Occasionally when you open a book it gets you. It grabs your shirt collar and pulls you in, sliding into its pages the words falling around you in waves. This is not reading, this is an easy swim through someone’s mind who shares your ideas, your expectations and your dreams. Someone who sees life with eyes like yours, who has the same ideals and who has struggled up and over the same mountains. The writer knows you and when they wrote the book they were writing it for you. It’s a personal letter not a book of thousands of words. It’s a personal letter of such meaning it can bring you to tears or tug at the rage you once felt. It makes you smile all the way up to your eyes and drags your frown down to your chin.
Three Botanical Gardens and the Things I Didn’t Write
When I travelled around Australia in 2003 my friends bought me a diary to write. I had three very different experiences in three Botanical Gardens so I thought I would dig out my diary and reminisce. Searching through my notes I realised I didn’t document them! The people, places and events that interested me then are definitely not what interests me now. I will have to write from memory.
A Christmas Present – Tiny Things to Write About
As a Christmas gift I was given a book of tiny things to write about. I’m sure it will improve my writing and I thought I would share some with you.
One morning you run into the person who bullied you at school. After preliminary greetings, you let loose, what do you say?
‘Isn’t it strange that when we were alone together you were always so kind. I guess you tried to make yourself look superior to me in front of everyone else by putting me down. However I saw in other people’s eyes pity, not for me but for you. I was always winning our battle, even when I didn’t want to. Sorry. I hope you have more confidence as an adult.’
Endurance, the hard work
I have never understood physical endurance tests. One of our good friends once did the Marathon de Sables; five and a half marathons in five or six days, set in the Sahara Desert. I am currently writing with a guy who has swam the English Channel. Why? Was my first question. Surely life is difficult enough without giving yourself more challenges. However I have realised that giving yourself these bigger challenges makes very easy work of everything else. Isn’t it true, that through struggle we grow?
Feeling physically fit is mentally empowering. Being a Pom in Melbourne can sometimes feel like a fish out of water. Aussies are a beautiful race and generally seem a lot more active than us Brits. Beach Road is more of a cycle track than a road. Swimmers don’t just go to the beach to muck about, they go to swim five kilometres, ten kilometres. Even around the bay!
Page Three…the error
I have sent my manuscript to various publishers and then today as I went through it for the umpteenth time I saw it. That bloody error on the third page! This means that all five publishers will have seen it. Some publishers want 100 pages, some the first chapter, all want a synopsis. One wanted a three line synopsis! To which my explicit words were rampant for a good half hour whilst composing.
Energy
Something’s happening!
Isn’t it amazing when you just click with someone. They get you and you get them. Sometimes words are not needed. This is happening a lot recently. I’m making a lot of new friends and finding them in the most unusual places! When I say friends it feels more like old family acquaintances that have been missing from my life for a while. They know me better than I know myself. We share a history, although our historical journeys could not be further apart if we tried!
Ten Months of Writing
I thought I’d map out what has happened this year. In February I started writing my first fictional novel, my aim was to finish this by December. Then at Swinburne Uni I was told ‘write everyday’. My good friend bought me a planning diary and I soon realised my manuscript would be finished way before Christmas! In fact it was finished in July. All 67,000 words of it, I actually wrote more like 80,000 but edited it down. I think it fits in the genre of Chick Lit, a friend said it could be Bridget Jones meets Monkey Grip.
Frankie’s Fiction
It was busy on the train into Flinders Street but Sarah managed to get a seat. The man opposite catching glances in her direction was about her fathers age and ruggedly handsome. Sarah’s phone beeped and she looked down.
Running five minutes late, meet you inside the NGV
She looked out of the window noticing some of the tin roofs passing by. It had been a long time since she had stayed with her Gran in Warburton. She loved thinking back to the nights she had spent laying in her bed listening to the rain hammering on the roof. The sound would send her off to sleep and at other times would wake her up with huge crashing thunder and lightning. Luckily their house never got hit, she knew a few in Warby that had.
Seven Lessons
I thought I would list the biggest lessons I have learnt this year as we head towards 2016.
Letting Go – Petrified
After watching the tragic end of Anna Karenina. I realised there was something I needed to look at and let go. In previous posts I have talked about finding my inner child. Feeling so pleased to have her back I was ignoring the fact that she wasn’t very happy. Trying to give her a voice and indulging her in childish games wasn’t working, she needed to let go of something. Continue reading