Lots of rejections, non-progressions to shortlists, no replies; busy life; deaths; reorganisation of entire house; visitors; business picking up (I run a holiday let) later, and I’m back. I’ve tickled the keyboard from time to time, but nothing too great has come out. My ideas, however, have been non-stop and I’ve been itching to get back to the keyboard, especially as I now have an office. The total house reorganisation resulted in us finding a room – a whole room! – that I could turn into an office. Okay, ‘room’ is a slight exaggeration. It’s a porch. It was first, the dogs’ place, at night, when they were alive. Then it turned into a home for the tumble dryer I had to buy when I got fed up of Scottish winters seeing my house hanging with laundry like a crazy fabric shop, and a dumping ground. When we dug everything out, a room piped up, ‘I’m here! Use me!’ so in went a desk, a chair, a couple of cat baskets and some books. Voila, an office. It’ll be freezing in the winter, but in the summer it’s an office al fresco, opening as it does onto my back yard where I have boxes full of busily growing veg. In a small cottage full of four people’s stuff, this is my very own corner. It’s like being a kid getting her own room again – a whole room, mine, that I don’t have to share with anyone (except the cats), that I can decorate in my own no-wall-space left under the posters/kids’ drawings, postcards, post its, reminders, notice board way, that I can cram with plants and books and ideas. This room is chock full of my ideas. It’s a little bit of me, a place I can retreat to and write. Previously I camped in a corner of the lounge and had to bear my soul to everyone who came in and paused to look at what i was doing. This office/ porch – porffice – is an extension of my own imagination, a place full of ME, that I can come to and relax and be creative. How lucky am I. To get here required weeks of reorganising and finding piles of crap that needed sorting. But it was worth it.
I mentioned that my business has taken off – I spend a lot of time ironing sheets – first time in my life – as I want the place to get cracking reviews and people to love it, which happens every single time. The ironing is good though – I can daydream and think up stories, an stimulate my mind by listening to TED talks. Every one I listen to widens my mind and gives me ideas.
I’m back on the Scottish Book Trust site, with a follow up to last year’s piece that was published in the freebie book that was in a print run of 150,000. I’d love to be in this year’s book but not sure if a) my piece is good enough or b) if it is, whether I’m allowed to be in it two years running. I suspect not. But it’s here, on their site:
http://scottishbooktrust.com/writing/nourish/story/second-life
I’m feeling better. Life is good. Never ever been so busy – if I wrote a list of all the things I do day to day in the home at work on my computer in the village at school for our forthcoming wedding, then you’d never believe it could be done. I breathe in and breathe out and get on with it. Being busy stops me thinking about stuff I shouldn’t be thinking about and I get FAR more done. Every week I choose a couple of hours to sit on the sofa and just read for two hours and catch up with myself. Invariably I’ll fall asleep, but that’s fine. This year I’m trying to read a book a week. I’m two books behind schedule, which isn’t bad.
Thanks for reading.
Thanks for finding me, porffice.
Thanks for being patient, my precious ideas.
Emma J Myatt 