Me versus the Depression

For a long time I thought the depression was going to win and here's the thing:  when you are depressed you always think the depression is going to win.  But here's the other thing:  it doesn't if you keep fighting.

When I was first diagnosed I wanted to know when I would get better, how long is the recovery period?  Like when I broke my ankle, I knew I would be in a cast for 3 weeks, then physio for 6 weeks and then I would be almost good as new.  For the most part, this was true, give or take a few weeks.

With depression, there is no defined recovery period.  I have seen people bounce back after a 3 month dose of citrolapram and never look back.  I've seen people who have fought all their lives against this insidious illness.

In the early days, my psychiatrist assured me I would get better.  I asked him how long that would take.  He said something vague like "a while".  When I pressed him for something more concrete, he was unable to provide any time frames.  At the time I thought he must not be very good at his job.  But now I can see that there really isn't any way to predict recovery.

The effectiveness of medication changes over time.  The effectiveness of therapy is wildly variable.  What happens in life is outside a clinical study and therefore cannot be factored into a recovery timetable.  In other words, you just have to ride it out and have faith that eventually you will get better.

But if you think that getting better means going back to the same person you were before you were ill, you are in for a big surprise.  You never come out of depression the same person you were going in.  Many of the behaviours and thoughts you had before were the very things making you ill.  It's like drinking poison, recovering, and expecting to stay better but going back to drinking the poison.

Everyone comes out of depression fundamentally different than when they went in.  Same as when cancer survivors come through but their lives are fundamentally changed thereafter.

Here are some of the things that have helped me recover to the point where I am today:

1. Take the prescribed medication as and when your psychiatrist prescribed it.  Don't mess with that.  If you think you might be ready to make a change, discuss these with your psychiatrist and agree a plan.  Follow that plan to the letter.  Trust me.  I once took myself off my meds because I thought they were making me worse.  That was simply put, one of the worst decisions I have ever made in my life and probably set my recovery back a year, perhaps more.
2. Get a tribe.  You will need to be surrounded with people who get you and get your disease.  You will need people who will allow you the freedom to discover a new you.  You will need people who will love you unconditionally.  You will need people who will come to you even when you tell them to go away.  This tribe will consist of some old friends and some new friends.  Family may not or may not be included.  My children get it better than my husband does.  Maybe that's because children generally get unconditional love better than adults.  I have lost a few people I thought were my friends along the way but I have more than gained in the overall friendship sweepstakes.  Ask that tribe for help when you can.  Give back to that tribe.  They are invaluable and deserve your investment.
3. Find contentment in the present moment.  Don't strive for happiness.  It is fleeting and impossible to sustain.  Instead be at peace with what is happening, good or bad, in the present, right here, right now.  When the shit hits the fan, feel free to duck and cover but be at peace with the exercise.  Know that this too will pass.
4. Invest in yourself.  Increase your self awareness.  Change your habits if you don't like them or just accept them as part of your rich tapestry as a human being.  Be as kind to yourself as you are to others.  Forgive yourself and those around you.  Embrace yourself as a totally unique individual that has limitless potential.  Sounds new agey and hippy groovy, but when you stop having expectations and judgements of yourself and others, you will start to feel contentment in the moment.  Avoid drama.  Not your monkeys, not your circus.
5. Breathe.  When all else fails, breathe.  I know this sounds stupid and I've lost count of the number of times I've rolled my eyes when someone tells me this.  But it works.  When you think you can't face another moment, stop.  Stop thinking.  Stop moving.  Just stop everything.  And breathe.  In slowly.  Out slowly.  And again.  All day if you have to. 

I am certain my journey has not ended.  The shower (& bath) proves to be an ongoing nemesis.  I find contentment when once in I'm there but getting there is a major struggle every day. So I've changed what it means to be ready to face they day.  That may or may not include, as is more often the case, a clean and fresh smelling me.  My tribe loves me regardless.  Social situations are challenging but I am taking them one at a time and engaging more often than not these days.

But the proof is in the results.

1. I am writing again!  This is the biggest achievement so far.  I abandoned my first novel as it had me in knots.  I started a whole new one that had been assembling itself in my brain for a few years and in just 10 days over 110,000 words came out of my head through my fingers and hit the keyboard.  I hit save.  I'm actively sending it out to potential agents every day and have some interest.
2. My life modelling becomes a bigger and bigger part of my life.  I model nearly every week at least once and most weeks more than 3 times.  It helps me to be still, physically literally and mentally in practise.  I use the time for positive affirmations, meditating, and breathing.  It also helps me to accept the beauty (both inside and out) of who and what I am in that moment.  I can't envision how I would have recovered without it.
3. I don't listen to others thoughts on how or what I should or should not be doing unless they are part of my tribe.  Even those in my tribe, know that whilst I may take their advice under consideration, I am free to choose what I feel is best for me.  And they love me still.

Near as I can tell I am winning, 1-0.

 

A Week in Cornwall

A week in Cornwall can work miracles, at least that is how it appears to me.

As many of you will know, I have been suffering from the debilitating effects of depression and anxiety for several years now.  I have been hospitalised on 3 different occasions.  I take no less than 13 pills every single day to keep the chemicals in my brain finely balanced.

The good news is, they appear to be working finally.

I remember when this all started asking my psychiatrist how long it would be until I was better.  He said "A long time."  I thought he meant 6 months, maybe a year on the outside.  I had no idea that it would take several years and several tweaks of the medication, several more years of psychotherapy, and even more time just trying to overcome the demons that ranted inside my head.

For now, the demons are quiet.  They aren't completely silent.  I can tell when I've missed taking my medication.  So can my friends and family.  I leave the house regularly now without the pit of dread tightening in my stomach.  I still find social situations uncomfortable which is annoying because that isn't how I see myself or how I used to be.  

But the demons have reduced their screeching to a mere whisper.  And some days, I don't hear them at all.

In mid-February, a very generous friend offered us the use of their seaside cottage down in St Ives in that gorgeous southwest corner of England known as Cornwall.  The cottage is absolutely delightful and exceeded every one of our expectations.  We took my daughter's best friend and her mother with us.  It was an eventful few days to say the least.

On the first day we were there, our one-year-old black Labrador puppy, Guinness, decided to take a flying leap (literally) off a sea wall.  I have that moment of her suspended in midair between her jumping and her falling etched into my mind's eye.  She looks like a cartoon.  She fell 30 feet to the rocks and grass below.  I ran to see her landing on her rear haunches, yelp, and try to stand.  She struggled and whimpered.

My husband managed to get down to her.  He tried to get her to walk but it was clear she was hurting and had a minor cut on her knee.  She was shaking and her heart was racing.  She was going into shock.  My husband carried her down the hill and went to get the car.  We raced to the vet.

Fortunately, after several hours at the vets on a fluid drip, antibiotics, opiates, and tranquilisers, she made a full recovery and was just sore for a couple days.  Talk about stressful!

The next night we were informed that a combination of spring tides (when the tides are at their highest) and rough seas caused by the gale winds and torrential overnight rains would mean that the sea was likely to breach the seawall at the harbour in St Ives.  Our cottage was perfectly placed just a few doors up from the seawall at the harbour which was a great location until that warning was issued.  

Every few hours we made our way the few steps down the street to evaluate the threat.  It was exhilarating and terrifying in equal measure as the waves crashed over the wall and into the buildings on the seafront.   In the end, this also passed without any real danger posed to man or beast.

We spent the days walking on the beaches (there are no fewer than 5 beaches around St Ives) and walking around the town exploring galleries and art museums and used book stores and odd little shops.  We ate out.  We cooked in.  I even got breakfast in bed one morning delivered by my daughter and her friend.  What a treat!

I was surrounded by positivity and tranquillity on the trip. When I returned home I felt as if a fog had lifted.  I started writing.  At first it was just in my head.  A story had taken hold of me and was busy organising itself.  Then 2 weeks ago it felt like the harbour wall had collapsed and the sea of words was rushing to get out.

I sat at my computer every day, some days for more than 14 hours.  I managed to write over 110,000 in 10 days.  It was emotional.  One day I started crying about 5 pm and kept crying through the night until about noon the next day.  The tears lasted on and off until I was finally able to finish that chapter.

The book, All My Loves, is about a woman dying of a brain tumour.  She is in the hospital and in the final stages of dying.  She is revisited by the memories of the men she loved and those who loved her.  Some are good memories.  Some are excruciatingly painful memories.  Same are hilarious.  Woven into the story is also the love of her parents as they divorce and remarry, and the love of her grandmother towards her alcoholic husband who died with their youngest son in a drunken car crash.  It is about how love changes us, not always for the better.  It's a little bit saucy.  What book about love could possibly avoid sex?  It's sad but it is also hopeful, I think.

I am now in the editing phase.  I have edited the first three chapters with the help of a very dear friend of mine who is labouring away on the next 8 chapters.  The editing was more difficult than the writing.  Who would have guessed?

I am now looking for a literary agent.  I have someone who has expressed a possible interest which is very exciting but I'm not counting my chickens until a contract is on the table.

The road to publication is long and winding.  But the words are still flowing out of me.  So, I am back to blogging.  I also have an illustrated children's book that I completed a few years back with a very dear friend who did wonderful illustrations for me.  I've got to get that all gathered up and repeat the agent process for it.  I have several more ideas for novels inside my head.  I need to let those organise themselves but one is already starting to take form.  I might be back burning the midnight oil when that comes out of me.  Finally, I've got the novel I started before my depression took over my life.  I want to go back to it and see if I can do anything with it.

In the meantime, I hope you enjoy my musings.

MumsNet BlogFest

This weekend I attended the MumsNet BlogFest at Millbank Tower.  Having attended several events in London in the past 10 days, I must confess to being slightly weary of meeting new people and doing the whole chit chat network thingymajiggy.  Plus, I've been to so many "conferences" in my past incarnation as an IT Professional that I just wasn't sure I was up for another event where we all jostle for the a quick cup of bad coffee which we try to drink balancing a dozen other things in our hands whilst trying to shake hands with people you pretend to be excited about but can't remember their names 2 minutes after you've walked away.

But as stated in previous posts, I am at a crossroads/fork/meltdown in my life and am exploring options in every corner of the capital and beyond.

What is MumsNet? And what is BlogFest? I had no idea which is why I attended. I signed up for MumsNet a few months back but to be honest, I have been a very passive user.  I get emails and when I have the time and/or inclination, I read them but I would be lying if I gave the impression that I have invested the appropriate amount of time in exploring and extracting all the value I might be able to find.  I was hoping that BlogFest would show me how to get more from MumsNet and how to get more from my blog.

The trouble is I'm not sure I want to get more from my current blog.  My blog started as a training tool when I worked in the IT industry and quite inextricably found myself in charge of the corporate intranet with no skills beyond being able to spell intranet. It soon morphed into a way to keep friends and family involved and informed about our family adventures.  Now I might, just might, want to earn some money from it.  Or maybe not.

 

The morning started superbly with an Opening Keynote by Miriam Gonzalez Durantez who is an EU policy advisor, solicitor, mother, oh, and before I forget, the wife of the UK Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg. She was stunning, not just to look at with her shiny black hair and beautiful white jacket.  She was stunning to listen to.  The wisest words of the day came from her when she said "Woman's rights are human rights." and "Helping the next generation have choices is our responsibility."  I could have listened to her all day.  She was intelligently inspiring.

 

The next session was all about the blogging and finding your voice.  It featured some Blog Royalty including Zoe Q Williams ( journalist for The Guardian), Zoe Strimpel (author, journalist and blogger), the very funny Rachel Cusk (another Guardian journalist and author), and the pee your pants every time she speaks funny, Jenny Lawson (author and blogger extraordinaire).  I found little information that I didn't already know, having written a blog for the last 6 years, but I did find affirmation in the general consensus that I was doing things right, even if hundreds of thousands of people weren't reading my blog.  My big takeaway from this was keep doing what I am doing.  It is authentic.  It is real.  It is me.  It is my passion.  It keeps me sane.  OK, that last point is debatable.

 

I thought there would be a problem with queues for the loo.  I mean there is always a queue for the ladies room, even at events that are predominately male in attendance.  Just so you all can sleep at night, I want you to know I didn't have to queue once for the loo.  Phew!  Glad I got that out of my system.  Literally!

 

After a quick loo and coffee break (with the best cupcakes ever provided by Beverley Hills Bakery), there were several breakout sessions to choose from and I attended the photography session, mostly because I am shit at remembering to include images with my posts, but also because I don't seem to have any images which seem appropriate.  The session was presented by Carrie Barclay and Darren Baldwin.  I picked up some super duper tips about using a 3x3 grid to frame my photos, changing point of view, and some useful apps to download.  My biggest takeaway from this session was not to fear editing a photo to make it better.  I usually avoid this as it feels unauthentic but I think I might be able to forgive myself if I just crop a bit here and there or wash away a power line and enhance the colours.  I mean, it's not like I'm airbrushing 30 pounds of anyone or giving them a flawless complexion when they are well past 60. 

 

Then we had lunch and a lovely lunch it was.  Just for the record, the mushroom risotto was scrummy and I'd like to say thank you to the anonymous ones who prepared it.  It was delish!

 

The afternoon started with more breakout sessions.  I choose the Advanced SEO  session after a bit of soul searching.  Was I a beginner?  Was I going to get lost in the mumbo jumbo of technology acronym soup if I went to the advanced session?  Did I know as much as I think I know and be bored to tears, not to mention frustrated, in the beginner session?  I opted to stretch myself and became frustrated in the advanced session.  We seemed to go seriously off piste with some very individual specific questions and the presenter was unable to make it even halfway through his slide deck.  Although as he whizzed through his slide deck, I'm not sure I would have felt like I had any better grasp of the subject matter than I did when we began.   I think the big takeaway for me was if I'm writing about things people are looking for, they will find it.  If I'm not then no one will.  Duh!

 

I then stumbled and fell with my one wrong choice of attending the Blog Beautiful session.  If I had read this properly I would have found that this was a session for bloggers writing about fashion and beauty products.  Oops, nothing could be further from my blog.  And here I was thinking it was going to be about blog layout and what makes a blog beautiful.  Silly me.  This session featured Sali Hughes (another Guardian journalist who also has her own web page although oddly the blog link on her website doesn't actually go anywhere.  Her videos look informative.) The panel inlcuded Avril Keys who blog about what to wear at the school gate.  Not my cup of tea as I'm just not that fussed about what people think of me at the school gate hence being caught out in my slippers from time to time.  but if this is a priority for you, then this might be the place to go.  Not sure how it fairs for plus size women though.  Also included was Alyson Walsh who writes a blog of fashion for the over 50 demographic.  A cursory of look at the blog though featured home interiors and quite a few young, skinny models so I'm confused but I will return to give it a better seeing to.  Finally on the panel was Louise Woollam who has an extremely funny blog even though it is about beauty products.  Seriously, I read it for pure entertainment value.  Other than that, I confirmed that I wear clothes that are comfortable and just enough makeup to avoid scaring the shit out of people but not enough to have to remove it with more than a baby wipe.

 

Let's just say I did get TWO samples of Boob Goo (which might not be the correct name but it's what I'm calling it) from Mama Mio.  Now this stuff promises to get rid of all the wrinkles from the chin down to my below my boobs.  It does not promise to lift my knee sagging boobs which I must say is a vast disappointment but I am willing to continue to use the product simply because it smells divine.  My take away from this session is that there are a lot of blog about beauty and fashion and this area is best left to the women who are passionate about this subject.  I am not one of them.  Oh, and whilst many deny there is any conflict between bloggers and print journalists in this area, many feel there is.  I'm going to leave it at that.

 

There was then another coffee break and opportunity to spread delicious cupcakes all over my face again but I chose to retreat to a quiet area to do some thought catching and avoid that whole social awkwardness that causes my face to twitch when I constantly smile.  Can you imagine the self control it took to walk away from the cupcakes.  Let's not go there.

 

We were heading into the home stretch with the Keynote Panel which had all the promise of a duck egg blue box from Tiffany's.  Regrettably, upon opening it there was a gigantic turd right in the centre of the box.  Let me explain.

 

The panel included Zoe Margolis, whose blog about sex was at one time considered the 24th most powerful blog, although I notice she hasn't written a post there since September and only 2 blog posts for all of 2012 so maybe this has run its course or just isn't has titillating since she was outed by the Sunday Times.  She stood out with her amazing long, dark, black curly hair, her amazing rack bubbling out of the top of her top (Zoe, if you read this, you've got great boobs), and her acerbic observations and witty advice.  You can bear witness to her success from her web page which is far more up to date and professional, and far from being "just" a blog, although not nearly as entertaining and thought provoking as she was on the panel (or as her original blog was).  My takeaway from Zoe was that massive success is possible using blogging as a springboard.

 

Also on the panel was Tim Dowling, the testosterone contributor of the day.  There had been a few men lurking about but Tim took to stage with all the aplumb of a consummate professional.  He is yet another Guardian journalist and writes about family life.  I'm not sure how I feel about all these journalists pretending to be bloggers just because they write about family life.  To me a journalist writes for a paper and gets paid by the paper (doesn't matter if it is print or online - that line is increasingly blurred with every passing day).  A blogger is someone who doesn't get paid except by any tiny morsel of revenue generated by their blog.  This morself is probably so small that they have another job or source of support (husband, partner, family inheritence, benefits).  Regardless, a news outlet which is also a corporate machine does not support them.  I fell in love with Tim when he identified his litmus test for a good post as making his wife laugh.  A jolly good chap all round, then.

 

Eliza Gray is the pseudonym for a woman writing about being over 50.  It's a pretty good pseudonym because without knowing the name of her blog, I coudln't find her on google.  When I found her blog, I found she wasn't writing about anything much different to what I (almost 50) have been writing about for the last 50 years, our life with all its ups and downs including dog destruction woes.

 

The last member of the panel doesn't bear mentioning and due to her insults to everything www.mumsnet.com BlogFest and I are about, I refuse to increase her visibility by even printing her name here.  Let's just suffice to say that she was a bitter, twisted, sad, mean wench of a woman.  My takeaway from her was to make sure that I never ever become anything like her.

 

And as if to prove everything that I do want to be like the Closing Keynote speaker took to the stage to a rousing round of applause and hoots.  I think I even heard a few whistles.  Caitlin Moran took to the stage in a burst of cut off jeans with black tights and doc martens paired with a trusty lumberjack shirt and a mane of black hair with her signature blonde stripes.  She has a husky, raspy, sexy face and from the start she made us laugh, at her, at ourselves, at blogging, at life.  I have to confess that when my book group read her book, How To Be a Woman, last year, I refused.  I mean, I've been a woman for the last 48ish years.  I don't need someone 10 years younger than me telling me how to perfect what I've already perfected.  I will be the first to admit that I might, just might, be wrong about this.  I'm going to go read the book and get back to you on this.  But my takeaway from her keynote was, and pay attention because this is the most important bit of the day, BE YOURSELF.  Be free to be who you are.  Express yourself.  She left me energised and ready to take on the world of the blogosphere with renewed energy and focus.  Which really is what the day was all about!

Favourite Bits:  the sound of babies cooing during the sessions and the seriously stuffed swag bag (with some seriously awesome stuff!!!!!).

 

Improvements Needed:  there was no feedback form either paper or online.  I have tons of suggestions for making this even better for next year:  QR codes on the name tags, additional sessions (eg getting started (ie blogging for beginners), monetizing your blog, blog usability), bags at the beginning for things like the newspaper you handed out in the morning.

 

Can hardly wait for next year!

Write a Letter

A few months ago my husband's great aunt Dorothy died. At her memorial service, her grandson, Simon, read a few excerpts from the letters she had written to him throughout his life.  Dorothy was a prolific letter writer.  In this day and age of modern technology, other than a few birthday cards and Christmas cards, I rarely receive hand addressed envelopes and certainly never receive hand written letters.  And I don't really expect to.  That would be like deciding to go back to horse and buggy.  I wouldn't be too popular on the motorway, I reckon.

And I am a big technology fan.  I text if I have to.  I love email.  It's fast.  I love Facebook.  It's even faster.  I love Twitter.  It's the fastest of them all.  Embrace change!

But there is something nice about getting an old fashioned letter.  It took time and you know that.  And there is something far more permanent and higher quality about a letter.  The stationary is special.  The handwriting is personal.  When my grandmother died, I found boxes of the letters and postcards I had written to her when I first moved to Germany.  It was a fascinating journey through my life as I watched myself change and grow and mature through those letters.  I can't imagine that if I had made that journey during the age of email that I ever would have had the ability or foresight to rifle through her email inbox.  Besides, I don't think she even would have kept them or I would have been able to find them.  And I was able to match the letters she had written back to me with the letters I had written to her and it is a strange sort of journal of our lives during that time from two different perspectives.

Listening to Simon read just a few bits from the hundreds of letters Dorothy had written to him over the years, brought smiles and chuckles of laughter from the assembled congregation.  Her thoughts about current events was captured.  Advice was liberally dispensed.  Her personality sang out.  There wasn't a dry eye in the church.

It was in that moment that I realised it was important to me to give a similar gift to my children.

Our son, Sebastian, has embarked on an amazing journey.  Over the last 18 months he has been learning how to be a chorister and during this time he spends less and less time with us at home.  By February of this year he will be boarding full time.  We will get to see him on Wednesday and Friday evenings and all day on Saturday but the rest of the week he will be far too busy to absorb the depth of my feelings.  Besides, he's 9!  Mom can't seem a bit heavy at times and we aren't talking about my weight fluctuations here.

Last school term I often wanted to tell him how proud I was of him and it seemed insufficient to just say it in the rush of homework, dinner, bath and bedtime routines.  And the last thing I wanted to do was ring him on the boarders phone and interrupt whatever might be consuming his every waking thought.  That would be a very uncool mummy thing to do.  So I started writing him a letter each week.

I found some beautiful stationary that I bought in Italy over 12 years ago in my long abandoned stationary box that I'd never had the opportunity to use what with the demise of letter writing and all.  I got out my beloved fountain pen which did require a new ink cartridge and I sat down and wrote.  When I handed him his first letter, I asked him to keep them in his trunk and not to lose any or throw them away. I thought he would blush but he didn't.

I drop the letters off at the school office on Tuesday afternoons when I pick up Abigail and Sebastian has already gone up to the song school for one of the days two rehearsals, right before the evensong performance.

I was surprised to find one pinned up on the cork board next to his bed the week of Christmas.  He was working so hard at being the best chorister he could possibly be and I could see the dark circles around his eyes but he assured me that he was having a blast. When I asked him if he was afraid that someone would read the letter and he would be embarrassed by it, he just shook his head, like "why would I think that?".    "Don't you really want to hide it away in your trunk with the other letters I have given you?"

"No," he replied, completely unfazed.  "that was the letter you wrote to me after you saw me perform The Messiah and I was just so proud to have a mummy who wrote to tell me how proud she was of me, that I wanted it to be up there.  No one else's mummy writes them letters telling them how proud they are.  And when I miss you at night, I can just reach over and read it and it helps me not miss you so much."

OK, so writing letters is a good idea.  Maybe I should do this a bit more.  Who could you write a letter to?  Will you?

Dissolution & Dark Fire by CJ Sansom

The first novel in the Master Shardlake work is a masterpiece in transporting the reader back in time to the sights, the smells, the sounds, but most importantly the feel of the reign of Henry VIII as he dissolves the monasteries across England. The novel is steeped in rich historical details and the plot carries you along without ever once losing your attention.

Master Shardlake is one of the most wonderful creations of historical crime fiction I have ever come across. He is a hunchback but the author doesn’t stoop to the carnival clichés and for large parts of the book you forget he is disfigured much like you imagine he forgets about his obvious physical deformity until someone else notices it.

The setting of a monastery on the Sussex coast in Scarnsea is brilliantly executed right down to the lighting and the echoes of footsteps. It did make me think how he knew what a disintegrating monastery would sound like. I particularly liked the descriptions of the journeys back and forth to London by horseback in the mud with driving rain and the state those travels must have left their clothes in.

The plot and pacing are perfect. I found myself unwilling to stop until I finished a chapter and before I knew it I had started another chapter. I read this book whilst we were on our summer holidays in Cornwall and many a cold night was spent curled up in the sleeping bag reading with only the light of my headlamp.

The second novel in the series, Dark Fire, is also quite good but not as good as the first in my opinion. I found the plot device of a ancient weapon of mass destruction from the time of the great Byzantine empire unearthed by a couple of bumbling idiots in Tudor London to be improbable if not impossible. I also felt this novel didn’t have the cut and thrust of the previous one. It plodded.

I really liked the subplot of Elizabeth, a young girl refusing to defend herself against the accusation of murdering her cousin. I felt this was a stronger plot and everything else detracted it. I finished the novel only to find out what happened to Elizabeth.

One of Shardlake’s sidekicks, Malton, whom he befriends at the monastery in the first novel, takes a much more active role and is developed more fully. Malton is a former monk with Moorish parents who fled Spain. Shardlake “rescued” him from the homelessness he would surely have suffered from the dissolution of the monastery in the first novel. Malton is a complex individual fighting the prejudice of the day but also exposing all those things which Shardlake doesn't know.

Both books capture the uncertainty and confusion that the people of England must have felt as their great and good King floundered in his many attempts to produce an heir. He was like a desperate, lovesick teenager flip flopping between women. Unlike the dalliances of our politicians of today, those whims had a profound impact on his image as the head of the church, the defender of the faith, and the one who declared the pope irrelevant. England was in chaos with every new wife.

Both books are clearly meticulously researched and with some more attention to editing, I reckon the remaining 3 books in the series will be as captivating, which is exactly why I’ve bought them on iBooks.

Fear

Fear is my enemy. It keeps me from doing what I want to do. Dangerously, it sometimes keeps me from doing what I need to do.

I fear making the wrong decision so I make no decision. Anyone who has seen my attempts (or lack thereof) at home decorating will attest. We have curtains but they are "cheap, disposable, thrown up in a hurry so I can tear them down in a hurry and not fret over the wasted money" type of curtains. This is true in every single room of the house.

Curtains are expensive and I can't really see in my mind's eye what I want or need to cover the windows and get the room to feel the way I want it to feel. I fear making a decision that doesn't look good and having to stare at that decision every single day. And worse subject my family and guests to that decision. And I won't be able to just throw it away because that would be a waste of money and bad for the planet.

Honestly though does my fear of making and living with an errant interior decorating decision ruin my life? No. Does it even diminish the joy I find in my life? Not really. Not when compared to the joy I get when my daughter cuddles up to me with her "I just woke up" eyes and mummy's warm safe body is all she wants right now.

But my fears runs deeper, ever so deeper, than that fabric swatch surface.

I didn't make any plans for the summer holidays last year. I had a vague idea of all the things we wanted to do and I was afraid if I started planning we wouldn't get to do all the things I wanted.  Phew, glad that didn't happen and we scrapped by.

I have had only 3 really grown up jobs in my life. I don't count the jobs before university. Those were practice jobs. But once I got serious about who I was and what I wanted to do with my career I found a job and I stayed there. The first job I stayed far too long than was good for me. The second job they pushed me out because I wouldn't jump when I needed to change from a traveling crazy haired consultant to a mum who lived just down the road from where she worked. Now I'm in my third job. I've been there for almost 8 years now. Some might say I need a change. I'm afraid that I change jobs and it ends up being worse than the one I've got, which actually isn't that bad. In fact, it's pretty good. So I stay. I don't even look. I fear no one will want me, which is stupid and idiotic, but real.

But the biggest fear I have right now is that I want to write. I haphazardly write here on this blog and it kept me satisfied for a good long time. But I want to get a bit more serious about my writing. I aim for a novel. I've started one.  Then stopped.  Then started again.

Now I'm writing a lot of blog posts and a little bit of my novel and a lot of another book and a screenplay and a couple poems (I am bad at poetry).  Every day I think of new ideas to write and suddenly there just isn't enough time in the day to write.  The other night I was up til 1 am and woke up at 5:30 am fearful that the thoughts in my head just wouldn't be there when I woke up if I went back to sleep, like a dream you wan to remember but can't.  One fear replaces another fear.

So I'm going to stop writing this and start writing something else.  Just to let you know, my fear is still there.  But I've asked it to go out for a bit and let me get on.  I've got a lot to do.

Writer's Retreat - Final Part

The story of Assynt, the area in Scotland where the retreat was hosted, is a fascinating one. You can read more about that here.


The Assynt Foundation, who works with Top Left Corner, is doing some amazing things for the area.  You can read more about that here.

The history of the Vestey family is equally enthralling. You can read The Rise and Fall of the Vesty Family by Phillip Knightly (although I haven’t yet) or you can read more details here.

Lochinver and the surrounding area appears to be a mecca for creativity. There are artists for every discipline. Actually I don’t think this is limited to Lochinver. In Ullapool we met artists in the local tea shop. It seemed I was surrounded by them. I wanted to be one of them. Must be something in the water.

I’m not entirely sure how much of my transformation was due to the majesty of the scenery, the comfortableness of the lodge, or the stillness of the silence. I do, however, fundamentally believe that a large part of what I learned, what I took away, what I am becoming were the people who joined me on this voyage. I could not imagine having made this journey and travelling as far as I have without the benefit of having them along for the ride.

Obviously I could spend hours in the land of the hypothetical. Would it have been the same with another 12 people? Are all writers supportive and giving? Is the world full of really lovely people just waiting to be friends? Is this a byproduct of the retreat itself and a happy outcome for every Top Left Corner retreat?

I like to think we were special. We were unique. Somehow all the planets aligned and lightening struck in the same place more times than I can count. We are all still in touch. Many of us are on facebook. Some of us are sending emails. Some are only just returning from their extended travels abroad. We are planning on meeting up again during the year and with a little luck and a fair wind many of us will manage to bring ourselves back to the lodge at Lochinver and see what we can else we can accomplish.

In the meantime, I write. I don’t manage my morning pages every page when real life invades but on those days I can feel I didn’t do them. I’m cranky and grumpy and less able to be calm. I’m not writing my blog every day as despite the alarm going off at 5 am I am still just as good at turning it off. This post is a day late. I haven’t written a word on the novel for about 7 days which I’m ashamed of.

But what and who I have taken away with me will last me a lifetime and help me fulfill some of my lifelong dreams.  What more could I have asked for?   Oh, I know.....everyone will buy my book when it gets published!  LOL!!!!

Writer's Retreat - Part 5

But the end was nearing and I could feel it.



An unexpected bonus to the retreat was the expanded cast of characters who would enter our daily routine and enhance it in ways unimaginable with little unexpected opportunities to watch, listen, learn and embrace. One day we were treated to a visit from Helen who runs a lovely business dying her own wool for knitting. When she arrived with her tubs of yarn I had to resist just jumping in. Her skeins varied from delicate 2 ply to the big thick and chunky. The yarn had combinations of cashmere, mercona, alpaca. They all felt wonderful as they caressed your hands. The colours came from within Helen’s own imagination and largely echoed the vibrant nature outside the windows of the surrounding Assynt basin.

Or Phil who just occasionally joined us for a walk and as magically as he appeared, he would disappear.

Or Martin, an Iyengar yoga instructor with eye popping blue shorts, who had an exquisite command of every muscle and could move each in isolation of another. He urged me to hold poses for longer than I ever had and stretch my shoulders out way beyond the boundary of the Arctic Circle in a downward dog. And boy, I felt that stretch in the morning.

And John who greeted us and helped lug our bags about on the first awe struck evening, spent the first night with us and then vanished never to be seen from again.

But what had I really accomplished? My objectives were vague. I had always loved writing but felt that my writing lacked depth and was one dimensional. I had written a journal from the age of 9 until I was 36. For some reason I stopped when I met my husband and in the intervening 10 years have completely failed to pick it back up again. My blog was an outlet for a while but that too fell into disregard when I ran out of ideas. I suppose I needed to discover if there was more to my writing than just my day to day, self-indulgent capture and recapitulation of what happened in the last 24 hours.

I needed to discover if I had a creative bone in my body; if my imagination could soar with the eagles. If I had the power to move people with my words the way so many authors have done and continue to do for me when I read. Could I actually take all these ideas for novels, short stories, and journalism articles in my head and put them down on paper? And if I did would they be worth reading.

During the week I discovered that I could indeed get the words out of my head. In total I wrote more than 30,000 words not including my morning pages and my daily journal. I started my novel writing the plot arch, most of the character profiles and the first 4 chapters. I am very happy with how Chapter 1 reads although I am still tinkering. I wrote several professional articles which I am hoping to send into to professional journals. I wrote some more articles which I hope to get published in magazines. I wrote poetry! I’ve never written a poem in my life but somehow the people, the place eeked the words from me and they landed on the page resembling something that vaguely resembles a poem. I’ve submitted it to the Royal Berkshire Poetry Competition. It won’t win but I did it.

I write my morning pages most mornings. I’ve skipped them a couple times since I’ve been back and I can feel that impact the rest of the day; my state of mind is distracted and grumpy. I am forcing myself up out of bed at 5:45 in the morning to make sure I have time before work, children, the rest of my life invades this precious space.

I’ve written quite a few lengthy blog posts which you know if you are reading this. I’ve loved writing about it. I cannot recommend this retreat highly enough if you, like me, harbor a desire to write, or just want to see what is in that other side of your brain.

Work continues on the novel. I’ll be sure to keep you updated.

I can only imagine the sheer scale of Mandy’s exhaustion when we waved goodbye as she stood in the purple doorway. I can’t remember ever feeling the conflict of emotions as we pulled away and headed back to our other lives, our other selves, the other side of our brains.

I’ve struggled to find the left side of my brain since I’ve gotten home. My education and professional life seems to have sent that part of me into a long enforced silence. Now that the best has been awakened from its winter sleep I don’t want it to go back to bed but equally I don’t think I can do my job solely from the right side. I am trying to integrate the two.



For now, I’m a writer who just happens to also be an IT Manager by day.

Writer's Retreat - Part 4

There is earth, wind, fire and water. And then there is Mandy Haggith. She is the fifth force of nature. And nuture. She is tiny but do not for one minute think she is weak. She is strong like a hurricane is strong. And then she is as gentle as a duckling’s feather.

She is passionate about the environment and has written a fabulous book called Paper Trails about the lifecycle of paper from trees to trash. Everything she says or does includes nature. She can’t help it. Several days during the week we were given opportunities to join Mandy on a walk. You got the impression that she was going even if no one went with her so you might as well join in. Some walks were long and others were just in front of the lodge. You never knew where she might take you. But one thing that never failed was her ability to ignite your sense of wonder, heighten every sense in your body like when you were a child doing and seeing everything for the very first time. She took me to places I never knew existed inside and outside of myself.

When she speaks with you she is so thoughtful and considerate. You never get the feeling she wants to interrupt you. Or hurry you along. She just absorbs you and ignites your passion in writing, in poetry, in nature, in people.

The exercises during the week were always optional. There were no rules except to be respectful of one another which just sounded like common sense to me. Mandy held a stream of consciousness writing session at 10 each morning. Some people came to all of them, 1 person came to none of them, others mixed it up a bit. These were followed a few times by writing exercises meant to get your brain thinking inside, outside, and all around the box with the ultimate goal of encouraging and enhancing your writing input and output.

I suppose at some point I could have doubted that any or all of it would work. But that wasn’t why I was there. My logical, left side of the brain told me you are all in, darlin’, give it all you got to give it or just go home with your head hangin’. That left side of the brain sometimes speaks with a Texan accent, just so you know.

So I threw myself all in. Three or four times during the week the afternoons were punctuated with “walks”. Mandy’s definition of a walk is quite broad. One day this was a wonder out around the front garden seeing, feeling, squashing, tasting (yes, eating). I fear a few of us were expecting something bigger (like a climb up the glorious and ominous Suilven mountain) but what an unexpected pleasure to find us just wandering around in front of the lodge and finding wonder so close to where we were. You mean I don’t have to go far to find inspiration? Gee, that never ever occurred to me.

One day’s walk did push me up the side of a mountain. We didn’t go all the way to the top just to the bothy. Bothy? “What the heck is a bothy?” I hear you say (if you’re not Scottish). I just went along with it and had a certain feeling in my bones that I would know it when I saw it. The walk started out easy if a bit muddy. But I had my hiking boots on so I was appropriately kitted out. There was something satisfying in getting the boots well and truly covered in the mud. And then the walk took a more sinister turn and we were walking up some steep bits but again the path seemed to have a staircase of stone placed there by the power of nature made especially for me to simply walk up. I was gasping for air but not because I was out of shape (ok, a little bit of that) but more because the views across the landscape were literally breathtaking. Who could have guessed that the world looked like that from there?

I was sweating like a stuffed pig. I had packed for the cold, wet Scottish weather everyone had warned me about and didn’t really bring any T-shirts with me. Plus this was a walk out into the wilderness and I’d read all the alarming literature about being prepared for the weather to change at a moment’s notice. The trouble was the sun was beating down on us and I was trying to keep pace with the keener walkers in the pack. These people walked for fun and entertainment. I walk when my car breaks down. Nope, don’t walk then either. I ring a taxi.

Just when I thought I couldn’t take another step a stone structure appeared before me. So, this is a bothy. The skies had suddenly turned dark and ominous and the heavens began to spit on us. As we went entered the bothy, the heavens opened up and it rained and hailed like I’ve never seen it before. Actually, like I’ve never heard it before. The bothy has a tin roof and when the squall convinced me a military fighter jet was hovering above. We broke out our packed lunches all individually packed at the lodge that morning. In my backpack I had tucked away a tin of sardines, some crackers, a wedge of cheese, some dried apple crisps, a pear and a Green & Black’s bar of chocolate. Mandy had brought some ginger beer for us all to share. It was the best picnic I’ve ever had. We talked about the sources of our inspiration and what blocks our creativity. We all signed the bothy book which is like a guest book and packed up our rubbish to take it back down the mountain. As we stepped outside, miraculously/magically the storm stopped and the sun won the battle against the darkness. The path was a lot muddier, the puddles a lot bigger and where there had been small trickles of stream large waterfalls where thundering down the mountain.

Returning to the lodge was easier than I expected and I found myself marching like a soldier headed home. I have no idea where this reserve of energy came from but I was turbo powered. But the real magic happened in the way Mandy chatted to each and every one of us about our lives and our relationship to writing. She was interested in each and everyone of us in our own, her own special way. When she listened to you, she gave you every ounce of her attention. When she gave you advice it was constructive and supportive and imminently relevant and useful.

Just as we stepped on to the slate stones of the lodge porch the rain started to spit down on us once again as if mother nature had grown weary of keeping the threatening weather at bay. We’d only been gone a few hours but it seemed like a lifetime. By body ached and my brain had an electricity storm of its own going on. I went to my room, changed into my cozy tartan slanket with feet. I returned to the lounge and sunk into a big leather chair with my book and began to read.

Next thing I knew a gentle hand was on my knee giving me a little wobble and a soft voice was asking me if maybe I wanted to get changed for dinner. I was slightly alarmed to find that the sun had set and people were gathering in the lounge for pre-dinner drinks. When I went to sit up it was clear that my body was not in an entirely happy place. There was no way I was going to be moving any more than was absolutely necessary. I went to dinner in my slanket. Then I went to bed. And then I went to sleep like a bear out for the full count of winter.

Which was in fact the exception to the rule. I had visions of wasting away my precious writing time with sleeping and reading. As a mother I find it difficult to carve out me time to sleep in on the weekend mornings or just laze about in the evenings with a good book. I was fearful that my sleep deprivation would catch up with me or the books I was reading (Dark Fire by C.J. Sansome and Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld) would prevent me from focusing on my real mission of writing. But nothing could have been further from the truth.

On more occasion than I would like to admit, we would finish our after dinner readings and sharings, each made our own way to our own room. My brain would be full of everything I never knew was in there. I would sit down at the computer and the words would just tumble out of me. And it wasn’t just me. During the nights when the house turned quiet and the fire had died down a casual observer might have thought that everyone had gone to sleep. What they couldn’t appreciate was that our brains just didn’t turn off. Like a freight train hurtling at us without any brakes our minds would unleash themselves on to our laptops and we would frantically write to keep up with the avalanche of words coming out of us. It was like everything that Mandy said and everything that Mandy did and every word we heard and every emotion we’d ever felt purge when the silence of night descended. Nearly every one of us experienced the nighttime energy and produced seminal works in the wee small hours of the morning.

This was so much more than I could have expected, planned , hoped, dreamed, prayed, begged.  And it wasn’t over yet.

Writer's Retreat - Part 3

We were the last to arrive. We could hear voices coming from somewhere else in the house. John announced our arrival and after putting our luggage down he went looking for Mandy. The three of us stood there smiling at each other not yet having found our comfort zone.

Mandy bounded into the foyer. She looked exactly like I expected her to look but that was because we had cheated and she had friended me on Facebook the day before my departure from civilisation. She showed the three of us to our rooms and John helped us with our suitcases. We were told to meet in the lounge in 10 minutes.

1o minutes? Who does anything in 10 minutes? OK, so no long hot soak in the great big huge bath tub which could have doubled as a hot tub for 6. No splashing cold water on my face or freshening up my makeup. They were going to have to love me or leave me.

I took a quick survey of my room. The walls were a gorgeous periwinkle, cornflower blue. There were two single beds but only one of them had sheets. There were two pillows on each bed and they were huge. This is a good sign. I was slightly alarmed when I saw that the writing desk of my dreams was actually a folding table and the view of inspiration was actually out the back of the house. I had a not so lovely view of a dog run and small rubbish tip. Uh, not exactly what I expected.

I knew that I had booked late. In fact, I think I got the last spot available. Yes, I had planned this way back in April but it suddenly occurred to me when we were on holiday in Cornwall in July that I had completely failed to complete and return the booking form along with my payment. When we got home from holidays I rang Mandy in a panic and she said I could have the very last room. I knew room allocations were on a first come first serve basis and that my room would not be the one with the best view. I took solace in the fact that I had my own bath and toilet so didn’t need to share. But in that one moment, I felt a pang of disappointment.

I raced downstairs after hang up my higgly piggly wardrobe for the week thinking to myself I must have been drunk when I packed and in fact discovered I had not packed enough knickers (underwear) for the week. I was sincerely hoping no one would notice.  I was nervous to meet the others.  Who were they?  And what were they doing here?  Were they going to be authors and professionals who felt my sophomoric attempts at putting my thoughts to paper were ridiculous and more appropriate for a pre-school class?  Would I be able to write anything at all?

A fire roared in the lounge where we gathered only long enough to introduce ourselves but somehow this set the scene for everything beautiful that was to follow. We settled into the big soft brown leather sofas and all of these strangers proceeded to introduce themselves with honesty and vulnerability. They opened up about why they were here and showed us a tiny glimpse inside their souls. I immediately thought this is going to be good.

We were a diverse group but similar in so many ways. Of the 12 of us, only 1 was a man, 3 were Americans (including myself although I was the only one living in the UK; the other 2 had travelled all the way from the good ole US of A to be there), we ranged in age from 41 to 81, 2 of us had lived in Colorado (me and one of the Brits). We had a painter, a geologist, a psychologist, a sociologist, a nurse, a taxi driver, a runner and a hypnotherapist. We were cat lovers and dog lovers and animal lovers. Some had no children, some had children grown and some had children growing. And whilst our groups commonalities twisted and turned the one thing we all had in common was that we wanted to write. We wanted to write like we wanted to breathe.

After a few bottles of wine and the smells from the kitchen had wafted under our noses, we were summoned to the dining room where we enjoyed the first of many down home cooked meals (in the Scottish way) courtesy of the treasured Christine and Tina. Every night, these two lovely ladies prepared a home cooked meal with tender loving care. We ate homemade soups (carrot & coconut being my personal favourite), lasagna, fish pie, chicken curry, venison and cranberry stew and steak pies. We even ventured into true Scottish territory and had ourselves some haggis, neeps (mashed turnips) and creamed potatoes. We enjoyed gorgeous homemade puddings including a cheesecake that was simply out of this world.

After dinner we waddled our way back to the lounge, stoked up the fire and got ourselves cozy. If you felt like reading something you had written, then you were welcome to read it out. If you wanted feedback the feedback was honest but supportive and kind. If you didn’t want to read, well, you just simply didn’t read. No pressure. No judgement. No ill will.  During these sessions we laughed and we cried (just a tiny bit) but mostly we listened.  We listened with the rapt attention of a mother watching her child take their first steps.

And then the magic happened.

Writer's Retreat - Part 2

My mad dash for the taxi queue sent travelers scurrying out of my way and I hurled myself at the poor driver, grabbed his arm and promised him the world and all my money if he could get me into the centre of Inverness in the next 20 minutes. The bus station was 15 kilometers from the airport and I convinced myself I would hold my breath for the entire journey if that would reduce our drag and make us go faster. God knows, the taxi driver needed all the help he could get as he proceeded to pour out his life story to me: 4 children from 4 women and he was only 47 and didn’t I think he looked a lot younger. He didn’t seem to want my world or need my money. I snarled a speech about STDs and appropriate use of birth control. I have never wished more that I carried condoms in my handbag than I did at that moment. OK, that’s not entirely true.

Just as we rounded the corner for the station, I had a major panic attack that I had left my wallet on the counter at the airport Starbucks when I thought I had all the time in the world to enjoy a coffee as I strolled to the bus and sat back on my relaxing 1 hour bus journey. Instead I was clutching the cup as I jumped out of the taxi whilst it was stopped at a red traffic light and heaved open the boot of the taxi and started rifling through the various pockets. The poor taxi driver was speechless as he stood next to me watching me meltdown. Some of you may remember I certain trip I took a few months ago to Zurich when after enjoying a full day of polo with even fuller glasses of champagne being quaffed nonstop for nearly 6 hours I thought I accidentally left my card in the cash point machine (ATM) at the Zurich airport. I couldn’t find it when I checked into the hotel and in blind panic rang home for bank numbers and card numbers, then rang the bank and got it all cancelled before realizing I then had no way to check out of the hotel which did eventually let me check out using a debit card. The one bit of the story I haven’t exactly gone public with is that I hadn’t left the card in the cash point at all. In my drunken stupor, I had put the card in a secret stash pocket of my wallet where I had never before ventured and whilst searching for a pound for parking months later happened upon the card thinking to myself, how the hell did that get there? Stayed tuned to the very end of this long and winding road to find out about the latest adventures of my wallet.

Needless to say, my wallet was in the top pocket of my suitcase which is the home I had given it in light of EasyJet’s ban on handbags. Even women are allowed only one carry on which means that if you have a suitcase to carry on you must put your handbag or the contents of your handbag inside your suitcase. Do they know how difficult and disruptive this is? Do they care? Nuff said.

I jumped back into the taxi and apologized for being a wee bit crazy. I knew he was thinking “a wee bit”? He drove to the other side of the road and couldn’t get me out of his taxi fast enough as I threw copious wads of money at him. 15 kilometers in 15 minutes, life story of sexual irresponsibility, near catastrophic public meltdown in the middle of Inverness all for the low low price of £27. Who could ask for anything more? And this was just day 1.

Considering my lack of experience with bus stations, I found the right bus with surprisingly little difficulty despite the fact that I don’t think I properly pronounced the city of my destination, Ullapool, which is where I needed to change buses. The blessed driver even agreed to postpone his departure until I returned from the toilet. Phew. After that coffee, I was bursting and I was scared to death of being trapped on a bus with no loo for the next 2 hours and no access to facilities.

The bus wasn’t completely crowded but there were enough people partaking in the joys of public transport that I felt very green. The seat next to me was empty so unpacked my handbag which was inside my suitcase and started moving things around making my handbag much more useful. I was tweeting and facebooking until my fingers ached anticipating imminent disconnection from the grid. I surreptitiously sized up my fellow passengers looking for the two women, Kristen and Rhoda, who I had guessed would be on the same bus as I but I couldn’t spot anyone that looked like a writer. Besides, most of my fellow passengers had fallen fast asleep complete with drool down the side of their mouth and even one (perhaps two) rumbling snore(s). So, this is Scotland? I was so jazzed up on my caffeine and the adrenalin rush from the taxi journey I couldn’t even manage a yawn.

The sights outside the window were by far more compelling than my fellow traveling companions. I was soon mesmerized by the landscape passing me by. Somehow I had missed the news bulletin announcing how beautifully stunning this landscape is. All I had heard was that it rained all the time and the midges/mosquitos were evil. So far I had seen nothing other than glorious big blue skies (with some very dramatic clouds) and not a single midge had taken an ounce of flesh off me. So, THIS is Scotland!

The bus driver didn’t really announce any stops and there wasn’t an electronic billboard announcing the next stop so I was hoping it would be obvious when it was time to disembark. Since the bus stopped at Ullapool Pier and was returning to Inverness I made an educated guess that now might be the time to get off. No sooner had I got my luggage and walked round that bus than the next bus appeared.

It seems that time is a wee bit elastic in Scotland. Our bus to Lochinver was scheduled to depart at 4:52 but at 4:55 we were still sitting there. I thought maybe someone had gone to the toilet and we were waiting for them which was only kind considering they done it for me. But at 5:05 we were still sitting there. I resisted my standard mode of operation which would have been to go up and find out what was going on. I figured I had no place to be by any specific time so no skin off my back. You have no idea how liberating that was! Soon another bus arrived and a whole bunch of people got off that bus and got on to our bus. Seems there is a ferry in Lochinver and if our bus had left those people would have been stranded for the night away from their home. Waiting is not a bad thing.

But apparently being late is. The bus driver decided this was his opportunity to practice his Formula1 skills: twisting, turning, up, down, oncoming traffic be damned even if that is a lorry. Thoughts began to race through my mind: I think I’ll just close my eyes, no, that won’t work, oh god, that was a really bad idea, I think I’m going to be sick, hang on, you are going to fall into the lap of the old man with a flat cap, perhaps I shouldn’t have sat at the front of bus, oh dear those suitcases are flying, that suitcase is going to fall on me, ouch, that’s gonna leave a bruise, this may just be the end of my life, is my will up to date?

Every now and again the bus driver would stop and let someone out. Once a young, fiery red haired, Irish girl in her twenties hoisted her backpack up on to her back whilst the bus was still moving (that impressed the hell out of me) and got off when the driver stopped. I don’t know how he knew that was where she wanted to get off. And I don’t know where she was going. It had started to drizzle rain. She had no coat on. There were no cars waiting for her. There were no buildings anywhere around, only a road that headed off to the west disappearing over a hill.

I didn’t have much time to ponder her fate as I watched her disappear and the ride of my life resumed. Every couple of miles the bus would come to a stop and left off a few passengers. As the population of passengers diminished I noticed that the bars on my mobile phone had greatly diminished and I had little mobile phone signal. It didn’t really matter anyway because I didn’t dare release my grip on my seat to type out a witty text, status update or tweet. I couldn’t bear to look out the window and witness the landscape racing past me like my life before my eyes. I began to surreptitiously inspect the stragglers. Who on this bus looked like a Kristen? A Rhoda? I’ve never met a Rhoda although I’ve seen one on television. What does a writer look like? What does someone who would go on a writer’s retreat look like? I was only entirely sure that I didn’t have a clue and no one looked like they were looking for a LaDawn.

I saw the sign indicating we had arrived in Lochinver but instead of the blind good luck I’d had in Ullapool, it became clear that there was more than one stop in Lochinver and I couldn’t remember which one I needed. Before the driver could put his pedal to the metal, I raced to the front of the bus and asked if he knew where I was to get off for where I was going. He asked me where I was going.

It was at this point that I realized I didn’t know how to pronounce Glencanisp and that all I really knew was that I was going on a writer’s retreat to meet a woman named Mandy who ran a organisation named Top Left Corner. None of this came out of my mouth in any coherent way so that another human being could make any sense of it. Maybe he wasn’t really human in the way Lewis Hamilton can’t really be human. But he appeared to understand me and mumbled something that vaguely sounded like “next one” so I returned to my seat not feeling any better informed.

At this point, having revealed myself as the bus idiot, Rhoda and Kristen revealed themselves as fellow retreaters. Before we knew it, the bus had stopped again and the driver was mumbling something which sounded vaguely like “this is your stop” but could have just as easily have been “get off my bus you stupid women”. All three of us remained seated. OK, so they couldn’t understand him either. At this point he raised his voice and told us to get off the bus. Well, perhaps not those exact words but definitely words to that effect.

The trio retrieved their luggage and fell off the bus and looked for a woman named Mandy. There was no woman here but at least the rain had stopped. When only a man was in the car park I was certain there was a mistake and was ready to get back on the bus. But he introduced himself as John and asked if I was LaDawn, Rhoda or Kristen. He relieved of us our belongings and packed it all into the back of his estate car (station wagon).

Rhoda was very persistent that we stop almost as soon as we started to pop into a shop. She wanted wine and with my trip having frazzled every nerve ending, I felt that a bottle or 7 wouldn’t go astray. I also knew that the arrangements were that we were responsible for providing our own alcohol although the joining instructions had indicated wine would be provided on the first night. I didn’t want to risk running out either. I sided with Rhoda.

We crossed the road to the local Spar and whilst I bought a single bottle of wine, I was impressed when Rhoda purchased a bottle of gin. Kristen had a good nose around the shop but didn’t feel the urge for intoxication courage.

My mobile phone had lost any and all single at all as soon as we turned down the single track road towards the lodge. The sun was beginning to set and dusk was upon us. We were surrounded by breath taking scenery and were able to introduce ourselves properly to each other.

Soon we pulled up in front of the lodge. The door was purple. Who paints a door purple on a grand and genteel lodge? I hadn’t expected a purple door and now everything I thought I might find behind that door was pulled into question. What was I going to find behind that purple door? Who was I going to find behind that purple door? It started to rain and John opened the door and we stepped in.

Writer's Retreat - Part 1

I've been blocked. Just in case you have missed the bloomin' obvious I haven't posted to this site since April and even before then the frequency of my blog posts was in serious decline. I think I made some excuses about not having enough time but whilst that was certainly a factor it wasn't like the day suddenly had less than the 24 hours it had always had.

I believe I stopped writing because I didn't know what to say and I didn't know how to say what I did want to say.

I've always harboured a deep desire to be a writer, not just a blogger but a fully fledged, card carrying, published in paperback, want to see people carrying my novel around type of writer. I don't want to be famous like JK Rowling but known to my readers like Lionel Shriver or Ian McEwan: unrecognised on the street but moved to tears and/or laughter by their words.

So I finally decided to stop letting my dreams be jut dreams and trust in myself to make them a reality. But carving that time out of the chaos of my life is not only difficult, I found it quite simply impossible. I've got a full time career which to be fair has pretty much defined me for all of my adult life. I've got a husband who needs and deserves more of my attention. I've got 2 amazing children who I don't play with as much as I would like or should. I've got a high degree of commitment to my friends and communities which make it painful to say no when they need me.

This past year I have been plagued by pneumonia, back pain, weight gain, stress and general fatigue and when it all got to much I decided it was time for me to stop saying no to me and stop depositing some serious investment into my well being, emotionally, physically and spiritually.

I am back on the treadmill of losing weight. I've lost 14 pounds so far and the battle continues. I've set myself some aggressive targets but also some whopping big rewards. but the weight is a symptom not the problem. I needed to dig a bit deeper.

I decided to escape into the wilds of the northwest corner of Scotland. I haven't been to Scotland much having only been to Edinburgh twice for short weekend jaunts. This is most certainly the furthest north I've ever been in Great Britain since there isn't much more north to go before falling off into the North Sea. And the west coast is littered with only islands requiring boat, ferry, surf board which was perhaps a step too far for me this time.

I started my research back in April and decided a wee small chunk of my bonus would be spent on a Writer's Retreat. I had no idea what a writer's retreat was or what you did or what to expect. In fact, I found great difficulty in packing. Normally, I can get myself packed for a trip in under 30 minutes. But for days I circled the luggage struggling to come to terms with the dress code. What do writer's wear? What is their uniform of choice? Did I need high heels and a ball gown? Would I be allowed to wearing my pajamas all day long? At 2 am I surrendered and threw random items into my suitcase and hoped I was appropriately booted and suited.

Normally, the obsessive part of my personality ensures that I research any new venture with relentless energy and focus. I buy books about the subject. I speak to experts. I take classes. I do google searches until the wee hours of the morning. Nothing is approached without the full spectrum of the latest research committed to memory. But not with my writing.

I think writing is something you are rather than something you learn or do. I've always written and long time fans of this blog have commented on more than one occassion that I sure used to have a lot to say. But I knew that I wanted to add some dimensions and depth to my writing and I certainly didn't have a clue where to start to get the novel out of head and on to a page.

Lat Saturday, the alarm went at 5 am. I showered, dressed, agonised over what and how many books a writer takes to a retreat. Shouldn't I be reading rather than writing? But I couldn't help myself as I picked out 4. Just how much reading could one do in 7 days? A lot, if that writer couldn't write, I reckoned.

The children were eased out of their slumber bribed with the promise of a McDonald's breakfast and deposited in the car. Abigail couldn't decide if missing me was a good thing or a bad thing.

Whenever I've flown out of Luton airport, we've parked the car at the long stay and taken the bus to the departures hall. But Marc had to go round the round abouts several times before we figured out where to drop me. As I exited the car and unloaded the suitcases from the boot, I dropped the book I was carrying and it started to rain. I was trying to kiss the children and my husband goodbye, pull 2 small suitcases and keep the book and magazine from getting wet whilst trying to get the hood of my coat over my head and stay out of the way of impatient fellow travelers more eager than I invading the space behind me. I could hear the frustration in their sighs. I nearly started to cry. What was I doing? Why was I doing this? This was crazy and I had clearly lost the plot.

I entered the safety of the departures hall and found comfort in the predictability of an airport. I know what to do when I see an arrow pointing at Departures. I approached the desk, handed the small man with the perfect haircut my passport (photo id, not because I was leaving a country) and the boarding card I had printed out at home. I heaved one suitcase on to the belt becoming aware that my carry on was much heavier than my checked luggage which seemed wrong on so many levels.

I received my boarding pass back and made my way to the departure lounge to wait. I had managed to get a pretty good deal on my flight from EasyJet and I was trying to focus on the positive aspects of money saved as it became clear that the scheduled time of departure was clearly not going to be met. I don't know why I always expect EasyJet to do as they say they will. They never have in the past so why should they start that day?

Amazingly, despite a 30 minute delay in boarding the passengers, everyone was on board and we headed north landing 15 minutes before our scheduled arrival time. Clearly we passed through some space and time continuum because we almost landed before we took off with no time zone changes. Or I had already lost touch with reality and all concept of time, which is entirely possible.

There is only one building at Inverness Airport, one gate, one luggage carousel, one Starbucks (hurrah!). I had a 4 hour wait for my bus to Ullapool so I made myself comfy and immersed myself in technology fully aware that before nightfall I would be off the grid. Where I was headed had no mobile phone reception, no wi fi, no internet, no connection to the wider world other than a landline phone which I was entirely convinced I still knew how to use.

I lost track of time in twitter, facebook, hotmail, text messaging, my book, my magazine, my thoughts, my head. With about 30 minutes to go before the bus departure I decided to enquire about where and how I might purchase a bus ticket to Ullapool at the Information booth. Politely, the lady informed me that I couldn’t get there from here. My nervous breakdown was unfolding before her very eyes as I realised it was a very real possibility that I would miss the only transport that day to Lochinver and the gateway to my dreams.

Famous Friends

OK, so she's more infamous than famous but I think she will be famous one day.

This is a great article by a mummy friend of mine writing about part of her trip across America last summer.

What she did leave out was the rather panicked plea I got from her when she had made it to Detroit and been fleeced by her rental car company. Since we were on that side of the Atlantic, I had offered to help and dispensed some suitably useful advise about insurance and hire cars.

Mel is now writing a book about the experience of taking her boys on a trip of a lifetime. Give her your support!

PS In case you missed it, Mel is the author of Toasters Don't Roast Chickens, the amazing and inspiring story of how she dealt with her son's chronic health problems. It will make you think twice about the advise and prescriptions your medical professionals are dispensing. It will also force you to look at what you feed your children.