Measuring Up

Coffee spoons are not the only the way to measure out a life. I find that hopping from one nice thing to the next, and trying to ignore the boring or bad stuff in between seems to work out ok for much of the time. The lily pads of life, perhaps. 

It's harder to make this strategy work when you know it's a hell of a jump coming up from one nice thing to the next, and a long and perilous leap in between. I expect this is why I burst into tears this morning, sitting in France and knowing I was about to head back to the grim, grimy grind of the drear dark days. 

Leaving the holiday from life, with the golds and rusts of the trees, the smell and the tread of soft wet leaves underfoot, the last low rays of the sun before it disappears for months - oh it was hard. Who would want to come back to all of  -  this?

I have been dropped off from the ferry and have already done 5 hours of work on the journey. Now I am in a Travelodge, alone (of course) and contemplating a week where I won't have a moment to get my head up. 

I sometimes doubt that I will be able to see through my plan.  But you know what? I've had a little rest and so I'm not ready to quit just yet. Look out world, I'm still kicking.

Book Hopscotch

This is my view every Saturday. As an aficionado of 'shelfies', it's not a bad outlook. 

I try to sit somewhere different each week, so that I don't become one of those people who have their own spot. Deadens the thinking, having the same perspective all the time. Did you know this is why we instinctively tilt our heads when we're curious? Animals do this too. It's to get a slightly different view. 

This weekend I can take a journey through time, just by scanning the shelves opposite.  I can start with the fabulously titled Feeble Mindedness and Mental Deficiency. On through Outwitting Our Nerves to the Psychotherapy section. Scan past Freud, Kinsey, Shere Hite and Why Is Sex Fun? then before you know it, I'm straight into Psychosexual Problems, Perversion and The Pathology And Treatment of Sexual Deviation. After that we segue into depression and suicide. 

Pretty miserable stuff - and fortunately not my own topics of research. Sure I'd much be rather be having sex on a rainy Saturday afternoon than working in the library, but you can't always get what you want, right?

Her Comes The Bride

How very Guardian. Here’s a piece about a girl who was so in love with herself she decided to marry herself.  As if reading this article wasn’t bad enough, I also suffered her being interviewed on the Today programme on Monday.  When you’ve finished laughing (at her, not with her) let’s ponder what this ceremony might actually be about. 

There are a number of unpleasant alternatives from which we might choose.

Is it the self-obsession of young people taken to its extreme? And I’m asking this with only the merest trace of irony as someone who blogs the interminable drivel of me me me.  

Is it about showing off, about being the kind of person who can’t do anything without announcing it to the world? Making some promises to myself in diary just wouldn’t be enough, it has to be formalised and witnessed.  Sadly most of her family weren’t able to attend “for logistical reasons”. You don’t say.

Is about being so desperate to be a bride that you just can’t wait any more? Just want to get that wedding dress, design the invites, choose the flowers?

Is about Verfremdung, about splitting yourself into parts? If you marry yourself, you must feel that you were separated before. That’s not a good way to be.

I’m sure the honeymoon would be great fun. But how would it be different from any other night on my own? Seducing myself wouldn’t be much of a challenge – I figure after all this time it’s a bit late to play hard to get. I’m sure I wouldn’t mind if I hadn’t shaved my legs, and I wouldn’t bother with the suspenders and all that jazz.

"I'd been essentially single for six years". Well, no shit. Having listened to this young woman on the radio, I have a sneaking suspicion that I know why she might be on her own. She sounded like a total pain in the arse. At least this way she won't get left on the shelf. 

Wonder whether she'll publish another article when she gets bored with herself and the nag nag nag of her inner voice, and has an affair? I can't wait. 

Hero's Welcome

You know I like a sexy building. And they don't come much sexier than the Wellcome Library. It's been one of my favourite places since I ran a project there a few years ago, but lately it's become my second home.

I'll be spending Saturdays there, writing. There is hardly anyone here at the weekend, so it's lovely and quiet. There are no more excuses not to get on with it. Here are the things I'll be working on (in no particular order).

• developing a poetry collection
• submitting poetry to journals
• writing my novels (yep, 2 started)
• writing reviews
• blogging

These are a few of my favourite things. More about the raindrops on roses, brown paper packages tied up with string, crisp apple strudels and all that shit later.

God's Own Shortlist

As if we needed more proof that Cameron is completely out of touch with everything and everybody, he said last week that William Hague is the greatest living Yorkshireman. 

This is so ludicrous I couldn't even think about without foaming at the mouth for a fair few days. Then I thought I'd better make a definitive list. Why shouldn't it be me? I'm better at choosing than Camoron. 

So here we go - in no particular order. See if I'm right.

• 
  
• Alan Bennett
• Geoff Boycott
• David Hockney
• Michael Palin
• Margaret Drabble
• Patrick Stewart
• Jess Ennis
• Jarvis Cocker
• Sean Bean
• Judi Dench

Sorry about Sean. I know you might dispute it  -  but I can't live without that man and his starring role in the spank bank. 

Reboot

So I am all out of excuses now, about not having time to write.  I have every Saturday, and long evenings stretching into night in the spare room.  It is time to do this properly.

I have started by sorting out all my files, the bits and pieces of poems and prose, the seeds and germs of stories. The two novels that are nothing more than ideas and a few thousand words. 

Why now, you wonder? Well it's all part of a wider plan.  More on that in the weeks to come.  Suffice to say for now that an end is in sight. Still quite far away right now, but close enough to start making an actual, concrete plan. With a couple of key milestones to break the journey. 

One of the parts of the plan is writing. This is the only thing I've every really, really wanted to do. For all the success I've had in the day-job, it's not the same as fulfilment. Writing is something I need to do, I have to do. 

It'll be a shame if I'm crap at it, won't it?  But at least it gives me an excuse to do absolutely anything I damn well please, all in the name of research.  A poetry friend of mine once said when I was going through a desperately dark time - "think of all this as raw material".  That immediately made it better, if only because it started to place a distance between me and the stuff, as I thought about how to write it, and started to get a sense of proportion and a more clinical viewpoint. 

I'm aiming to write my postcards two or three times a week (at least) so if you're interested in updates from my tour around the inner landscapes, do drop by. 

Looking Forward

The place we chose for our half term break was strangely deserted. Some days we saw no one at all. This should have been lovely but was rather unnerving until we found the rhythm of the days.  Reading, swimming, sunbathing and eating freshly-caught fish in a wooden restaurant right on the beach. 

My birthday passed quietly. Two cards - 37 messages on Facebook.  Most of these people wouldn't have sent a card in the old days of snail-mail so that was rather nice. There was plenty of time on holiday for thinking, reflecting, planning.

Reflecting is hard, of course. Thinking things through is difficult too, given all that has happened, and so much of which I do not care to re-live. However, plans must still be made, as the future rolls forward ruthlessly and relentlessly, whether we want it to or no. 

I decided I should set myself some goals to attain by my 50th birthday, targets that I can hit no matter what else life throws at me. Here is what I've come up with.

• Keep Thing 1 and Thing 2 happy and healthy
• Spend quality time with my friends and family 
• Become healthy and fit
• Be happy by doing happy things 
• Publish more poetry
• Write - here, there and everywhere
• Develop a plan for the next 10 years

I do not want to be a Fat Frumpy Fifty. Significant remodelling and reinvention will be required so I'd better get cracking.