And the Answer is ...

So, did I do anything on that old list?

Ha, ha, ha!

No.

Where's that stick ...?

A Week Off - How Lovely

This Sunday morning sees me relaxed and enjoying the blissful vista of a week away from work.  I can't remember the last time I took time off and spent it at home.  I usually take the opportunity to head M6-wards and absorb the Cumbrian balm of fells and water and my bff Emms.  This time I decided that I'd have one of these staycations I've heard so much about.  I have, naturally enough, made myself a to do list - possibly so that I can get to the end of the week and realise that I haven't done any of them, thereby giving me a stick to beat myself with.  I'm hoping that, once I've done the things I need to do, I'll have acres of time in which to write.  That is the plan.  I'll let you know whether or not anything gets accomplished.

There are some things this week that are written in stone.  The first one is dinner with my family tomorrow.  Its my birthday.  I tried quite hard to sweep that fact under the carpet and pretend it wasn't happening, but it seems that isn't allowed.  So I'm being taken out for tea in the afternoon and then dinner in the evening.  It sounds ungrateful, I know, not to be happy that those I cherish want to show me that I too am loved.  I am far from ungrateful.  Its not that simple.

I understand that most people think of themselves as being a particular age even when that age is a faint dot on the horizon of their existence.  I have accepted that in my head I'm 37.  The fact that the calendar tells me a different story is the distressing part.  I had no qualms about passing 40.  That was okay. The discrepancy wasn't so great that I couldn't square it with myself.  Right up to 45, things were fine.  The rebellion and denial seemed to take on a life of its own when I got to 45+1.  I suspect my daughters' remarks along the lines of  'you're closer to 50 than 40' didn't help.  Bless them.  I now find that 45+2 looms and I've started screaming in earnest 'STOP!  Whoa!  Wait a minute.  No, no, no, just give me a little time to re-adjust.  I WANNA GET OFF!'  It's all happening a bit too fast.  Life rips by and I don't know where it all goes.  How did it get to August, for example?  How did that happen?  Maybe that's why I keep getting the urge to keep still.  I suspect that some part of my brain thinks that if I keep still, it'll all slow down.  It doesn't.  I just find another day has gone and I've not done anything.  This then leaves me with the frustrated feeling that I've accomplished nothing of any import.  Which is true.

I've started to think that maybe I'm having a mid-life crisis.  Mind you, if this is mid-way, I'm obviously expecting to live to see 94.  I suppose that's good and entirely possible, just so long as all my faculties are in tact and I haven't got to the point where someone is having to wipe my bottom for me.  I don't want to see my dignity exit stage left and leave me centre stage, thank you very much.  I want the curtain to come down while my dignity and I are still hand-in-hand.  I don't think that's too much to ask.

And my age isn't the only thing that's frightening the pants off me this week.  Looming like a playground bully intent on stealing my dinner money, is the second week in September.  What, you may ask, is so scary about the second week in September?  Well, that's the week that both my girls go off to Uni - Jo back to Wales and Tasha to Sunderland.  I've got used to Jo's absence.  She started her degree last year and since then has completed her month in South Africa learning how to use firearms and tracking animals which could kill her in a variety of ways.  She's also spent a year in Cardiff, so I've inured myself to her antics.  If she can survive the African bush with a bunch of Uni students and Saturday nights in South Wales, then she'll be okay.  I remember bawling my eyes out on the drive back up the M4 when I first dropped her off, seeing myself as someone akin to the nasty owner in the Fox and the Hound who abandons their puppy in the woods.  I remember getting home and the ache of walking past her empty bedroom and bawling all over again.  However, last year I had the solace of Tasha doing her Foundation course, staying at home and re-decorating and moving into Jo's room.  This time Tasha's going as well.  And Sunderland feels a long way away.  I've not been separated from both my babies for longer than 10 days since they were born.  It all feels very final.  When they come home now, it'll only ever be temporary.  My little terraced house suddenly feels cavernous.

So it seems I have more than one reason for wishing that today would go on forever.  I know what I want for my birthday ... a time machine.

For What It's Worth ...

I’ve started this post a couple of times in the last day or so and deleted it to go away and think some more.  It seemed shallow and callous to simply talk about writing fiction when around us such bellows of outrage were being heard.  On the other hand, what do I know of the reasons behind this civil unrest?  My life is relatively privileged and comfortable.  I’ve had a decent education, always lived in a more than decent home and been part of a family and a community, even if, on a personal level, I may not have felt I entirely belonged there.  The point was that they were only too willing to include me in it. 

Don’t mistake any of those things for having had a smooth ride.  I’ve had my ups and downs and, believe me, the downs were pretty low.  Once you’ve stared into the abyss of possible oblivion and made the conscious choice not to jump, but to turn and fight your way back to the light and re-engage with life, you find you’ve developed a slightly different perspective on the human condition.  I’ve had one member of my family tell me that I was the unluckiest person they knew.  I assured them that, to the contrary, I was one of the luckiest because I’ve had the opportunity to re-build myself from the foundations upwards and craft the person I choose to be.  I’ve learned more than even I realise.  I can dance as if no-one is watching.

It makes me sad to see young people with such bleak, blinkered and inward-focused gazes that the purpose of their existence at the moment is to take and rend and destroy and think that it will somehow bring them happiness.  I have an understanding of the yawning hole they are trying to fill, the need to feel not only visible, but that they matter. 

Drink and drugs and stuff – other people’s stuff – won’t make them feel better.  Depriving others won’t make them feel better.  Bellowing this loud, so everyone can hear won’t make them feel better, at least not in a way that is meaningful and lasting.  It’s all a temporary fix.  The shine will wear off.  Then where will the next thrill come from to try and fill that hole?

How do you get a generation to learn to respect themselves and by respecting themselves, respect others?  How do you get them to feel connected?  How do you get them to believe that they are good enough?  How do you get them to understand that they matter simply because they are here?  That every breath they take impacts on someone else for good or ill.  Their presence creates ripples and it is their choice what ripples they choose to make, what impact they choose to have.

I’m not a religious person, however, I have a strong, personal, spiritual faith which is sorely tested on a regular basis.  I’m not a happy-clappy hippy either - I work in the NHS in an area with a large immigrant community and where there is high unemployment and ill health (real or perceived) within family units. 

I do believe that most people, at the most basic level, simply want these things:  to feel secure; to feel loved; to be happy.

I don’t know what the answers are.  I wouldn’t even know where to start looking.  The thing I do know, is that we can’t carry on this way and expect everything to turn out alright. 

A phrase I learned from a wise man called Steve is ‘if you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got’.  I think maybe now’s the time to do something different.

The Marks Are In

With all the ballyhoo behind us, for A215 anyway, the last part of our OU course was our marks for our exam and our overall mark for the module.  I think we were all remarkably patient, bearing in mind we submitted our work in early June.  For me, it felt more like an afterthought.  I'd moved on in my head and left it behind.  That still didn't stop me getting twitchy when I received an email last night to say that our marks were due within 24 hours.  All of a sudden our Writers' Workshop started to resemble a 4-year old's party when the attendees had partaken of one too many bags of Haribo.  I've no idea if anyone slept.

The morning sun brought with it whoops of delight from all and sundry.  In our Workshop, we all got high 2:1s or Distinctions - quite an achievement, I think.  When we came to our last posting for feedback on our work that was going to be submitted for our exam, we all said that the critiques and support we had received from our fellow Workshoppers during the previous 9 months was a vital part of our learning process.  I think our marks go to prove that has been the case.

Ron Woods - a tiny piece of his work is displayed in a post further down - was published on Sunday - the first one of us.  We are all very proud of him.  He's a brilliant writer.  The hope is that he is the first of many.

All eyes turn, now, to A363.  Let's hope we can make it Distinctions across the board this time next year.  To use a cliche - which would have our tutors gasping in dismay - watch this space!