This is a blog about nothing. Seriously. I’m not joking. This isn’t a ploy. This isn’t a device. I was ill at the end of last week and I’ve spent the last few months rewriting the same novel-length story three times, over and over again. It’s very possible that the last month has driven me ever so slightly mad.
Read MoreThe house move that's been consuming our live since we started looking at locations back in March has finally locked into place. Over the space of a rapid Tuesday afternoon we went from feeling like we were never going to actually move to finding out it was happening in a week’s time. It was pretty dizzying. A happy flavour of panic.
Read More Hi.
This is not going to be a blog. Not as such. For which I apologise. I always like to try and serve up a decent sized portion of my brain to you each week. However, this week, I don’t have it in me. It has been a truly strange week. My gran died and it has left me feeling totally and utterly devastated. Since then, I’ve been living in slow motion world, surrounded by small talk and sulking away for quiet moments. I’ve been feeling numb and it turns out numb is no way to write. You would think writing would offer some escape, but first you need to get past the fog in your head and I’m not there yet.
What I’m trying to say is that a really productive writing session hinges on a particularly mercurial lynch pin. It depends on finding that certain kind of flow that comes from precisely not focusing on anything in particular. Instead, you allow yourself to be swept up in your own story. You’re trying to reach a moment where it’s no longer clear who’s steering: you or the story.
Read MoreI think I just spent too many years of my life assuming writing would be the solution to all my problems. I never realised back then how much of writing would be about other things. Selling myself being one of them. I never saw that coming as a kid. I just wanted to write. It felt like a clean and uncomplicated way to live. Writing seemed a way to keep away from the world, whilst engaging in it. I could hide in a pretty decent house, send my stories off for people to read and pretend that everything was A-Okay. Boy, was I wrong.
Read More I always knew this day was coming. Ever since I started the blog. I knew, one day, I would hit the wall. The barrier. I’ve reached the blog plateau. I’ve got nothing to say and an allotted time I set myself to say it in.
What’s the proper etiquette here? Do I walk away and hope no one notices we went a week blog free? That feels very much against the aim of whatever this is. I want to keep a dialogue open with you. Because, you know, I’m Mr Needy.
I’m all too aware that there are people far worse off than me. I get it. I do. I’m not living in a war zone. I’m not a refugee or a soldier. I have clean water and food. I’m not consumed by poverty or addiction. I don’t have to fret about supporting a family. I understand that I’m a terrible person. Still, terrible or not, that knowledge doesn’t hold back the twitch in my right eye whenever work gets to me. If anything, it just slathers some guilt on top of the stress. A self-loathing cherry to go on top of my frustration cake? Yippee!
Read MoreI suppose that’s why, some Sunday mornings, I reach for another cup of coffee. Just to prolong the unnerving sensation of being out of sync with myself. What can I say? I write horror stories. I thrive on a little alienation, even from myself.
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