New Year Resolution - What's mine? Less Waste, More Thrift.

Is there any point to making a new year's resolution? I'm bad at keeping up random commitments/expectations of myself at the best of times and I suspect plenty of other people are too. I'm making no judgements. I have no intention of expounding any expectations I'd like to have for my family, friends, country, Prime Minister, Jeremy Corbin, East Coast Mainline trains, European Union, Huddersfield Town FC, Brexit, Monster Raving Loony Party, Old Uncle Tom Cobbley and/or all. But I have quietly made a commitment relating to my post of 8 August 2018:-

https://sugswritersblog.blogspot.com/2018/08/its-environment-stupid.html

Any sane commitment I make for the future has to be aimed at helping to save the environment. So for now, mine is that I shall try to be less wasteful. I started by saving some of the Christmas wrapping paper, ribbons and ties that were used. I do remember that my grandparents, both sides of the family, did this and really nice, good quality wrapping paper often reappeared three or four years running before finally being consigned to the fireplace or bin. They didn't do this because of serious poverty but through innate thrift, which we seem to have forgotten is a virtue.

Wrapping paper is largely insignificant, do I realise this and will try to do more, much more. Just as soon as I get over this damn horrible cold! At least the dirty tissues have gone in the stove and briefly helped to keep us warm, thus saving a minute puff of gas.

Word of the Day: Hiatus

Word of the Day


HIATUS.

Meaing - pause, break, being up shit creek but still sure you do have a paddle, somewhere.

I wrote a Ghost Story

The Friday the 13th Garden

Behind a tall, old brick wall there was once an exclusive, private garden, with fruit trees and curved flower-beds, an oval fish pond and a crowd of climbing roses on a wide pergola. It was also full of self-seeded buddleia, infested with nettles and partly covered with ivy, ragwort and other uninvited guests. One other fact that you need to know is, this overblown private garden was in Chelsea. To have a private garden in Chelsea, you need to be posh, or rich or preferably both.

Sylvie was neither posh nor rich, but she was a gymnast and proud of it. This particular day, Friday the thirteenth of May, after a row with her now very much ex-boyfriend Simon, in the crowded pub known locally as ‘The Plastic Meat,’ due to the display of fake foods beside the serving hatch, Sylvie found herself walking alone, beside a high brick wall. She was still angry and felt lightheaded and seething with adrenalin after the fight. A black cat ran across her path and shot up and over the wall. The wall was six feet high, Sylvie was five foot four, but she followed the cat.

She’d walked past that wall often enough, and never felt the urge to climb it before. It was on her way home from college and she assumed, like everyone else, that it backed onto the row of garages which were clearly visible from the next street. Yet somehow that Friday evening the sight of the agile cat almost thinking itself up the wall triggered an unfamiliar instinct in her. Once on the top of the wall, a position that surprised her for a moment, Sylvie looked back at the street, which seemed duller and further away than quite made sense.

When she turned and looked into the garden, she found a large apple tree was reassuringly close, with an adjacent branch which she leapt onto, then she saw the cat on the ground, looking up at her.  Although it was getting dark, she could see the cat quite clearly, as if the air in the garden was brighter than the street outside. The cat made an inviting sound, a sort of loud thrum, then turned and walked off into the weeds, its tail a dark question-mark above the greyish grass heads.

Dropping to the ground, Sylvie felt soft, mossy turf beneath her feet. She began to follow the cat; its tail was still visible in the undergrowth. She found the stems of grasses and ragwort parted before her, they were very tall, so were the nettles yet brushing against them didn’t harm her hands or face

She found she was approaching a huge wooden structure that loomed skyward, with the vast stems of climbing rose that enveloped its posts swaying in the evening air far above her head. The scented roses, white and full, seemed to dot the sky like stars.

Then a deep, charmingly melodious voice called out her name.

‘Sylvie! Why hello, Sylvie, thank-you for gracing us with your pretty presence.’

Sylvie arched her back, she felt the hairs on her neck stand up, then those on her back and her tail. The entire sensation was so surprising that she ignored the voice. A hiss escaped from between her pointed teeth as she worked mentally through her body; eyes, nose, ears, whiskers, paws, tail…

Whiskers? Paws? Tail?! She yowled in alarm.

‘Don’t trouble yourself, dear’, the voice said calmly, then there was something under her belly and she was lifted up three times her height and placed onto a huge, white cushion.

‘…you’ll find it a little startling to begin with,’ the voice continued, ‘but you will become accustomed to your new state. You may even come to prefer it, others have done so.’  A large, pale face was smiling down at her, hugely sparkling eyes and mouth with a smear of dark, strange smelling lipstick.  

Then the black cat appeared on the cushion beside her, seeming much bigger than before and he rubbed his cheek against hers.

‘Judas! You clever boy, thank you so much for finding Sylvie for me. She is delightful, look at her velvet coat and amber eyes. She could almost be your sister if it wasn’t for those white claws.’

 Startled, Sylvie looked down at her front paws, they were black and soft, with curved, pale claws which were clinging to the cushion for all they were worth.

‘Sylvie dear, I know this seems a little strange,’ a hand was stroking her back, it was somehow soothing. ‘Judas brings me new friends every Friday the thirteenth, as I can’t leave my garden.’

Sylvie opened her mouth to ask a question, any question, there were so many buzzing around inside her mind, but all that came out was an anguished, ‘Mmrrrooooww..?

‘You shall be my newest friend,’ said the voice, ‘allow me to introduce us all.  Judas you have met, he has been here the longest. Over there in the camellia bush are Dante and Gabriel, tabby brothers, such naughty boys, they constantly squabble. By the pond you will find grey Derek who tries quite obsessively and yet fails to catch the goldfish and my dear Caroline nests in the overgrown ivy, I so wish she would come and play with me as she once did. Her delightful white fur has become knotted with roots and spiders’ webs. There are so many others, I seem to forget all their names.

However, I am Gwennifer Drew-Jones, my father was Viscount Hubert of Llanmaes and I have resided at number 2, Cadogan Close all my life, and all of my death. When my nephew inherited the title, he had me smothered and buried underneath this lovely rose, since I was still an embarrass-ment. Having a witch in the family, even a very old one, is apparently most improper, so he buried me like an animal.’

Sylvie felt her fur starting to prickle again, and then there was more stroking.

‘Please be calm, Sylvie dear,’ Gwennifer said, ‘I am by no means the first spirit you have met this delightful evening.’ The black cat called Judas licked the giant cheek, then turned to Sylvie and purred a confirmation. ‘There, you see, Judas was here before me. He was my kitten when I was quite a child myself. He was buried by the wall, following a disagreement with a hansom cab. Being a young cat, he can easily surmount the wall and go into the street to look for likely passers-by. I myself cannot go beyond the garden, since I am permanently an old woman.’

Sylvie’s fur had settled beneath the soothing of the giant woman’s hand, but it felt disarrayed, without thinking she found herself twisting her head around and licking her shoulder, combing the disobedient hair flat with her rough tongue. It was a satisfying sensation and she felt a throbbing purr begin inside her chest.

‘There, there, Sylvie,’ Gwennifer said, ‘You could return to being a young woman, if you choose, but you must leave my garden to do so. There are some who choose to go. There was my lovely Geoffrey, he was a beautiful ginger fellow and his companion was lovely Soo-Ling, they came here together. Dear Geoffrey went away and even Soo-Ling can’t tell where he is now, can you dear?’

Sylvie became aware of the slim Siamese cat who sat on the other side of Gwennifer’s vast, tweedy, tree-trunk legs. The Siamese put its head on one side and stared intently at Sylvie. She knew that for a cat, a straight stare was usually a challenge of some sort, but this cat’s expression held something entirely different.

Words formed in Sylvie’s mind… ‘Geoffrey had the right idea. If you stay too long, the instincts take over, though your mind remains human. You’ll find you can’t leave, you’re without solid food, or love, or sex. Your body will starve, then you will just be here forever as her toy in this damned ghost garden. Go, while still you can.’

Word of the day; Execrable

Word of the day:

Execrable. 

Synonyms of execrable. base, contemptible, currish, despicable, detestable, dirty, dishonorable, ignoble, ignominious, low, low-down, low-minded, mean, nasty, paltry, snide, sordid, vile, wretched

Apply where you will.

Subterranean Homesick Blues by Bob Dylan - my Desert Island Discs three

When are song lyrics actually poetry?  The basic types of song lyrics, 'I will love you forever' and 'I love you but you're nasty to me,' usually bore me. Occasionally such songs can be raised by a sublime tune and rendition, such as the Righteous Brothers' 'Unchained Melody,' but mostly they aren't any more meaningful than Max Bygraves' 'You're a pink toothbrush, I'm a blue toothbrush.' Things can get far more raunchy, but are basically about one thing, sex. Poetry these are not.

Slightly more interesting song lyrics tell a story - Tom Jones 'Delilah' tells a story of jealousy and murder but with a sing-along chorus which diminishes the impact of the plot. Bobbie Gentry's 'Ode to Billy Joe' is a more obscure and possibly even darker story which leaves the listener wondering what actually happened on the Tallahassee Bridge, but this is still storytelling, it's not usually considered to be poetry.

There's has always been any amount of snooty, academic opinion which tries to dismiss anything beyond a certain highbrow canon as simply lacking the cachet to be considered proper poetry. Their dismissal naturally includes song lyrics. I always disagreed with them, I still do. Who are they to dismiss anything which doesn't fit their preconceived notion of poetry - 90% of which has been written by academic, western men? Answer, they're mostly academic, western men!

More of Me by Kathryn Evans - Book Review

My goodreads review:-

More of Me
by

Kathryn Evans (Goodreads Author)

Sue Gilbert's review

Oct 21, 2018  ·  edit

really liked it

bookshelves: might-read-again, novels, sci-fi

I would have read this in one session but for needing a night's sleep. It's remarkably well written, I can't fault it. Anyone who's ever been a teenage girl will probably recognise the uncomfortable feeling inside their skin, even if this story is teenage angst and weirdness taken to the max and beyond. 

But am I allowed to like it? I was a teenager a very long time ago. If all so called YA fiction is this good, I will read a lot more of it. But I hate fiction being put into these boxes, YA, SF, mystery, crime, fantasy, etc. Good books are good books! I was reading adult's stories and children's stories when I was eight, I didn't differentiate then. I'm certainly not starting now. 

*****************************************

This is the first of my Hastings Litfest prize books which I've so far read. The others will need to be extremely good to be as immediately engaging as this is. 

I won a Prize! No, not for my writing

Simply for turning up to Hastings very first LitFest.

I only found about the LitFest by chance, even though I now live in St Los, which is to Hastings what Hove is to Brighton, i.e. an attached twin. But I found out in time to attend a couple of the events. Hastings Lit Fest isn't famous, this was its first year, but it will become famous - I'm told that most events were very well attended and all the workshops were sold out. Already it has playwright David Hare as its patron and attracted speakers such as Patrick Gale, Sophie Hannah, Ed Boxall and Mavis Cheek to name just four of the 36 involved.

I only attended two events, but they were very worthwhile. First was in a garage behind a pub where I watched excellent performances of 2 long, Shakespeare derived monologues written and directed by writer/performer/ producer John Knowles. I then attended his scriptwriting workshop the following day. I'd never heard of him, but the workshop was very worthwhile, I'm now engaging with three separate monologues of my own, one of which may even get performed, Mr. Knowles is staging another production and was quite keen on what I did at the workshop. I have submitted a piece, not the one I began at the workshop. We shall see.

So how come I won a prize? My name was just pulled out of a proverbial hat which contained, so I'm told, the name of everyone known to have participated in any of the events. I went to a meeting of Litfest volunteers where I was presented with my prize, a bundle of signed books by some of the festival speakers. Can a writer own too many books? Of course not! I'll review them as I read them. 

In no particular order, here they are:-

Prague Spring by Simon Mawer

Angels of Islington by Sam Davey

More of Me by Kathryn Evans

Me and My Alien Friend by Ed Boxall - book and CD
Of Men and Angels by Michael Arditti
Dogchild by Kevin Brooks