A Perfect Place to Write

Spring view from our deck

Other writers may envy my perfect writing place. At 7,000 ft. there’s silence, except for chirping birds and an occasional helicopter. I can write any time of day without interruption. Well, almost. Phone service is unavailable with the exception of sketchy cell service, so we don't get many telemarketers.

Phone  conversations are normally cut short anyway while standing in the only place in the house where there's signal, under the ceiling antenna. So we resort to email and whenever there’s a storm, we have to unplug the cell phone system.

And speaking of storms, we sometimes lose power because of high winds in the area which not only knock out the electricity, but blow shingles from the roof. 

Wild game often appear on our small ranch, at times in our garage, if the door’s left open. I enjoy taking pictures of deer nibbling grass in the yard as well as an occasional elk or antelope. We have no livestock of our own but my husband fenced in an area with a solar paneled stock tank so that we can lease out our pasture. We sit on our deck and pretend we're cattle ranchers, with 110 borrowed cows and calves, which graze around what we call “our water cooler.” When the rancher delivered his cattle, he mixed up two sets of cows and calves and the mismatched pair bawled throughout night until the mistake was discovered and the orphaned pair delivered. Great research for a ranching mystery novel, if I ever decide to write one for adults instead of children.



Winter Solstice

We’re a quarter mile off a dirt road and rarely see a car go by. When we do, we wonder why they braved the narrow, winding, mountain road with steep drop-offs in strategic places.  Cows park themselves in the middle of the road in open rangeland, which  is commonplace in ranching country, but when you spend your formative years in Los Angeles, and don’t remember ever seeing a cow or wild game animal, it's a litttle unnerving at times.   

Despite the drawbacks I love it here. I can sit on the deck with my laptop and get a suntan and have my hair blown dry while I write. A 40-minute drive down the mountain to town once a week for supplies and visiting friends is an adventure I look forward to, but I also enjoy the solitude that most writers crave by living on the mountain. Although I’m writing this with tongue in cheek, I consider myself lucky to live in a perfect place to write.