Ok, this may not make much sense. It’s a bit of freewriting I’ve done as the first exercise in writing 101. See what you think!
‘Twenty minutes seems like a bloomin’ long time to freewrite. I used to do a lot of it during my creative writing course and found it really helpful. I remember they told you not to use punctuation..hmmm gone wrong with that already here, and to just type a stream of consciousness. Dreams seem to be a stream of unconsciousness the mind just travels randomly and weirdly to where it wants without any input from me. Often scary dreams, uncomfortable dreams that live on with me throughout my day. They also said don’t correct mistakes..gone wrong with that too. I’ve made a few mistakes as I’ve been typing, but not many. I’m good and fast at typing. Did it a lot when I was working, in fact I learnt to touch type at school and its been a useful skill since the explosion of pcs. Mind you, when I learnt it was all big ‘ol typewriters, not even electric, that you used to have to thump the keys hard to get a dodgy smudgy letter from. Sometimes letters arrive at my house that are smudgy from the rain. It rains a lot here. Not raining now though. In fact theres not a lot of weather this morning just dull greyness, it’s not even that cold. Autumn approaches. Did you know there’s Christmassy things already in the shops here. September. September in the rain. That’s a song I remember from years back. I like music. I downloaded George Ezra’s new album on Saturday. My dad was a big fan of music. He used to stand in front of our fireplace conducting orchestra’s on the radio. He was a bit barmy. We didn’t get on all that famously I’m afraid to say. Bit of a temper on him, though never violent with me or mum, but hit the wall a few times and his verbal tirades where something to behold. Not sure whether they’ve scarred me for life I think I remember him being more arty than cross generally speaking. Gosh this is turning into a bloody counselling session. I certainly didn’t want that to happen I wanted to write of wine and roses and pretty things. Sunshine and laughter and nice people singing. My writing is never like that though. Always turns out dark and dismal. Usually violence and murders in my stories. People who are nice on the surface but turn out to be psychos. Hmm wonder where that came from? Hehee… this is a counselling session. I wonder how much longer I’ve got left. I type fast so it could be another ten/fifteen minutes yet…who knows..doesn’t time fly when your enjoying yourself. Time is relative its so much slower when you’re waiting for the clock hands to click on to five so you can go home after a busy day, than it is when your playing games with your children. Watching tv shows can either slow or speed up time too depending on whether you are enjoying them or not. We watched a lengthy Chinese film on Saturday evening, can’t remember the title, but there was a lot, a lot, of fighting, and I couldn’t tell who was who it was just one grey blur of people with swords, it seemed to go on forever, and yet the programme I chose to watch, which made me laugh, was over in a flash. I guess that could be that the film was three hours long and my programme was just half hour, but you know what I mean. Journeys out to holidays, even long haul ones, go a lot quicker than coming home. Goodness me how long journeys can drag. It takes just and hour and fifty minutes to get to London by train from my house, but oh’ that journey can feel like a lifetime when you are on a smelly, overcrowded train sitting next to someone who had their music playing just loud enough to you cant actually hear what it is but you can hear that thrumming beat. Enough to be really annoying, but not bad enough for you to actually complain. Or the people who are sitting getting really drunk around the same table as you. I hate sitting round those tables. Often four people forced to look in every direction but each other for the entirety of the journey, or as I once was, stuck with three others who were sharing a bottle of champagne. They could have offered me some couldn’t they. Although champagne on a train could be a little sickmaking I would think. I don’t usually eat or drink if I can help it. Apart from anything, if you drink too much you are forced to use the revolting loos. I used a loo on a train in India. It was a squat one. That was a challenge I can tell you, but at least you don’t have to touch anything. I could write a book on loos around the world, have been in all sorts. Good and bad, very very bad. Also sad. Some of the loos in China were pretty horrid, but I tell myself I only had to use them the once, some of the villagers (in a particular place) had to use it the whole time. That’s one thing travelling helps with, finding your place in the world, alerting you to other people’s circumstances, reminding you that you are one of the fortunate ones. In fact, I view travel as an education. We took our daughters to India when they were about thirteen. They learned much about different cultures….’