4 - Wednesday, November 17, 1993 - North Shore News

ob’s cabin: welcome to my working place

IN A spirit of hospitality,
allow me to invite you into
my cabin.

We could call it my office, my
study, my studio, and it’s only a
year old and not rustic at all,
rather modern, actually, but I like
to think of it as my cabin. it must
speak to the primitive in me.

It's something people who have
private places where they write
don’t often do — invite someone
in, that is, unless they’ve generally
known them for a Jong time.

One’s cabin is about as private
a place as one is going to get, on
the land, at any rate.

I'm lucky, I’ve always had cor-
ners where I could hide away,
where I did my writing, or paint,
which is what I did as a teenager
before the writing bug bit me, al-
though I don’t know. how much
luck has to do with it, really.

You makes your space. If
you’re serious about something
that requires space, you claw for
It.

The finest writing spaces I ever
enjoyed were aboard boats, not

. just my own, but a few other
boats where I could burrow a
writing hole to slip into to do my
work, often down in the engine
room, where the noise was so bad
that nobody could interrupt my
thoughts anyway, since you
couldn’t hear anything over the
roar of the diesels.

: In addition, for the last 15 years
or so I've almost always had a
separate cabin for writing. A
detached structure. A castle in its
own right, with a big
psychological moat around it just
by virtue of existing in such lonely
splendor.

“*Bob’s out in the cabin”’ is
supposed to mean: ‘‘He’s on the
moon.”

., Anyway, welcome inside. If the
‘Queen can go public with Buck-
‘ingham Palace. ... And I’m not
‘charging.

STRICTLY PERSONAL

Don’ t mind the hampster seeds
and stuff on the rug. I'll be
vacuuming that up tomorrow.
That’s Henry, bless him.

My wife bought him for our
daughter, but he bit her little
finger and got banished to the
basement, where I rescued him
and brought him out here.

We're biters, both of us. Have
to be kept in a cage. Might as well
keep an eye on one another. ~
Companionship, eh?

As you can see, the place is
small. Hardly room for more than
one person.

Just by coincidence about the
size of a bachelor apartimnt in
Tokyo. About 90 square feet (8.4
sq m), L-shaped to fit around a
tree, with a single black leather
swivel chair, Grey rug, white
walls, electric heater, overhead
fan, adjustable table lamps.

There are three windows around
the arm of the cabin where the
computer, monitor and printer are
stacked above each other ona
mobile writing station.

Perched on a similar black sta-
tion beside the computer is a
mobile library-cum-desk-cum
hampster cage tray.

: Reduction in Youth Violence
v i will work together against violence
tf Carry out a curriculum where our children have empathy and
understanding of the Consequences of youth violence
v Support policy and imptementation of zero tolerance on

violence in schools

DISTRICT
MAYOR

VOTE

THE
CREDITABLE

64A castle in its own right, with a

big psychological moat

around it .

The library part contains reports
on logging, fisheries, chemicals,
CFCs, global warming models,
morbid stuff like that.

A white desk and filing cabinet
occupy the other wing, with
scrapbooks, manuscripts and all
the different editions of my own
books filling the shelves above.

Over the chair in front of the
computer, another bookshelf is
filled with other people’s books,
mostly about ecology, history,
media, religion and philosophy.

1 keep the readable stuff in the
house.

Out here, I’m interested mainly
in quotes, stats, great truths and
sayings. And, of course, my own
junk, going back to the first item
} ever had printed, and absolutely
everything printed since, thanks to
a patient mother who used to and
a patient aunt who still does col-
lect it all for me.

The walls are covered with pic-
tures, of course, everything being
some form of memorabilia by
now,

a

That painting of a spaceship
landing on Mars? | did that in,
let’s see, 1957. Not original. !
copied it from a magazine.

That anguished face in the
painting beside it? Ripped off
from a sci-fi cover.

Here’s the cover of a science
fiction book of my own that 1
wrote in ballpoint in a school
scribbler in Grade 9, which would
be 1953.

The cover, depicting a ruined
futuristic city, was done in
crayons, ripped off from some-
thing else, too, although [ can’t
remember what. Pretty grim stuff.

The Sands of Time. The blurb
on the cover, penned by me,
stated: They alone dared to face
the threat of anniliation (sic)!

That really weird painting
there? I call it Attack of The Claw
Creatures On The Mushroom
Peopie. Did that in 1970, My last
painting, actually. Yes, that one’s
original. You could tell?

‘Those swizzle sticks in that pot-
tery mug up there? These are the

Bee \ : :
Support ...

Real VISION ... a 1

enewal & Energy at CITY

swizzlesticks from every flight t
ever took, well, not every one.
Hundreds of them, anyway.

And all those little plastic cards
and [Ds and press passes and
memberships and certificates and
business cards stuffed in that box,
well, there's a long, long story
behind cach and every one of
them. It would take hours...

The manuscripts. Well, in all,
there’s about 20 feet of shelf
stuffed with manuscripts, and
while a few of them are printouts
of books written since I got my
first computer nearly 10 years ago,
the rest are yellowing originals.
What’s amazing is how fast they
look old!

My productivity hasn’t dropped
off in the last decade, but since
everything is on disk, the entire
output since sits in two little
plastic trays on the desk that stand
no higher than the soapstone car-
ving of an Eskimo woman bent to
the task of cleaning a fish while
the papoose on her back sleeps,
which was given to me by my
mother.

Slung around the desk lamp by
the computer is the red scarf I
wore when I ran with the bulls in
Pamplona, and under that the
kamikaze scarf 1 wore when we
rammed a driftnetter out in the
Pacific.

That’s about it. A couple of
plants. It’s nice. There’s an in-
tercom hooked up to the house,
but the battery died, and I left it
dead. Quieter out here that way.

Stop by again sometime.
Cheers.

ALTERNATIVE]

“Lam impressed with Pam's inzerest in and involvement with
a wide range of issues and activities affecting our
communit Pam wotdd bring a fresh perspective to the
Council table.”

"t admire Pam's enthusiasm and interese. As a Councillor,
she would be a real asset to the District.”

Mayor Murray Dykeman
“Pam really listens and really aces. Her integrity and
cummon sense are needed on Council. 1 support her 1 PO%!"
Tricia Andrew

“Knowledgeable hardworking, energetic ~ Pain exemplifies
the qualities needed to effectively serve in local governmnenc.
Marilyn Baker

“When Pam told me she was guing to run, I said, ‘Thank
you.’ We need Pam on council.” Or. Marc Boileau

Don Bell