The Importance of an Office; Theory of the Stable Datum

From a young age my father has stressed the importance of having an office. A place where you can work and organize your thoughts. This, in a constant effort to motivate me to cleanliness and organization, was frequently preached with the 'Theory of the Stable Datum.' A theory he described to me as having one stable place where you could work outward from (normally in reference to cleaning and organizing) but applicable to most things in life. These points were not lost on me, but my style has always been more of an 'organized enough to be functional, messy enough to be happy' sort of way.

[side bar: a quick google of 'theory of the stable datum' returns that it was apparently apart of a lecture series from L. Ron Hubbard (where it is referenced as the axiom of the stable datum). Although my father has never expressed an interest in Scientology, he did have a period where he read quite a bit of motivational text. I don't doubt that he read a bit of LRH during this phase. Whenever he would reference the 'Theory of the Stable Datum' he would say he didn't remember where he had heard it originally. This side bar is to quell any paranoia about myself or my father being Scientology. We're both crazy, don't get me wrong, just not THAT flavor of crazy. End side bar]

Even now, in the very messy three-boy house that I live in, when I sit down to write I set up an office. In this case it is clearing a spot on the cluttered dining room table, turning on my laptop and connecting an old dell key board (the Macbook 'L' key sticks and I've always been a fan of the more audible and textile feel of a clack-y keyboard). I put on a record (the record player is in the dining room) and let my ideas flow naturally.

For those lacking imagination.

I lack what most writers would consider 'formal training' and it's evident in my sentence structure and formatting. My style influence comes from Geoffry Gitomer, an author I had devoured in my own motivational text phase (inevitable for anyone of high energy who lacks direction and gets sucked into a sales job). His opinion of writing was to let it pour out, don't edit it immediately and return to it after 24 hours or so. I'm too self obsessed to let it sit that long before publishing but the blog format allows messy liberties (my blog, my style, deal with it).

That being said, I've got some things that wont serve this style (or vice versa). I want to compile a book. A great many extraordinary things have happened to me since my move to Kalamazoo last March. The experiences are entertaining, and may come out in a collection of short stories or possibly one autobiographical novel. The desire to write and share these experiences is something that has been looming over me for months. Nearly as soon as I moved to Kalamazoo I've had a sense of 'is this really happening?'

That 'larger than life' feel about it all is what kept me paralyzed for months (nearly a year). It prevented me from tackling the project of sharing it all. I've started to break it down though, piece by piece. I just find it odd that amidst all the chaos (of this house, my life and the people around me), I still feel the urge to set up an office.