Tears, growth and bastard things that carry on regardless

I’ve been head-down in deadlines, producing work for professional eyes and related feedback, so my apologies for the gap…if you missed me.

It’s an early June evening and not so long ago, it was dark, grumpy March.

And it’s hard to be grumpy when the world seems so ready for adventure: snapdragons heaving themselves shamelessly over one another, their velvety heads so heavy they can barely stand; honeysuckle filling the air with its come-hither magic; evil bloody bindwind literally blowing its own trumpet, while I battle like a Greek fool who’s chopping off Hydra heads (ten spring up, for every one I lop).

Why all this garden talk? Good question; multiple answers.

Managing the years’ creative demands has never felt too different from my battles with my garden.

Growth in the wrong places.

Choices about weeds.

Under-exposure (over-exposure not a fate I’ve yet suffered).

Barren patches.

Rot.

I wept – actually wept, proper shoulder-shaking, noisy, wet lengthy sobbing wails – with creative frustration yesterday.

I got some feedback on a project. It wasn’t awful, and in many important ways it was great. But there was a humongous “but” (which I’m not going to share).

Disappointment’s bitter slap really took me by surprise. I realised I’d made some unconscious assumptions about the work’s appeal. And those assumptions only became visible to me when they smashed on the floor.

But – writers – you can take your sympathetic fists from your mouths. I’m ok, ‘course I am. Because I’ve stumbled on another surprise. That I love the project, its people, and my choices about how I’ll communicate it and so I’ll carry on as before. “If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster / And treat those two impostors just the same…”

What’s interesting to me is this is not an indignant, defiant persistence in the face of wise advice; it’s acceptance that I have to get this story out in the way I’ve planned (over almost a year). They are probably right and that’s ok. But this thing just has to get writ.

I like that.

Long may that continue.

Watch this space.