My mind is all over the place

I’m finding it very hard to focus at the moment. I could name all kinds of reasons – a lingering head cold, Louis who  keeps demanding my attention,  but this goes deeper than that. I’m worried because a man has shown an interest in me. How crazy is that? The problem is he’s pretty awesome. I can almost feel his intellect and it scares me. I’ve always avoided overly intelligent men, not because I can’t keep up with them, intellectually, because I can, but because I’ve always had this huge feeling of unworthiness. When I was young, I met all kinds of people – low lifes all the way through to professional people. Which ones did I date/marry/etc? Well let’s just say NOT the professionals.

I remember one time I went to Sandown racecourse with a lovely man called Richard. He was an all-round nice man with a great job and a family who were very well  off. We had  great day, helped by the fact that I kept backing winners, but did I see him again? Of course not. He was much too good for me. Whatever would his parents have thought if they ever met me? I wore clothes that came from jumble sales. My father worked for the Guinness brewery in London, cleaning tanks.  

Now another intelligent man, with a great sense of humour and who shares many of my interests is in the wings and it’s a struggle not to scupper it before it’s even started.  I’m going to try not to do that. I feel as though this is a test of my mettle. A way to see whether or not I’m ready to take some leaps of faith and start a new life. After all, that’s why I’ve been clearing the decks.

I’ve often felt as though I’m actually two people. One of them is a pain in the ***, always putting me down, pointing out all my imperfections and all the things that can go wrong.  The other person has a hard time being heard. She wants to enjoy life, have fun. She thinks she’s OK and that she doesn’t have to be perfect providing she has a go, or does her best. I know which one of those two people I want to be but that doesn’t make it any easier. I’ve been listening to the bitchy critical negative voice for so long it’s going to take some serious will power to shut her up, but I’m going to give it a go.

So, Woman’s Weekly, People’s Friend  and Fiction Feast, how about buying some of my stories? That might just motivate me to write some more, then, who knows what might happen.  

My new life starts here.

I hope.

Ready for a new start

I went to see my homeopath yesterday and really enjoyed it. That probably sounds weird, but the fact is she’s such an upbeat lovely person, just talking to her, I felt better. She seems to think that this cold (yes, I still have it) is a good sign – marks the changes to a new season, etc  etc but I still wish it would hurry up and go. My voice has dropped an octave which, as it’s already quite deep, isn’t exactly feminine.  

Regarding life in general, I feel as though I’m ready for a new start. More than ready. I’ve just had a call from the Writers Bureau so I can now officially reveal that I won’t be tutoring for them after the 31^stof this month. I’d sent a letter in a blue bag in September, giving notice but nothing was said which seemed odd, so I sent another note.  Apparently, the original letter somehow got left inside the bag (!) so they’ve only just found out. Anyway, the lovely lady who runs the bureau has just called  and we had a nice chat. She understands  why I need to stop but better  still she also said that if I want to go back at any time, to let her know, so the door isn’t closed, it’s still ajar.

I can’t tell you how hard it was to make the decision to stop working for them.  Having deadlines and something I HAD to do has been such an enormous help to me while I was down. It gave me something to focus on, in much the same was as looking after the dogs. Now though I want some me time. The plan is to have a year in which I’m not committed  to anything so that I can go where the wind takes me. At the end of that year I can then weigh up what it is I want to do and where I want to be. If I then decide to become a recluse with three rescue dogs, that’s  fine, but I don’t want that to be a default mode.

I probably shouldn’t say this, but honesty is, and always will be, my ,mantra, but I recently started an email correspondence with a man. It’s been absolutely wonderful  in that it’s given me a huge confidence boost. I have no idea what will or won’t happen but the very fact that there are possibilities is great

Louis leaves on Friday morning after which I’m going to Long Eaton for a workshop on finding ideas. I’m hoping that some of the exercises will lead to stores and that my mojo will be waiting for me, ready and eager when I get home again. Of course, the gardeners are due on the Monday  so I’ll have to work round them.  

The other thing that’s happened in the past couple of days is a whole heap of rejections from Woman’s Weekly which tells me that the stories I’ve written recently haven’t been up to scratch. I think I knew that anyway but it’s still annoying.

I’ve always said that once I’m at 5 on the happiness scale (1 very depressed to 10 very happy)then I can write well enough to sell. I THINK I’m there now but I don’t have the energy or the time to take advantage. OK that’s an excuse, but it’s  not a bad one; I DO still have a cold, plus as this is the last time Louis is here, when he wants attention, I’m happy to give it to him (it’s very hard, no impossible, to write when you have a very heavy dog’s head on your lap). I’m almost sure that by the time I’m at Long Eaton, the words will flow. It’s the almost that’s the worry. I REALLY need to start earning some proper money again, and soon. That way I can enjoy spending it so if anyone knows who the god of mojos is, do let me know.

The dog has teeth

The sun is shining. The workshop for next Saturday is planned, the handouts printed. I have no Writers Bureau work to do. Time to think about what to enter for Leeds Writers Circle short story competition. I haven’t been writing much new stuff lately. The stories I have attempted haven’t worked, at least not to the standard I’m looking for. Obviously it would be nice to write something new rather then enter a womag story (which is unlikely to come anywhere) but I’m not sure I want to. While I have Louis here, I’d much rather spend time with him. We’ve just had a play fight. Anyone watching who didn’t know him would probably think I was in danger. His bark is fearsome, his growl deep and dark, and his teeth…. I tried to take a photo to show them off but this was the best I could do. 

After our fight, I feel a bit battered. He’s one heavy dog and he doesn’t play fair, but it’s a lot of fun, and he really seems to enjoy it so it’s worth the odd bruise.He especially likes it when I put my hand in his mouth (!)

I’m hoping to finally get around to doing his portrait today, in fact, I might have a go now. It’s been a long long long long time since I did any art so the result is likely to be poor but then I don’t have to show anyone do I?

Blast this cold

For more than a week, I’ve been fighting a bad cold. It’s so annoying how something so simple and trivial can cause so much annoyance. I guess it will clear up, eventually, but right now, the end is definitely not in sight. The weather’s miserable too which in a way is good as then I can’t be tempted outside.

I’m loving having Louis here. He really is an absolute darling. Of course, I end up with bruises on my bruises – he has no idea how heavy he is – but that’s a small price to pay.

I have the feeling that I need to spend time clearing the decks. I’m finding it hard. I had an email from Swanwick Writers Summer School saying my courses had attracted excellent feedback and they’d like me to teach the main short story course next year. I’d said on the feedback form that I didn’t want to  teach in 2014 so that I could enjoy the School as a delegate rather than teacher. The email said they appreciated that, but would I reconsider. The old me would have given in and said yes. I said no. Not only that but I sent a two page reply detailing all the things I feel they need to fix. I love Swanwick.  Very much. But. They don’t pay tutors enough and because times are hard, they’re cutting back – less well known speakers and so on. I think this is a BAD idea. People expect writing holidays to be expensive . They also expect to get their money’s worth. Anyway, I got a long reply saying that all my points were being considered and offering more money. I’m still going to say no. I’ve taught at NAWG for the past three years. When I go there, I get the weekend free plus expenses and a decent fee. Now if Swanwick could match that…

Thanks to this cold, I’m merely treading water workwise. Basically all I’ve done is tweak a few stories that Woman’s Weekly rejected so that I could send them elsewhere and kept on top of Writers Bureau work. I’ve started sorting out the details of the workshop I’m running in Long Eaton on the 12^th of this month. It’s going to be about various ways of finding ideas for stories, plus some pointers on how to make a story ‘work.’ My plan is to do the exercises too, on the day. My mojo WILL come back soon. I just have to keep tempting it to come out and play.

I see my homeopath again on Monday. I’m supposed to have been keeping an eye on my progress but that’s not easy when you’re think with cold. So how do I feel at the moment? Goodish. Frustrated, because I want to get back to writing GOOD (i.e. saleable) stories and because I have very little energy at the moment.  

I’m also feeling cautiously optimistic. I’m going to Wentworth with NAWG in November for a retreat with a few workshops thrown in (see www.nawg.co.uk for details),  Christmas is sorted (I’m off to Scarborough – hurray!), plus Strictly’s on. I love that show. Even more, I love Strictly Takes two with Zoe Ball. I record it every day so that I can watch it at my leisure. If you don’t like Strictly, I feel sorry for you. It’s not about learning to dance, it’s about learning to let go, have fun, express yourself. The changes it brings about in people (Matt Dawson springs to mind) are amazing.

Next year at the moment is a blank slate. Apart from a couple of workshop bookings, I have no plans whatsoever. That is both a scary thought and an exciting one. With no dogs to board, no part time job to do, I’ll be able to do what I want for once. I just hope I can take advantage of that.  

The photo shows one of my orchids. 

It's a dog's life

Life is full of good and bad. It’s up to us which we focus on. 

Right now I have a really awful terrible miserable cold and I feel really low, physically but I know it will pass. I also have Louis here for his last visit. I love that dog and I’m going to miss having him come to stay, but I need to do this. I need to clear the decks to make room for me. My plan is to give it a year. If I’m still on my own then, I might just think about getting a dog of my own and becoming a recluse who potters about in the garden, paints, and does jigsaws.

Talking about good and bad. Louis the chocolate

labrador is here. He loves to play fight. He’s a big, heavy dog with sharp claws and a set of teeth that a sabre tooth tiger could get by with. For some reason he loves to ‘chew’ my hand. This involves a large leap of faith on my part as those fangs could easily hurt me, but I take the risk. Also when we play fight, somebody always ends up either with scratches or bruises and I don’t need to tell you which one of us that is, but it’s worth it; You should see the almost insane look of gleeful happiness on his face when we do play fight. It’s worth the pain.

Pain is something I’ve been avoiding. It’s complicated so try to keep up at the back. All my life I’ve been miserable, trying to make everyone else happy, like everyone else I’ve suffered loss and heartbreak. It would be easy to give up on love. I know an awful lot of people who have done exactly that. My ex is an example in point. He’s looking for the perfect woman and unless she comes along, which she won’t as she doesn’t exist, he won’t even begin to try to build a relationship. I realised, long ago, that the perfect man doesn’t exist. I realised too that if he did, I’d probably get bored with him. What I’ve been afraid of is getting things wrong. That’s been a recurring theme, all my life. As a child, if what I did wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t good enough and as it’s almost impossible to do anything perfectly, I’ve always felt unworthy and pretty much useless. That’s why although I have some musical and artistic talent, I haven’t been playing music, singing or painting for years. That all needs to change. Who cares is I paint like a six year old or play the piano worse than I did when I first started? If I enjoy it, that’s what matters. The same applies to relationships. I’m finally realising that I need to mix with people who are positive. That doesn’t mean they have to   be cheerful all the time. it’s more about the way they look at things. It’s hard for me to write this. It’s easy to get involved in long conversations about illnesses and what’s wrong with the country and talking about bad stuff is fine, providing more time is spend on the positive side of things. Sometimes it’s hard to see them, but once you start to look for them, like red cars, you see more and more.

Why am I bleating on? Basically because I’m fed up with me.  This is my way of trying to give myself the pr4eoverbial kick up the backside.  I promised a friend that this time, I would paint a picture of Louis before he goes home. I have another ten days. By writing it down, I’m hoping that this time, I can make it happen. It’s one small step, but for me, it could be a giant leap.