Cooking madness

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I spent a great deal of time on the weekend cooking. I do this from time to time; a cooking marathon where I spend hours and hours (and hours) in the kitchen, pottering about, stirring multiple pots on the stove, singing along to whatever music I’ve got on, ending up covered in flour or flicked pasta sauce. I’m sure many people I know think I’m absolutely insane. The fact that they are right is completely beside the point.

I love to cook. I love to eat as well (anyone who’s spent more than about four hours in my presence will attest to this), but cooking is just such fun. And it’s calming for me. I spend so much of my time filling in every second, rushing from one thing to the next, pulse just a little higher than it should be, stress levels slightly higher still. I like that. I like to be busy. But cooking gives me something to do with my time that forces me to slow down.

While I’m kneading pizza dough I’m thinking. Sometimes I’m thinking about whatever it is that I’m writing, sometimes I’m navel-gazing or working through some decision I need to make, or imagining something silly like what a great singer I’d make for the band I’m listening to.

And then I test the results on those lovely people in my writers’ group.  And they give me constructive feedback.

Again, reading

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I’ve only just realised that I didn’t actually hit, you know, ‘publish’ when I wrote this. I’m clearly a computer genius. This is a post I wrote about the Saturday of the National Young Writers’ Festival.

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The first session I attended on Saturday was called ‘When You Were Young’ and featured a number of Young Adult (YA) writers talking about books they read as children, and how those books influenced their writing. Philip Gwynne, Margo Lanagan, James Phelan and Christine Hinwood made up the panel, with Bethany Jones facilitating.

Reading. It’s important to read. Read fiction. I left this session wanting again to get lost in a book, like I did as a child, to find another world. Childhood reading is something entirely different to reading as an adult. It’s less analytical, less cynical. No less thoughtful though, I think. Childhood reading is all about imagination, about questions and wonderment. I think that adult writing can be like that too. At least I want to think it can be like that. Perhaps that’s what I was nostalgic for when I watched that man reading a book on the train platform.

Discussion moved (probably inevitably) to the occasional tendency for young adult and children’s fiction towards being overly didactic. I actually think adult fiction can be like that too, and I find it incredibly irritating. I try (the operative word here) to remember when I’m writing that readers will expect to do some work themselves, and to be able to make their own decisions about whether a character or situation is ‘good’ or ‘bad’. Children are capable of that too, and I sometimes wonder if people forget that.

The best books for me as a child were those that just presented a situation and the ideas that came along with that; presented multiple views on an event or person, and let me think about it myself. Possibly there were subtle pushes towards a particular conclusion, but they were just that: subtle. I loved stories that captured my imagination, and if they inadvertently taught me something about the world then great. It was interesting (though not surprising) to hear the writers on this panel say that, when they write, the story itself is what they think about, not its potential to teach someone something. Margo Lanagan in particular was quite passionate about the idea that children are capable of complicated thought and a story that encourages questions simply because it has presented an interesting (or disturbingly intriguing, as the case is with much of Lanagan’s writing) situation is not a bad thing.

James Phelan mentioned that reading to children when they are very young is important. Big tick for my parents. I remember Dad reading me The Hobbit as a five-year-old. I’m fairly certain that would not have been the starting point! My youngest brother is seven years younger than I am, so I got to see more of his coming to reading. ‘The Hungry Caterpillar’ and ‘Whose Legs Are These?’ were two favourites that I was able to revisit in reading to him.

My all-time favourite childhood book though was ‘The BFG’. I felt an affinity with the main character. No, I was not an orphan girl who was taken away by a friendly giant. But I was a seven-year-old girl with glasses named Sophie when I first read it (I haven’t changed my name, no, but I am a fair bit older than that now, and have invested in contact lenses). My year two teacher let me read parts of ‘The BFG’ out loud to the class.

I really must find an old copy of that book again.

What did everyone else read as a child?

Monday Project: … and there followed a moment’s silence.

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They sat by the phone together, he and she, brother and sister. Waiting. They did not look at the phone with their eyes, but their bodies tried to turn towards it. She pulled at her handkerchief, he bit his lip. The branches of the bare tree outside scratched at the window glass.

When the phone did finally ring its sound filled the room and silenced the tree. The siblings held their breath, locked in a silent argument with one another. ‘You answer it.’ ‘No, you.’ ‘I did it last time.’ ‘You did not.’ ‘Did too.’ ‘Did not.’

He answered it.

“Yes. Thank you. No thank you. No. They didn’t want us to. Yes. The crematorium. Thank you. Goodbye.”

The phone clunked as he put it down. Silence, for a moment.

“So,” she said, and dabbed at her eyes, which were not wet.

“Yes,” he replied. “We should organise the funeral.”

“We’ve already done that. They’ve already done that.”

The tree was scratching again at the window.

“What should we do then?” he said.

She pulled at her handkerchief.

“Stella?”

“Let’s eat out.” She was up, quickly, striding towards the door that led to the next room. “They would want us to celebrate, finally. I’ll wear that red lipstick with that green dress; you can wear that tie Mum always loved.”

He raised his eyebrows at his sister; he’d owned the tie more than ten years ago.

“Oh. Well, not that one then.” She removed her hand from the door knob. “What then, Stuart?”

He stood up. “Sit down Stella. We need to absorb this.”

“You’re not sitting down.”

“No. I’m not.”

The tree scratched louder. The siblings blinked at each other from opposite sides of the room. She felt she should cry, but could not. She had been sure she would be able to. He could not believe his sister was not crying; she always did. She had cried when their parents had first told them what they were going to do. (“Weak eyes,” their father had said kindly. “Just like your mother.” Their mother glowered at him briefly, through eyes filled with tears.)

Stuart had wanted to be strong for Stella, to support her while she cried, but she appeared perfectly able to support herself for now, and he felt himself close to tears instead.

“I could wear a different tie.”

“Oh Stuart.” She took a step towards him.

“Don’t. I’m hungry. Let’s go to dinner.”

—

There’s more to this story, but I’m still working on it, and hope to have it published at some point, so I’m sort of keeping it to myself at the moment. I might share a little more of it later on. Any feedback on this part would be greatly appreciated though.

I’m posting this as my response to this month’s Monday Project theme. We’ll have the next one up soon, so play along if you’re interested.

Workshopping

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I’ve got more to write about my weekend at TiNA and the National Young Writers’ festival, but I feel the need to write about this now. So please excuse the interruption.

I’ve explored this before. I know many people have had horrible, scarring workshopping experiences, but I absolutely love them. My writing would either be incredibly crap or take about five times longer to produce if it weren’t for the regular opportunities I get to have other people read my work and give me feedback. Usually I know, somewhere deep down, what’s going wrong in a piece but it helps to have someone else articulate it for me. Sometimes though, like tonight, I know there’s something wrong, but I’ve no idea what it is. I spend far too many moments in my life thinking about it, rolling it around and around in my head to no avail. Those of you who’ve read some of my writing will be aware that it’s not always the most sunny and uplifting experience, so it can be quite distressing to have it kicking about in there.

Tonight I’ve workshopped something that I’ve been writing for about a month. Last month’s Monday Project helped me further some parts of it (I’ll put the result up here and there shortly). I’d finished the first draft but I was really at the point where I needed someone to be honest with me.

And therein lies the potential problem with workshopping, I think. Firstly, honesty can be difficult to hear; but, and perhaps more importantly, it can be difficult to give. Some people don’t want to hurt your feelings, so they hold back; others don’t care how you feel, or at least don’t know how to put the word ‘constructive’ into practice. I’ve found, though, that if you go into a workshop knowing that you don’t have to listen to everyone (or even anyone) it’s much easier to listen well. I’m certainly not always good at this! (Or giving feedback…)

I’m interested to know, from those of you who don’t get feedback from others about your writing or other output, what process do you use to work through the inevitable sticky points?

Reading

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I know my last post was about needing a break from reading and writing, and I stand by that, but the other day I was standing on the platform at the train station and really missed reading. It was as if I were somehow nostalgic about it, even though I really still read every day.

There was a guy standing next to me reading a book and something about the layout of the words on the page, the font, the colour of the paper, made me yearn for the experience of reading a book that looked like that. I didn’t want to read that particular book (I can’t even remember the title, it was obviously so important to me!), but it must have reminded me in some way of a book that I must have really enjoyed.

I love old books, like a lot of people. I love them for their smell, the slightly damp texture of their softened pages, the tiny text that sometimes bleeds a little, the beautiful fabric hard covers. But most of all I love them because they are someone else’s world. Someone else has lived through the experience of reading that book. Perhaps carrying it around with them, perhaps loving it, hating it, not even really remembering it. The characters and story world have formed a certain picture in their minds. The book might have moved them to tears or made them laugh.

But the man on the train platform was not reading an old book. The book was new, so it (probably) didn’t have that history. What it did have was a layout I’ve found common to new books coming out of small publishing houses. I’m not a typesetter, or a graphic designer, so I don’t know font names, but it’s a particular font, simple to look at but definitely computer-, rather than typewiter-generated. The page margins are wide. The spaces between lines are generous. Does anyone know the layout I mean?

I haven’t picked up a book yet this week. I’ve stuck to magazines. I think I’m trying to make myself really hungry for it. I’m sure this weekend at the National Young Writers’ Festival will help!

Testing

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So, ummm, I’m an iPhone nerd. I love the thing. And I thought that if I downloaded the wordpress application I might be more likely to update regularly. We’ll see.

This is a test post, just to see if it works. I don’t even have any writing or reading to write about on here today, since I’ve done neither today. I’m writing every second day at the moment, and today’s an off day. I don’t have a legitimate reason for the lack of reading, just that I didn’t feel like it on the train this morning.

That’s something I feel is important; allowing yourself to have a break, and (this is the bit I struggle with) not feeling too guilty about it. Sometimes I just need some time off reading and writing to feel like I even exist in the world, if that makes sense.

Tomorrow, though, is a writing day. I’m looking forward to my cup of tea and page of words to change.

I’m going to try to be good

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So I’ve been pretty useless with updating this blog. I always say I’m going to, and then I never get around to doing it.

But I’m going to say, again, that I’m going to try to be good and update it regularly. Occasionally I might be sneaky and do shared posts with the Monday Project. But mainly, I’ll try to update this space with tidbits about writing and reading. I might even post a few pieces of fiction here again.

In that vein, today I finished the first draft of a short story I’ve been working on for a little while now. It’s got a long way to go, but the first draft is always the hardest bit. I’m hoping to do a lot more work on it this week, and have something that I’m comfortable presenting in class next week. We’ll see!

Next weekend I’m headed up to Newcastle to go to the This Is Not Art festival, of which the National Young Writers’ Festival is part. I’m excited about, well, almost all of the events! I’m hoping to catch up with a few people, including Miss Literary Minded, and a number of friends of mine who live in Newcastle.

I’ll try to be good and post some about it!

Writing exercises

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This semester I’m doing just the one subject at uni, in an effort to slow down. It’s a short story workshop, which is right up my alley, because I love short stories (to read and write). Each week we’re being given an exercise to explore the various elements of stories (short or long, really); character, place etc etc. I thought I might share them each week.

For last week’s class we had to take a character from one of our stories to the supermarket. In writing, that is. I’m working on a short story I wrote last year — and that needs a lot of improvement! — so any feedback would be more than welcome.

I’ll also be posting these entries on The Monday Project.

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The supermarket is only just opening when Bella steps off the bus. This is her favourite time to shop because the place is virtually empty and she can be as slow as she likes without worrying that she will in someone’s way.

She recognises the cashier at the only open register and attempts a smile, but is rebuffed with a look of confusion and lack of recognition. The girl is here every week, but Bella supposes there’s not much interest in remembering a little old lady with a squeaky fabric grocery trolley. She certainly wouldn’t have been interested when she was the girl’s age. Bella sighs and moves to the toilet paper and laundry powder end of the supermarket. She has always moved through the supermarket this way, ‘backwards’ as her husband put it on the few times she convinced him to come shopping with her. He hated supermarkets and couldn’t understand the sense of freedom she found in them. “They depress me,” he used to say, but would not, or could not elaborate further.

After comparing the prices, Bella chooses the least expensive toilet paper, which is unfortunately located on the top shelf, almost out of her reach. She will have to risk an avalanche of toilet paper to get a packet down. She looks around her. There is no one in the aisle; no one who could help. On her tip toes, her hand on the handle of her cart to push herself a little higher, Bella manages to knock the paper towards herself and move out of the way to let it drop to the floor. She smiles. Last time she knocked down four or five packets and was too embarrassed to ask for help, so piled the packets on the floor neatly. Later that day, when she got home, she realised that the store probably had cameras and that the store manager could have watched the whole thing. She had caught two extra buses to shop in another supermarket for the next three weeks.

She carefully crosses toilet paper off her list with a pencil from her dress pocket. Laundry powder is also on the list. Thankfully her favoured brand is usually found on the bottom shelf — she assumes this is because not many other people buy it. Sometimes it is not in stock, but today she is in luck. Another straight pencil line on her list.

Monday Project – Brave

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You said once that she thinks too much about the future. She always denied it. Lately, she has been carefully building various plans and putting them away in little boxes under the stairs. From time to time she will pull out an existing box and look through it, get excited, take steps towards making that box her life and then, without explanation, hurriedly put the box back in its place under the stairs.

Month upon month she adds to the delicate pattern of squares under the stairs, watching on as you use the same ragged bag to pack hasily made plans into and head off into the world. Reckless, she calls you, bull at a gate. But she sighs heavily and sleeps badly.

The plan boxes grow dusty and she grows grumpy and loses weight, perhaps from all the extra fidgeting. She drinks too much red wine and laughs too long and loud. Sometimes her heart beats faster without explanation, her hair quivers at the roots and her hands and face grow hot. You cannot help her because she will not answer your calls.

One night she wakes up shivering and sweating. She showers and eats breakfast in the quiet dark of 3am. Into a small bag she throws some probably inappropriate clothes, says farewell to the cat and leaves the house, stopping only momentarily to smell the mustiness of the cavity under the stairs. Reckless, the boxes whisper to her.

She pulls the door shut behind her, watches her breath create clouds in the cold air and wonders if she will see you somewhere out there.

———–

This is my submission for this month’s Monday Project. This theme is particularly potent for me at the moment because I am struggling with my own bravery (or lack thereof!). Perhaps I should read this book again for inspiration.