7 Things I NEED on a Desert Island

Here goes! The first thing is really two. I don't think that's cheating. Do you?
Because what is one without the other? PEN AND PAPER.

Reach for a blank book, grab a pen and write, of course. Moleskin books are my favorite.

A few years ago I canceled my cable subscription, bought a book on poetry writing and for one year used my evening hours doing poetry-writing exercises.

During that year when anyone found out I "couldn't" watch television, the looks people gave me were indeed as though I had chosen to live on a deserted island. When my grandson visited, we talked, played games and threw ball for ForestGump, our Cocker Spaniel. My grandson was 7 years old at the time and benefited, I think, from no screens and remotes to compete for attention.

Any time I read a book I keep a blank book and pen nearby. I have years of recorded impressions, observations and tangential thoughts in books now tucked in random places. These are just some of the benefits of alone time.

Yes, a pen and paper is fundamental.

That's easy. The Poems of Emily Dickinson. (All 1,789 of them.) The biggest latest bookshelf, or, readers' edition, is still probably the one edited by R.W. Franklin.

My first book of Dickinson poems was titled, "Final Harvest." It is relatively small and still wildly popular today. It represents most of the best-known poems taken from The Collected Poems of Emily Dickinson, edited by Thomas H. Johnson.

Food. As long as I'm in this Genie-Generated environment, I can take anything.

Food for the body and food for the soul sometimes are the same. Sometimes this macaroni and cheese, featured below, is the perfect meal. Especially, with an something like an avocado salad.

Apparently, more health benefits of avocados have recently been discovered. I believe it. They are so yummy. Which makes this lense so much fun.

Add plain yogurt with plenty of cherries, bananas. And, as soon as I grab a bag of walnuts, I'm good to go.

Silhouette of...
Dominic Webster
Buy "Palm Trees and Desert Island at Sunrise" at Allposters.com

I always look forward to finding The New Yorker in my mailbox on Tuesdays. With the exception of a couple of years in the 1990s I have been a loyal subscriber to the magazine since the 1970s. I still miss Terrence Rafferty, who was the movie critic in the '90s, but his writing gave so much more than thumbs up or down about the "current cinema." Also, I loved reading with Brendan Gill (1914-1997) when he was alive. Mr. Gill was a great writer who made his reputation writing at The New Yorker for 60 years.

Once, when in New York, I stopped in to see their what was then new offices in 1994. They would move to Times Square around the year 2000. I had barely missed Mr. Gill, but I was allowed to visit some of the editorial offices. I was thrilled to talk to Pauline Kael, who showed me "The Thurber Wall."

I asked Mrs. Kael if I could see it, having read about when they were moving from the old, dilapidated building that housed its beginnings. The folks at The New Yorker made sure that sketches on the wall penciled by Author and Cartoonist James Thurber (1894-1961) in his office, got cut out of the wall (!) and framed for display for modern admirers and posterity.

I even bought a New Yorker T-shirt, the one with Cartoonist Booth's mangy dog!

I just think I'll stay over. One night. Two, maybe.

In that case I'll NEED to take a phone. And, it will have lots of pictures stored in it of my family, friends and pets. How's that for sneaking in an extra thing. Cell phones are more than two in one. Talk tool. writing tool. Photo album. Games. Music.

This is starting to sound more and more like home. Since batteries will be important. If you were the judge would you count each battery as a thing? Or, part of the phone.