Paper and Promises



I should probably start by saying that I don't intend for this blog to be a diary. Although this post is going to be a bit 'me, me, me', I thought I ought to introduce myself, before I expect people to trust or even listen to what I have to say.

The prospect of doing this has been playing on my mind for months. I've always enjoyed writing, English being one of the few lessons that actually excited me throughout school. Something else I enjoy, and perhaps do too much of, is voicing my opinion. So, a blog was pretty much the perfect thing to get going on - somewhere I could think and speak freely. I even scribbled down five or six possible blog post ideas while I was sitting waiting to sign on at the job centre, back when I didn't have a job. So I'm not really sure why it's taken me this long.

Confidence, probably. It's not like I didn't have the time, facility or inspiration. When it comes to doing things, I never have a problem planning. In fact I tend to plan relentlessly, mentally noting everything that needs to be done or avoided, writing infinite lists and personal instructions for myself. But then sometimes, that long winded process sort of ends there, and I give up before I've even begun.

I was sifting through what felt like an absolute river of junk in my wardrobe last week and came across a couple of things I didn't know I still had. An old diary, and another filled notepad of around two-hundred pages. I remember beginning and consequently forgetting about endless diaries throughout my childhood, of which I've come across many over the years, with the first few lines of writing going something like 'This time, I promise I really am going to try and keep up writing in here.' And I never did. What a waste of a promise, and paper. But the diary I found last week amongst all the crap in my wardrobe was battered and drawn on, with two years of entries inside. Not just once a month entries, either, but pretty regular ones. I may have missed a couple of months here and there, but it seems I had been pretty persistent.

As for the other notebook, I was pretty shocked to find that at 12 years old I had started, and finished, a two hundred page (bearing in mind it is handwritten) story about a white lion who gets taken to the circus. And I didn't even remember I'd done it. 

The past six months have been very strange. I went to university and came back after two months. I think that would knock a fair bit of self belief out of anybody. I spent the first couple of months looking for a job, found one, applied to university again, and then didn't really put my mind to anything else. I didn't really do anything at all. My song writing hit a brick wall and I stopped reading and singing. I looked at the people around me in awe at the amount of talent and passion people had, and then constantly asked myself why I wasn't doing the same things. For a good amount of time I forgot that I wasn't a robot, I forgot that I had feelings and not an infinite amount of confidence. I forgot that actually, I had just made quite a big life decision, one that caused me relief, but also pain and made me feel to put it rather bluntly, like a failure. Yet I expected to be able to get up, shake it off and get on with life straight away.

Finding my diary, and the story I had written... in the least cheesy way possible, sort of ended what I can only describe now as a bit of a slip up. Recently, I've been writing songs again, reading and I'm hoping this blog becomes another thing I can take pride in.

No, being the author of a rather badly punctuated story about a white lion doesn't mean I'm now sorted for life, but it did confirm for me that if I could produce something like that all those years ago, then perhaps I am capable of a lot more than I give myself credit for sometimes.

1 comments:

  1. Looking forward to hearing more from youuuu! such an interesting character and writing style :)

    ReplyDelete

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