The Wren

[I have had another of my long breaks from writing. My last blogpost was in June last year and I was both struggling with, and determined to carry on with, the children’s novel.

It didn’t happen. I am wondering whether trying to write a novel is akin to flogging a dead horse, as my mother would have said. Even writing short stories used to be hard (akin to pulling teeth?). There might be a good reason that I was known as a poet…

And so to 2023.]

There was a wren in my back garden today, reminding me that I still haven’t rewritten the blog post from a few days ago that my laptop kindly obliterated as I was trying to publish it… so here is another attempt.

It’s a struggle to get anything done at the moment, but I am trying to keep up some momentum since the wonderful Bardic Way workshop I attended recently, run by Dearbhaile Bradley. The theme was Imbolc, Brigid, spring and new beginnings, and there was a preparatory exercise involving going out into nature, stepping through a threshold and opening to all the senses and spirits of place. I had a significant encounter on the way which I briefly mentioned in my writing at the time, and expanded on during one of the exercises in the workshop. Both are copied below.

We started with grounding and centering and chanting the I-A-O to invoke the Awen, or spirit of creativity. Dearbhaile lit a candle and we brought offerings to make an altar, of spring flowers, hazel catkins etc. She emphasised that in the Bardic way the words would come through us rather than from us, a channelling of creativity rather than our own creation. In this spirit we did some writing exercises and shared if we wanted to, then wrote a list of nine small ways we could nurture our own creativity, sharing with another person and inviting concrete steps to ensure we did at least some of them. The workshop ended with a solemn Promise to ourselves and the other participants, to do one of those steps that we chose.

Has it worked? Well, I wrote a new poem since then, making space to actually write it down and type it up. I have played my violin twice in the last few days, and committed to performing a song I wrote many years ago at an event in March. I went with a friend to see a new artist at work and am inspired to try a new medium for drawing (when I can source the materials) and I went to hear two women sing and play their own songs with another friend on Friday night. I also set up a meeting with one of the women from the workshop to share and discuss our poems in early March (I hope to have more than one new draft to share with her by then).

So yes. I made a commitment to prioritise creativity and I seem to be doing something about it. Even though everything feels like wading through treacle and my laptop is slow and uncooperative at times!

Dearbhaile’s next Bardic Way workshop in Glastonbury will be at the beginning of May, for Beltane, so if you want a shot of motivation I highly recommend it. She also offers these online if you aren’t anywhere near Somerset, UK.

And without more ado, here are some of the things I wrote:

(Bardic Way Imbolc workshop 2023)

A wren before the threshold, wanting my attention. Very close.

A distant woodpecker. Bluetit. Thrush across the hollow.

Hazel catkins. Ash. Silver birch. Crack willow. A squirrel.

Lots of corvids, calling, moving.

Humans live here too, act here too.

Everything has to fit around us. Wood pigeon. Robin.

Some of us hear, some of us don’t.

Some of us see, some of us don’t.

A cold breeze. I see holly, fern, bramble. Ivy.

I ask if there are Guardians here, spirit Guardians.

It’s us. We have to guard it.

We have to feel it, see it, hear it,

Know it. Appreciate. Give thanks.

(Writing Exercise in workshop)

When we lose our little selves and find other little selves: I heard her first. A chittering in the tree. She was on a bare twig at the top of the shrub-sized sapling. I thought, Looks like a wren, but not a wren’s song. I stopped to notice. Then she flew much closer and perched on a twig by my path. This is not a wren’s behaviour, I thought. But it was a wren, very clearly, and very small and thin. It was a warning call. Was she warning about my presence, warning me off, or warning me about something? Considering this later, it could have been one half of a nesting pair telling me to keep my distance, big lumbering thing that I was. It could have been a male. But at the time, in the moment, this bird was significant to me and had something to say to me that I was not understanding. I was about to pass a threshold and seek connection. What was the warning there? I thought about the meaning of Wren, about messenger birds. So close, and so insistent. So now the Naturalist in me thinks, Male bird repelling a threat many times its size. And the poet in me thinks, Look up Wren in the Druid cards. And another part of me just feels and remembers the connection – that I stopped, that we encountered each other. And I still think about it, because humans do. And the wren keeps on being a wren, doing wren things, with no concern for me since I left that place.

The Druid Animal Oracle (Philip and Stephanie Carr-Gomm): Tradition calls the wren’s nest the ‘Druid’s House’. Drui-en allows us to glimpse the beauty of God or Goddess in all things. He tells us that ‘small is beautiful’ and that self-realisation lies not in grandiosity or apparent power, but in humility, gentleness and subtlety. Drawn reversed, this could mean that you need to look at whether your humility and gentleness actually render you invisible to others. Are they your way of defending yourself from life and from others, rather than facing life and its difficulties?

The wren symbolised wisdom and divinity. It is difficult actually to see a wren. At New Year the apprentice Druid would go out by himself into the countryside in search of hidden wisdom… If he found a wren he would take that as a sign that he would be blessed with inner knowledge in the coming year… a metaphor for finding the elusive divinity within all life.

2022/3: Online course and novel progress

Back in January I signalled my determination to get on with my children’s novel by signing up to a 5-week on-line course with Writers&Artists Yearbook. It started near the end of April, by which time I reckoned I would be struggling. In fact, I was struggling half-way through January, but I haven’t given up.

The short workshop with Steve Voake that I wrote about last time was very helpful. The course I have just finished with Christopher Edge was even more so, as it was longer and in more depth. The first homework sessions were about analysing other writers and how they managed various areas we looked at, like Beginnings, Memorable Characters etc. By Week 4 we had to produce a one-page synopsis for our novels, which is rather difficult when it hasn’t actually been written yet, but a very useful exercise. It made me firm up my ideas and look at emotional arcs, for a start.

And for Week 5, the final homework was to send in up to 3000 words of our novels in progress for feedback, with a deadline. I’m the sort of writer that needs a deadline or it won’t get written… Sunday morning saw me glued to the keyboard at last, not allowed to go out to celebrate the Jubilee with friends until I had hit ‘send’.

Thanks to that, I now have two and a half chapters of my novel, first draft. Hopefully I have used all the techniques we learnt, lots of action and emotion, all dialogue has to have a purpose, strong description of setting etc. Now all I have to do is carry on.

Like I said, I’ve not given up, although I am way behind where I thought I’d be approaching half-way through the year. Persistence, perseverance, get the words down and play around with them later. Editing is my strong point, but developing a story is what I have to learn. I remind myself – I love learning.

Onwards.

2022/2: Writing For Children Workshop

Oh dear. My resolution to write 1,000 words a week on my children’s novel this year didn’t get very far! Two weeks, to be precise, and only one of those was actually writing for the novel, the second week being writing about the novel to get some plots ideas down. Having Covid for ten days and a slow fortnight of recovery after that didn’t help much. However, it is never too late, so here I am again, resolved to give it another try.

Yesterday I attended a Writing For Children workshop with Steve Voake, run by Strode Theatre at Street library. I knew Steve Voake as a tutor on the MA course at Bath Spa ‘Writing for Young People’ which I had planned to take, until grandchildren and Covid took over. I was still intending to do it until I found out that I am no longer eligible for a student loan. But undeterred, I signed up for a 6-week on-line course with Writers and Artists Yearbook, starting at the end of April. Originally I’d thought I may be running out of steam by then and needing an extra kick up the proverbial, but having totally lapsed since January I was delighted to come across this two-hour session, in person, close to hand. And it was just what I needed.

Steve is an experienced and inspiring workshop leader. After introductions, he had us all writing straight away – a four minute exercise starting with the sentence, ‘It snowed for twenty years.’ Suddenly everyone from complete beginner to accomplished writer was scribbling away as the imaginative floodgates were raised. It felt good. I can work in a group and to a time limit, in a way I find much harder to achieve on my own in front of a laptop. I need a Writer’s Group, or a course, for stimulation. Another exercise we were given later was to write down a list he would give us and choose one of them to write about, a memory stirred perhaps. I chose ‘the garden in summer’ and the summer of 1976, the drought. The rest of the list is still in my notes to prompt me during the rest of this week.

We did a Question and Answer session using a character from our projected novel, leading to writing a scene for another four minutes, and I may use the results as a Chapter start. After some useful information on story structure, we were introduced to the notion of a ‘controlling idea’, one sentence which sums up the whole story that can be framed as a ‘What if?’ question. A guessing game round had us all inventing one sentence to describe a book or film (‘What if a stone age boy found himself living outside a modern town?’ was mine, easily guessed by many participants), followed by inventing twenty What Ifs for ourselves as an ideas generator for stories.

Finally we had another story structure session to fit an entire planned novel onto one page, complete with ‘and the moral of the story is’ at the end; we had to see if we could fit our intended plot into it. From this I realised that the intervening weeks have not been wasted. My novel has been running away in the background while I thought I was doing nothing useful, and I do in fact have a very good idea of the characters, setting, plot, structure and intended audience. All I have to do now is start writing again…

The most useful bit of advice I have taken from the session is to write the first draft to tell *myself* the story, without my usual perfectionism holding me back. I have to write badly and just get it down on the page, before I use my well-honed editing skills to make it leaner, fitter and worthy of an agent and publisher. So that is my aim for this year – to get a first draft written and tell myself the story, with the characters given space to surprise me. The W&A Yearbook course comes with an appraisal of up to 3000 words. Can I at least write that much by May?

My plan of action is to write for half an hour in the local library as often as possible, fitting it into my weekly routine. Somehow, sitting at home with a laptop and all the time in the world is antithetical to my output. Short bursts, by hand, and type up any ok bits later. And I must investigate using alternative word processing packages, such as Scrivener (Word won’t let me use it any more, unless I pay them lots of money).

Oh yes, I also wrote three poems in just over a week recently. Spring is underway.

2022/1: My New Year’s Challenge

Happy New Year to all my friends and readers! The last week has been a bit under the weather, dark, grey, cold, wet etc. I have not managed much walking but have caught up with a few old friends at least. And I did commit to my writing challenge, although not the life challenge mentioned in my last post. The key was to de-couple them.

The writing challenge, as you may have guessed, is to finally commit to writing my children’s novel set in the British Mesolithic age. For those who don’t know their archaeology, that is the period after the last ice age but before the Neolithic ‘Revolution’ when people settled down to farm, so roughly 12,000-5,000 BP (before present, now used instead of BC). During the first part of this period Britain was still connected to the continent by a large fertile plain now known as Doggerland but rising sea levels eventually drowned that area. Many archaeological artefacts are found by dredgers and washed up onto beaches.

When I first studied archaeology back in the late 70s it was assumed that the Mesolithic population were constantly-mobile hunter-gatherers eking out a poor living at the edge of the retreating ice and in the newly-growing forests. The discovery of ‘Britain’s oldest house’ at Howick in Northumberland changed all that – it was continually occupied for over a hundred years and its inhabitants ate vast numbers of hazelnuts. That was the inspiration for my first attempt at writing this novel – about a girl called Hazel and her family who lived there. I produced the first three chapters and a synopsis for my Uni course in Creative Writing and won a prize for the most promising children’s writer. But… further archaeological discoveries scuppered some of my plot around the different tribes or groups (also I never got to visit the place, which felt important to me) and I gave up on it.

Cue last year, when I did a free online course about Star Carr Mesolithic site in Yorkshire. Initially I took it as background research for the original novel, wanting to revive it, but the level of detail that the recent excavations have revealed inspired me to change my plans and write a whole new one set there – earlier than Howick. The plan is for at last three novels set at different sites anyway…

So this last week I have been reading through the many pages of notes I printed out from that course (run by the University of York Archaeology Department), working out characters and relationships, coming up with plot ideas, and writing my first 1000 words. The aim is 1000 words a week, plus research and thinking time. To keep me on track I aim to sign up to a Writers And Artists Yearbook online course on writing children’s books which starts at the end of April. I may well need some further encouragement by then!

And the life challenge I have dropped was to do an MA at Bath Spa University on Writing for Children, which I have considered starting since I finished the BA. Having researched funding, I discovered that I am no longer eligible for student loans and I can’t afford to pay the fees just now. I had to separate the MA idea from the actual writing part before I could commit. A six-week online course is far more affordable!

I aim to write blog posts fairly regularly over this year but probably not every single week. I will also continue to write letters to my writer friends to keep myself on track. Other projects include fitting out the new dining room area as a writing space, with a whole wall of bookshelves (and lots of plants and art), which will have to wait until the floor is finished… The delivery of the final section has now been delayed four times! I continue to trust that it will happen one day, then I can get on with the rest of the room, furniture etc.

New year, new me: Jo is a writer again. About time.

Week 52: How was it for you…?

Some people love Christmas. I’m not one of them. That said, this year was a pretty good one for me, as they go. But I know many people have had the opposite experience and I want to say: I hear you. I have a friend who spent it alone, a friend who tested positive for Covid on Christmas morning and spent the day feeling ill in bed, and a friend whose alcoholic family member kicked off. That’s just the ones I’ve heard about so far. These stories will be multiplied across the country. So when I say mine was good, spent with my daughter and her family and two old friends, with an open fire and too much food and drink, it is not to crow. When I got home last night (walking!) I sank into a state of anxiety and distress. This morning I realised that it was because I’d been reading about the 70s and 80s before I went to sleep – my TV packed up so I couldn’t watch the usual soothing wildlife repeats.

All my early Christmases were spent in a Christian household where going to church and celebrating the birth of Jesus together was the focal point of the event. On Christmas Eve I would help my mum with her ‘mince pie marathon’, producing dozens of home-made mince pies (both pastry and mincemeat made by her – I can’t stand commercial ones since then) for the carol singers who would turn up for hot drinks and snacks before heading on to the Midnight Service at our parish church. Eventually I was old enough to join them on the three nights we went around the village singing and collecting for charity, and to the exciting (because so late) service. Once I’d left home, and Christianity, nothing was ever the same.

My first Christmas away I spent in a cold youth hostel on Crete, huddled up in my sleeping bag for warmth, eating dried figs and darning my socks. As an idealistic Peace Camper I fasted over Christmas as my personal protest against the mouthing of Peace On Earth while our governments were preparing for nuclear holocaust. I don’t recommend fasting in midwinter in a caravan or bender, by the way. Miserable. Another year I was home for Christmas but had an unexpected miscarriage (I hadn’t even known I was pregnant) which I couldn’t tell my parents about, so suffered it alone.

Then there was another year when I was homeless and pregnant but with a toddler. I was supposed to rest in bed as I’d been bleeding and wasn’t allowed to pick up my one year old daughter. I had a late miscarriage in January, possibly the worst time of my life. And the many years living on benefits with an addict partner and two, then three children. Christmas was synonymous with anxiety, guilt, and keeping it as magical as I possibly could while hiding how I really felt.

The last eighteen years have been about recovery, understanding and growth. The adult children are all doing well. I am in a good place. And this year I was invited to oldest daughter’s household along with a couple of my friends, the honorary aunties, where we were provided for while watching my grandsons and lovely son-in-law playing with all their new toys. We even had an open fire to watch. We video-called with my son and wife at her parent’s and with my youngest, currently in Thailand. None of us tested positive (yet). No-one has lost their job or home. No-one has died (recently). So I reckon that counts as a pretty good one.

I didn’t quite make my word count this week though. And I’m still dithering about whether to commit to the writing and life challenge I have in mind for next year. But I reached the end of the year with 52 blog posts and enough words written (mainly in letters) to cover the 2021 words a week, so that’s a success. I’ll let you know with the first post of next year what my challenge is – if I do commit. Meanwhile stay well and find joy in every small thing, and blessings on your life.

Week 51: Here we go again…

That last-minute chew-your-fingernails time is here again – are we going to be able to meet up with family and loved ones over Christmas, or not? In the UK we have a ‘flat’ Delta wave plus an exponential Omicron wave on top. Events are being cancelled, people are reviewing their options, and our Government is dithering as usual. I expect it will be a case of ‘too little, too late’ again as Boris does yet another screeching U-turn when he finally realises what his own scientific advisors have been saying for a while. Personally, I trust the scientific and medical community a whole lot more than I’d trust a politician, so our family have already had Christmas #1 at my son’s, last night. We all tested beforehand and we are all double or triple vaccinated. and no matter what happens, I am in a bubble with my daughter and grandsons so we will be together on the day – barring active infection, that is. With Omicron being so crazily transmissable, I am sure it is only a matter of time before we succumb.

Daughter has invited a couple of my old friends round for dinner on the day though, so I am hoping that can happen. I expect a sudden lockdown to be announced either straight after Christmas or in January, but let’s see what happens this next week. I am limiting my contacts but still seeing people I really care about, and taking friends to appointments. Otherwise – well, we’ve been here before, haven’t we? We should all be prepared by now, although mightily sick of it all.

I count myself very lucky that I managed to sing in a concert, attend a carol service with two dear friends, and spend an evening and night with my closest family (apart from daughter abroad who is stressing about onward flights and PCR tests currently). I also have good neighbours, good friends in my town, lovely walks from my doorstep, and enough money to pay for food and heating. I am truly blessed. This is by no means the hardest part of my life. But there are so many people out there struggling with all this, homeless, on precariously low incomes, with poor mental health, lonely or stateless.

What has all this to do with my writing challenge? Nothing, really. This weekend I just need to write about what is on my mind. The shortest, darkest days are upon us, Solstice on Tuesday, so please think about supporting relevant charities this Christmas, be kind to each other – or at least tolerant – and may you all have everything you need to get through this.

I aim to post again next Friday so I will save my Christmas greetings until then.

Week 50: Giving Thanks

It’s a stressful time of year. I have not been sleeping well, like so many of my friends it seems. Last week was really full-on for a number of reasons so I’d just like to share here a thing I wrote on Thursday morning, in case it helps anyone else.

Note to Self

Stand in the dawn.

Yes, it was a bad night.

No, you couldn’t sleep;

but look now at these fleeting colours,

the bands of apricot and gold,

the pale blue-green,

see the first rooks arrive on your cherry tree.

Stand by the warm radiator.

Resolve to top up the bird feeder today.

Watch the colours fade

but the sky stay clear.

The wind has dropped.

You have food for breakfast,

clean clothes to wear.

Stretch that ageing body.

Things have been worse.

You may rejoice.

The concert on Friday went far better than we’d all been fearing, with a good audience too. The decorator has done the first coat on all and the second coat on some of the kitchen/dining room area, and aims to come back the week after next to complete before the 25th. The rest of the floor may be laid too, with any luck. The difficult lodger has moved out, and some Christmas presents have been ordered and arrived. More cards to write yet, more presents to buy, but it’s all looking achievable, and I can worry about my loss of income next year. I wrote two shorter letters this week, to go in cards, as well as the above. Still on target to finish the year of writing commitment and with hopes of a new project (or two) next year.

May all your plans also come to pass, however long they take.

Week 49: Renaissance

For much of my life, this time of year has been all about the singing. Last year of course was a serious blip in terms of performing, but we are trying again to sing a concert (now in the teeth of the omicron variant) and this week I am mainly getting up to scratch on the Josquin Des Prez piece we are doing.

It is difficult stuff to sing, but sounds heavenly – if you like your early Renaissance polyphony as much as I do. I grew up in a Church of England family where both my brothers and my dad were in the choir. We had family holidays where they went to sing in cathedrals for a week while the cathedral choir was on leave. I adore Tallis and Byrd. I was not allowed to join the choir in the 60s and 70s as it was a male preserve (my budding feminism is one reason I left religion behind when I left home), but took the chance to start singing in my 30s when a friend formed a small group to sing some restored pagan carols in Glastonbury. That turned into the Avalonian Free State Choir, who I sang with for over twenty-five years, and a smaller carolling group that convened most winters and for Mayday/Beltane.

From my teen years of singing carols round our village with the Youth Club, to the many years of singing carols at Community events and other gigs around Glastonbury, it’s not felt like Christmas (or whatever festival you care to celebrate) without singing. So last year was particularly weird. I now sing with another choir, Cantilena, which is back to the sort of material I grew up with. My parents would have approved. We rehearse from music, wear formal attire and stand still in rows, and it is challenging me musically. My sight-reading is not great but I can usually get to reasonable performing standard with the minimum of effort just by attending every rehearsal. Not so with Josquin!

Not only are we a reduced choir, twenty or so rather than thirty-five at full strength, but the score we are working from is archaic and confusing, and the timing of entries key. When I lose my place, which I still do, it is almost impossible to pick it up again as every part is singing different words and lines most of the time. So this week will be about daily practicing while I try not to panic.

The full concert includes other works by his contemporaries, organ music and readings (I have been allotted a couple of poems by the Spanish mystic St John of the Cross), and has mince pies and mulled wine during the interval. For anyone local to me, it is in St John’s church at 7.30pm on Friday 10th December, tickets are £12 and I have some available, or you can pay on the door. It will be wonderful, but I will be very glad when it’s over and I can hopefully relax into the rest of the festive season.

As to the kitchen project and my writing this week, the kitchen fitter returned on Friday to do a few more bits but still hasn’t had the delivery of the final part of the flooring, and the decorator is coming next week to fit me in for three days between other jobs. Another part that won’t actually be finished, but at least is progressing. I have kept up to scratch with the letter writing again and continue to ponder on the children’s novel I thoroughly intend to write (might finally get round to an MA next year too). Meanwhile I am invited to a gathering of poets this evening with my former tutor, who is having a weekend writing retreat in town. I will be mainly frying onion bhajis later for a shared meal.

Week 48: On Kindness

It is almost the end of this year of writing 2021 words a week (the #Write2021 Challenge) and blogging every weekend; this week I was not writing a letter but catching up on the current Mass Observation Directive.

For those who don’t know, the Mass Observation project was started in 1937 as an ‘anthropology of ourselves’, with a team of observers and volunteer writers studying the everyday life of ordinary people in Britain. It continued to operate throughout the Second World War and into the 1950s, producing a series of books and thousands of reports. The archive is now held at the University of Sussex and is a public resource for historical work; the project was revived in 1981 and issues ‘Directives’, or open questionnaires, three times a year for its panel of hundreds of volunteer writers. I joined up not many years ago in one of my periodic attempts to make myself do some writing again…

This Autumn’s Directive came in three parts, and the first was on Kindness, which is what I’ll focus on in this blog. I found it a very tricky concept to pin down. We all think we know what kindness is until asked about what is the most recent act of kindness you have performed, or who is the kindest person you know, or what places do you associate with kindness. What makes people kind, or unkind? How can we make society a kinder place? The more I read the word, the less sense it made. It has elements of compassion, of caring, of community. Is it a religious concept?

I wonder what anyone else wrote, whether there are common themes, whether we all disagree. To me, it implies respect, consideration and reciprocation. I look out for my neighbours, they look out for me. I was helped by random strangers when travelling alone in my youth, so I help out others when I can. I was certainly brought up with an expectation of being kind to others, in a church community. If I’d been brought up in a selfish family and a community of everyone putting themselves first, my expectations would have been very different, along with my behaviour.

I choose to be kind because it makes my life more pleasant. I attract and hang out with other kind, community-centred people. I can’t get my head round spite or malice, they shock me. And I do know how privileged I am to be able to make these choices, and to have come from a decent, fair-minded family. I have seen plenty of the other sort and the trauma they produce.

Anyway, lots to think on. Next week I will be back to letter-writing, and I’m already considering my writing goals for next year. After so many weeks of keeping up a regular word count I think it is starting to pay off and become a habit. Isn’t it time I actually wrote the first novel? I have been practicing and talking about it for long enough…

Week 47: In Memory

I wasn’t sure what to write about this week until I went for a longish walk earlier today, when I found myself thinking about my mother on what would have been her 90th birthday. She died at 70. It will soon be my father’s birthday too, but he died at 79. And when I got home I discovered via Facebook that a poet friend from the therapeutic writing community had died, quietly and unremarked, about a week ago. So this post is for Audrey, John and Katrina, with love.

I had my grandsons overnight and when they were cuddling in my bed this morning, far too early as usual, the oldest asked me about my childhood doll that has spent the whole pandemic on my bed. They have met her before, but this time he asked, ‘where did the clothes come from?’ She was wearing a red cardigan with buttons and a tartan skirt, respectively knitted and sewn by my mother. A 1960s childhood. It is how I remember her love – she knitted dolls clothes for me. Later I spoke with her cousin who had grown up with her like a sister, and mentioned that I intend to make scones in her memory this afternoon. ‘Oh yes, she always made lovely scones, your mother.’

She never wanted to be a housewife, she wanted to continue teaching, a calling as much as a profession, but she was stuck at home with young children for years because that was what was expected of her. Strange how I remember fondly the things she probably resented.

I remember my father by watching the birds on the feeder in my garden. He spent his last years confined to the house by progressive lung disease so when I visited, we would sit by his patio doors watching the birds. They featured heavily in the book of short poems I wrote after his death (My Father Speaks In Poetry Too, Poetry Space 2013). The house renovations I have been doing this year included installing patio doors so I can sit here at my desk and watch the birds (currently a small flock of blue tits). He was a good man, quietly spoken, unfailingly polite and very intelligent.

And Katrina – she was a reader of this blog who sometimes commented. We’d met many years ago through the Bristol poetry and creative writing scene, and although I didn’t know her well, I do know she was a good egg. Again, quiet and unassuming, with a unique take on life. I was sorry to hear that she is no longer with us.

So a day for quiet reflection and happy memories, I think. My writing news can wait.