Day 25

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Write on your WIP

Her sadness is a weight around her shoulders and it pushes down her head. In the sag of her shoulders and the shuffle of her step she seems too weary to walk the path in front of her. She clutches her small canvas bag to her chest, fingers palpating it and twisting the fabric into deep folds. She holds it tight, as if her life depends on it. The butterflies feel she would be better clutching a weapon or at the very least a large stick. In her sadness she does not seem to have the skills to survive this place. If she strays from the path it seems unlikely that she will leave the wood again. Some people are made to be eaten. 

The girl seems drenched in sadness, from her long glances behind her to the light at the edge of the wood to the staccato breaths, snatching the air into her nose, as she struggles to control her tears. Eventually she gives up trying to control her emotions and lets out a strange, animal keening as she walks. She staggers under the weight of such tremendous sorrow and her terror rises that this feeling will never never pass. She stalls in her walking and crumples to the floor, exhausted and unable to staunch this flood she dashes her head against the path, grinding her teeth and rending her bag. Her sorrow has become a flood of fury and she lets it wash over her. She turns her anger on her clothes and rips her bodice from her, noticing a sense of satisfaction as each ribbon pops from its moorings. She flings it from her and doesn’t notice the creatures in the undergrowth shrink back as it flies towards them. They dare not approach one so unpredictable. 

Without this to distract her she feels her awful sorrow rise once more. She pulls her hair out from the roots and feels satisfaction in the noise and ripping. She feels no regret, just a horrible interest, as she looks at the clumps in her hands and feels the lumps on her head. She curls into a ball with the bag cradled against her belly and claws at herself with abandon, raising welts on her arms and legs that will bleed and scar over time. By the time she has finished with herself she looks like she belongs in this wild wild place. A butterfly lands on a stone near her heart. 

Improbably she has survived a week in the woods, with some help from the creatures around her. There are no mice to mend her clothes or bluebirds to do the cleaning here but the creatures of the wood are wise and can be kind when the mood takes them. The butterflies have kept her on the path and the birds  have brought her berries from time to time. The wolves have watched her but kept their distance. There is little to eat on such a slip of a girl and they know the risks of riling the humans who can sometimes have . 

Day 24

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The average of all these wild and crazy opinions of the voice in your head  - both ecstatic and awful - is that fundamentally your writing is okay.
That means you can carry on without worrying too much.
So go do it.
Set your timer for 25 minutes (or 20 if you're doing that, or 30 or 40 or whatever feels right for you right now) and crack on with your WIP.

Butterflies can give you clues as to the natures of those in the woods around you. If the butterflies are flighty and frivolous it is likely that there are fairies nearby, if they are focussed and fleeing beware of trolls in the neighbourhood. If the butterflies fall still then they may be hiding from the goblins or humans who would pull off their wings for sport. Some travellers have told tales of butterflies lining the path and rising in waves of colourful consternation if the person they are helping has tried to stray. The creatures of the wood know that other travellers have been encouraged to leave the path - mesmerised by beating wings and kalaidescopic patterns as the butterflies dance them to their death. No one knows how the butterflies make their choices and they will not tell. 

Butterflies are the messengers of the woods. They carry secrets. They can settle on rocks or on trees or sway on stalks of the wild wheat that grows in the heart of the wood and listen to the world around them. Butterflies store away the whispers of the creatures in the woods and keep them until the information can be of use.   They can ascend the highest heights to listen to the rumblings of giants and stay unstaring on the earth to hear the whispers of the insected grass. Butterflies can carry secrets that are big and small. They will share them with the fairies and the gods and sometimes, if they are very special indeed, with the travellers in the woods. 

Day 22

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By now you have three lists that we've asked you to write

  1. A list of changes that could happen to a random character we gave you

  2. A list of plots or old myths and legends that you love

  3. A list of characters you love

Now play mix and match with them.

Imagine inserting a new or classic character into an old story with a new kicking off point (a change).

Set your timer for 25 minutes (P.S. we're up to 25 minutes this week, woo!).

Look through your lists. What pick and mix stories take your fancy? Could you clear a way through any plot holes by looking back at old stories? What points of reference would make sense to you now.

Granny looked around, bewildered, then she tutted. What was that girl doing sitting on the rock outside her cottage with barely a scrap on? Her hair was bigger than her clothes and she must have some sort of sickness to be so pale and thin. 

“Hello” the girl smiled. “Why don’t you come and sit by me? I’d be grateful for a chat.”

Granny sniffed suspiciously and moved towards the girl. She paused, surprised by her own ease of movement. She raised her arm to look at her hands, they were definitely hers but seemed now to have a flexibility and a strength that had faded many years before. Granny gave a delighted chuckle and turned to close her door.“I wouldn’t look inside if I were you.” said the girl, ‘There’s not much to like there now.” 

Granny turned to look at her with suspicion. “It’s my house, I’ll look wherever I damn well please, thank you very much.” she huffed. She peered around the door and gasped. 

In her bed was a very fat, very full wolf. It lay there, preposterous in her hat and glasses. In her bed. On the floor were shreds of her nightgown and some other more gristly matter than Granny’s mind steered clear of contemplating. Granny looked down and wondered how her night gown could be on the floor as well as on her body. She felt a gentle arm curl round her shoulders. 

“It’s not okay but it will be soon, I promise.” said the girl giving Granny a gentle kiss on the forehead. 

“Come with me.”

Day 21

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grab your blanket, grab your drink, grab your book. Set your timer for 20 minutes. Thank yourself for being a glorious writing beast, an art monster, and an all round excellent human, and read the shit out of your book. 

Read dribs and drabs of stuff lying about the house having left my book at a friend’s house who then got her bag & keys stolen so I couldn’t get it back. I think I am becoming a writer because I really want to describe just how horrible it was to see a friend go through that and how she handled it like a motherfucking star. I want to write what she showed me of how to handle something like this.

Day 20

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You've got 20 minutes on the timer. What's the elevator pitch of the story you're currently working on? Spend some time working it out and see if it matches where the story is currently going. With any time left, keep working on your WIP.

Subject + goal + conflict = plot

This is a playful exploration of mythic spaces and archetypal characters. This novella draws on oral folklore and the archetypes we find in cinema and on the television to tell the story a band of characters who find the wild wood is being threatened and though it holds dangers of its own it needs to be rescued. 

A band of adventurers happen upon each other in the wood and find they have to fight to save it and each other from the evil that lurks in the castle on the edge. 

Day 19

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Can you pinpoint a time when you found utter, uncomplicated joy in your writing? How can you recreate it? Can you find a way of playing with words that makes it joyful and fun? Do you love freewriting at speed or would you rather spend ages carefully crafting perfect words?

Set your 20 minute timer. Attack your WIP with a sense of playfulness and levity, and then come tell us about it in the forums.

Did work on the story but also wrote this on the forums:

I rediscovered my joy in writing when I did a stand up comedy course. The joy of stand up comedy is that the feedback is instantaneous. The horror of stand up comedy is that the feedback is instantaneous. But the actual writing felt totally different to anything I’d done before - it feel more like trying to solve puzzles and I think it’s a really useful skill to bring to writing fiction. The structure of jokes can be delightful and doing the course really freed me up to try new things without fear of whether they would work or not. I would definitely recommend it for anyone looking to step outside their comfort zone.

Day 18

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Go be human. Go art. Twenty minutes. Go do it now. (I definitely overran on the 20 minutes with this one)

I have had the pleasure of working in a number of different special schools and have consulted with staff in mainstream schools to support learners with additional needs. The majority of learners I work with will have an Education, Health and Care Plan in place. In an ideal world this document should be based on the needs of the individual and be a plan to specify exactly what the different professions can do, working together, to maximise that learner’s potential. 

In my experience this is rarely the case. There are many many eloquent parent bloggers who give vivid accounts of just how adversarial this can get. As a professional I can only offer my sympathy and say that we too feel frustration when we can see that the plan that is put in place does not meet the needs of the learner. 

I absolutely understand how we have got to a place where the plan is entirely focussed on the needs and strengths of the individual. On paper this looks like the fairest way of allocating resources - unhampered by contextual pressures or constrained by the economic restrictions in the child’s school. To create a document that focuses entirely on the support the individual needs in order to achieve seems like an effective strategy to stop that support being chipped away by broader concerns about school provision. However, learners do not develop in a vacuum and to ignore the context in which they are learning is not only detrimental to the individual but to the actual structures of provisions themselves. 

Special schools and mainstream schools are very different environments. I will be focussing mainly on special schools here, as I am more familiar with how they worked in the past, how they work now and how they could work with a bit of will and more multi-disciplinary planning. 

On paper it looks eminently reasonable to specify the number of contacts/hours (depending on where your EHCP is written) each professional should be allocated to help the individual develop. I can absolutely see how this is helpful in a mainstream school where, if the contact are not specified, services may struggle to ensure adequate intervention is offered. However, due to the completely different nature of special school funding and special school teams, this system can be actively detrimental for learners in special schools. 

The majority of special school funding for speech and language therapy is co-funded through service level agreements - this means that the funding does not match to the individual EHCPs - money is not allocated according to the need specified at the level of the individual, it is more amorphous than that. I think this is a good thing. 

A special school environment is one where the staff all have a higher level of understanding of complex needs and how to support learners in developing their movement, communication and ability to learn that is typically found across the board in a mainstream school. The classrooms themselves are adapted to ensure a higher level of support for basic skills that are fundamental to learning, such as constant access to specialist equipment in all lessons, a Total Communication environment, calm down spaces within the class itself. All of these are fundamental to the learner’s development but are almost erased from consideration when identifying support in an EHCP, 

In my experience, the focus of families and a lot of SEN workers is almost alway the hours /number of contacts provided by health professionals. To have EHCPs that specify the need for a trained professional to have direct contact with a child in order to help them achieve is in most cases a gross oversimplification of how that child learns. A child with severe learning disabilities will gain far more from regular ongoing contact with teaching staff who has received specialist training than from half an hour weekly sessions with a therapist. The work that needs to be done is the building of effective integrated multi- or trans-disciplinary teams that ensure holistic support is offered throughout the school day. 

The lack of discussion around the fundamental importance of environment and staff skill sets when reviewing  EHCPs is a real problem.   If we highlighted the things that special schools do that mainstream schools are not achieving such as calm down spaces within the class room, then we may start to value the things these wonderful schools can offer. I believe it is detrimental to the needs of all learners with additional needs to focus on what a specialist is offering rather than placing their day to day lived experience at the heart of this document. We have created a system based on mainstream provision which accounts for approximately 25% of mainstream school pupils whereas usually 100% of pupils in a special school will have an EHCP. Yet the documents enshrine what the individual is entitled to are far more focussed on the structure of a mainstream school rather than celebrating the successes and trying to identify the more diffuse ways of working that are supporting the majority of learners in special schools. 

EHCPs anatomise learning into different sections with different professionals linked to each. People working in special schools know that it is far more helpful to work on these things together - child feeling frustrated in their stander? Do some work on play and interaction at the same time. Child unwilling to walk across the room? Have a chat to the Occupational Therapist about what motivators might encourage them to do so. I know so many OTs who are stuck fulfilling specific fine motor programmes because it is specified in the EHCP rather than being able to work collaboratively with teaching staff to adapt the classroom environment so it is becomes a place where the learner is more likely to want to pick up a pen and practice without needing a highly specific programme at all. 

This system also ignores the broader context in which each child lives. The focus on provision in mainstream also means that greater challenges for families of learners in special schools are also ignored. In my experience this tends to manifest itself as highly contentious discussions around the provision of transport for special school pupils. I think this is often a flashpoint for families as the logisitics of getting your children to 2 different schools for the same time is extremely challenging for all families. There is also the isolation that comes with special school provision - you can’t make school gage friends if you are not at the school gates. 

If EHCPs focussed on the provision of support in special schools, where most children with EHCPs are actually educated then it could mean that we could be fighting for a provision that actually meets the needs of these learners rather than trying to fit them all into a mainstream box which actually misses all the strengths that we should be pulling into mainstream provision for learners with additional needs rather than creating a model of expert advice in what should be a place of mutual planning and environment shaping. 

If we want to get good at something we all learn the same way - we start doing something badly and then keep doing it until we get better or we get frustrated and give up. Special schools should be places where we create constant opportunities to give it a go until you get better at it. 

Day 17

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Set your timer for 20 minutes. Get our your WIP or a new story you want to write or an idea you want to expand that has come to you recently. 

In the heart of the wood lives the wise man. He can mix you a tincture or divine the path you should take but he will not solve your problems for you. Often he may make them a good deal worse. 

The Magus sits in his cottage and feels the threads of destiny spinning around him. He is not the weaver he simply sees the patterns. He can see where the threads are dropped and need to be repaired and he can sometimes predict the shape the pattern will take. He can point you towards the place you need to be but he will not take you there. The magus knows that you must walk the path yourself, no one can do it for you. [Bleugh, mixed metaphor]

The Magus knows how to make the world uncomfortable enough to help you take the path that you need to take. It is always uncomfortable in the woods. The magus may light a path or plunge you into darkness. It is hard to know if the Magus works for good or bad. The Magus does not think in these terms. There is done, not done, might be done, might be better not done, worth thinking about, worth dismissing and all points in-between. What the Magus means is that the world is complicated and good and bad are overly simple and usually unhelpful. Altruism can lead to unimaginable horror and the worst of us may walk through the world without leaving a mark. It is impossible to understand the impact of what you do so you must simply walk the path you choose. But walk it you must. The alternative is to stay in the woods and there are things in the woods that do not want you here.  The Magus knows this. 

The Magus does not strive to bring balance, he simply rides the pendulum. He has made hard choices in his time and knows that once a choice has been made there is little point in thinking of the alternatives, the alternatives are simply unmanageable - there are too many possible permutations for this to ever be helpful. The Magus does demand thought though - that you strive for understanding of what you are doing and why you are doing it, that you think about the impact of your choices to the best of your ability, that you do your very best, whatever that means to you. 

The Magus has little time for people like the hero - those who choose actions instead of analysis and deal with the consequences. The Magus is irked at how often the consequences play out negatively for people other than the hero and the hero marches on oblivious. However, he likes the fool, one who dances on the edge of uncertainty who thinks herself into a state of paralysis - he rather wishes more people would do this. The Magus has given little thought to the princess. He will find that this is a mistake. 

Day 16

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Get your WIP or grab a story you want to start or an idea you've been mulling over.

Write

Write like the wind!

Write with a heart and mind that is open to whatever ideas may float into you.

And when you're finished say thank you to yourself, and that you appreciate what you're doing for yourself.

There is a tiger that lives on the roof of our house. In the daytime it lies quietly, sometimes peeping through the window but usually calm and quiet. But at night the tiger likes to play. 

At night, the tiger creeps down down down the wall and onto the windowsill. One paw, two paw, three paws, four; all balanced on my tiny window sill. The tiger pushes and pushes against the window until - pop! - she is in my room. I put my head under my covers but the rumbling voice of the tiger weaves its way all around me and I can feel it nuzzling against my neck, making the hairs stand up. I can feel it turning round and round on my tummy, settling itself there and getting sleepy as its weight lies heavier and heavier upon me. My muscles get tighter and tighter as I carry the weight of the tiger. 

I don’t like the day and night tiger. 

Sometimes, on very bad days, the day and night tiger will follow me to school. I can see it sitting at the edge of the field, looking at me when I look out the window when I should be working. The tiger shows up when my work is hard or my friends are unfriendly. I know the tiger is near when I feel it squeezing my chest, or I can feel it lying on my back and I have to make my body tense up to carry its weight. When I see the tiger in the day my breathing goes funny and I feel tense and angry. I get cross with my friends because I want to keep the tiger away from them. 

I know people who can help me beat the tiger.

One night, my mum ran the tiger over on the motorway - squish! We had a long long talk and I told her all about the tiger in the night and how it made me feel and now it was beginning to creep around in the day. We talked and we talked and the tiger got so bored it slipped off the roof of the car and right underneath. But this is a very tricky tiger and it found its way back to my roof in a little while. I know I can beat the tiger for a bit but it always comes creeping back. So I am building up barricades to stop the tiger sneaking in.

 I have friends I can talk to and play with and when we laugh we make so much noise we can scare the tiger away. 

My dad is brilliant at beating the tiger. He bashes it on the head with logic and evidence that such a tiger can’t exist and then, for good measure, he picks up his tiger bashing tennis racket and whizzes it about outside my window scaring the tiger away. The tiger doesn’t like tennis rackets. 

My mum will hold my hands and help me do special breathing that can blow the tiger away. Slow breaths in through the mouth and then I pucker up my lips and blow that tiger right out of the window. I do at least ten big breaths to make sure it doesn’t come back in. 

My big sister will come and lie with me on my bed so there isn’t any space for the tiger to fit in at all. I think the tiger is scared of my big sister.

I am learning to fight the tiger on my own. It is hard and take practice but I am finding the things that I can do to shoo that tiger away. There are songs I can sing that will make the tiger quiet; I like songs that make me feel big and brave. If I really really need to I can turn on the light and - poof - just like that the tiger is gone and sometimes he doesn’t come back. 

If I read a book in bed the characters can come and use their tricks to help me beat the tiger. I can tell myself stories where I can be the hero and the tiger is afraid of me. Sometimes I stretch out on my bed, like a star, so the tiger can’t fit around me. Then I make all my muscles tight and strong so the tiger can see how strong I am and it knows not to mess with these muscles!

The day and night tiger likes to lie on the roof of my house. I am learning the tricks it take to keep him there. I don’t think I will be friends with the tiger but I am learning to live with him. 

Day 15

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For the first 5 minutes you're going to write a list of between 5 and 10 characters who fascinate you, or who have captured your imagination. You don't even have to like them, they just need to have stuck in your mind. And for each character, write down a quick sentence or two about what it is about them that you love/hate/obsess over. These characters don't actually need to be fictional. Include anyone who floats your metaphorical sailing vessel.

Pick a character you're already working with or someone entirely new, and write a short paragraph describing your them in a way no one else could be described. Here are some things you might wanna think about in order to get a deeper look at who they are:

  •     An external provocation (someone else, something else) and your character's reaction

  •     An internal provocation (a memory, a pain) and subsequent reaction

  •     A prop and what they do with it

  •     How other people react to them

  •     How they react to other people

  •     The way they interact with their environment

  •     Their thought process at any one time

  •     A comparison

    Exercise 1:

  • Dorothea Brooke - the finest person

  • Thomas Cromwell (Wolf Hall) - so different from how I imagined him, such good rationales for his later actions

  • Bertie Wooster - delightfully funny, kind but dumb.

  • Psmith - a delight, gets shit done

  • Granny Weatherwax - hard wisdom

  • Sam Vimes - soft cunning

  • Josee (Those Without Shadows) - so inspiring, self-aware but very flawed. I was delighted to read an intelligent young woman who has making terrible choices and knew she was doing so

  • Lyra Bellaqua - a fucking hero

  • Red Riding Hood (Revolting Rhymes) - ‘she gives a smile, her eyelid flickers, she pulls a pistol from her knickers.’ Need I say more?

  • Death (The Sandman) - I hope to meet her one day

Exercise 2

The hero reached up and plucked a single rose from the bush and smelled it. They smiled and gently offered it to the girl who stepped back, disgust on her face. The hero felt confused and glanced at the rose. They recoiled to see it bristling with caterpillars, the petals tattered and torn by their hunger. The hero dropped the rose and strode away. 

Stupid stupid stupid. Nothing ever went right. Even a kind gesture could be corrupted, everything failed. Everything. And now, here they were lost in the wood with a half-wit, a princess and surprising assortment of woodland creatures that seemed to follow her wherever she went. The hero was grateful that the laundry was getting done and all their shirts were beautifully mended and the creatures were perpetually filling the princess’ apron with assorted berries and nuts but it was a little disconcerting to wake in the night to the anguished shrieks of various rodents as they rolled over. Also, taking care of a princess in distress was definitely excellent hero-ing, they were just the person for the job but they were just a little concerned that they hadn’t had much experience heroing before now and helping a princess reclaim her kingdom from an evil wizard was… well… mythic. The hero had hoped they’d have a chance to work up to mythic; maybe start slowly with rescuing a wench from drowning or catching a runaway carriage, that kind of thing. Facing down an arch-nemesis felt like it should require training. The hero sighed and shook their head. They turned to the princess. “Sorry, I just thought it would be nice.”

The princess smiled “It was nice, I like caterpillars. Oh, look, they’re spinning me a pair of tights. So thoughtful, the invertebrates.” 

The hero looked at her askance “Did you even need rescuing? It looks like you could manage here just fine - you’ve got all the food and water you could possibly need and apparently the creatures are now making clothes for you. I’m sure if you asked nicely they’d fashion you some sort of yurt. Hell, in a couple of months you could be running your own business.”

The princess smiled harder. “Well, I did live in the woods until my 14th birthday when the prince turned up, so I am pretty used to it, but I would happily trade some of my freedom for some walls and a feather bed.” She gasped as a clatter of blue tits made their feelings on this known. “Im sorry, Im sorry - I wouldn’t stuff a mattress myself, but if it’s already stuffed then surely there’s no harm in using it?’ The blue tits turned their backs and jettisoned their feelings on this matter all down the front of the princess’ dress. The hero suppressed a snigger. 

Day 14

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In a mo you're going to grab your blanket and hot drink for 15 minutes reading, but first quickly answer these three questions:

  1. What's your total word count over the last 14 days?

  2. Over the last 14 days, what has made you happy? (in relation to your writing)

  3. What's the biggest or most important thing you've learnt so far?

Word count: 4279

Choosing to dump the sad novel and write a thing I like has made me exceptionally happy. A fairy tale with characters with disabilities in it without some stupid bloody magic linked to it in some way is well worth writing.

I think I am still learning what I am going to learn. I am also learning about commitment and broadening my scope to include less familiar stories as well as those I know by heart. I have also been pleasantly surprised at how well I remember King Lear

Day 13

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Set that precious timer for 15 minutes and:
Carry on with you WIP, a scene you're desperate to carry on or start or wherever you are.

I have done this and, thanks to this rather lovely course I am now actually writing something I enjoy rather than the novel I was writing which was making me feel sad and anxious. I don’t think what I am writing is good but at least it is written down - which is more than I can say for my novel. I am finally enjoying thinking about the topic I want to write now. This is very good news.

Day 12

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Set the timer for 15 Earth minutes.

Take the protagonist from your current WIP, or a character you've been obsessing over and see if you can explore their story from the perspective of three other nearby characters.

The other characters can be emotionally close (mother, brother) or just adjacent in the story world (creep watching it unfold through binoculars, waitress who sees the protag once a day).

Goneril

Fucking Cordelia. Always daddy’s little precious. He prizes her higher than the kingdom and yet here I sit, by his right hand, just wishing he would turn my way. Everything she wants she gets and I have to beg for scraps. I am full of fury and I don’t know what to do with it. I twist my skirts into ribbons as he dotes on her. I can taste my bile as it rises in my throat watching the two of them together. An idiot and his caged bird. She gets everything she wants. Everything. 

I could love Francois and I know that we would make an exceptional match but no, he holds him back for his precious little Cordelia. I am the oldest sister, surely I should be the one whose marriage unites France and Britain - what can she possibly offer him? She is little more than a child and I know far more than she does how to entertain another monarch. France should be mine but instead I am offered Albany. Where even is it? How is this the match he makes for his first born daughter. I know it is monstrous but I feel my hatred for my father growing day by day. After all, I am the one who will get the kingdom when he is gone, not her. It is the law, not his choosing that makes it so. What monstrous lies would he have to tell to change the state of our nation to let her rule?

Regan

My sister scares me. She doesn’t know that I see how she looks at daddy but I do. I mean, I have some sympathy. Once Cordy enters the room it’s like all the lights go out and there she is in the spotlight. He only has eyes for her. I think he would be well advised to look to his eldest once in a while - the look on G’s face is dangerous, like she would burn the whole country to ashes just to spite them.  

I don’t mind so much. Daddy doesn’t really care for me, I know that but the other two are just obsessed with him. I know this leaves me unseen but there are many things a girl can do in the dark, and I’ve tried most of them. It’s amazing what you can get away with when no-one is looking. Cordelia, with her fair complexion and weak constitution would do well to check her wine glass once in a while just to see what’s in it. And it’s so funny to watch G seethe when she sees once of her precious trinkets has somehow made its way to Cordelia’s room once again. Just so long as she doesn’t work out that it’s me doing the moving. 

Day 11

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We're bringing the timer back down to 10 minutes because you might find this harder than you expect. Grab your notebook. Find a window with a lovely view. A train window is great for this if you happen to be travelling at any point today.

Stare out the window.

No phone. No other screen. No music. No book, no newspaper, nothing.

10 minutes of blank staring.

If at first you panic because you think you must find something profound to think about, take a deep breath and just chill. No need to think about anything. Just let your mind wander. Or let it be blank for ten minutes.

At the end, scribble some notes down if anything has popped into your mind. Don't if they haven't.

And that's it for today. Writing without writing.

I usually do my writing after dark so this one was a little tricky. Instead I lay on my bed and imagined all the places I would like to write. 

I had visions of sitting in the pub on the canal, watching all the barges in the basin bobbing on the water.

I thought about taking long walks in a wood, trying to untangle a tricky plot problem. 

I thought about a space of my own, a small cabin of daub and wattle made where I can work in peace with a brook babbling its secrets as it passes by. 

I thought about the reality of my writing, perched on the sofa/bed, legs crossed, head bent - my studying pose since I was 15 years old - and how it still works for these old bones even now. 

Day 10

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Set your 15 minute timer. You can go in as deep as you like and the alarm will bring you back round soon enough. You're not gonna get lost in there.

Write without fear. Or write with fear but ignore that little bastard. What is the raw, strange magic of you? What are the things you know?

These things I know. Kindness is the most important quality and yet it seems to be in short supply, even in those who have every experience that should lead to empathy. Also kindness can lurk in the most unexpected places. I have seem someone I downright loathe show greater kindness than I ever could, who used her words carefully to correct the course of another who had lost her empathy through sheer frustration. 

I have seen kindness cripple people, leave them washed up and exhausted but raise their heads and continue to fight the good fight. I have watched a woman in tears as she told me of the black mould creeping up the walls of a child’s bedroom and into her lungs and she shared her frustration at the cruelty of a society that doesn’t immediately rush to stop such horrors. 

I have seen kindness shared with people who never never deserved it and I have seen some of those bloom and others cut kindness down where it stands, burning every bridge as they blaze with fury at a world that doesn’t care, even when it is showing them it does.

These things I know. How you look doesn’t show who you are. How clever you are is not the most important thing. If we make space for kindness, not progression as the primary value of our society then we are making space for success for so many more people. People with learning disabilities make the world a better place. They make the world better for our children and for the rest of us. There would be no soft play centres without people with l

earning disabilities. Learning in school would still only happen when seated at a a desk. If we focussed the technological expertise we devote to war to developing new ways of supporting people with disabilities to fully engage with their world then the whole world would be better, though probably a little poorer. War breeds money but kindness breeds itself. 

These things I know. The look in a parent’s eyes when you tell them their child has autism. The slump of the shoulders in a mother who just can’t breast feed their premature child. The defiant head tilt of the mother of a child with down syndrome who will not take no for an answer. The despair on the face of a father who tells me he’s not crying as tears run down his cheeks as his son’s seizures spike for the third time in three years and he knows the terrible path he has to walk down again. The confusion on the face of a grandmother when I intervene to stop her force feeding a toddler when she knows she’s only doing what’s best. The rapid speech and complex language of the teacher who feels threatened by yet another person invading her classroom with a pen and clipboard to write yet more notes on her practice. (For the record I am only ever there to see the child, your practice is always respected by me, even if I don’t agree with all of it.) 

Day 9

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So today's exercise is this: set your timer for 15 minutes and make writing your BFF.

Write down what made you start writing in the first place.

Write down the way you felt the first time you truly got into the flow.

Write down all the magic you hope to create with your words.

And then keep on going. Write that scene or vignette or conversation that's been playing over and over in your mind, the one that keeps you coming back to the idea of writing over and over again.

I don’t remember starting to write. It’s just something I’ve always done. After my parents died (separately; I’m not a child in a Roald Dahl story) I found myself rereading some of my old words and they were delightful. Reading the stories written by 8 year old me was simply lovely - I recast my dad as a hard bitten detective working the “Highway of Murder” - a job at which, considering the body count, he was clearly unsuited though to my eight year old eyes he could do no wrong. It was lovely to see the high regard in which I held him though. I also rediscovered phrases that were clearly my mum’s voice that I had faithfully transcribed and then forgotten. Even now my past writing is a gift to myself - I reread the blog I have written to help me get through the stormy toddler years and the memories come whooshing back. Writing now is a present for future me.

I am glad I have a husband who has always been keen to support me in this, often far more than I have driven myself. The thing that comes with age is kindness - I have always berated myself that my writing hasn’t gone anywhere, that I haven’t managed to monetise it, whilst being equally high minded that art should never be in the service of finance. I have finally accepted that this kind of thinking is a huge barrier to writing at all. All of that stuff can come later. For the first part it is a priority to get the writing done - I can worry about what comes next once the writing is worthy of being looked at and I think that’s probably quite a way away at the moment. Just write. That’s all. 

I do totally get the flow thing happening some of the time. I tend to edit and revise as I go though, so there is always a part of my brain critiquing what I am doing, which can be a little exhausting. To be honest it has been quite a while since I have had flow. I used to get it when I was writing sets for stand up - I think it’s an important part of comedy writing - any inner critic needs to be silenced so the jokes will come. 

I often find it easier to find the flow when i am huddled in the corner of a busy coffee shop rather than in my quiet calm home - something about the need to block out the bustle helps me to really focus on the words, whereas the quiet around me means I am very easily distracted by any noise and I will quite often trip down a long distracting meander through the internet as I try to track down whatever kind of bird is singing in the garden right now. One of the key things I have discovered though, which is quite important financially, is that it doesn’t have to be a nice cafe. As long as the drinks are highly caffeinated that is more than good enough for me. In fact a grotty cafe gives me far more incentive to distract myself from my surrounds and fully immerse myself in my writing. 

[I didn’t get as far a writing a scene - I enjoyed writing about myself far too much.)

Day 8

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List 10 of your fave classics. Fairy tales, myths, legends, whatever. A bit o' Cinderella, a Bible story here and there, something to do with King Arthur. It's all good. You have 15 minutes.

And in the time you've got left, start going through each one and fitting it into the four point plan we mentioned above. Here it is again for reference.

  1. The hero's life changes and they have a problem to solve

  2. They go on an adventure to try to solve the problem

  3. The meet someone or learn something that helps them solve the problem

  4. They live happily - or unhappily - ever after

Red Riding Hood 

- needs to visit her sick granny

- strays from the path

- meets the wolf

- recognises the wolf and saves herself and her granny 

(she gives a smile, her eyelid flickers, she pulls a pistol from her knickers)

Semele & Zeus

- Semele sleeps with Zeus & is proud of it

- Hera visits Semele and plants doubt in her mind about Zeus’s true nature

- Semele confronts Zeus

- Semele is left extra crispy and her son has to gestate in a thigh

King Lear

- Lear divides his kingdom and disowns his most beloved daughter

- Lear is treated badly by Regan & Goneril and leaves to wander the moors

  - Lear meets Edgar who shelters him and leads him towards sanctuary

- Sanctuary is broken and the war is lost and everyone dies, except Edgar who may or may not pick up the crown

Lancelot & Guinevere

- Guinevere is happily married to Arthur until Lancelot arrives

- Lancelot carries out many brave deeds that take him far from her but is always motivated by the wish to impress her

- Some dickbag locks her in a castle & threatens to rape her and when Lancelot rescues her they give in to temptation

- Some years later everyone finds out and everyone dies (looking like Bon Jovi circa ’86 in the film Excalibur)

Penelope & Odysseus

- Penelope spends a decade in #metoo hell focussing on mindfulness through endless embroidery. 

- Some weird old dude arrives and challenges all the suitors to a pissing contest. Penelope knows its Odysseus but doesn’t let him back that easily

-  Penelope tests Odysseus by asking him to move her bed which he knows can’t be done as its carved from a living tree

- Odysseus acknowledges her superiority and they get it on

Echo & Narcissus

- Narcissus catches sight of himself in the pond and is dumbstruck by his own beauty

- Echo catches sight of Narcissus and is struck repetitive by his beauty

- Echo tries to get Narcissus to notice her but he is too in love with himself 

- Narcissus wastes away into a flower & all that is left of Echo is her voice

Nero & Agrippina

- Agrippina poisons her way to the top and rules as regent for her spoiled son

- Nero comes of age and realises he doesn’t want to share power with his mum

- Nero hires some engineer types to try and rig a few booby traps to kill her. They don’t work so he hires some burly thugs instead. 

- Burly thugs find Agrippina but she goes down swinging ‘Strike me in my belly, where I bore him.”

Bluebeard

- Girl marries man who tells her she can go anywhere in the castle and open any door except the one opened by the key with a red stain. 

- He goes away and girl immediately opens door with key with red stain. It’s lucky she did because the room is full of murdered women. It’s unlucky that the key is a grass and stains her hands red so he will know

- The girl flees Bluebeard and shouts for help from the roof of her castle. She sees dust rising as someone rides to her rescue

- It’s her mother who slays the beast & frees her daughter

Beauty & The Beast

- Daughter asks for a single rose which is a perfect humblebrag for Insta

- Ineffectual father meets the beast & makes a shitty deal to save his own skin. Daughter is imprisoned in the beast’s castle. 

- Talkative crockery spills the beans about the beast’s curse 

- Being treated shiftily by the adults in their lives helps this young couple bond and they live happily ever after with a surfeit of roses and very few family lunches.