Writing.

Creative writing, short stories, general musings.

  • Deadlines

    Self-imposed deadlines can be useful, when the work is something you actually really want to do. Last month when I set myself the challenge of writing every day, having that daily deadline meant I prioritised the thing I wanted to do (writing) above almost everything else. This is especially useful for giving yourself licence to push the mundane but time-insensitive tasks (such as vacuuming the house) to the bottom of the to-do list, although, of course, those tasks all have to get done eventually. And setting writing as a high priority meant I was more likely to do it earlier, when my brain was at its freshest and the ideas could flow freely.

  • Reflections on a month of writing

    When light hits a surface and bounces back to our eyes, we see a reflection. Our face in the mirror is perhaps the most familiar one we see, but it is not our true self. It is a distorted image, flipped by the light. And so it is disarming when we see ourselves as others see us, through another’s webcam or video. Any reflection of ourselves should be honest, but it can only be as honest as our own perspective allows. Perhaps that is the perspective that really matters. Bats use echolocation to orient themselves in three-dimensional space, the reflections of sound waves helping them locate prey, find their way and circumnavigate obstacles. In a similar way, we can take the opportunity to reflect on our experiences, to consider not just what we’ve achieved but how we want to move forward.

  • Book review: Children of Memory, Adrian Tchaikovsky

    This is a book that would certainly fit into the category of “epic” sci-fi, spanning as it does vast intergalactic distances, countless millennia, and various intriguing alien races. But the story it tells is fundamentally human. The focus of the book revolves around the human colony on the far-off planet of Imir, as observed by a crew of highly intelligent aliens with far superior technology, and a young girl, Liff, on the planet itself. As the humans’ last-ditch hope after fleeing a dying earth, life on Imir is hard. We are treated to glimpses of the founding days of the colony and the tough decisions made by the founders.

  • Funfair

    When you’re ten, the funfair is a place of excitement and adventure. Of exhilarating, brightly-coloured rides with flashing lights, booming music, smoke machines. Of games of chance, with exciting prizes for the lucky few who can master them. Of ferris wheels and helter-skelters, taking you up high for a never-before-seen birds-eye view of an otherwise familiar place. Of the scary ghost train, where you enter if you dare. Of rainbow candyfloss, dodgems, bouncy castles and magical memories.

  • The Weeds

    Eleanor hacked at the brambles until her hands were blistered and sore. The midday sun beat down on her as she dug determinedly into the dry, stubborn soil, yanking up roots and tough, thorny stems. She’d been at it all morning. Sore and dripping with sweat, she stepped back to admire her handiwork. It was a start. A patch was starting to clear and she could see the brown, dusty soil underneath. A patch where she’d promised herself, a year ago, in the full flush of honeymoon, that she’d plant a vegetable garden.

  • Human

    The dawn of day
    The sparkling dew
    The rising sun
    The fresh
    The new
    The air
    The sea
    The breeze
    The heat
    The ground beneath your feet.

  • A thousand different journeys

    We must have walked this path a thousand times, my son and I. A thousand journeys, each one a little different as we’ve grown, changed and (mostly) become wiser. When my son was small he was also restless, with a ton of energy. Still is, in many ways. Always moving, never still. We’d wake up at dawn, sometimes before, and I’d be thinking of ways to keep him occupied so we didn’t both go stir crazy. So we’d walk along the path, in the direction of the park. Sometimes we didn’t make it that far. We’d be stopped by a bubbling stream, or a half-dead worm needing to be rescued, or a ripe blackberry bush, or just a patch of dirt that was inexplicably fascinating.

  • Sunny Bank Holiday

    The radio this morning announced that today has broken the record for the hottest day in May ever in the UK. Here in Wiltshire the temperature reached 32 degrees, more than many of us Brits can comfortably tolerate. Climate change concerns notwithstanding, we are lucky to have some sunny weather during the school half term and Bank Holiday weekend — though less so when it’s unpleasantly hot. And of course, climate change is a difficult thing to dismiss. The notion that while this might be the hottest May of my life so far, it might well be one of the coolest for the rest of my son’s life.

  • Beaches

    The sea is in my soul. Growing up in Cornwall, my vividest memories are of beaches. Jump in the car and a short drive along winding country roads would bring you to the nearest beach. Every family holiday involved camping in my dad’s 4-person mountaineering tent at Mother Ivey’s Bay, a mere hour’s drive from where we lived, sometimes for weeks at a time, every single day spent swimming, running and playing on the pristine beach. We’d wake up before 6am (with the arrival of the gulls) and walk down with our bodyboards, my dad, my sister and me, plunging straight into the cold, grey sea before anyone else was up. Spending that first golden hour, while the beach was deserted, letting the primal call of the sea deep into our bones before heading back to the tent for chocolate porridge (my dad’s speciality made from mixing hot chocolate powder and porridge oats) cooked on the little camping stove. At night we’d walk there again by moonlight, watching for bats and listening to the sound of the waves.

  • Beginning

    The first line is always the hardest. I sit in front of the blank page with its cursor blinking, aggressively or invitingly, wondering what I’ll write. I know that if I can first uncork the bottle, the rest will flow. It’s the decision paralysis that gets you. The temptation to turn back before you’ve even started. Sometimes you just have to begin, not knowing where it’s going. Forget about all the things you think you need before you can embark. You don’t really need any of them. Once you’re on the trail, the woods close in behind you and the only way is forward. A meandering path through the thoughts in your head, only forged by putting one foot in front of another, testing the ground underfoot, backtracking when it’s too thorny, too overgrown with weeds. Finding alternative routes, easier paths made by those who came this way before, but which combined with your own journey make something new. Streams to ford, distractions or unconventional paths to uncharted lands full of new wonders? An uphill climb until you finally break out above the tree line to survey the landscape below. How far you’ve come. Is it far enough, or do you forge ahead to higher peaks, where the path is more treacherous and greater dangers lie? Where the journey is more perilous but the rewards far greater?

  • Community

    One of the most significant things that inspired me as a web developer was the sense of community. Through conferences, meet-ups and just being online a lot, I found a tribe of like-minded people who were all similarly passionate about web standards and making fun, creative work. This community spurred me on to make better work, to think and discuss more, to write about what I learned and even to speak at conferences where, in turn, I made new real-life friends, grew my community even further and, hopefully, helped others too.

  • The swifts are back

    In the last few days, the swifts have returned. Surely the bellwether of summer, I hear their high-pitched trills and spot them soaring and swooping, twisting and turning joyfully as I settle down at my desk. Always moving, never resting. A life spent on the wing.

  • Untethered

    Elkin couldn’t remember a time when he hadn’t been on the boat. He knew at one time or another he must have been somewhere. A long, seaweed-encrusted rope trailed from the bow of the small, weather-beaten wooden dingy. An umbilical cord. He supposed at some point it must have been tethered to something. Here he was nowhere, drifting freely on the wide open ocean, with no landmarks as far as the eye could see, the sun, moon and stars above the only markers of the passing of time and place. He had the vast open skies above him and the endless expanse of sea to call his own. But this little boat was all he knew as home.

  • Being a student again

    I’m currently studying part-time for an MSc in Computer Science. It’s an interesting experience being a student again. The course is entirely online, which has its advantages: I can fit it in relatively easily around work and anything else I want/need to do. But it’s a far cry from my arts degree 20 years ago, which was entirely studio based. I do miss the interaction with my peers, and I feel that shared experience can be a good motivator. The work is mostly interesting, but it could certainly be made more so by sharing thoughts and ideas with others.

  • Journeys

    Journeys are time to think. If not to relax, at least to collect your thoughts, to pause and to process. They are the spaces between places. It could be said that a good journey is a forgettable one. Uneventful, nothing out of the ordinary. The ones that went according to plan, where we arrived safely and punctually at our destination. These are the journeys we hope for. But the journeys we remember are the ones that defied expectations. The ones where we met someone new, or where we took an unplanned detour. The joyous ones spent travelling with friends or family, embarking on unexpected adventures, or the hellish ones where we’re stuck in traffic or delayed unavoidably by broken down trains. They are the journeys that leave their mark upon us. Travelling with another person is one way to really get to know them. A shared journey can cement a relationship, or expose its cracks.