Ten Minutes a Day

Something to come out of this weekend's writer's retreat is my love of writing has been rekindled.
Dev, love her, provided the much needed shot of what is know as Vitamin Dev, and has got me back on track with this writing lark - which I know I love so much, but have been denying myself for a while. A lot of this I blame on work, but the message was loud and clear.

'Writer's write in the cracks.'

'You don't have to prioritise it, you just have to keep chipping away at it. There are novels which have been written in ten minute blocks.'

'Get the hell out of your own way.'

This weekend, I found the poet again. I'm not sure if this is a good thing, but the poet came out again. If I'm honest, the poet came shivering and moaning, buck naked out of the shallows of the Southern Ocean on Sunday morning.

As I waited for the shower to become free, sitting in the chapel, the words came.

I've missed the feeling.

Another thing that happened this weekend was some pretty frank discussions about many subjects. One of the more frank and open discussions had was on the subject of abortion.

The book, Choice Words, was available to buy. The book is filled with articles about women's experience of abortion in Australia. I bought a copy.

I'll be open. Friday was the anniversary of me terminating a pregnancy. This happened over twenty years ago. It's not something I regret or I'm ashamed about. It's not something that eats me up, but the shortest day of the year comes and I will reflect on the experience. And I come away grateful that I was able to receive  non-judgmental, safe and legal services at the time.

I've read a few chapters of this book. Dev and I had a chat about this too. It reminded me that the first thing I had published was on this very topic. It won a short story competition in a literary journal. It was published.

So, after the gym tonight, I hunted around for this story. It took a bit of rifling round, going through old stick drives and external hard drives.

But I found it - on the first thumb drive I ever bought. It has a capacity of 256MB. It cost me over $50 at the time - online. My first Ebay purchase.

The file is dated 19 June 2000.

I've been on this professional writing journey for 20 years.

I shouldn't moan - the written word is my life. I write for a living, albeit corporate crap.

But that first time I got freaking published was nineteen year ago.

Shit.

I've read the piece. It still stands up. It's a bit clunky in places, bit it has my hand on it.

Would I write it differently now? Probably. Would I write it now? Hell, yeah.

Time to pull my finger out.

Time to write in the cracks.

Time to get over myself and embrace this bit of me that won't be cut out.


Today's song: