Writing Workshop – Bright Eyes

Welcome back to your Writing Workshop!

At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to link up your posts. It’s open till Sunday so don’t worry if you haven’t had chance to join in just yet – there’s lots more time.

I’ve chosen prompt number three – Pay attention to a stranger you meet this week or observe, and write about them.

This is actually a piece of writing I did a little while ago. I actually spent a month earlier in the year sitting on benches every Friday doing nothing but writing about the people I observed there. It was a great project, before a busy schedule got in the way. I should add some more to it really. I posted a few of them on secret out-of-the-way blog that was only read by a couple of people. This piece was my favourite. I think it deserves a second airing…

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The man stands with feet planted firmly, swaying slightly as he sings. His unfocused, strangely wandering eyes, looking unseeingly at a spot in front of him, give away his blindness before the white stick does. Strangely not the long, thin cane you would expect, but a standard, wooden walking stick with the shaft painted white with house paint. The tip rests protectively in the large Tupperware box at his feet in which lie his collections for the day, to prevent, I guess, some unscrupulous person disappearing with his spoils. He is busking. Without soundtrack; without accompaniment; without explanation: just a lone, quiet voice in the winter afternoon.

He is, I estimate, in his early seventies: average build, average height, looking slightly huddled in his winter coat. His face is lined, his eyes dark and expressionless. He looks slightly lost, and very, very alone. His posture never changes: one hand on his walking stick, the other held stiffly at his side. He does not look unkempt or neglected, a hint of a shirt and tie peeping out over the undone button of his coat. He may not be able to see but he obviously takes great pains with his appearance. His leather shoes are polished; his hair combed and trimmed short; his face clean shaven. It is obvious to me that he is a man with pride, in himself and in his voice. His voice is not strong or impressive, but he holds the tune and sings with a quiet confidence, never faltering on a note or a stumbling on a word.

He is singing ‘Bright Eyes’ by Simon and Garfunkel, and the irony of this makes me want to weep. I wonder how he lost his sight: he strikes me as someone who was once a seeing man.

Passers-by largely ignore him; some risking a more lingering look and a puzzled, or in some cases, more scornful, glance. One elderly lady pauses in front of him, only to remove a soggy tissue from her sleeve and blow loudly and unceremoniously into it before moving off again. The occasional coin is thrown without comment into his collection box, the ‘clink’ causing him to stop and thank the empty air in front of him, before he picks up the thread of the song from right where he left off.

Verse flows seamlessly into verse, song into song, barely pausing between the finish of one and the start of the next.  I faintly recognise some, but, for the most part, they come from a time long before my own. A time of 50’s glamour and music hall, of Las Vegas swing and rat packer’s croon. He is word perfect and sings, of course, from memory, without prompt or reminder: a seemingly endless repertoire.

Periodically, between songs, he pauses and breaks his pose to gentle tap his cane in the pot of coins, testing their number, before finding, it seems, their total lacking, and embarking on another song.

Why is he there? For the extra money? I wonder perhaps whether it is for an audience after an age of isolation, singing into unreciprocating emptiness of home. I wonder at his story, what brought him to this place and this time, to be begging for coins outside a gaudy department store window display. I wonder if there is anyone out there, thinking of him, worrying about him.

He seems immune to the cold wind biting at my fingers and finding its way under my clothes to chill my skin, his stamina far greater than mine as I pack up my notebook to find warmth and caffeine. His hands are bare and white and I am suddenly struck by the urge to go and buy the man a pair of woollen gloves and press them into his hands before rushing away. But I remember he is a man of pride, and a man of intelligence given his capability for memory, and I have no wish to offend, so settle with a dropped pound coin and quiet ‘take care’ as I move past, the sound of his song echoing after me in the fading light:

“There’s a high wind in the trees,
A cold sound in the air,
And nobody ever knows when you go,
And where do you start,
Oh, into the dark.

Bright eyes,
burning like fire.
Bright eyes,
how can you close and fail
How can the light that burned so brightly
Suddenly burn so pale?

Bright eyes.”

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So now it’s your turn. What prompt did you choose?

1. Tell the story of a first kiss
- suggested by Snaffles Mummy and her post about little Snaffle’s first kiss this week

2. “Between the cracks”
- Suggested by Chris at Thinly Spread

3. Pay attention to a stranger you meet this week or observe, and write about them.
- suggested by Kate of the Five F’s blog who’s been guest posting over at The Blog Up North about a little girl she met.

4. Write about something you struggled to let go of.
- Inspired by Mummy Limited who did something for the last time this week.

5. Lucky
- Inspired by my friend Heather at Young and Younger and her awful scare this week.

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop – Relentless Life

Welcome back to your Writing Workshop!

At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to link up your posts. Don’t forget you have till Sunday to post your link, so if you’ve not had time to write anything yet, it’s not too late!

I’m afraid there’s no post from me today. I have my interview for art school on Tuesday and am away this weekend so I’m making the most of the last few evenings to work on my portfolio. Although, when I say ‘work’, what I meant last night was ‘spend all evening on something only to end up ripping it up and putting it in the bin’… *sob*

I think I’m a bit nervous.

Anyways, I’ll be back on Monday with some new prompts but until then I’m off to battle with charcoal, self-doubt, student finance forms, and have a couple of days away to get my head together.

See you on the other side!

I’d really love it if you could make an extra effort to comment on other people’s posts today, especially if you see a blog in the list you don’t recognise. Go say hi and offer some encouragement – just one comment on a post can make a huge difference to someone’s day. And thank you to all of you that take so much time every week to do just that.

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So now it’s your turn. What prompt did you choose?

1. Do you believe in fate? What in your life feels ‘meant to be’, good or otherwise.
- Inspired by Karin at Cafe Bebe who shared the lovely story of her and her hubby on the Writing Workshop last week.

2. Tell us about a Eureka moment, when you had a sudden flash of inspiration or insight.
- Inspired by Julia at What Will Julia Do Next? who has been guest posting on Him Up North’s fab blog.

3. How have you changed? Recently or longer-term…
- Inspired by Jax at Making it Up who’s been wondering how she ended up where she is and is bravely trying to rediscover herself.

4. What has felt relentless lately?
- Inspired by A Small Hand in Mind who is well and truly fed up with rain!

5. Release
- Suggested my beautiful friend Metajugglamum

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop: Sisterhood

Welcome back to your Writing Workshop.

At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to link up your posts. It’s open till Sunday so don’t worry if you haven’t had chance to join in just yet – there’s lots more time.

I’ve chosen prompt number one – write a post celebrating sisterhood.

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For my beautiful sister in the dollhouse.

I wonder what you see,
when you look at us?
Two women drowning in a sea of coffee cups and chaos.
Our earnest conversation punctuated with
exasperated sighs and shouts,
crisps and crumbs in aromatic air and hair.

I wonder if you listen to our whispered woes
and see the looks that pass between our tired eyes.
Our hands may well be wiping mouths and soothing brows,
but if you watch you may well see
their briefest squeeze
and something unsaid hang there in the space between.

I wonder if you squint and tilt your head a bit you’ll see
our twenty shared years fall like crayons to the floor
to leave two pale, determined, smiling girls,
still too thin and loud and free of mind,
our arms wrapped tight around each other’s fragile hearts.
Not letting go.

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So now it’s your turn. What prompt did you choose?

1. Write a post celebrating sisterhood: a friend, a blood-sister, or someone that feels like one.
- Inspired by English Mum’s beautiful post on love, sisterhood and friendship. Go read and take up her pledge.

2. “Why I want a ………..” – fill in the blank!
- Inspired by Two Become Four who was lusting after a new iPhone last week.

3. All’s well that ends well. Tell us about a difficult journey that ended with a positive resolution..
- Inspired by Little Mummy Erica’s moving story of her relationship with her Dad.

4. Tell me your worst habit(s).
- Inspired by Keep Calm and Eat Cake who’s been trying to break some of hers this week.

And finally, the last prompt is just one word. This should allow you a bit more creative freedom if you feel like taking the safety harness that particular week.

5. Found
- Inspired by Deer Baby’s post Finders Keepers

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop: Remembering

Welcome back to your Writing Workshop.

At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to link up your posts. I hope you found a good prompt to work with and are pleased with what your writing conjured up for you this week. I always think writing is a little like magic, it’s no wonder it was controlled by the priests and holy people of the world for so long. Anyway.

I’ve chosen prompt number four – memories of my childhood.

Now, I’m cheating a little bit as this is actually a post I wrote last September, just before I started the Writing Workshop. It was one of the first creative pieces I shared on here, so I thought I’d reproduce for you today. Reading it back it still encapsulates so many memories for me. Writing it was very, very powerful, transporting me right back…

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I am 6 or 7. Sitting on the top step of the stairs in the dark when I should be in bed asleep. Listening to the murmer of my parents conversations, the hum of the television, the sounds from the kitchen as they boil the kettle or tidy up. Sounds of home, of safety and familiarity. I inch down, silently, one step at a time, wanting to get closer to that feeling.

I am 16. I am lying in bed listening to the rain hammer on the flat roof of my bedroom. I’ve decided I want to be an interior designer and mum and dad have given me free reign to decorate my room however I like. I often dream of a beach-hut hideaway so have crafted my room to make me feel like I’m by the sea. Holiday beach scavenges gift driftwood shelves, twisted sea-smoothed branches and endless stones and shells with which I fill my space. I’ve painted my favourite quotes from books and poems that I love straight onto the walls in meticulous, curving script. Tea lights twinkle – I must remember to blow them out before I fall asleep. I lie under the sail canapy I have hung over my bed, drifting on a sea of dreams. The world feels huge and full of possibility.

I am 9 or 10. The passageway down the side of the house is my own secret hideaway. In the hollowed out centre of the big shrubs that grow against the fence I have made my den. I can smell the damp earth, the peeling paint on the fence panels, and feel the rough prickle of the branches as I push my way through. There is a tin there, hidden under the foliage, full of secret things. In it is a piece of paper with the name of the boy I like at school. I haven’t told a soul, not even my best friend. I hope my brother hasn’t found it.

Christmas morning. Endless Christmas mornings. The rule is not to wake mum and dad before 7am. It is early but I am awake. I stick out a probing foot to prod the sack of presents at the foot of my bed and get that familiar rush of excitement and anticipation. There’s no way I’m going back to sleep now. I sneak into my brother’s room with my duvet wrapped around me and there he waits, equally awake and wide-eyed. We put our sacks of presents by the door and try not to look at them, filling the time till the promised hour playing games and talking in urgent whispers, muffling our giggles through our fingers.

Long summers in the garden. The paddling pool and water-fights with empty washing up bottles. Being given my own little patch of earth to plant seeds and forget-me-nots in. The heat of the greenhouse and the smell of the not-quite-ripe tomatoes and the compost heap. Swirling my fingers in the jelly soup of the frogspawn and watching the tadpoles in the pond grow legs and loose their tails. A plant by the Buddleia which was always, unexpectedly, covered in ladybirds. Writing in chalk on the patio slabs. Worrying that the initials marked in the cement by the previous owners meant that one of them was buried there. My shrine under the apple tree to Tabby, my cat, with the stone I had painted with her name on and jam-jars full of faded flowers and green water.

I am 19. It is September 11th 2001. I have come home from college and fallen asleep in a haze of fatigue. My Fibromyalgia is beginning to worsen although I don’t know this yet or what is wrong with me, only that I am tired and I hurt. My brother wakes me. Something has happened he says. We sit together and watch the TV in silence, shock and horror. I can’t believe what I am seeing. I cry but I can’t look away. Ant comes over after work and the three of sit and watch the same clips repeated over and over. Time stops. Pain and fatigue is forgotten. All I can feel is their pain, their loss. I do not sleep that night.

I am 7. We are sat eating tea. My brother will not eat his food. He is chewing the same mouthful of meat over and over until it is grey, tasteless ball that he cannot swallow. Mum is cross, “Just swallow it!” she says in her best pretend ’I’m not cross’ voice. But she is cross, and we both know it. She tries to get David take sips of water but still he will not swallow his food. He cries and has to spit it out. We have been here many, many times before. I kick my legs under the chair and feel smug that I am not the one being told off. We finish at last andI recite by rote “Thank-you-mummy-for-my-dinner-please-may-I-get-down” in one long drawn-out breath.

It is raining and the water is dripping through the bay window. We spring to action with tea-towels and margarine tubs to catch the drips. Christmas Cacti adorn the window sill. I have an overwhelming urge to twist off the tops, and draw smiley faces in the square panes of the window. Both are expressively forbidden. But thinking about it makes my fingers twitch.

We have been playing out in the snow and have come inside damp and rosy cheeked and smiling. I sit in front of the fire to thaw out. I can’t feel my finger tips and my ears buzz with cold. I rest the edges of my double-socked feet on the marble surround. Getting as close as I can without burning. A black and white ceramic cat shares the fireplace with me. When it’s my turn to dust I am extra careful with it, scared I will break it and get in trouble. It has yellow, glass eyes.

It is Sunday afternoon and I sit and doze on the sofa. Dad has the cricket on and the soft lull of the commentary makes me sleepy. I am full of dinner and memories of Sunday school.

I am 19. The contents of my room are packed into boxes and are being put in the removal van, ready to be unpacked in my new room at my mum’s partner’s huge and beautiful house. I sit and say goodbye. Dad hasn’t lived here for two years and somehow that makes it easier. This house isn’t home anymore – I am ready to say goodbye.  But still the tears come as a thousand memories tumble forward.

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So now it’s your turn. What prompt did you choose?

1. Disaster! Tell us when a a best laid plan went spectacularly wrong…
- Inspired by my lovely friend Rachael over at Tales from the Village and her cake wrecks.

2. “I have a ……….. and I’m not afraid to use it”. Fill in the blank!
- Inspired by Tara over at Sticky Finger’s latest post about cooking with children.

3. What last made you cry?
- Inspired by Annie over at Incessant Ramblings’ emotional experience at her daughter’s school last week.

4. Share a powerful memory, or memories, from your childhood. Close your eyes and try to conjure it up as vividly as you can and share it descriptively with us. If it’s a painful memory, let the remembering be a healing release for you.
- Inspired by Slummy Single Mummy who has been using writing exercises to remember.

And finally, the last prompt is just one word. This should allow you a bit more creative freedom if you feel like taking the safety harness that particular week.

5. Storm
- Inspired by Sandrine’s haunting workshop post last week… Twilight Zone

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop: My Therapy

Welcome back to your Writing Workshop.

At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to link up your posts. I hope you found a prompt to inspire you this week and help you create something unique, grown out of your own unique experiences and thoughts.

I’ve chosen the first prompt – what’s your therapy? Like Kerry-Ann, for me music is my medicine….

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I feel it building. That sense of panic. It is like a wave that starts down low, twisting my stomach as it rises up into my head, into my ears, filling them with a pressure that feels like being pushed, hard, down under water. I am drowning.

It could have been anything. Jumping out of the middle of a good mood like the very cruellest game of pass the parcel. Or it could have crept on, slowly. A day when time and patience and energy is sucked out of me drop by drop. Just one word, or lack of one. Too much attention. Too little. Who knows. My heart has it’s own mind, that’s all I know. I can control it as well as I can control the weather.

Whatever. I have given up trying to understand it.

Before long it is so strong I can barely see, barely think, barely speak. My hands start to fidget, mouth chewing at my nails, fingers pulling my hair up into ragged clumps, fists clasped and unclasped. My feet feel poised as if on a starting block. The need to run is so overwhelming it is all I can do to stay in one place, instead beginning to pace from room to room. I have to get out. I have to get out NOW.

A mumbled goodbye to Ant and my hand is on the door handle,  my bare feet slipped quickly into my shoes, fingers reaching up to plug in my stereo headphones before the door has even closed behind me.

I walk, fast. Striding quickly through the familiar streets as the light fades in the sky above me, my eyes low and full. I flick through the menu on my music player, letting instinct find what I need, one finger pushing the volume control up as loud as it will go.

The beats starts and my stride slows to match, my feet turning down the wooded cycle path that has acted as my therapy couch over and over. There is no one here, not a soul in sight down the long mile track, and, as the piano starts and deep vibrating lull of cello or guitar rises with the melody, I allow my shoulders and my neck to unclench. My body starts to sway, my head gentle nodding and shaking from side to side as my eyes close and I let my feet carry me forward and music drown out all thought, sweeping down every neural pathway, stroking every inch of skin. I feel every note, every rhythm. Behind my half focused eyes I feel washes of colour begin to flood my vision. I am oblivious to everyone, everything, the sideways glances of the occasional dog walker not even breaking my stride.

Lyrics wash over me like waves, somehow always finding the exact line and phrase to illuminate the dark place. Comfort, connection, reassurance. What I feel, what I am going through, it has been felt before. It is heard. It is real. I breathe it deep down, the emotion I am feeling. It is ok. I am ok. Pain and confusion and heartbreak and fear. It is ok. Right now I will give myself to it. I will stop fighting.

My mouth opens and I pour out the sound, words tumbling off my tongue as I sing to the empty night and to the dark trees and the shapes of the swifts as they swoop and dart. As loud as I can, my lungs filling with cool air, releasing with every breath.

Sometimes just one song, played over and over. The message I need to hear. Or an album, played straight through, every word as familiar to me as any word I have ever written. A part of me, integrated into my consciousness after obsessive listening, over and over. Thousands of songs, a library of life and experience and expression, what feels right that night so variable, as variable as my mood. It doesn’t matter: there is always something right, always the right pill for this ache. I just have to keep walking, and keep listening, keep singing if it helps.

Soon my panic has been released out with the sound. My limbs soft again, my muscles unknotted and my mind clear, my heart calm once more.

After half an hour, and hour, maybe even two some nights, the hard frown has been softened and my brow lies smooth again.

I am ok. I will not run this night. I will not break.

I am ok.

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So now it’s your turn. What prompt did you choose?

1. What’s your therapy?
- Inspired by Kerry-Ann at Falling Starlett who has been using music to give her inspiration and peace.

2.Tell us a story of something that happened with a bang.
- Inspired by Emma’s beautiful firework photos over at Me, the Man and the Baby.

3. Who’s your boss? Who (or what!) is in charge of you and your life?
- Inspired by Geeky Mummy’s four year old’s impeccable logic…

4. Share your experience of a difficult transition. A moving ‘from’ to ‘something new’.
- Inspired by the Bubbleboo and her son’s Transition Day at school.

And finally, the last prompt is just one word. This should allow you a bit more creative freedom if you feel like taking the safety harness that particular week.

5. Running
- Inspired by World of Walker who has been finding her running feet again

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop/Gallery: Joy

Welcome back to this week’s special Gallery/Writing Workshop. This week we challenged you to combine words AND pictures to create something different. Something unique. Just one prompt: Emotions.

Don’t forget to link up your post below and/or over at Sticky Fingers, so as many people as possible have a chance to read your post.

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A couple of months ago I wrote a Gallery post about pride. It was about feeling stuck, paralysed. It was a very grey picture – I was in a very grey place.

Today I am re-writing the words of that post, for a new me.

Life is hard just now, very hard. But in between the things that make me sad there are increasingly bright flashes of a deep joy that take my breath.

Things are changing. I am changing. And I love the way it is making me feel. I love the colours it is opening up to me.

I am not being held back now, not ever again. It is joy and it freedom and just a touch of fear that feels a little like taking a running jump off a cliff, and just keeping going. The pure belief in it making you fly.

These are my emotions right now.

And it feels pretty good.

She opened up her hands
and there sat joy,
daubed onto every line and crease.

Like sunshine rich
it drenched the pores,
feeding potential underneath.

Hands that DO write
beauty out
in free uncensored streams

and paint many a masterpiece
no stroke begrudged,
and no need to wash them clean.

YES, she says, and spreads-out wide her joy to show:
rainbow skin, with widest grin
as finally she lets go.

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Now it’s your turn. As always try and visit as many as you can, to offer words of support, or encouragement, or just to say hello. Let’s make something special happen today.

Writing Workshop: Light

Welcome back to your Writing Workshop.

At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to link up your posts. I hope you found a prompt to inspire you this week and help you create something new, a new piece of you.

I’ve chosen prompts number 5 – light.  There was a reason I chose this word this week, for light has been all around me.

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I am addicted to light.

The heavy, hot kind. The kind that covers you like a blanket. Fire on your limbs and on your eyelids. The burning kind.

I am addicted to that sticky light, that comes just before the sunset. Coating everything in thick, syrupy honey-light. Sticking to leaves and branches as it drips through like liquid gold. I want to drink it, to smother myself in it and glow like it does.

That half-light, that filters through the curtains at sunrise, when I often seem to wake, if only for a moment or two. That light that comes threaded with solitary bird song, and long shadows that make my legs look long. It is the kind of light you would like for looking at someone beautiful, mouth slightly open as they sleep. The light mingling with their breath and kissing their face with soft shafts.

I am addicted to that last light. Hanging in the air like a grapefruit. I want to stretch up and pluck it from the purple clouds and eat it down until there is only darkness and I can sleep.

And I am addicted to moonlight, too. When gold turns to silver and my mind wakes up. When dreams mingle with reality and my thoughts and body are moved by a force that is not my own. It is a light of fantasy, and submission, and deep water that stirs and swirls.

It is like love, light, as a particularly lovely sunbeam said. It IS love. Bringing with it synthesis, a knitting together, recombining of parts of self to create something new. It feeds growth, pulling me in new directions like a climbing rose.

I turn to face it, running towards it arms, open wide, and I breathe it in. I let it fill me up and surrender to it, until it is I and I am it.

I will let it take me to wherever it leads.

Solstice Sunset

So now it’s your turn. What prompt did you choose?

1. Tell me about a time you felt sexy, completely comfortable in your own skin. Or if you struggle to feel like that, write a story in which you do. What would make you feel sexy?
- Inspired by Catherine at ‘How to laugh in the face of it all’ and her BRILLIANT short story about a Denise who dared to bare.

2. Many, many people have or do suffer with depression at one point or another, myself including. What does depression feel like to you? Find words, descriptions, poems, stories, to give shape to that dark place that so many of us share.
- Inspired by Holly’s moving post: ‘Anatomy of depression’.

3. Write about a time you put yourself first. How did it feel? Or if you end up feeling an eternal ‘second’, what about yourself and your life would you like to be made more of a priority? Time to be a little selfish!
- Inspired by Sarah at ‘A Life More Lived’ who’s been brave enough to say no.

4. “It’s your fault!”. Time to write about a time when you felt the blame was firmly with another person. Absolve yourself from responsibility!
- Inspired by A Modern Military Mother’s musings about blame and original sin, which made me smile.

And finally, the last prompt is just one word. This should allow you a bit more creative freedom if you feel like taking the safety harness that particular week.

5. Your word for the week is: Light
- Suggested by @amylane from Cooking, Cakes and Children, and in honour of the longest day.

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop : Lost Art

Welcome back to your Writing Workshop!

At the bottom of this post you’ll find the widget to link up your posts – I’m looking forward to having a good read through them later. Thank you, as always, for your contributions.

First of all though, it’s my turn. I’ve chosen prompts number 2 – a part of my myself I lost and would like to find again…

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It’s strange how some weeks, the workshop seems to give me a prompt that is just what I need to say at that particular time.

I rediscovered a part of myself this week. Well, I am discovering quite a few lost aspects of myself at the moment, but this was an especially significant one for me, for this is a side of myself that was very, very lost. I thought irretrievably so.

You have all been so kind and supportive and encouraging in your comments about my art work, giving me strength to keep going with this, so, if you don’t mind, I will share the story of why I stopped. I’m feeling brave, and it feels right.

I’ve talked about confidence before on this blog, about it is always something I have struggled with. Thanks to this blog, and you lot, and special people in my life who have made me feel like it’s ok  to be me again, confidence isn’t as elusive as it once was. I’m actually fostering something these days that is feels something like self-belief, probably for the first time ever. I’m not perfect, far from it, full of deep flaws and scars. I fail a lot, and often. But actually, I’m alright with that. I quite like that. I quite like being me.

But this has been a long time coming. For a long, long time I had no confidence at all.

Art for me has always been a big part of who I am. I was always the creative one in the family, our house usually taken over with whatever project I was working on. You always knew where I’d been from the creative mess I left: splodges of paint, snippets of yarn and fabric, my mum trying to get the waste from erasers and endless rubbing out out from the cracks in our big oak table.

It was just how I expressed myself, along with words, although I lost those too along the way, pouring meaning out on to paper and canvas and the walls around me. Making some sense of what I felt and how I saw the world in the things I made.

When I got sick, the world stopped making sense for a long while. *I* stopped making sense. I didn’t understand why I was ill, why it seemed so hard to get better. As weeks dragged into months and into years, the magic ran out of my life in huge, rainbow runs like a watercolour painting held under the tap, leaving only grey, grey and more grey.

I felt worthless. I seemed incapable of functioning as a proper human being. Every time I tried to achieve something, I would get sicker and end up having to pack it in. Everything that seemed to make other people ‘something’, I didn’t have. No job, no degree, no social life. Just a pale ghost spending most of her day in bed. As much as those that loved me tried to support me, I felt very judged. They didn’t understand why I was ill either.

It felt like it was all my fault. Like it was because I was doing something wrong. Like I deserved to be ill.

I become intensely self-critical to the point of complete self-destruction. It was not good enough, not ever. I had to be better. I had to prove that I was worth something. And even as my body started to get better this remained. In fact, it got worse. I became harder and harder on myself.

At about the time that this was all reaching its peak, I painted a painting that changed my life. It was for my mum’s birthday. I spent two weeks intensely focused on the folds of petals, being drawn into its centre in something like a trance. I don’t remember thinking at all. It was the most significant period of just BEING that I remember. I don’t have memories of painting it, just of it slowly appearing on the canvas in front of me.

When it was finished I got very afraid. It was good, it was very good. Even me, so hard on myself, could see it was good.

My mum loved it. Everyone loved it. And on a whim I entered it into a competition.

It won. And from that exposure someone representing a gallery in Spain contacted me about producing a range for them.

And I panicked.

You’d have thought that this would have been everything I had been looking for, all the validation I had been so intensely seeking. But I was too far gone for that.

The pressures of self-perfection made it intensely difficult for me to begin anything. I’d convinced myself I would fail even before I started, that there was no point even trying. I developed the most intense case of artist’s block, too scared to even pick up a pencil, knowing I would never be able to paint anything as good again. Knowing I would just disappoint.

I began to destroy a lot of what I had made, entire sketch books ending up in the bin in a fit of frustration and despair. Canvases painted over. It was not good enough. Nothing was good enough.

A lot of you have been asking to see some of my work but the truth is that pretty soon there was nothing left, except the one painting that still survives on the wall at my mum’s and which I’ve shared a photo of at the bottom of this post – a constant reminder of what I could do but was too afraid to try at. A constant reminder of my weakness.

Time passed. I pushed down a lot of my creative urges, letting it out in ‘safe’ doses – knitting that followed a pattern, for example.

Anyway. You know the rest. You know I am being woken up.

I want to be the artist again, that lost herself in creating. I don’t want to be afraid to try. I want to make mistakes and smile at those mistakes and display them proudly. I don’t want to be perfect any more. I just want to DO. I want to go back to describing how beautiful I find the world in big daubs of colour, along with my words. For both are who I am.

And I will. Time are a’changing. On Tuesday night I looked down at my hands, black with charcoal, the table covered with my creative mess once again and I smiled a smile that made my face ache and my eyes run.

I’m not losing that again.

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So now it’s your turn. What prompt did you choose?

1. Have you ever had a holiday romance? If not, perhaps you’d like to make up a story where you did!
- Inspired by Nappy Valley Housewife and her wonderful post about a summer love (and yes, I sang Grease songs the whole time reading it and you will too…)

2. What part of you is lost that you would like to find again?
- Inspired by Toulouse Confessions’ beautifully self-reflective post.

3. Take a walk around your garden. What do you see there? Or tell us what you dream of seeing when you step out of your back door.
- Inspired by Kelly from A Place of My Own AND Livi from Livi’s Little Bubble who both took us round gardens, imagined or otherwise.

4. Write about one moment with all of richest, imaginative sensory description you can muster. It could be anything: something mundane, very domestic, or something more exotic and unique. I want metaphors and similes people!
- Inspired by Victoria at It’s a Small World After All and her description of what Summer feels like.

And finally, from now on the last prompt is going to be just one word, like last tie. This should allow you a bit more creative freedom if you feel like taking the safety harness that particular week.

5. Your word for the week is: Time
- Inspired by Baking Mad Mama and her retrospective through summer’s past.

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop: Remembering a Summer Past

Welcome back to our Do-It-Yourself Writing Workshop! If you remember we’ve done things slightly differently this week. Instead of prompts, I gave you a series of words and phrases to inspire your OWN prompts on a theme. I can’t wait to see what you’ve all come up with. And, don’t forget, the five prompts that I like best will form the basis of NEXT week’s workshop, (and you’ll win a prize too).

I chose the first word, summer, and used it to write the prompt “Remembering a Summer past”…

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The girl lay lay out on the warm green grass, her legs and feet bare, her hands splayed above, collecting daises in the gaps between her fingers.

Image Credit: stock.xchng

She stretched, feeling her spine lengthen, pushing down, down with her toes, the prickly turf scratching her skin, the earthy, dry smell filling her nose. And she breathed. In and out, in and out. The pulse of the nearby traffic a soft roar like the sound of a womb, or the sea, or the wind through trees. Deep tendrils of feeling inch their way down through the soil, rooting her, as hot, piercing, healing waves of sunshine pin her down, heavy on her eyelids and her chest, flowing through and down and round and out.

And she smiles. And then stops, the smile catching as she remembers this, this moment, in another time and place.

A summer past.

Her grassy bed is replaced with firm mattress, cold sheets. Sunshine knocks at glass but can’t get in, the breeze from the open window not reaching her. She tries to stretch, and the burning pain of knotted, tight muscles chokes a sob from her. Her body feels swollen, unresponsive; tar running through her veins.

Breathe girl, breathe.

She closes her eyes, trying to paint the missing pieces in her mind, but how ever hard she tries she can’t turn white sheets into grass, or the ceiling into a blue sky with vapour trail kisses. She can’t feel the earth, suspended so far above it as she is. It is not sun that pins her down, just fatigue, and a body that won’t do as it’s told.

She is just a girl, stuck in bed, in pain, trying not to cry.

I am both these girls. Simultaneously across time, two summers separated only by six or seven years. My yesterday self stretched on the grass in feline bliss as my old self lies trapped in bed.

I had forgotten this. I’m not sure how, but I did.

This post did the rounds again yesterday. Remember?

Somehow I had failed to. Funny how it came along to remind me. Thank you my lovely Tara Lara, and I really mean that.

Because like lenses overlapping to bring distant letters into focus, that extra layer of meaning laid over my thinking yesterday brought with it clarity.

It is no wonder I feel as I do.

It is no wonder that feeling, sensuality, freedom, adventure, seem so attractive to me right now. Why I want to grasp them with both hands and not let go. It was not just motherhood that robbed me of those things for a while. Long years before of illness and pain left me living a half-life.

I stand at a point in my life where actually, if I’m honest and shake off the layers of assumed pressure, there is nothing to strive for. I am well, whole, alive. I have a demanding child, yes, and the emotional conflict that has dogged me my whole life, that is much a part of my nature as that need to do, to succeed…

But actually, right now, for the first time, I have the freedom to just be.

It is no wonder I want to make the most of that. I should make the most of it. My twenties have been one long, gruelling climb fighting the forces trying to push me down. I fought tooth and nail for everything it took to get me here.

And right now I am giving myself permission to stop for a bit.

I am going to try to just to stop. Just be. Just be alive.

Enjoying the sun on my face and the feel of the grass.

Because, you know? I’ve bloody well earned it.

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Now it’s your turn. What word did you use to inspire you?

1. Summer

2. Lost

3. In the Garden

4. A Wedding

5. Escape

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.

Writing Workshop: The Dog Ate It

Welcome back to this week’s Writing Workshop.

It’s going to have to be one of those weeks where I bunk off I’m afraid. As some of you know I’ve had some ‘stuff’ going on this week. Nothing serious, but it’s left me really distracted and fidgety and struggling to concentrate on anything that requires anything remotely resembling brain power.

I spent two hours in front of the computer last night with a blank cursor blinking, cried, then went to bed.

Which just goes to show it happens to all of us.

So it’s over to you. This week I want you to make an extra effort to click on a name or blog in the list that you don’t know and go leave a comment.

Which prompt did you chose?

1. Tell us a tale of wanton destruction and chaos; share your stories of mess and mayhem.
- Inspired by lovely new blogger Nudie Princess and the sh*t her kid ruins…

2. Write about something that was worth waiting for – what was worth the patience and frustration?
-Inspired by new mummy’s Tiddlyompompom and And One more Means Five who both had gorgeous babies this last week. Congratulations!

3. “You just don’t get it!” – share a story about a time you felt that your other half, or somebody else, failed to understand something important about your life, your personality, or your needs.
- Inspired by Cafe Bebe who wrote about her worries about whether her hubby understands her blogging hobby and how to get the balance right.

4. Have you ever felt bullied? At school? At work? In your personal life? How did you deal with that? Tell us your story.
- Inspired by Mummy Tips and her post about feeling the affects of bullying this week.

5. Write about a time that common sense took a rain-check. Perhaps you were given a piece of ridiculous advice, or you lost your own sense of perspective for a while?
- Inspired by Muddling Along Mummy and her plea for the world to return to using its common sense

Leave your name and the URL to your post in the MckLinky below (the URL should be to your post not just to your blog) and leave me a comment to let me know you’ve taken part. If you have the time it would be great if you could try and read and comment on at least two other entries. And be kind! It’s supposed to be a bit of fun – we’re not looking for the next Booker Prize winner here.

If you haven’t had chance to respond yet, then you’ve still got till Sunday to enter your link! Or just wait till next week, when there’ll be five brand new prompts to get you thinking.

This Writing Workshop is brought to you in association with Mama Kat’s Losin’ It – who’s lovely author came up with the concept and runs her own workshop over in the U.S.