Recently, my son, who maintains my computer, was migrating my email. He noticed I email myself quite often with what appear to be random subject lines. I explained that when I have an idea for a book or an article or blog post that I’m writing, I email myself my ideas.
Often the notes are pretty cryptic. And taken out of context, they could seem quite odd.
That conversation reminded me of my second year of college when I worked at a tooling company doing filing and delivering parts. At the time, I was writing for the college newspaper, as well as short stories and working on my first novel.
If you’ve done any filing or driving for work, you know there are lots of hours to think. I spent those hours dreaming up new storylines and characters. I’d jot the ideas down on bits of paper and store them in my desk drawer at the tooling company.
It was a small front office consisting of me and my boss, Sandy, and the owner, Benny. The rest of the staff were in the warehouse doing tooling.
One day, Sandy came up to my desk and said, her tone very serious, “I need to talk to you about something.”
I nodded and waited, wondering what I’d done wrong.
“Benny was going through your desk and found a bunch of odd notes. He wants to know what they are all about.”
When she asked this, her expression becoming even more serious, I suppressed a smile and held back a laugh.
“Those are notes for my writing projects,” I replied.
Sandy’s eyes narrowed. “They aren’t notes about Benny or the office?”
By now I could barely stop myself from laughing. Not able to speak at first, I shook my head. Then I managed to assure her. “Nothing like that. Like I said, they’re notes for what I’m writing.”
When I gathered my things at the end of the day, I put the notes in my purse. I don’t know if Sandy or Benny believed me. But I did have a good chuckle when I got home that night and read through the notes—many of them cryptic—from their perspectives.
From then on, I made sure not to leave any more notes in my desk. But I bet that didn’t stop them from checking!
