Reverb10: Friendship and a Lesson Learned

Image by karindalziel

Reverb10 Day 16, prompt by Martha Milhalik:

Friendship: How has a friend changed you or your perspective on the world this year? Was this change gradual, or a sudden burst?

A friend said to me this year that if you want to write, what you need to do is write. You don't need to wait until you have an expensive pencil.

I have wanted to write for a very long time, I spent years waiting to have this fantastic idea that I could then write about. I didn't realise I should just write, and then the ideas would come. I didn't need to wait for the right time, the right tools, the right idea. I should just write.

So I am.

Image by pinkstockphotos

Reverb10 Day 17, prompt by Tara Weaver

Lesson learned. What was the best thing you learned about yourself this past year? And how will you apply that lesson going forward?

Ooh, not sure about this one. Probably that I can do things, and that I will never find out if I can do them unless I take a deep breath and try.

And that me and crochet don't mix. Oil and water.

Reverb10: Two in One

Playing catch-up here, so two-in-one today.

Reverb10 Day 14, prompt by Victoria Klein

Appreciate. What's the one thing you have come to appreciate most in the past year? How do you express gratitude for it?

In the past year I have come to appreciate many things.

• How clean my kitchen stays now that the Young Philosopher is away at University. Conversely, how nice it was when he lived at home and used to clean up the garden after the dog every day, instead of me having to do it.
• The joy of being able to burrow back under the covers for a while when the Dusty Professor leaves for work in the mornings.
• Being able to rest when I need to.
• The lovely Essex and Kent countryside, which I didn't see much of before the Dusty Professor moved in, as I don't drive. Now we often spend our weekends driving around in the pretty.
• How lovely it is to look forward to someone coming home to me every evening.

And Day 15, prompt by Patti Digh

Five minutes. Imagine you will completely lose your memory of 2010 in five minutes. Set an alarm for five minutes and capture the things you most remember about 2010.

Okay....here goes.

• That I didn't have to work this year.
• Being on set to watch the Dusty Professor do some film work for Channel 4. Yes, dressed as an Anglo-Saxon monk.

• The Young Philosopher dyeing his hair several times- orange, green, blonde, blue.
• A lovely weekend just me and the DP in Hay on Wye. Bookshops and beautiful countryside. Wonderful.

• The DP asking me to marry him in the ruins of Skenfrith Castle, Wales.

• Planning our slightly eccentric wedding for April next year. Details in due course.
• Being a Saxon for the day at West Stow Anglo Saxon Village.

• Taking the YP to university for the first time, Getting used to him not being at home.
• Learning to make tablet weave, and to use a drop spindle.
• Taking part in Mondo Beyondo and Dream Lab.
• Failing dismally to cope with learning to crochet. I was the dunce in the class.
• The DP icing little cakes for our anniversary.

• Weekend visits from the YP. So nice to have him home, even if his hair is like a parrot's feathers.
• Rediscovering writing and discovering an interest in photography.

Reverb10: The Blank Page

Photograph by Pink Sherbert Photography

Reverb10: Today's prompt from Leo Babauta of Zen Habits:

What do you do each day that doesn't contribute to your writing - and can you eliminate it?

I started writing very recently, after having a vague urge to write for many years but never knowing what to write. I think I always thought that one day I would miraculously have a fantastic idea and then I would write a book.

What I have come to realise is that all this time I just needed to pick up a pen and start writing. The inspiration comes the more you write. I have wasted too much time waiting to have something earth shattering or deep and meaningful to say, when I should have just been getting on with it. I came to this realisation only recently, and I have started this blog, where I write several times a week. I may not be writing anything of great importance, just my thoughts and things that are going on in my life, but I am developing a writing habit and I hope it will help me find my voice. I am also doing other writing each day, but not as much as I would like to. I still struggle with feeling I need a great idea before I start.

What do I do each day that doesn't contribute to my writing? I allow myself to think I don't have anything of interest to say. Can I eliminate that? I am working on it.