Nice things bloom all the time
Last week, Aoife Barry published a great piece on disappointment and social media. I recommend you read it.1 I had some of the below written before I read Aoife’s words. An echo. Aren’t we all going through it?
Sometimes people tell me I have to focus more on my art, give it more of my time, abandon the day job, or find a different role which allows for creativity to thrive.2 I’m always glad that I tend to have a glass of something in my hand at those moments. Even a bad drink makes it easier to swallow whiplash words. Nod and say sentences containing phrases like interesting, so right, yeah I need to do that.
Although, I often don’t choose the easy route in these circumstances. I can’t help it. But I totally can. I am comfortable with fangs. I don’t mind being blunt about money. It’s the rural upbringing. How did you get that new tractor? Etc.
I once met a vlogger on a photoshoot and she spoke, casually and somewhat viciously, about how no one told her she was meant to be doing the sensible money stuff, the how and the when. She’d grown up without the invisible map. And she was angry. She felt dreadfully behind her peers. And it was electric to hear someone vocalise such frustration. Because I too held those embers inside me. They are there now. I think they’re in most of us. Stable families, nice homes, multiple holidays, full health, good skin, a list of publications and prizes - it’s easy feel lacking while lurking in other peoples’ shadows.
It can be tough working full-time and writing part-time in tinned-fish pockets of time. But lots of people do it. It is how most people make things, actually. I have to remind myself of that. My existence isn’t unique and special. I’m a speck, and so are you. Most artists don’t have a surfeit of physical and metaphorical space. People create fun and beautiful work in rooms where the walls are furry, the cheap carpets gnawed thin by moths. I’ve read work that has moved me to tears from authors who’ve been ill or caring for loved and/or frustrating people. Nice things bloom all the time.
I’ve a much better set up than most. I’ve to remind myself of that. But then my lack of output compared to others, people with bullet pointed and hyperlinked biographies, makes me feel like I should be doing more. And I’m someone who has had a great little year so far. Still, guilt and disappointment seeps in. When I go to the gym, a rare occasion, I see word count goals dwindle. In bed, I look at my phone and my brain goes well, you can’t be giving out about an annoying wagon housesitting in Connemara or Greece and scribbling while you’re watching a dirty house in London being cleaned by someone who is using enough chemicals to finish off the remaining coral reefs. When I spend hours on a Sunday making a chilli for the week ahead, that’s a short story that will never be edited, finished, it is down the sink with the salted chickpea water.3
The Monday evening before last, I set time aside for that sour milk term, life admin. And I got four things done. All costly things, all boring non-creative things, but that’s that. Last night I submitted a big receipt to revenue, a fruit of the life admin labour, which will help pay for the next thing on the list. Then I sent across nearly 6,000 words of something that isn’t finished, will never feel finished to my writing group. It was a real ‘fuck it, fuck it, fuck it' add to folder moment. And it brought me incredible peace. I’d done something. That’s today’s feelings of inadequacy banished.
Last week, paid subscribers got a little bit of flash fiction. I had great fun writing it. Subscribe to read it and other bits.
Apologies, I sent this out with the wrong link initially - I think I sent readers to a student film competition entry. I hope you voted for the budding filmmakers though!
Personally, I’m not convinced these mythical monotonous brain-off roles exist in the Late Computer Age. Let our enemies cut the deep sea cables. Bring back bad weather days cancelling work.
You know one thing I will never do? Make chocolate mousse with chickpea water. You all went too far with that one during lockdown.