Fi Benson

Who am I thanking?

2012-01-04T04:02:00.000-08:00

Thank you for the music ... cue for a song. But I've been pondering. Who am I thanking?

Ancient peoples making random harmonious sounds, that's music. But for me to pick up a piece of sheet music and be learning to sing it (I've joined a choir), or play on the new digital piano that Santa brought, there has to be musical written language - notation.
Who thought originally of doing this?
(I'm reminded of the joke about milking a cow - who was the person to think 'what a good idea, we'll pull at that critter's udders').
And visually and structurally, with staves and bar lines and dotty notes, written music follows the same rules whether I'm reading the music for 'when the saints go marching in' or a piece of Mozart. So do all nationalities, with all their different languages (Greek, Japanese, Swahili?) all start learning notation with the 'Every Good Boy Deserves Favour' mnemonic?
Hmmmm ...
Any answers or insights anybody?

Making The Most Of

2011-12-02T03:03:00.000-08:00

A writer-friend recommended the following article, and now I'm recommending it to any of you writerlies who want to hear some good suggestions on how to make the most of the research and early draftings you do towards finished pieces.

'Tis interesting and useful.
If you enjoy it, if you'd like me to include further blog links here in my own blog, let me know.

http://hopeclark.blogspot.com/2011/10/writer-is-multi-talented-multi.html

More haste, less hash

2011-12-01T03:04:00.000-08:00

Okie dokie,
that twitter address for my good self is @Fibenson1.
See, this is what you get when you dash, an unnecessary desire for hash.
Let this be a lesson (to me)

Busy Bee

2011-12-01T02:44:00.000-08:00

Buzz, buzz ...
It's been a hectic few writerly months.
My epublished Hang On A Minute! - on Amazon for Kindle UK & USA - has sales nicely trickling in, I've written two children's books that I'm merrily revising-and-hawking, revising-and-hawking, I'm almost finished the anthology Through The Skylight - humour & travel, and I've started to write a supernatural thriller (ooooo, spoooky!).
I'm gaining much from LinkedIn sub-group discussions and I've switched from PC to Mac (actuarlly I'm ambidexterously using both at the moment until I get the full hang of the Mac-machine, having fun).
And I've started to tweet - I cannot tell you how perfectly the Twitter concept suits my butterfly modus operandi .... oh, I just did. I'm at ... hache fibenson1 (hmmm, where's the hash key on the mac keyboard .. must find out ...)
What you up to, followers??

No Time To Waste

2011-07-19T08:47:00.000-07:00

A member of my online writing group – who has a full time teaching job and a young child - asked everyone how they fitted in time for writing with the demands made by the rest of their lives, how they made their writing time productive. I’m repeating here what I replied ...

I think there are two separate issues here.

The first is the fact that a common difficulty for writers - other than the A list-ers and maybe it's the same for them (because marketing & promotion is damned time-consuming) but they just don't say it - that there isn't enough time for actual writing, there are too many distractions.

Especially if most of one's hours are taken up with paid employment and/or family or domestic roles.

Easy to feel impatient during precious writing time, easy to feel as if you're not getting anywhere unless you have made the available writerly hours count.

I'm a full-time writer but I still have occasions of impatience, a discontent that I haven't completed more pieces and have them out, out, out, looking for a pay-return home. There's always so much that we want to have done, so many ideas that we want to follow up, it's easy to be unhappy with the amount of output we feel we've achieved. Especially when we know there's likely to be a lengthy wait to find out whether editors, publishers, producers are accepting our hard work - and make us feel that it's all been worthwhile - or rejecting us - which makes us feel ... rejected ... and of course unpaid. Bad, very bad, why did we waste our time, we must get on, get on, get on with it ....

This discontent does have some value when it -

makes us set deadlines for ourselves to have finished this or that piece of work, tightens our focus;

keeps us at our writing desk (or equivalent) beyond the point when we might have thought 'that's enough for now' - or as Stephen King referred to it in his 'On Writing' - gives us 'butt glue'.

But ... we shouldn't get carried away with revering 'product' as the one and only criteria for our overall and ongoing artistic success . Creativity involves process, and can't be converted into the desired final product without that effectiveness of process.

So when we're analysing objectively what we've achieved, we need to take into account the 'value added' by activities or reflections that have enhanced the process but not necessarily yet been converted into finished product.
This is all very corporate-sounding because to be a professional creative (whether it's writing, art, music) you have to have a business perspective. But to be creative per se you need to acknowledge what the process of creation needs, nurture it, give it the same respect as the final result. The creative process needs freedom to grow, stimulus to inspire or unlock it, space for play & experimentation. Creativity is an unstructured and unpredictable entity. Which leads to frustration for the person trying to capture it in a given period of time. Which is why, in our impatient modes, we feel that hours spent on the process without a definable product is wasted, unproductive. But if the process isn't properly fed and watered it's going to pass out and die before it gets to the outcome destination.

Whenever I feel impatience coming on I call to mind -

a description of writing that I came across years ago, referring to the activity as 'constructively staring into space'

the relatively non-prolific output of acclaimed (and one of my favourites) writer Kazuo Ishiguro (who's had only about half a dozen books published throughout his entire career)

the classic writer - I think it was Dickens - who described how he'd once spent a whole morning putting in a comma, and the whole afternoon taking it out

the fact that David Fanshawe, reputed to be one of the world's most original composers, spent 10 years travelling across the Pacific continent to come up with his African Sanctus (latin mass with African music merged). I met Fanshawe once, attending a live lecture from him about his life. When he talked about those 10 years he pointed out that he had no commission, did not have any guarantee about what would be his musical results of those years or whether anybody would pay for them and that writers and artists had to be passionate about doing what they were doing for the actual doing of it, and just keep going, keep going, keep going

my recently learning that the script of the brilliant (imho) contemporary film 'Inception' also took 10 years in the writing (Chris Nolan, the writer, obviously working on other stuff in the meantime, like the Batman Dark Knight film, but still)

So, we need to go easy on our manic urgency for speedy product output.

A couple of other things can help us have a better relationship with our writing time.

The first is our aspirations to perfection. I'm not about to say that making sure we do a good job of our writing isn't important, it clearly is. But 'a good job' doesn't always have to be the Ultimate in Perfection. John Fowles put out his The Magus for publication even while he was not totally satisfied with it, but he thought it was good enough to be published, which it was, to acclaim. Sometimes we need to say to ourselves, that's the best I can do at the moment, let's finish there and get it sent out.

This was borne home to me with my very first publication success, a story in a national magazine. I subscribed to the magazine so was familiar with it. I'd studied the nature and length of the short stories already published in that mag. I wrote my story, sent it to them, heard nothing for four months. I took my copy of the manuscript out of its 'pending' drawer, read it through again, decided that it had loads of weaknesses I hadn't noticed when I'd sent it out. I wouldn't publish it either, is what I thought. But I thought I'd just write to the magazine, ask them to confirm that they weren't using the story and could they give me feedback. They wrote back with a 'sorry for the delay, yes we'd be delighted to publish your story'. Really? Hurrah! Readers loved it. It was accessible, coherent, interesting. The fact that it didn't reach my current literary standards wasn't an issue. This was a big lesson in the subjectivity of views of perfection.

So, the first issue is how we perceive accountability of our 'pure' writing hours. The second is how to make the writerly, creative most of the time that's taken up with getting on with the rest of our lives.

There are loads of ways that we can be developing our writing without actually being sat 'doing writing'. Some of them very simple. We have to find the ways that suit our individual personalities, lifestyle and commitments. Mine include:

getting out and about to new places - can be done will all the family, with friends, alone - paying particular attention to the sensual detail of the place - sounds, smells, etc - building up a bigger repertoire of potential settings or partial settings for our tales;

reading - and this can include reading to our small children - which stimulates the story-telling imagination, introduces us to new types of characters, extends our vocabulary and ideas of symbolism, exposes us to structure of stories and character development;

jotting - noting down bits and pieces, fragments, of ideas, phrases, observations - on whatever scrap of paper that's to hand, then collecting them all together as a stimulus resource for later stirring of imagination or putting wholesale into a longer piece when we're doing the focussed stuff. I put all mine in what I refer to as my 'paragraph book', even though there's all sorts of tiny bits of stuff in there. For example, one morning a long time ago I was out in the garden with my rise-at-dawn son, outside so that the rest of the tribe weren't woken up and beginning the attention-demand day prematurely. While I was playing with son I made some visual observations that I jotted down on an envelope in my pocket. Thus:

the sun is breaking through curtains of mist, bringing to three-dimensional life the two-D silhouettes of the firs on the wooded valley I'm overlooking ...

the landline phone rings and because it has been days since I heard it, the Godfather theme tune does not immediately resonate with my brain response, and when it does it has stopped and the mobile's ringing instead. Who would ring this early?

They're tiny snippets, but they're keeping the creative muscle exercised ...

I hope some of this is valuable for any writers following the blog! Leave me a comment and let me know your opinions on this discussion.

Hang On A Minute! Day 1

2011-07-01T06:37:00.000-07:00

I am having an extremely motivating and transformational birthday month.
I've been learning 'epublishing'. I started to skate along this particular learning curve because my From Wear To Wye book has sold well locally but is imprisoned in a bookshop in the woods. I have regained the publishing rights and was going to court another, bigger publisher. Or find an agent. Well, folks, that was only a couple of months ago but I've so moved on!

I'm undertaking an epublishing apprenticeship with From Wear To Wye, which I've rebranded as 'Hang On A Minute! Tales of a writer's life in the ancient Forest of Dean' (there are search keyword reasons for such a long subtitle btw). And I've taken those tales into the global playground, to meet new people, make new friends, new sales, new readers who want to read more of my work.

Initially, I've published via Amazon Kindle, and via the free download available for Kindle for the pc (see links below). But I'm learning, learning, learning ... and more global publishing platforms are to be undertaken in the very near future (could be next week for one of 'em).

I have no qualms at all about epublishing/self-publishing. Any form of publishing does not guarantee you sales. It's all about the promo and the distribution, honeys. To epublish is to give you global distribution. That's quite a big market you know. And it's free. You don't pay money up front, Amazon Kindle etc take a proportion of the sale price per book (just like trad publishers).

But unlike traditional publishers, the epublishers don't take the lion's (lioness's) share. I received 15% of my paperback price. I receive 70% of my epublished copies.

Nice.

Even when you set the price low to attract more readers (HOAM is £2.15 to download), you're still able to get paid more per book.

Oh, the delicious control of it! It feels great!

You still need to work at promoting your book - just like you do with traditional publishers - but that's only fitting really, it's your book.

But you don't have to wait months and months - maybe forever - for publishers & agents that you are courting to stop playing hard to get and tell you how they feel.

It is so motivating, I just can't tell you ... well, I can, because I am. It's marvellous!!!

And for any of us who are writing genre material - fantasy, science fiction, horror - there's a huge and hungry market. Huge. And hungry ...

Below find my Kindle blurb and the relevant links.

And that's enough for day one, except to say that I've already made 2 sales - including one in Ireland that I didn't have to travel to in order to promote or sell - and that's 2 more than I've sold in months.

More, much more, anon

From Kindle Store:

"Whether she's communing with a dead composer, performing to an audience of uni-cycling cherubim or time-travelling through a gateway in the woods, Fi Benson's tales are filled with cheery nuggets of wisdom and hearty laughter. Hang On A Minute! is a collection of tales about Fi's life as a writer and dramatist in the ancient Forest of Dean. Wry and quirky, her stories sparkle with faerie dust and provide a magical introduction to a beautiful setting.

'That one little book has made me feel better than 6 months of therapy'

'Fi's vivid characters make me laugh - they remind me of the people I know'

'Totally absorbing'

'Has she written the next one yet?'"

It's epublished in Amazon's Kindle Store - if you haven't a Kindle you can read the book on your computer via the free download 'Kindle for pc' with the following link: http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=kcp_pc_mkt_lnd?docId=1000426311

For UK, it's £2.15 and available at: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=Hang+On+A+Minute&x=14&y=25

In USD, it's $3.43 and available at: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Ddigital-text&field-keywords=Hang+On+A+Minute&x=13&y=21

Writing autobiography - risky business

2011-04-28T03:42:00.000-07:00

The seven tales that I wrote for my anthology 'From Wear To Wye' are all explicitly autobiographical. By explicitly I mean that I name names, referring directly to family members and friends, so I talk about them in material that is intended for, and has reached, the public domain ...

Depending on what you say and how you say it, doing this can quickly lose you those beloved family and friends, so you have to be careful, careful, careful. Especially since, as much as we like to think we know some folk inside out, we actually don't. Who of us shows everything to anybody except perhaps a miracly-discovered soul mate (come on, it has to be a miracle, what are the odds against that ever happening). So the risks are high that your view of something you're saying about somebody being completely harmless, inoffensive, and actually true, aren't guaranteed to be received that way by the somebody themselves.

Tricky.

My anthology tales comment on happenings from the past, from my personal history, and of course from the personal history of everyone I mention in the book. But much more risky it seems is writing autobiography for a family member and actually writing their lives ahead of where they are now. Because I've just finished reading A S Byatt's 'The Children's Book' - which I borrowed from Ross-on-Wye public library but which I love so much I'm intending to shell out some of my small-but-special writer's income to purchase my own copy of the book. I wanted to start reading it again the moment I'd finished it - and a character in the book is a writer who is writing autobiography ahead of the game for one of her children. With dire consequences. Of course, this is the fabulous Byatt, and none of what I'm describing is as simple as this summary of it. But it did make me think more deeply about the implications of giving an opinion about somebody in a public work, and the risks of that opinion becoming self-fulfilling.

Tricky.

'From Wear To Wye' is published by Doug Maclean Publishing in Gloucestershire, but remaining copies now available only from my good self, if you'd like details of how to buy a copy put your enquiry in a comment to this posting, I'll find ye ...

What do you get when ...

2011-04-14T00:11:00.000-07:00

... you cross a writer with a meeting-of-like-minds opportunity?

A 3-hour conversation in the cafe at Taurus Crafts Arts Centre (better order another coffee since we're taking up a table)
and
a 3-hour conversation in the bar at Cafe Rene (better order another drink since we're taking up a table).

It's good to talk!

The Echo-Children

2011-04-11T08:55:00.000-07:00

In a recent posting I was telling you about the first of my three days at a primary school local to Gloucester City who have been having a Celebrate Gloucester week. I worked for three mornings with years 1 - 3, so 5 - 7 years old. At the start of each session I chatted with them about where they personally liked in Gloucester. Not necessarily where the obvious tourist attractions might be but where they themselves liked to be. Maybe there was a particular little lane, or shop window, or building, that they particularly liked. The overall concept was for the children to create personalised tour guides for my bear Ursula who lives with me in a cottage in the woods and has never been to Gloucester ...

The children had the choice of creating the tour guide in a comic strip paper-based form, or of creating a piece of performance ... with a narrative ... using settings from around the city.

I've already mentioned the tale of Ursula's Scary Visit To Gloucester created by the children on day one of the project. Days 2 and 3 brought tales of the homeless (princesses all dressed up and nowhere to go), two silly secret agents (Peter Sellers' Inspector Clouseau would have been proud of their slapstick performance I'm certain), a boat crash on the canal (Oopsie!) and an enchanting tale of children who could throw their voices, by echo, all the way from Gloucester docks to the Forest of Dean.

All of the tales were performed to an audience that consisted of the bear and the other children in the group.

On the third and final day, there happened to be over 20 children in the overall group, so several performance pieces took place. As the last one finished, a child who had been an enthusiastic audience member but not in any performances herself, shouts across the room to me to ask 'which one did you like the best?'

'Which one did you like best?' I counter, because I don't feel it's appropriate for me to show favour based on the limited time they've all had to create their pieces.

The questioning child is around 5 years old, but one of those 5 year olds that are going on 30, you know the ones. So she repeats her question. I like all of them equally, I tell her. And she gives me a look that tells me in no uncertain terms that she knows I have a favourite, that she knows which one it is, and she wants me to declare it.

I resisted. And after a brief internal struggle with herself, the little lass decided not to persevere.

But I'll tell you ... it's the echo-children that return to me every time I visit Gloucester city.

The image that accompanies this posting is one I took during the Crucible sculptural art exhibition that was held at Gloucester Cathedral last year.

I visited the exhibition several times but I've never worked out why we were warned to 'take care'. Danger! Look out! There's a sculpture about! I wonder what the echo-children would have made of that?

The Bear Truth

2011-03-30T07:09:00.000-07:00

Here's a picture of the lady herself, Ursula the bear.

I found her a few years ago, sat inside the doorway of a charity shop in Coleford, which is one of the Forest of Dean market towns.

She has been a valuable colleague during many of the drama and writing workshops that I do in primary schools. Mainly through her active listening skills - the 'active' not a mean feat considering her biological status - when a child has needed an ear to which to tell a story or a poem and all the live grown-ups are busy with other children. Well done that bear!

Even though, when I first adopted Ursula, neighbours warned me about taking her into Forest schools (I'm sure they were joking) because of the following Forest of Dean myth ...

In 1889 four Frenchmen came to the Forest with two Russian bears which they exhibited in the forest town of Cinderford. The troupe headed for the nearby village of Ruardean - either because they were already intending to, or because they were being chased. A popular myth at the time was that foreign bear-keepers fed the bears on the flesh of children, and a rumour had spread throughout Cinderford that the Russian bears had killed a child and seriously attacked a woman. The residents gave challenged the Frenchmen, chased after them and their bears, caught up with them, viciously attacked the Frenchmen and killed the innocent bears. Some of the Ruardean residents took pity on the Frenchmen and rescued them from the attack.

The attackers were caught and charged with their crime, but during the legal process they were wrongly referred to as being residents of Ruardean, not Cinderford. The mistake created longlasting scorn and lingering 'tribal' animosity.

Two interesting links here ...

For a description of the attackers' sentences, see Notes from the Offences Book of Drybrook Police Station 3 May 1889, in the Forest of Dean Family History Forum, http://www.forest-of-dean.net/fodmembers/index.php?mode=thread&id=986
And for a BBC article about the remains of the bears being discovered in a vegetable patch, see http://www.bbc.co.uk/gloucestershire/weirdwest/2004/11/bear.shtml

All I can say is that Ursula is the best two quid I've ever spent.

Ursula in Gloucester City

2011-03-29T07:52:00.000-07:00

I've been working in a primary school in Gloucester today, leading a comic strip and performance devising workshop with a group of 5 - 8 year olds. The school is having a 'Celebrate Gloucester City' week, and I'm there for three days as part of a creative programme offering lots of creative activities to lots of different groups of pupils.

What fun!

So stimulating to work with four small children who were bursting, just bursting, with ideas for a performance story. I love devising by improvisation, it's like letting your imagination into an adventure playground.

The children came up with 'Ursula's Scary Visit To Gloucester', a delicious ghostly story that took in the cathedral (of course), the railway station (not sure why Ursula was going to Scotland for three days but at least she came back because she was missing Gloucester), and the little cafe stall in the indoor market that apparently does great hot chocolate and marshmallows (who knew!).

Ursula is my bear by the way.

More on Ursula tomorrow.

For now, just well done to this morning's group who devised, rehearsed, dress-rehearsed and performed the play - to an audience of some other pupils and Ursula her furry self - in a morning.

I'm working with a different group tomorrow morning, same theme, same workshop, but there'll be massively different results. I'm looking forward to it immensely.

Emerging From The Mist

2011-03-26T07:52:00.000-07:00

From my garden.

Just like the mist is clearing over the valley,

I'm gaining a better view of

my writerly aspirations.

I've opened a new page in this journal, My Writing, where I'm posting pieces of my work. I hope you pop in to take a look at the page, and I hope you like what's there.

Walking on water III

2010-08-07T05:29:00.000-07:00

There! :-)

Walking on water II

2010-08-07T05:25:00.000-07:00

Hmmm, I'm not so sure you believe me, I'll find a clearer water-walker, hang on, checking the million photos now ... hasta la vista, wiv another piccie, spk soon

Walking on water

2010-08-07T05:12:00.000-07:00

So there I was driving away from the Create building on the Brunel Lock in Bristol, and the sun was shining, and I was full of the joy of a beautiful day, so full that there wasn't any room for brain cells ... clearly ... because instead of taking the lane that would put me nicely on the road back towards the Forest and a planned meander in Chepstow I found myself heading along the A370 under the Clifton Bridge and heading towards Nailsea, Blackwell and the like ... Having made this mistake before I knew that it was a divil of a road to find a place to turn round ... so I didn't bother and substituted Chepstow with Weston.

Hadn't been to Weston for years 'n years.

Stayed there till sunset, visited the International Sand Sculpture Festival, had vegetable jalfrezi and sag paneer on the harbour steps, watched people walking on water ...

No sh*t, they sooooooo were, I have the photos to prove it. See! You'll have to look closer, that sort of thickening in the middle-ish, that be a person ...

I didn't have time to walk on water meself, but I plan on a return visit to do just that, oh and buy pewter sea-horses at the market. And eat more of the Cinnamon Indian take away food watching the sun go down on the sea ...

Advance dates for your diary

2010-03-24T06:17:00.000-07:00

I'm the speaker at an informal get together, as part of a series of speaker-ed coffee mornings, at the New Inn pub in Ruspidge, Forest of Dean. Website is: www.newinnruspidge.co.uk and phone number is 01594 824508.
I'll be doing a reading from my 'From Wear To Wye' anthology, and will be answering questions and generally chattering to anyone who's there and wants to ask or chatter along with me. The pub's in the traditional style and I like that it's putting on as wide a range of activities and events as it can while staying in the trad style of pub. Very friendly, very cosy.
That date is Tuesday 6th April, day after Easter Monday. Reasonably priced soup and a roll on offer. And my chatter o'course :-)

Another date, Saturday evening 22nd May, Lydbrook Church of Holy Jesus - the big one on the hill going out to Joys Green. I'm leading and reading in 'On That Note' - an evening in the company of local writers, with musical interludes. I'll post the flier once it's finalised, but the writers are me with my autobiographical/travel journal tales ... Christina Hollis, writer of Harlequin tales - but we're in church, right, so Christina will be reading from her short stories, the Harlequins will be available on sale, and Rebecca Tope, writer of popular series, the Cotswold Mysteries and also the writer of the Rosemary and Thyme crime novels.
More details to follow, but there'll be readings and a question and answer time, and music in between. Not to mention the absolutely gorgeous church as setting, tis beautiful!

That's me for now
Back soon, cos I still haven't mentioned the Monmouth event last Monday

What time is it Mr Wolf?

2010-03-24T06:01:00.000-07:00

Blimey oh, look at the time, it's March! How did that happen?

Since the last posting back in December I have been busy ...

being entranced by the extended snowfall ... high on a hill in me cosy coat, yodel a-ee, yodel a-ee, yodel-a-ee-o ... up Worral Hill in the freezing cold, yodel a-ee, yodel a-ee, yodel-ayyyyyy ...

I can't think that's how you spell all those yodels though, ne'er mind.

The 'high on a hill' lines are the start of a poem that I performed at Maggie Clutterbuck's Poetry Evening at the Annexe in Lydney in February, great fun evening. The poem's called 'The Important Question', it's definitely a winter-seasonal poem, so maybe catch me for a rendition next winter ...

Further writings from the snowbinding include the tale 'The Anagantian Enchantment', well, it's called that at the moment, but it might also appear as 'Lullaby', haven't decided yet. Marquez seems to have squeezed his fabulously magic-realist way into it too

writing Sea-Fruit for the Coleford Festival of Words' March cabaret at the Kavern Bar in Coleford ...

working with some gifted and interestin' children at Steam Mills primary school in the Forest, doing a project called 'The Weather Machine'. The school has its own weather station, which I think is very, very cool ...

playing country kitchen and making loadsa Indian food and spicy stews

meandering ... more of that in postings-to-come and in my next book of tales which I'm busy compiling, hope to have a publisher for the finished version some time late summer or early autumn

supporting the fundraising for Lydbrook Church, more of that anon

preparing for my firstest ever visit to the US, more of that anon also

writing Wolf Month, another tale for the CFOW cabaret evening methinks

Anyways, that's a quickie summary just so we're all catched up ... sort of.

My next posting won't be so long in coming, because I just have to tell you about a great pub in Monmouth that I visited for the first time on Monday evening - the pub that is, I've been a Monmouth-loiterer for decades

Hope you're all well!

xx

Hmmm, where's the darn piccie?

2009-12-08T03:25:00.000-08:00

Image referred to in the most recent posting seems to have dropped through its own perforations ... let's see if I can catch it and post it here as per original intention ...

Ah, here it is above ...

Past Decembers - an image

2009-12-02T09:44:00.000-08:00

Once on a winter solstice ...

Naming the blog - first up - Daldinia

2009-12-02T08:16:00.000-08:00

Okie dokie, I've had a think about naming the oh-what-an-ugly-word Blog. I've decided there's absolutely no way I'm going to come up with a name that I'm going to like continuously, for ever and ever ...

So in the spirit of self-awareness I see the only resolution to be choosing a name For Now (this is not the name by the way, it's a personality trait ...) and then changing it whenever I feel like it. It's my blog after all.

I've decided name one will be Daldinia.
It has a certain ring to it.
Literally as it happens, because daldinia is a type of fungus (yes, I did say fungus), whose full name is 'daldinia concentrica' or it could be concentricus, but I don't think that's important really.
Daldinia concentrica is more commonly known as King Arthur's Rings
Cos the fungus is black like burned cakes.
Actually I'm thinking I may have mentioned the daldinia earlier in this blog, no matter, re-incarnation does have that 're' quality about it, as in 'returning', or 'reverting' or in any case 'taking summat from the past'
That's alright then.

Reincarnation decision one - the fi benson blog will forthwith be known as Daldinia.

That feels better.

Time for another photo I think, let's have a browse ...

Full moon

2009-12-02T08:13:00.001-08:00

'tis a full moon tonight, Wednesday 2nd December.

Actually, I'm reliably informed by my lunar diary that it was actually full moon at 7 27 this morning.
And it's been out celebrating all day.
Which is why it's flat out and steaming on the ground like in this here photograph (see below) ...

I dunno, you can't even trust the moon to behave itself these days, tsk tsk

2009-12-02T08:10:00.000-08:00

Reincarnation

2009-12-02T07:37:00.000-08:00

There's an interesting subject! But only if you're interested in it I suppose, like most things, like everything probably. And vast - the subject of reincarnation that is. So, without a rambling introduction - too late, I know - just thought I'd return and reincarnate me blog ...

I hope it's missed me.
I've certainly missed the blog
This is clearly a goddamn lie, because if I'd missed it that much I'd have given it some interaction since the last post (cue for a few bugle strains? Perhaps not) in July.

But I have been terrifically busy ...
Oh, here come the excuses I hear Blog say
Dear, dear, I can't be referring to me blog as Blog, very boring, and let's face it not particularly 'pleasing' as a word, is it, blog. Not like say 'Wednesday' or 'juxtaposition' or something equally as attractive!

No, blog won't do.
And since it's re-incarnation day, a new name for the rebirth would be a good idea.
I'll be back when I've had a think.
See you in July.
Only joking

Fi

Garden Cafe & Gallery

2009-07-16T08:32:00.000-07:00

I seem to have been remiss, and not included the Garden Cafe in my links, so am addressing that now.

Me -
I meet friends there for long chats and refreshments

I go there monthly to enjoy and take part in the Words' Cabarets on the 2nd Tuesday of the month, 7.30 pm (starting up again in September 09)

I currently have some items being exhibited in the Celtic Year Exhibition that's being held until the 2nd August as part of the Open Studios' month-long extravaganza

I am inspired to write, by its range of settings and by the weird and wonderful things that comprise its contents

Many other things.

You -
should go there at least once, although I can't imagine once you've been there that you won't want to go back.

Part of the magic of the place is its apparently random opening hours (I'm sure Paul, owner and host, will assure us that it's not random, that it is in fact us visiting that's random, but still ...)
If you want to check the door's open, ring Paul on 01594 860075
The website address is in my links

Fi
x

The Secret Life of Bees, by Sue Monk Kidd

2009-07-16T08:29:00.000-07:00

Just finished reading it.

Stunning, absolutely stunning!

If you're trying to shake off guilt-about-mistakes-made, or have someone who's made mistakes 'on you', you absolutely must read this tale.

Oh, and if you're a woman, read this tale.

And if you like beautiful imagery, read this tale.

And if you like a mystery, read this tale.

Just read this tale.

Fi
xx

Mischief of a different sort ...

2009-07-16T08:26:00.001-07:00

Hi

In the seeking out of the nonsense poems that I've just now posted, I came across another poem that I'd forgotten about. I've 'tinkered' with it. It seems most apt for the upcoming Full Moon.

Fi
xx

The Mischief Moon

If the day's in wrack and ruin
without reason, without rhyme,
if you think you must've killed someone
in a previous lifetime,
if you're wondering when it could have been
that you broke the looking glass,
if you're searching hill and dale for lucky black cats,
then there's every chance that I'm around
so nothing good is happening soon
for I'll have brought my jug of jokes to town,
I'm the Mischief Moon

If you've lost the cards, the tickets, the keys
that you had only yesterday,
if everybody's arguing with everything you say,
if the power's going crazy
and not one machine will work,
if your confidantes are snubbing you or wearing silly smirks,
if you're locked up, locked in, locked out
and no-one can hear you shout,
if you've spun out of control at the mini-roundabout,
there is every chance that I'm near-by
and indulging in a mood that I call custard-pie
so you can bet on your banana skin
nothing good is happening soon
for I've brought my jug of jokes to town
I'm the Mischief Moon.

You might as well resign yourself
That bottles and jars will drop from shelves
and curtains will fall, and tools will snap,
and clothes will tear, and you'll step in crap,
and the car won't work and the dog'll be sick
and the flickering channel-flicker will completely fail to flick
and the curry will burn and the gin'll be gone
and it'll stay that way until I alone
have tired of this season's tricks
and gone to create a superior mix.

But don't you worry, I'll be back soon
and I'll be higher and mightier
for I'm the Mischief Moon.

More nonsense

2009-07-16T08:24:00.000-07:00

As per previous posting re a bit of nonsense, here's another of the absurdist poetry

Fi
xx

ZOOLOGY

The giraffe is a tall fish
that flies from tree to tree
and bush to bush
and shrub to shrub
seeking kidney pies to eat.

This is no mean feat.

The buzzard is a beetle
with a turtle on its back
and as it crawls along a path
its scales grow out and in and out
and sometimes turn to black.

This depends upon the track.

The woman is a tiny bird
who swims through salty seas
and rocky hills and windy plains
to look for fun and frolic
that she'll pass on to her mate.

This allegedly is her fate.

The reader is a strange cheese
who doesn't sleep a lot,
who can smell a rat from outer space,
can spot a joke in an elephant's face
and knows nonsense when she sees it

not mistaking it for wit.

A spot of nonsense ...

2009-07-16T08:17:00.000-07:00

Hi,

Being in the mood for a bit of nonsense yesterday morning, I dug out some absurdist poems that I wrote some years ago for the writers' group I belonged to (5 women, the Wishing Wellies' group, so-named because we met in a house in Clearwell village and we did a lot of wishing that one day our work would get published …)

I found the poems, quite liked them all over again (though I've since subbed them to my online professional writers' group who have exacting standards and have already started to offer critical comments ... so think of these below as The Draft For Now :-) .

Anyways, one of the poems was (is) … a version of the children's rhyme 'there was an old woman who lived in a shoe …'

While I was working on my version, I thought of how female elders keep cropping up in the free-write exercises I do intermittently with the afore-mentioned online group, and I thought of two other lovely rhymes about old women that I'd like to 'versionalise' – the one where she's tossed up in a basket and carries a broom (one of my all time favourites, I sang it to my children, now I've remembered about it I'll sing it to my grand-daughter) … and the one where she swallowed a fly, a spider, a bird, etc

I'm so loving all of these that I've decided to write a triptych … three old woman poem versions … that I'm calling the Crone Collective

I'm planning to contribute the Crone Collective to the Celtic Year Project I'm involved in, catalysed by Samhain in November – 'traditionally a time to honour our ancestors' and 'linked with courage and protection' and when 'hags' (old stems of mullein soaked in wax) are used as torches …

I'm also planning on performing these as performance-poetry slots in the Words & Music Cabarets that are held locally monthly, starting again in September.

Well, that's the background tale.

Now for the first of the poems:

Fi

xx

The Crone Collective

I
There was an old woman who lived in a …

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe
and had so many children that she didn't know what to do

so she let them do it instead.

*
There was an old woman who danced in a slipper
and breakfasted daily on herring and kippers

which gave her good skin but unfortunate breath.

*

There was an old woman who slept in a sandal
and wore tiny skirts that caused huge scandals

as often as she liked

*

There was an old woman who caroused in a boot
and spent all her Saturdays playing the flute

which annoyed the man in the trainer next door

*

There was an old woman who cooked in a wellie
and made several fortunes from parmesan jelly

and treacle-fried potatoes

*

There was an old woman who lounged in a clog
and owned fifty rabbits, ten cats and six dogs,

which were all called Spot

*

There was an old woman who dozed in a dap
and dreamed all day of marmalade baps

and pink tartan caps
and black satin wraps
and old treasure maps
and who knows perhaps
she's still in that dap

*

let's give them all a clap!

Words & Ideas, at Coleford Festival of Words

2009-07-16T08:12:00.000-07:00

Hi,

during the Coleford Festival of Words that recently took place in the market town nearest to the village where I live , one of the events was called 'Words & Ideas' and involved myself, Sally, Liz (all of the Celtic Year project that I'm involved in) and Lori Strong Wisdom, a visual artist from just over the Welsh border.

We four were presenting a 'show and tell' about the multi-art form or artist-collaborative activities that we've been enjoying recently.

The concept of the event was that everyone should 'have a go' at creative expression, in whatever form they wished to ... to just play!

In the audience was Bridget. I met Bridget when she came to a Writing Fairy Tales workshop that I delivered at Beechenhurst Loft in the Forest, this was about three years ago, so it was lovely for me to see her again.And then even more lovely, a few days after the Festival to receive through the post a letter and accompanying poem from Bridget.

I've copied the letter and poem below - after asking Bridget's permission to do so.
She refers to the event as 'Words and Images' which methinks is a better title, maybe we'll retitle the event for next year's Festival :-)Bridget doesn't have internet access, but I'll pass on to her any comments that you might want to make after reading the poem.
Fixx

Dear Fi

It was good to see you at the Festival. I found your 'Words and Images' an oasis calm in the middle of a hectic week. How wonderful adults can allow themselves to do something for pure enjoyment and admit it!

I threw a few words together to help me remember the evening and enclose a copy so you will know someone listened to what you had to say!

I still can't believe you put that in your pocket!

Kind regards
Bridget

{You'll have to read the poem to know what I put in my pocket …}

REMEMBER PLAY

Do you remember play?
Carefree, unfettered joy,
Mind and body
Free to wander the
Path of imagination.
Young child's 'friend'
Known only to the believer
Invisible to those
Trapped by convention,
Rules and regulations.

Some break free.
One tore pages
From a favourite book
Then placed them
On banana sheets.
Gave words life,
Colour and movement,
Her reward – FUN –
To a loved one
A precious gift.

An artist put aside her work
Painted for pleasure
Immortalising a dream.
Orchard rich with bloom
Bathed in moonlight.
These blossoms will not fade
Or be forgotten.
Her birch trees too
Remain erect, unscathed
Nature's everlasting cathedral pillars.

Another, given
Unexpected time and space
Chose to play with words,
Some her own,
Others lent by friends.
She stirred them round
Sought bits that fit,
Helped them to join together
Releasing poetry
She had not expected.

Another, opening her eyes in dark places
Found Nature's magic in
Fungi, black and apple-shaped
Which she carried in a pocket.
To her delight
It drew mysterious circles overnight.
When spent she placed it in
The garden to revive.
This was not its element
It belonged in dark, damp places
Yet it was here she found her
Light at the end of a tunnel.

Okay, just a little more Gossiping

2009-06-17T04:38:00.001-07:00

Gossiping is bad (apparently), the Gossipers are good, here's some more of em

A couple looking a little coy if you ask me

The Gossipers

2009-06-17T04:34:00.001-07:00

Here's another photo, a bit more seemly ...

Except this un comes across as a bit lonesome.

Let's have a more cosy image ... see next post

Fi

xx

Sculpturals & the CY Project

2009-06-17T04:07:00.001-07:00

Hi,

Last post (as it were), I forgot completely the reason why I popped in to post ... 'twas as below

As I've mentioned in an earlier posting, us contributors on th Celtic Year Project have devised autobiographical details using the Celtic calendar as catalyst for specific information about our good selves.

In one of the autobiog sequences I mention favourite places. These include the site of the 20-odd piece sculpture 'Conversation Piece'. This is its formal name, locally we all refer to it as The Gossipers. Maybe everyone who visits it refers to it as the Gossipers and only the artist calls it by its chosen name, I don't know.

Anyways, the Gossipers are located on the shore of a little beach in South Shields in the north-east of England, and I love them.

I popped in to post a photo of them ...

There they are

Hope you like them

Actually I've just realised that one of them looks like (s)he's wet her/himself. I might look out another photo

Off to search

The Celtic Year Project

2009-06-17T03:48:00.001-07:00

Hi

I've been involved with the Celtic Year Project (www.celticyear.org) for several months. I did mean to get involved with it from its very start back in Samhain 2008 but I was distracted with other writing projects so was a tardy starter.

Howsoever, since my Imbolc contribution 'Between the lines - Words in a February Pond' I've been more and more enthusiastic until the point where I'm currently quite obsessed.

I've created three pieces of writing that I wouldn't have created without the stimulation of this project - the February pond poem, 'Yezriel', and 'Gedesa'. They all took a turn for the mythological. Have a looksie on the Celtic Year site to see them in context with their Celtic calendar moments and the work of the other artists who are contributing to the project.

Beyond those individual pieces though, something far more developmental and exciting is happening.

Sally Stafford who is mistressing the Celtic Year project has arranged for us to hold an exhibition of our works down at one of my most favourite places the Garden Cafe & Gallery, bottom of Lydbrook. See the website link that I'll be adding soon for fuller details, but folks the place is gorgeous, just gorgeous, in the kind of quirky and unique way that I love, love, love.

Enough of the gushing. Be assured the place is fab.

So, me and Sally met down there for coffee -and-nettle-tea (not together o'course) and a chat about the exhibition, and Paul the owner says 'you have seen up the back of the house haven't you?'
Nope
So he leads us up the garden path (this has a happy ending) behind the house, and up the hill, and shows us the most wonderful ... piece of old railtrack ... but so much more to our perception. We're calling it the tunnel atm, because of the way the sides of the track curve around, like wings really.
But me and Sally were both so immediately inspired by it that we decided to collaborate on a piece of work in response.

Cutting a long story short (I never ever do this) (but I'm going to because I have to go to Monmouth in a bit) the collaborative process, with its accompanying creative alchemy, is proving to be compelling. And much lovely work is developing from the initial inspiration of that lovely tunnel site.

We are showing-and-telling about this process as part of an event called Words & Ideas which is to be held on 1st July at the Kavern Bar, Coleford as part of the Coleford Festival of Words. So if anyone's about ... pop in.

Fi
xx

Nahuatl

2009-06-10T11:09:00.000-07:00

Hi

this is another of the random word freewrites I've written with my online writing group, Wac.

As I've mentioned earlier, a member of the group (we take turns) chooses a word at random from a handy book, and posts it for members, if they so desire, to freewrite for 10 minutes on first impression of the word.

Sometimes, like the word below, there's a need for a definition.

My freewrite for the word's below the random word.

It kinda tickled me.

Fi

Nahuatl(adj. Of or relating to any of a group of American Indian peoples of southern Mexico and Central America, or their language.)

Freewrite ...

We were thinking of going to Mexico to do our open water dives for the PADI scuba diving certificate, but then there was swine flu fever, and the guy at the Brecon pool training centre says anyway that pound for pound you can't beat the Red Sea.

I'll bet Moses would have a thing or two to say about that. Now I think of it, I wonder what he did say, I can't remember, but I'm bound to have read the story in the bible several times, you can't go to 3 Catholic schools without having read Moses really.

I wonder where I can get hold of a copy of The Apostles by Elgar, I'll look in town when I go through on Thursday.

American Indians, Native Americans, the Sacred Path and Medicine Wheels.

Once upon a time there was a wheel spinning down the road, all on its own. A medicine woman flew after it. Not ran very quickly, quickly, actually flew. She'd have flown faster if it wasn't for the totem animals that were clinging on to her. She hadn't actually meant to evoke them, especially not altogether. Who would? 9 wild animals materialising all at once, just at the moment when the wheel made its break for freedom, causing the carriage to ground to a halt and throwing her and the totemics up up up into the air!

She knew that wheel was going to be trouble from the first time she hitched it to the cart, it just always wanted to go its own way. Teamwork! That was what made a cart get from one place to another, teamwork, all 4 wheels working for the common cause, goddamit.

It was right about now that she was wishing her totems were creatures like the dragonfly and the spider and the ant. Sure, one of hers was the Hummingbird, which was kinda small enough not to be a bother, but come on, a Hummingbird! Zinging to and fro in front of her face so she couldn't see where the hell she was going. A blind flying medicine woman wasn't the done thing round these parts at all, no, not at all.

Especially since she was so low to the ground, what with the other 8 animals not able to go far from her own body and being a bit shocked at the rude awakening they'd all experienced. It would have been fine if she'd been able to rest down on the Bear, or the Moose, or the Elk, and let them carry her and the animal burden basket, but she'd tried and they just wouldn't co-ordinate, and after a couple of roly-poly down the roadie experiences where they'd all bundled together in one ball, she'd dragged them all off the road and back into the sky again. And the noise they were all making! It was ridiculous! The Wolf was howling, the Horse was neighing, the Mountain Lion was roaring, and to be honest she could well do without the Whale singing her damn head off at the moment. It wasn't helpful at all, no, not at all.

Neither was the Coyote's infuriating laugh, she was going to have to do something about that damn laugh, just as soon as she caught up with the wheel …

Raindrops on roses ...

2009-06-10T11:02:00.000-07:00

Okay, not exactly, but ...

just recently I've written biography details related to four main themes of the Celtic Year, including Beltain and its nod to a personal sense of place. So I was pondering on my favourite things, place wise, and my love of site-specific work ... so here's an extract from the biography ...

Fi
xx

I enjoy site-specific work and since working for the Sculpture Trust as a PA for their Projects Manager and then as Community & Outreach Officer, working alongside site-specific visual and multi-media artists was a great inspiration.

I'm interested in the imprints in and around old buildings. I'd like one day to explore further the history of the 18th century cottage where I've lived for over 20 years.

From my garden I have an open view of a wooded valley which always refreshes me. Living in an ancient forest means that I have lots of choice for My Favourite Trees, a collection which I add to constantly

We grow our own vegetables, have mature fruit trees, and my particular favourites are the stunningly attractive and fabulous scented herb beds (I have 23 varieties - of herbs, not beds - the same as had P L Travers who wrote the Mary Poppins' books …)

Special places that I visit often include …

The Forest of Dean 'itself', so many personal tracks and paths
Dean Heritage Museum
Tintern Abbey
Garden Café, Lydbrook
Ross on Wye – especially the areas around Palace Pound, St Mary's Church (especially when they're doing bell practice on Tuesday evenings), the Phoenix Theatre
Riverbanks by the Kerne Bridge, Goodrich; at Ross on Wye; & Symonds Yat
Wye Valley from the Bigsweir Bridge to Tintern
Monmouth – from the Bridges, past the Monnow Bridge, to the Blake Theatre, to the avenue leading to Church Street
My childhood beaches on the north-sea coasts of Sunderland and South Shields, from the Roker Marina, Cat 'n Dog Stairs, Seaburn, Whitburn Bents and cliff top
The coastlands between Whitburn and Shields, the Marsden Grotto, Frenchman's Cove
The Boardwalk Hotel and conservatory alongside the harbour on one side and the sculptural Gossipers on the other
The Winter Gardens in Mowbray Park

College Green in Bristol, the canals and wharfs, St George's Tower and surrounding park

Gloucester Cathedral and Gloucester Docks area;
the Playsets room at the top of the Music and Drama library overlooking St Mary's churchyard;

The Everyman Theatre in Cheltenham

Bridges and staircases and railway stations, especially old ones like Kemble and Stroud

The monumental Larkin Angel in Sunderland Cemetery
Fetternear graveyard in Aberdeen
Sculpture Trail

Cinderford Town Trail & RIO

2009-06-06T06:16:00.000-07:00

Hi,

torrential rain and a strong fresh breeze has encouraged me to stay indoors awhile and do a little blogging.

I want to tell you about the heritage trail leaflet for Cinderford in the Forest of Dean. This leaflet has just been created by the year 5s of Littledean Primary School in a project that was arranged by the Real Ideas Organisation (RIO) and enlisted the creative support of myself, Ffinlo Kilner, and Sally Gibson, and the energies and enthusiasms Sarah Jane Bonser.

For more information on the Trail, go to www.cinderfordsplash.org/town-trail ... or if that doesn't work, google (or whatever is your search engine of choice) 'Cinderford Trail' and follow links ...

The pupils were supported by:

myself, with their creative writing, creating the text of the leaflet;

Ffinlo, with initial research about Cinderford's heritage, design of web input, graphics and images within the leaflet, design of the leaflet itself;

Sally, with providing access to the Artspace venue, and organising a research day for us all - that involved a talk and access to archive material and old books at Cinderford library; a tour and talk at the Palace cinema; a talk and access to old photographs and cuttings by a chap who worked at the old Mercury newspaper office for over 50 years;

Sarah Jane, in her role as one of the school's senior Teaching Assistants - helping to keep focus on the tasks in hand - and with the successful efforts of herself and her daughter to find the weather-worn grave of Forest poet, Catherine Drew.

The whole project had first to be approved by the head teacher, and was initiated by Debbie Cook from RIO. More about RIO below, and I'm including their website in my Links list.

We are all tremendously proud of the finished result, the trail leaflet - but the type of process that this sort of project enables is a wonderful, wonderful thing.

I have 'put my oar in', last year some time, about the value of creative collaborative projects to the development of young people's life and essential skills to a select committee researching creativity in schools. I can't emphasise too strongly the massive gains to be had in getting a couple of creative practitioners together with a bunch of school pupils under the umbrella of a previously-researched community project and driving the process through to a finished result - and usually a darn good launch event with the local press and fruit juice and healthy biscuits and such!

Massive gains to the pupils, but I'm talking about myself too (I know, selfish, selfish).

I always gain inspiration and creative stimulation from working with these projects. Not least is the thought-provoking and entertainment value of, say, a baker's dozen of 10 year olds in one space, given free rein to their ideas and opinions.

But other stuff too, that can't be predicted at the start.

Like, for example, I hadn't previously been to the just-gorgeous old Victorain church and graveyard of St Johns.
I hadn't stood on the terrace of the Baptist Chapel and looked over the forest landscape from that view.
I'd barely heard of Catherine Drew, an 'ordinary' housewife who happened to write poetry about the Forest.
I'd never read the 1965 scrap book created by the WI that is housed in Cinderford library.
I'd never heard about the alleged-witches of the area.
I hadn't realised the Triangle now had a mini-auditorium with Forest dialect carved into the sides of the seating!

And one of the times that I really, really loved was the discussion about dialect that the year 5s, me and Sarah Jane had!
I speak with a north-east dialect, even though I've been out of the north-east for over 20 years (lived out, that is, they don't keep me out per se, I go up there all the time :-) ... and I am passionate about the cultural value in retaining dialect. It was lovely to be chatting dialect with these Forest children and their forester TA!

RIO

As per their website wording, RIO are a 'social enterprise creating and providing programmes, products and services that help young people around the world realise their potential'.

This is a huge ambition!

But all of my experience with RIO shows me that they're achieving it in their local projects with schools (probably in lots of other projects too, but I only have experience of the schools' ones :-))

And I'm happy to be involved with a further RIO project in the county, this time with Longlevens Primary School.

I wonder what treasures are in store for me this time!
I'll let you know after the project.

Fi
xx

RWords #2 and #1

2009-04-25T00:46:00.000-07:00

While I'm on the subject of random-word freewrite responses, here's April's first 2 ...

{Rest assured, I'm not turning this into a RandomWordBlog, it's only for April while I've been the chooser :-)}

Fi
xx

#2

Outdoor café

She was always confusing Minmutia with Rissia. They were both market towns, they were both exactly 9 miles away from where she lived, and they were both dominated by a long high street. So yes, that was understandable. But they were really very different as to the sort of independent shops that they contained.

What was so similar, she supposed, were the terrace cafes that had sprung up in both towns recently. Probably since the smoking ban inside public places, she thought.

Boring.

Once upon a time there was a terrace café overlooking a small harbour. The terrace was cut into the Cliffside, not as high as the Minnack theatre in Cornwall, not as low as the Marsden Grotto in Tyne and Wear, sort of middle-heightish.

You gained access to the harbour café from two directions, from inside the cafe itself or from the beach up a flight of narrow stone steps.

The steps were old, old, old. And had started to crumble a little on their sea-ward side.

Susannah had been a fisherwoman for sixty years, but was retired now and living in a beach hut at the end of the beaches where the harbour café overlooked.

Every day for ten years, she had climbed the narrow stone steps up to the terrace and had ordered bacon and black pudding baps and a pot of earl grey tea for her brunch.

One day, half way up she stopped at one of the steps that was crumbling. What was that buried inside the stone, starting now to peek out from where it had been buried, maybe for hundreds of years? Something green and shiny.

Susannah leant down and picked away at the stone.

#1

Blue notes

They were everywhere. In all shapes and sizes, from post-it notes to pages ripped from various exercise and jotting books to the massive mural on the west-facing wall. On all media, because they were carved into the bookshelves, painted on the lampshades of two standing lamps, dyed into a blue shirt nailed to one of the wooden panels that lined most of the room.

A thousand shades of blue, either in the ink or paint that was used to write with, or on the papers themselves.

The floor was carpeted with them. No wonder she'd had trouble pushing the door open.

Delize was still standing in the entrance to Victoria's library. The light in the room shifted, the day growing older outside of the open curtains catching her attention. She didn't know how long she'd been standing there, first shocked by the sight of the room, then not wanting to go inside, start seeing more and more of the words written on the notes, fearing all of the unknown that was just about to happen, not wanting to disturb for ever the state of this room … the state that Victoria had left it in … looking to be the last communication between Victoria and the rest of her world …

A fluttering in one corner of the room startled Delize out of her suspended state. A blue butterfly flew around the library, alighting here, alighting there, almost casually.

It was enough to break the spell on Delize. She took off her shoes and stepped into the room, into her dangerous adventure.

Film editing

2009-04-25T00:11:00.000-07:00

I spent a delicious couple of hours yesterday editing a 15-minute-when-I-started piece of footage that I took in July 07, wandering around the Forest of Dean Sculpture Trail.

The Sculpture Trail arrived in the forest in the summer of 86, as did I. I walked parts of the trail for a while before I realised what it was, quite magical. It has continued to be magical for me, and the only week that goes by without my walking on some part of it is a week when I'm away from the Forest. I love it.

Anyways, a couple of summers ago I started collecting footage for personal archives and for Some Future Use. And now I've started playing with it (both the footage and the Use).

So, I've titled & split, hidden and narrated, added a bit of original live music with the aid of my guitar-strumming girlfriend. And now it's in complete chaos. I look forward to returning to it with-a-plan

:-)

Fi
x

Random words

2009-04-25T00:06:00.001-07:00

Hi blog-readers

I seem to have a bad-case of the hyphens, so you'll have to forgive me. I'm sure it's a temporary condition and will soon pass-over. Try to ignore it if you can, I'm not sure whether it's contagious ...

Anyways, this morning I've just posted the double-word random-word #4 for April, on my writers' group site, for any member who wishes to pick it up and freewrite with it for 10 minutes.

This morning's random-word is below, and my freewriting response is belower ...

Fi
x

Scattered light

Resonates, light waves washing over a shore of darkness.
I am back to the sea and purple moonlight falls like a veil over the water.
The salt waves chopping the veil into pieces, slitting it into two and three slivers, only to be reunited with each other and sealed back, seamlessly, as if they'd never drifted apart.

Resonates, with Marge de Piercey's collection of poems, Available Light, and her I am salt as the salt marsh, ripe as mature brie, and her Eat Fruit, and the other observations that I loved to read when I found her book.

Resonates with the Young Connections play about the pharoah's wife and concubines sealed in the pyramid when the pharaoh died, and the army of soldiers that were also entombed, and the still-has-me-spellbound mix of cannabalism and fragile paper birds that the women created while indulging in their cannibalistic acts.

There was once an old farming woman who found herself sat on a neat little lawn beside a neat little house on an estate down a neat little country lane.
Come in, they said, you're going to catch a chill.
She wouldn't of course, because the view inside would impose itself on her, and out here she had a much better panorama spread out in front of her, in front of her mind's eye, that is.
Eventually, they all retired for the night, as did everyone in the houses around, until she was alone on the lawn, the only person awake for miles.
The night-sky was intermittently clear then dull, for there was a breeze blowing before it a largely unenthusiastic smattering of clouds.
When the night-sky cleared, it left spaces for the stars to shine through.
The scattered light shone down on the old farming woman.
Get up, get up.
The scattered light shone down on the path that the old farming woman trod, away from the neat little lawn beside the neat little house, across the hills and far away, to find herself a small-holding to hold once again.

The Shooters

2009-04-24T23:59:00.000-07:00

Hi Chris,

thanks for your reply.

How come no Shooting People for you now? I'm thinking that if it proved as successful as it was in effecting your Ten Dead Men movie, you'd be keen to keep the membership.

This is not a marketing promo for the Shooters btw, I'm just a nosy lass LOL!

Will you re-incarnate any of your early scripts (or characters or settings etc from them) or are they very definitely for you left-as-part-of-the-apprenticeship?

Fi
x

Greetings, Chris Regan

2009-04-18T01:15:00.000-07:00

Hi Chris,

I see you're following my blog.

I've visited your Midnight Writer site, like the concept.

Congratulations on the release of your film.

I'm just about to start pitching my full-feature screenplay 'Vorland' - 'when fairy tales grow up, they turn into tales like this'

A slice of gothic horror, modern fairy tale told in the classic dark-and-dangerous style.

How long have you been writing film-scripts?
Vorland is my first full feature.

Do you belong to shooting-people (the film-makers as opposed to 'hands up')?

Fi
xx

Scenic Route

2009-04-18T01:13:00.001-07:00

Okie dokie.

Clearly not quite awake this morning when I started playing with the blogs.

Please could I now direct you to http://thecelticyear.blogspot.com where you'll find 2 postings - one about me returning from Monmouth, the other about a random-wording process in which I occasionally indulge ...

I managed to post both to the Celtic Year rather than here.

Darn, and double darn

Fi
xx

Born of the Butterfly

2009-04-17T05:02:00.000-07:00

Hi

long time no postie (blog-relatively).

This is due to

i) my determination to focus on and finish specific writing-taskings without distracting myself with either class A- or class B-distractions {see example list below} and

ii) my lack of commitment to i) above

So, current class A-distractions include -

skimmy-dipping into ... Falconer by Alice Thompson because she wrote Pharos which I read recently and loved it's about a haunted lighthouse, & Pleasures & Regrets by Proust translated from the French when the title of the book was Les Plaisirs et Les Jours so I wanted to know how come what should literally be 'Pleasures and Days' was suddenly supposed to be filled with regrets, & The Essential Gore Vidal because I was attracted by its cover (I am attracted by covers) and was next-level attracted by the titles in the contents list (I am attracted by titles) which included Early Fiction, et The Ladies in the Library; Theater Writings; Inventions; Religion; Essays; because I really wanted to see what inventions were in comparison to everything else in the book {I still haven't worked that out yet, I'll post when I have}

These are class-A distractions because something in them or about them might conceivably be useful or valuable to my literary aspirations some time in the who knows future.

Current class-B distractions include -

aimless wanderings up and down Monmouth High Street, because to do this makes me feel like I'm taking some sort of coffee break

It is useful, I may add, that such aimless wanderings can look from the outside as though they're purposeful, because I just happen to be a really fast and strident walker preternaturally. This has been most helpful in less creative jobs than 'writer' let me tell you :-)

Class-B distractions are those distractions where the only purpose or value attached to them could be 'leaving myself open to random chance and co-incidence'.

I am quite addicted to the class-B actually.

Still, I am managing to focus on some proper projects. I'll tell you about them when I come back from Monmouth.

Fi
xx

New story ...

2009-03-28T04:59:00.000-07:00

This is the start of a new story that I'm about to write based around some photos I took a little while ago.

Once upon an April dream ...

... the girl wandered down the hillside towards the light.

Yezriel

2009-03-27T04:29:00.000-07:00

On this fair and fresh Friday morning (I know, too much alliteration) I'm playing with my blogs. Especially this one, newly hatched.

Below is a poem that I wrote about an hour ago. It might have been inspired by what I had for breakfast, with toast, but it wasn't. It's inspired by the time of year.

Feel free to comment me! Specially if you like the poem ...

Fi

Yezriel

She knew it was inevitable.
The fluids had dried up a decade ago.

She was just putting off that moment a little while longer.

She wasn't sure why.
Not so that the world would be more ready for her,
because that would never happen,
not even if she waited another thousand years

to add to the fifteen that she'd already spent inside the egg.

She unfolded her arms from where they were wrapped around
her scaline body,

shook her several wings, 3 at a time,

slowly, slowly, slowly stretched out a hand

and started to scratch at the shell with her nails.

You'll find this poem, more of my work and that of other writers, artists, all sorts of creatives at the following address:

http://thecelticyear.blogspot.com

And now to play about with what I want to post next ...

xx

Greetings!

2009-03-27T04:19:00.000-07:00

Hello,

I am ... among other things :-) ... a freelance writer, storyteller, and workshop leader.

Welcome to my blog.

Fi

x