Dahl, Hemingway and Thank you x

Morning world – it is a beautiful day here in the U.K. I’ve already been for an hour’s walk, through the country lanes, with the dog. It’s an absolute blessing to be out and about in gorgeous sunshine – which confirms how much it has rained lately.

This week, I managed to watch two documentaries dedicated to Roal Dahl and Kenneth Graeme – both programmes took a deeper look at the personality of each writer. I hadn’t realised that both writers had lost one or both parents during their early childhood. Both men, as always, had their specific quirks where ideas writing were concerned – though like all writers they predominately pulled details from their childhoods. Both programmes were a pleasure to watch and my mind kept returning to them at various points this week. As always, scratch the surface of a writer’s life and the true depth of their nature reflected in their work.

Each night I have worked on my current project ‘ To honour…’ though, I haven’t read any to my husband or writing groups. I have made a conscious decision not to share my work until I have completed a considerable chunk of the work. I feel that one of my downfalls when writing ‘Her’ was talking to others about it, it took away the urgency to write it, which didn’t help carry the momentum.

I managed to polish, and read to hubby, my writers’ group exercise relating to the monkey puzzle tree and grave. I seems a long time since I sat and read my work to hubby, and yes, it was great hearing his feedback, like the good old days when life wasn’t so busy. Though, I do always take it with a pinch of salt, family always think that your work is great – that’s their love coming through and they can’t be objective about it.

During my lunchtimes I have been reading ‘A Paris Wife’ by McClain, which is about Ernest Hemingway’s first wife Hadley - it is beautifully written and so romantic. I think it shows Hemingway in a new light, he is so ambitious and yet lacks confidence as a writer. I’d recommend it as a decent read for anyone, writer or not.

Life dealt me another nudge of contemplation this week, the funeral of a precious little boy, whose passing has reminded me just how precious this life is - we are so complacent about time, when really we should be carefully selecting how to spend our time. I wrote a poem in his honour, I won’t be sharing it, as it was my thank you to him for the gentle reminder on how to breathe. It can’t be a coincidence that I have laughed louder and heartier this week.

And so, to the week ahead. I have a special writers’ meeting on Monday night – where I shall be providing feedback on a short story competition that I’ve been involved in. I am eager to see what the others on the panel thought - it could be a long night!

Today, and maybe tomorrow, I have school work to do in preparation of a ‘big’ lesson and meeting which is part of qualifications. But, that is no excuse to lose the writing momentum that I’ve currently created. I plan to spend most of the day at the laptop working on ‘To honour…’

Wednesday night will be spent at the Mad Hatter’s meeting reading our monkey puzzle stories – I am expecting that each member will have produced a unique slant on the story.

Remember that you can follow me of Twitter odwyer_author – last night you’d have been able to view the best insult I’ve seen in ages – I cried from laughing, before I retweeted it.

Enjoy!