Searching For Childhood Book on Secret Codes, i.e. Ways to Procrastinate in Writing

You know, I am the supreme master of procrastination. Ask anyone who knows me. It's no secret, and I don't claim that lightly. Add my dorky behavior and undying curiosity to the mix, and you get a typical day like this .... 

3:00 pm: I wanted to continue my work in progress this afternoon. That was the plan. It's a mystery and just so happens to involve a secret code. I LOVE secret codes. (Insert matching character detail -- quirky, dorky, or anything synonymous.) So, I was about to write when a thought came to me. I remember I had a book as a kid called Codes & Secret Writing (see photo). I bought it through our class Scholastic book program. Oh, how I loved those fliers! Full of wonderful books, I wanted to buy them all. My parents had other ideas. Anyway, I thought about that book. It was such a fun book. I'd spend hours using those codes to write secret messages. (Yes, I know. Dork.) I decided about then to go look for that book. I saved ALL my books, much to my hubby's disappointment. I even have a rather large collection of Nancy Drew Mysteries, if you ever stop by and want to take a look. 

Now, where was I? Yes, finding that code book. I searched my toy chest (kept that, too) and found lots of goodies, including a Chatty Cathy, Tiny Tears, and Barbie along with her friends and family. That took me about an hour, ooing and ahing over all of them. But no book. 

4:00 pm: I never was one to give up, however I ran out of hiding places for the moment. So,  it was on to the internet, a true cornucopia of information. Several minutes later and ta da! There it was. The cover image had been carved, burned, etched into my brain. How could I ever forget? That beautiful cover, belonging to my my childhood memory, and I found it on a vintage book website. Easy peasy!

Of course, after all that I needed to process my thoughts, and I came up with this perhaps obvious takeaway -- Childhood can be a wonderful thing, and evidently memories over a lifetime may trigger an idea or two, which may become a part of a writer's story. It has for mine. I'd like to think my stories are made of all the details of my life experience. Each and every day, from small ones to big ones, those moments are connected, linked like DNA to form my imagination. Yeah, underneath it all, sometimes in a small way or even big, it's where I believe the story starts, with my building blocks of memories.

5:00 pm: Oh, and one more thing ... after all the reminiscing and searching? I decided to write this post. Ugh. Procrastination. Now, if I can just stay away from Facebook, Twitter, and all things cyber-like, maybe I could finish that chapter ;-)

Happy writing and reading, all!