It's Elementary

When you hear deerstalker hat, cape, pipe, magnifying glass, and London, what comes to your mind?  If you said Sherlock Holmes, then you’ve read the exploits of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s most famous literary character.  This month marks the 125th  birthday of Detective Holmes.

Some of us, most of us, who write keep our day job because the income from our efforts on the keyboard couldn’t keep a bird alive.  And my little bird, Crash, would surely like to be kept alive.  However, Arthur Conan Doyle was a doctor (not bad for a day job), but he wrote stories to bring in extra income.  Would that we could be so lucky as to strike gold with a character like Holmes!

What was different about Sherlock Holmes?  Doyle introduced him as the first detective to solve crimes based on scientific methods.  You could say he became the first CSI agent.  CSI London?

I visited 221B Baker Street in London.  It was difficult to walk around the apartment, stand in front of the fireplace, see books and a pipe on an end table, and realize this was the apartment of an imaginary character.  Maybe the apartment was a product of my imagination as well!

Holmes solved his cases by observing.  Little things most people wouldn’t see, he took note of and filed away in his ever-inquisitive brain.  I’m happy not being too observing, that way I don’t see the dust on the picture frames.  What I don’t see, I don’t have to clean. But I wouldn’t mind having a few more filing cabinets in my brain to store things; maybe then I’d remember where I left my keys or what I came into a room for.  Sherlock Holmes, I’m not.  It’s elementary my dear ….