I'm in Columbus, where I'll be speaking at the Thurber House tonight. It's a pretty great gig -- dinner tonight, followed by a speech to what they anticipate will be over 100 people (including one of my Eckerd students, which I think is cool). Afterwards, my signed photograph (the Marion Ettlinger one) will be mounted on the wall alongside many, many truly famous writers. Because wall space is getting tight at Thurber House, I'll be in the bathroom. But those who know their Thurber will remember that's where Thurber was the night the ghost got in.

Perhaps the coolest tradition, however, is the ritual of signing Thurber's closet. Some writers sign their names. Some add Thurber-eseque drawings, or a provocative line or two. I wrote: "The first time I visited here, a cop brought me . . . (true story)."

And here it is. In the summer of 2000, Lisa Pollak, Rob Hiaasen and I decided to write a series of light-hearted features called "Greetings from Baltimore," in which we traveled to other parts of the country with Baltimore in the name. Some people thought it was the stupidest idea ever, but I stand by it as a valid exercise in feature-writing. I went to Baltimore, Ohio. En route to the Columbus airport the next day, I realized I had lots of time to kill, so I decided to find Thurber's house. I'm a big Thurber fan (there's a Walter Mitty reference in Baltimore Blues) and my sister even owns a Thurber drawing. I read his children's books -- most of them are sadly out of print -- and even loved the television show inspired by his drawings, My World and Welcome to It.

Problem was, I didn't know Columbus that well. So while I was trying to find the Thurber House with the rent-a-car map, I blew through a red light and got pulled over by a motorcycle cop. I explained the situation. As a woman who has been pulled over maybe six times in my life, I usually have great success explaining the situation. (The one real ticket I got, which I actually didn't deserve, was from a female cop.) This officer not only waived the ticket, he radioed in, got the location -- and escorted me there.

I thought I could turn the whole adventure into an amusing featurette for the Sun, perhaps a travel piece about the Thurber house, or a first-person about my visit there. I arrived at work the next morning so proud of myself. Other reporters with time to kill in Columbus might have . . . I don't know, taken an earlier plane home? Gone to see OSU? But I had used my time to generate a second story, turning the trip into a two-fer.

That was the day that my immediate supervisor told me that I was being sent to the county office, in part because "you no longer do your best work . . . maybe because of the novels."

Walking around the Thurber grounds today, I tried to remember the woman who visited there almost seven years ago. Was she happy? She thought she was. Did she love her job? She thought she did. Would she have jumped at the chance to write fiction fulltime? She believed she would, but if her bosses had accommodated her, she would have stayed at the Sun a while longer.

Seven years ago, I honestly thought I had job security. I thought I could hedge my bets, write novels while keeping the job with benefits. When they transferred me, the illusion of security was stripped away. Sure, I could have a job forever, but it would be on their terms, and their terms could be nasty, as I soon learned.

I know this much: I wouldn't be back at the Thurber House today if, in the summer of 2000, I had returned to the Baltimore Sun and they had said: "Welcome back, you're such a good worker and we're so proud of you." I still have trouble wrapping my mind around it, but the fact is that one of the greatest kindnesses in my life was done to me by someone who was trying to punish me. So, thanks. I guess.