"If you think writers create from nothing or that writing is a lonely occupation, you are wrong. Writers create from life, and writers are never lonely. Whenever I get writer's stasis (never ever use the 'b' word), I put on a comfortable pair of shoes and take off walking. Even on a dreary day, when there isn't a soul in sight, life explodes all around me.Every piece of ground or cement you walk on, every 'space' through which you pass, has stories to tell--perhaps thousands of stories. When you stand at the light at Third and Arizona [in Santa Monica], you know that maybe just the night before a couple stood in the same place, arguing about a movie, each asking themselves how they ever were going to find someone who really loved them. An hour later, a homeless person--who spent his youth raising a family he hasn't seen in a decade--stood wondering where to go watch the last episode of Seinfeld. Two hundred years ago, on this very spot, a Chumash warrior was captured by the Spaniards and bludgeoned. Every square inch of ground in every city and hamlet on Earth practically yowls with stories of courage, brutality, joy, sadness, love, friendship, disappointment, and faith, but without someone to tell these stories, none of this and none of us will be remembered.Think about it the next time you go for a walk. Think about it the next time you go anywhere. If you are a writer, you are never without a story to tell and never without a purpose in life. And no matter what you do for a living--as the old song says--you never walk alone."-- Tom Schulman (from "Why We Write")
I lived for a year in a room behind the third window from the right, top row. No, not when the photo was taken, thank you very much.
I do have a number of what I consider to be interesting stories from my time there.
However, I would imagine that there are stories from that room that make mine pale in comparison.
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