New Beginning

                Welcome, or welcome back to Scribe. I am fifty one years old, I work for a local council department, the pay is low and the management and the general public seem to conspire to drive me around the twist. I’m married, no children. We live in a one-bedroom flat in south London with our cat. And I dream of have my stories published, my scripts performed; of earning my living from writing.

                I’m not writing anything. That is to say, I’m not currently engaged in a project. I write Morning Pages (see Julia Cameron’s TheArtist’s Way) five days out of seven, and I do Writing Practice (seeNatalie Goldberg’s Writing Down The Bones) five days out of seven. My writers group folded in September, and I haven’t joined another one. Basically I’m treading water, or resting on the page as Julia Cameron might have put it.

                But I feel positive. Ever since New Year’s Day, I’ve felt recharged. I’ve been challenging myself. I want to do one thing each day that scares me, such as initiate a conversation. I’ve also decided that I’m going to read more. I found a quote by Stephen King recently: If you haven’t got time for reading, you haven’t got time for writing. Yesterday, I had the flat to myself. I was so tempted to put on a dvd, but I said to myself, no, it’s time to read. I carried on with Sheridan Le Fanu’s  Best Ghost Stories, and I was bloody glad that I did. It reeled me in. I was completely immersed in a story, and it affected me more powerfully than even the best film. For someone who wants to write novels and short stories, I am embarrassingly ill-read.

                The new year hasn’t properly got underway yet. I haven’t been tested. At home, we’re still jubilant from Christmas. At work, nobody has been ill; consequently, we haven’t been short of staff. The true, Grade A nutters haven’t returned yet, and management haven’t yet announced that they’re going to lay off any more staff, so relative peace reigns. They will, though, and the psychopaths will be back. I can’t control other people, only my reactions to them. So I’m determined to try and preserve my own self-esteem, perhaps even expand it, and to change my life for the better.

                So I wish you all, belatedly, a happy new year.