Counting my blessings one song at a time

After a couple of disturbed nights I woke up this morning having had a full night’s sleep. It has put a spring in my step – actually I have felt like skipping today.

I have spent the day window shopping, looking for tiles, light fittings and paint colours for my new kitchen. Sitting in the car with the radio on these are the songs that have put a big smile on my face.

It started when I heard "Blockbuster" by Sweet when I dropped the boys off at school. This was the first single I ever bought, it was out in 1973 and I was only five years old but this song brings back memories of dancing round the kitchen with my dad on a Sunday evening when we would listen to the top 40.

I don’t know what the song is about but there’s a line “you’d better watch out if you’ve got long black hair.” Well I have always had long hair and my dad’s hair was dark so at such a young age I had a crazy notion he was singing all about us.

The very next song on the radio was Jenn Bostic “Not Yet”, well I wrote all about that one yesterday (you can read it here), the radio was turned up even louder as joined in!

I stopped at the lighting showroom to be bedazzled by sparkling ideas with exorbitant price tags!

Back in the car and the DJ played “Mr Blue Sky” by E.L.O. Now in some ways this song could make me a little sad as it was played at Andrew’s funeral.

When we had the private family cremation before the church service I chose two songs, one to be played when we entered with the coffin and one to play as we left.

The undertaker advised me to pick something more cheerful to leave by and “Mr Blue Sky” was the first happy tune to pop into my head.

It’s a song that never fails to makes me smile and gives me confidence to carry on. It certainly worked at the funeral because it transformed my mood and I was able to stand up and give the eulogy Andrew deserved to a packed congregation without a tear. 

Another stop to shop, I found some cheaper lights and discovered to my delight that HMV was still open! 

I picked up a copy of Jenn Bostic’s CD and popped it on in the car – bit of a mistake, the first two songs were new to me but the third was “Jealous of the Angels” - go and look it up on Google if you don’t know it, I was in tears well before the chorus as she sung about the pain of losing a loved one.

Still I have become quite adept at driving while crying over the past couple of years and the next track was the now familiar and positive “Not Yet”!

As the day progressed my kitchen plans moved forward. I think I’ve definitely chosen a paint colour for the walls – it’s called Rice Cake – even if the lights fittings and tiles are still under consideration.

It’s been a good day all in all, made even better by the sun shining and seeing my story appear on the Nation Flash Fiction Day Flash Flood!

It’s not always easy counting your blessings but a happy song or two along the way certainly makes all the difference!

Time to stop spinning because I'm getting Dizzy...

The fiction is put aside once again and I am writing another real and honest post for you today.

Sometimes I wonder if anyone out there cares about my thoughts written here in this public extension of my private diary. But then that is and always has been my greatest weaknesses – a lack of self-confidence.

Just over a year ago I was putting together an application for a writing award, with an idea of turning my first blog Unravelling-Edges into a book, chronicling the thoughts and feelings I experienced during my first year of being a widow. 

I wasn’t successful with the application so that made a grand total of two rejections in two years.

This year the deadline for applications came and went and I never even considered putting my name forward.

I’d almost moved on too far from those early days of grief that were so raw and debilitating and I was eagerly searching for something new.

And so I started my NaNoWriMo project, turning the book of Esther in a young adult novel.

I’m full of grand ideas and daydreams but something always seems to stop me mid flow. It’s as if I lift up my head and look around I realise how scary this all is. 

How can I possibly write a novel or a whole book about grief? Surely there are better writers out there far more capable?

Then there’s the biggest stumbling block of all – I don’t actually know the right people, I don’t have the right contacts for this to succeed!

And that’s when I cry because that is Andrew talking in my head,  the Andrew who perhaps believed in my abilities but gently crushed my dreams with reality so I wouldn’t get hurt later on.

The other day I re-posted this from last year Dreams – Old andNew. I added it to my Facebook page and got this comment back from my bridesmaid who I first met when we did a voluntary year together.

Don't give up on your dreams.

Found my frontline t-shirt in loft yesterday, you wrote,

“hope we're still friends when I am a famous novelist

and you are just a housewife with four kids!”

The “just” in the last sentence was tongue in cheek, at least I really hope that’s how I meant it but the truth is my friend is a mother of four, it was always her ambition, although now she is pursuing other dreams too.

But what I had genuinely forgotten was that even back then I had a desire to write. That was completely overshadowed when I got married and had the boys. Family life took up all of my time and energy,

It’s taken me a long time and a tragedy to really start believing in my talents again and put fingers to keyboard.

How did I forget my dreams? They got pushed so far away they were almost out of reach.

I found this video yesterday of Jenn Bostic’s new song “Not Yet”

I especially love the young dancer in the video, she reminds me of a much younger version of me. Once I had dreams to dance too and there is something about the flick of her hair as she twirls and that yearning expression. 

The video shows “ordinary” people pursuing their passions and this along with the comment from my bridesmaid gave me the shove I needed to do something…

Last night I found and tweaked three flash fiction pieces to send into the Nation Flash Fiction Day website, this morning I found an email saying they have accepted one story and it will appear in tomorrow’s Flash Flood of stories throughout the day.

And next weekend I am going to show my writing to a proper published author – see I actually do know the right people after all – I am going to get an opinion from someone who knows stuff!

It's time to knock on a few doors again in between the writing, re-writing and editing because I really need to believe in myself enough to get a project finished for once!

Stop pretending I don’t care

Comparisons won’t get me

They won’t get me anywhere.

We’re all diamonds in the rough

It doesn’t matter what you think

I’m good enough

No matter what it takes

I’m going to make it

Yes I’m going to find a way

Think I’ll give up and forget

Not me

Not yet!

To Whom It May Concern

Well my story never made it into the Flash Flood but you have to keep writing!

At just after 2 pm I found out there was Flash Fiction Write-in. It closed at 3pm which gave me a little under an hour to get something written and posted!

There were 200 prompts which took time to look through but finally I settled on the one below which I used as a title...

It is dedicated to my friend Ann, who is the woman in the story although it is fiction and I have embellished!

To whom it may concern

I have a friend who has a knack of writing letters especially of the complaining nature. She twists her words and phrases to make her usual tirade of expletives sound almost polite. 

It pays off mostly, money off coupons land on her doormat with alarming regularity and once a huge bouquet of flowers was delivered as recompense, shame about her allergies but I enjoyed their sweet fragrance.

She is certainly a friend worth keeping with all the perks and freebies to be had. Besides would you want to cross a woman with so sharp a tongue?

Without a doubt her finest hour was coffee with manager of Marks and Spencers. There they sat putting the world to rights, discussing knicker elastic over two toasted tea cakes.

I sat in awe a couple of tables away as her voice rose and he looked flustered.

Eventually she was bought with a voucher from the man who was concerned.

“Two for ten pound meal for tea?” She gave me a wink and I followed in her wake.

Click here for some more great short stories

Warning: Flash Flood Approaching

No my warning is not about the awful weather we have been having of late but about a flood of flash fiction that will arrive at midnight.

Tomorrow is National Flash Fiction Day and things have been getting a little crazy over on Twitter as those of us addicted to writing flash fiction are deliberating story ideas for a Flash Flood. The idea is we submit stories of up to 500 words in any genre or style. From midnight the best stories will appear on  the Flash Flood Journal.

I had an idea but just haven't got around to writing it so I decided to plunder my old Word documents and I found the story below.

A tiny bit of editing and tidying up and it comes under the 500 words limit at 422.

Now there's just four and a half hours to go until the deadline - the question is do I pull out all the stops and get my original idea written too? (you can enter 3 stories in total) It could be a late night but I will keep you posted...

The Scene of a Crime

            I lay on the ground, still, sheltered by the bushes. Unnoticed except by the man who had shoved me there earlier. 

He gently tapped me with his foot.  Partly to reassure himself of my presence but also to kick me further into the undergrowth making sure I was covered.  He was aware my discovery would scupper his plans. 

He needn’t worry, I wouldn’t make a sound. I’d keep silent, while all around there were raised voices.

            “How touching, coming down here to protect your lover.  First I’m going to kill him and then I’m going to kill you.”  A gruff man’s voice.

            A woman was sobbing, “It’s not what you think. Don’t kill him Bill please!”

            There was a thud.  Some heavy object swung with great force collided with, what?  A tree perhaps?  From my vantage point there’d have been little to see even if I were able.

            The man swung his weapon again, this time there was a cracking of wood as if it had struck a branch held up in defence.

            The woman continued her pleading and sobbing.

            “Get out of my way bitch!”  The gruff man shouted.

            She yelped as she fell to the floor. While the skirmish continued above us both.

            It was then she saw me although she didn’t know at first just what she had found.

            She reached out. I could not move. She touched me with her manicured fingers.  There was fresh blood in her nails from where she had joined in the fight.  Finally she grabbed hold and pulled me roughly towards her. Releasing me from my hiding place I fell apart in her arms.

Liberated I spewed my innards. Twenty-pound notes blew in all directions like confetti.

            Both men stopped for a second, and thought of catching what they could. 

One man watching with bitterness thinking of what he stood to lose. 

The other exhilarated by thoughts of the unexpected rewards to be gained.

            But it was the woman who had found the real prize.

            She unburdened me of my heavy heart.  Its coldness now rested in her hands.

            A shot rang out and then another, her aim was true. Maybe she needed neither of them anymore after all.

            Frantically she gathered together what money she might require, stuffing notes into her pockets.

She’d taken my heart, now she scraped out my very soul and discarded me too in her wake.

Two bloodied bodies and an abandoned shoe box.  None of us able to talk, but we all have a story to tell…..