Creativity: Self-doubt

Do you remember the post a little while back where I was all like WAHEY I'M WRITING A NOVEL! No? Well, here it is, in case you forgot.

That project stalled, which is why you haven't heard much more about it. I couldn't make the idea work in a way that I wanted it to, if you know what I mean.

I'm having trouble with my writing at the minute. Yesterday I read through a few of my poems that I wrote last year, and they were (if you don't mind me saying) pretty damn good. And I very rarely feel that way about a piece of fiction that I write. Definitely not a piece of extended fiction. So: I feel like my poetry is of a better standard than my fiction. But the thing is, I don't want to write poetry.

There was a time when I really wanted to write poems. I wanted to publish a collection (only ever one collection, mind). I wanted to write poem after poem, and I did, for a while. Now though - by which I mean in the past six months or so - I have absolutely no desire whatsoever to write poems. None at all. And no poetic thoughts or inspiration. It's strange. But I'm happy this way.

What I really want to do is write a novel. So I'm trying again. The idea mentioned in that earlier post has been... re-worked, let's put it that way. There were mermaids in it, and now all the mermaids are gone and now it's just people. There has been vague planning and structuring, and I'm busy playing around with the narrative perspectives and such like. I have a prologue that I'm happy to work with for now. I just need to get my teeth into the main body of it all, don't I.

So, in the words of a certain sports brand: Just Do It.

Scrapbooking

I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the most artistic person in the world. I think the artistic gene skipped me and went straight to my sister. I'm creative, sure, but it's words rather than colours or pictures or... anything like that.

So I know my scrapbook isn't the prettiest in the world, but it's very therapeutic and it's something I'm really enjoying at the minute. For years I've kept a "memory box", if you like, full of random souvenirs and random things that mean stuff to me. I've got important things like the funeral orders of service from my grandparents' funerals (x3), I've got things from ex-boyfriends, birthday and Christmas cards, tickets to sports events, music events, theatre events etc... Photos, tickets to university nights out, random photos and wristbands... Lots of random stuff, anyway.

And it was getting a bit cluttered. I'd been given this gorgeous scrapbook several years ago (I can't even remember who gave it to me now!) and hadn't even touched it. So I figured, with all this time on my hands, and with everything from high school and university all finished now, this would be a good time to start work on this.

I'm pretty pleased with it so far, although my memory box still seems to be as full as ever. Oops! If you're interested (and even if you're not!) here's a couple of pages I particularly like so far...

Some bits from a family holiday to South Africa in 2005/2007. Probably bits from both - I can't really work out what's from when. That's me and my sister in the bottom photo. She's 18 now, all grown up!

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These are from a school cruise in 2004. We went to Greece, Egypt and Turkey, and it was an amazing trip. The photo in the top corner is of Leanne, my best friend from school who I don't see nearly enough these days because we both moved away to study, and now she's planning to live where she studied, which makes me sad. She's still wonderful though, I love her lots!

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And this is from when I went to see Muse play at Wembley - twice. Once in 2007 and once in 2010. Amazing both times! There's a bit of a story behind my 2007 trip, so if you'll indulge me a moment more, I'll share it with you:

I was due to go with my boyfriend, James. We split up, and he gave my ticket to his new girlfriend. Fortunately my friend Alison (top corner) knew someone with some spare tickets, so we went with Leanne and had fab seats (much better than if I'd gone with James, which was even better!). It turns out that the person who gave Alison the tickets was my current boyfriend, Ollie, who went (I think) with his then-girlfriend. How strange! And how strange that our paths didn't cross then!

Anyway. Enough chat from me - I've got some serious scrapbooking to do this evening!