I read the announcement
in the newspaper and took particular interest in the location -- the fire
station close to my house. Perfect. Motivated partly by proximity, I decided to
go. When Saturday morning came, I headed to the station about 15 minutes from my
house.
I drove down country roads through lovely scenery, sharing the road with
only a few other cars, if any. I pulled into the gravel driveway and went in to
find a small group of friendly writers at a table. I sat down; we introduced ourselves; they seemed to know each other; they welcomed me. We talked about our writing passions, shared writing experiences and our expectations of
the club. This is heaven, I thought. I left inspired and grateful.
On at least
a couple more Saturdays in the following months, I did the same and met a few more
people. Then the meeting place changed. The room in the fire station, someone
said, did not meet certain criteria. And we want to grow, they said; we
want to be bigger and better – an understandable and worthwhile goal for any ambitious
organization. More announcements were sent out and some people worked hard to
find a snazzier place to meet, which turned out to be an upstairs room in a
fancy-smancy grocery store the size of a city block.
On the next scheduled
date, I headed out again, only this time instead of turning right, I turned
left. And instead of heading down a two-lane road with lush scenery on either
side, I fought for my position on a crowded interstate for thirty miles then manipulated
another jaunt of stoplights and six-lane streets. Finally, I turned into the
massive parking lot and squeezed into a space, hoping I could find my car when
I came out of the building.
I went in the store, passed by Starbucks and customer service, and
found the winding stairwell hidden in the corner. Up I went to a large room
with wall-to-wall gray steel and more people than before, accompanied by the noisy hum of an air system/handler/blower/thingy somewhere in the rafters. The people were still welcoming and friendly but the
venue was no longer quaint. The setting had lost its charm.
So now, with a certain level of
disappointment, I contemplate my future with the writers club. Shall I roll
down the interstate to the asphalt jungle and entertain my passion or miss out
completely? It is sort of like picking out a restaurant for Friday night dinner and having to choose
between excellent food and ambiance. Will it be candlelight or compliments to the
chef?
I am probably alone in my curious stance, which is somewhere between the buzz
of town and the serenity of close to home. The only reason I write my thoughts here is because,
well, I’m a writer. In
the words of a familiar hymn, this is my story; this is my song.
Sometimes when I travel past the fire station, I long for the good ‘ol days, when for
a short time I hung out with other writers on Saturday mornings, in a charming
place far from the maddening crowd. In this ever-changing world of so-called progress, nothing seems to stay the
same, but once in a while, I wish it would.
