Vigilant Silver Fox

Are you ready?  Have you cleared your November calendar? Have you registered for National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo)?  If you have you can officially call yourself a "WriMo."  If you want to know how I really feel about this great event click on the link below:

http://www.heliumnetwork.com/nanowrimo-acronym-pat-w-coffey/#!

Happy writing to all WriMos!

Each time I arrive in Chicago I recall Thomas Wolfe's book You Can't Go Home Again. The Chicago I visit today is not the city I  once knew. The landscape in some ways is the same and in so many ways it has changed. Significant buildings have had their names changed. The people, though still friendly, look tried and worn down.

"The Chicago Public Library" was located on 78 E Washington St.  Its construction lasted from 1893-1897 under the designing hand of Robert C. Spencer and J.L. Holzer. It was renovated and updated in the 1970's. Today it is known as the Chicago Cultural Center.   The Harold Washington Public Library (now the main branch of the Chicago Public Library System) is located at State/VanBuren. It is ablaze in metal, lights, and technology. As it should be, hey, everyone knows the card catalogue drawers are all but gone. 
 The train station I use to sell donuts at on Veterans Day as a young Camp Fire Girl is no longer in existence. My son recently b…

My ideal setting for writing is a room full of inspiration. It is clutter free, equipped with a pot of fresh coffee or tea  (depending on the time of day). There is large dry eraser board for me to write notes to myself as inspiration strikes. Of course large sheets of paper sticking to the walls, so I can write story lines, avail myself to spontaneous character development, or left my muses spark new ideas on the papered walls while I am writing.

In reality, the room I call my office,  the room I seek calm and serenity to write is smack in the middle of the family photo storage (as in pre-digital photos). My grown children's mementos that "someday" I am going to place in a scrapbook fill a cupboard/bookcase. It has novels that I have read and kept because I like them. (I donate my books at the end of the year if I don't think I will use again).

My writing reference books occupy an entire book shelf. Another bookcase is filled with cookbooks (that's another blog…