What you are about to read is fiction. Fiction woven around real people in my family. But fiction. It is not true. It is my feelings and memories of real events based on flawed memories and family hearsay ... Nobody can agree on solid facts and perhaps that is good thing? Maybe I am the only sane person in my family. And the mere fact that I write that makes me feel insane. Hanging on to your sanity in a crazy family is almost impossible. Almost. Thank goodness I have though. I think. Most of the time at least. (We are all allowed a little craziness on our days off surely?) Feel free to judge for yourself. I hope to move on to some famous people in my family eventually. Their fame and success makes me wonder if several generations ago insanity, and a kind of genius that went with it were already present. Perhaps in the genes.
The photograph is someone I never met ... And yet I know them very well.
Or do I?
Are they the same person 55 years later?
Were they even the same person 5 years later?
I was born within five years of that photo being taken.
Maybe I ruined the woman's life?
She is my mother ... But before I was born she changed irrevocably. Or I have always presumed that she did. Events so tragic must surely have affected her I thought. But now I am not so sure. Maybe she was immune or numb to such events by that age? And perhaps because things far worse had already taken place. The more I ponder this the more I realise how impossible it really is to know a parent properly. Or perhaps it is a universal thing and we can't ever really know any other person. Orson Welles' words about dying alone sink into the pit of my stomach. So friendship is what really matters? Attempts to be nice to each other in the brief time between birth and death. And tell each other stories to help us feel connected during our lives. At moments when we are quiet and have time to read or listen.
This blog will be my attempt to tell stories. And to learn the art of storytelling as I go along. To improve. I hope.
I have a personal library which I want to share along the way too. I feel so lucky and privileged to have time to do this. I adore my books and hope readers will enjoy sharing snippets from them. I have a collection of books about the art and craft of writing itself. It turns out learning to write starts with lots and lots of reading. And rereading. And figuring out why you like some writers and even paragraphs more than others. I also have many many other books who can't wait to get a mention here.
Welcome to my blog.
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