique, covered with all kinds of papers all the time. In the corner he kept a large cage with several Canaries. The birds were males, so they sang. He was a mining captain, and sadly I knew the birds were sacrificial lambs to the iron-ore mines. While he kept them in his home, he adored them, and could coax them to sing constantly.

It was in that den where I fell in love with books every time, (with his permission) I could step over that threshold to stand in awe, especially on a clear sunny day, when the light would pour through a huge bay window onto the wide old hardwood floors, that creaked when stepped on. And if I stood on the window bench, I could see through the trees, Lake Superior like a brilliant blue gem in the distance as the books wrapped around as soft as a worn old afghan, framed with the song of caged birds. Then I’d set down for hours in that window and look at his picture books depicting the stories of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table.

I’ve tried to bring this wonderful experience alive in my own home for my grandchildren. My husband built me a set of beautiful shelves, I’ve lined with books. Although the pipe tobacco is missing, and I don’t own any birds, the furniture polish and paper covered in print is ever present. On my modern battered desk a computer sets, surrounded by CD’s and the debris of my writing, with a knitting project within reach when I hit a wall in my WIP and need a break to think about what comes next. Busying my hands with yarn helps me to break through the barrier.

I hope my grandchildren will remember my den when I’m gone. And will return there in memory, as I do to my great-grandfather's to find fond reminiscences, lined with comforting warmth, as they turn the pages of a book read to their own children to surround themselves with the familiar scent of print on paper.

Lee