I overheard a rather disturbing conversation last night on the train coming home from class. It was late, after 9pm and after dark. The train was crowded as usual. I was sitting and the man was standing right over me, talking into his mobile phone. He looked about fortyish, dark haired, well dressed, obviously in some executive job. His voice, the expression on his face, even his body language, said ‘impatient’ and ‘exasperated’.

‘Just tell it to go away,’ he kept saying, ‘just walk away from it, just go home…’ and a few other phrases I can’t remember.

The voice on the other end sounded young, female and distraught. His tone suggested that he was talking to his child, rather than an adult. He seemed dismissive, unconcerned, as though the person on the other end was making an unnecessary fuss. Normally I hate mobile phone conversations on trains, especially pompous, self important businessmen who talk like they’re captains of industry, or young women loudly sharing their intimate private lives or social arrangements with their fellow passengers. But this time I was straining to listen and work out what was happening at the other end, building a picture in my mind. Not just out of nosiness, but concern. The person at the other end was obviously out and about, walking somewhere, because the man kept saying ‘just go home.’  It might be a predatory male perhaps, who was following them, making them feel threatened, but the man kept referring to an ‘it’. The picture in my mind was a stray dog. But ‘it’ could also have been a car. A kerb crawler? Following his daughter home?

Now it could have been an elderly mother, perhaps with dementia, but why would an old person be out walking the streets at night? His impatient dismissive attitude could indicate perhaps an elderly confused person who repeatedly did silly things and went wandering off, like that awful scene in Iris, where Judy Dench goes walkabout. But my guess was that it was his teenage daughter.

I will never know, because he got off at the next stop, but it has been bothering me ever since. What upset me most was his evident lack of concern. If that had been my daughter, or my gaga old mum, or my wife, (it was definitely a female voice and sounded like a family member), out and about somewhere, in distress, being followed, I would have been beside myself with worry. I would have been in frantic tears, telling who ever it was to call the police, knock on someone’s door, whatever. He just didn’t seem worried. I still am.

For mothers in particular, that umbilical cord is never quite severed. Your offspring, however old they are, never stop being your babies. You never stop worrying about them. I now know what I must have put my parents through. And no doubt the same experience awaits my daughter later on. It’s scant comfort, when I have those moments of ‘this is what I remember my mother used to say to me and now I understand’ and ‘she will understand this later on when she has her own child.’

Last Monday we had a family outing, a birthday treat for Izzy and Dan, whose birthdays are a week apart. In the old days, a family outing would be a trip to Thorpe Park or Legoland, a picnic by a lake or a day at the beach. This time is was Russell Brand. And he was beyond brilliant. It was a philosophical dissertation laced with hilarious filth and biting satire, with a brilliant punch line. He reeled off complex, highly sophisticated sentences and every word was heard and followed. He quoted Nietszche and Wittgenstein and no-one felt patronized. He had a right old go at David Cameron and the Daily Mail, slaughtered globalised capitalism and patriarchal monotheism, all the things I hate. He worships the feminine divine! Women are goddesses. I’ll buy that. Never mind that it’s so he can get laid after the show, I forgive him his concupiscence. I can’t imagine being able to stand on a stage and spout your mouth off for two hours and remember everything I was going to say, and keep an audience of 3000 completely enthralled. He got a standing ovation at the end. The best thing was, a lot of it related to what I’ve been reading in my Critical theory module at Kingston uni. Not the filthy bits obviously.

We’re having a joint birthday party for Izzy and Dan next Saturday. It had to be done - I had a great idea for the cake…….When Izzy was young I would do these big themed birthday party events, usually based on the latest Disney release, complete with makeshift costumes, fairy grottos, castles, gypsy treasure hunts, teepees and visiting storytellers. The party bags were meticulously themed too. The cakes were not just cakes, they were three act movies with subplots. I had Pocohontas rafting down a waterfall, witches storming castles, mermaids beckoning to hapless sailors, fairytale princesses and a gypsy encampment with a fizzling fire. I made them myself, all bodged together fairly crudely, using a lot of food dye and hundreds and thousands of hundreds of thousands, but it got the idea across.

Maybe one day I will grow up. And by that time, Izzy will be doing the worrying

RIDING AN ELEPHANT WITH PIERCE AND EMMA 

Well, this summer has been most eventful. I’ve spent several weeks in an Indian jail, where I’ve had the inevitable shits and been beaten up with a bag of oranges by a huge gang leader bully. I am currently staying in the swankiest possible five star hotel in Pune, surrounded by unimaginable luxury. But this is not to last; shortly I will be setting off on a long and uncomfortable train ride to the middle of nowhere, where the journey will be continue by elephant, (although my supervisor is not sure about the elephant bit), and God knows what misfortunes will befall us on the way. Armed poachers? Monsoon floods? Tiger attack? A stampede of rogue elephants?

And all the while, I am travelling with Emma Thompson and Pierce Brosnan. Yes! They are charming company and I am really glad I cast them in the roles of my two main protagonists. They spark off against each other quite wittily. The chemistry is ‘there’ as they say. Although this time, they are not playing a divorced couple, only an estranged couple. Emma and Pierce do not know yet that they are playing the lead roles in the film version of my book, (called The Elephant Trail, if you’re remotely interested), but I am sure they will be delighted to take it on….

 … this is the point where I have to stop daydreaming and carry on with my dissertation. Silly woman! Seriously though, casting actors in your head this way is brilliant. ‘Such fun’, as Miranda’s Mum would say. Try it. It really helps you visualise your characters and brings it all alive. It’s a technique that Robert McKee advises screenwriters to use, but it works for any kind of storytelling. As the Great Guru says, stories are a metaphor for life, and characters are a metaphor for people. If you use an actor rather than a real person it will be more likely to resonate and stimulate.  

For those of you who don’t know, I am currently studying for an MA in Creative Writing at Kingston University, with a view to moving from children’s writing to writing for an older audience. I have reached the 25,000 words mark now and I’m wondering when and where to stop. Do I get on the train and go off into the blue yonder with Ems and Pi? Do I do a bit more research for the next bit of the story? Have already read loads of books and the internet has had a proper bashing, with pages of links for the bibliography. Sadly the trip to India is not an option, although I have travelled a bit there and can dredge up some memories. Or do I go back now and make all those changes and revisions that have occurred to me along the way, or been suggested by my fellow students and my supervisor?

At some point, all of us will have to select the 15,000 words chunk that will be our dissertation, under the guidance of our supervisors, and start refining it. Under normal circumstances, all of us would be thundering along to the end of our narrative, without even stopping for petrol, to complete a first draft, before going back to revise, rewrite and edit. Some of us may even have got right to the end. I certainly haven’t.

Either way, it’s been a fun ride so far. I wish all my fellow students at Kingston, an extremely talented bunch, the best of luck. And elephants are lucky, so I hope my luck stays with me too. 

BIO

Lucy Raby has earned her living as a writer for 25 years, (as Lucy Daniel Raby) with a background in children’s TV, a few books, and a couple of plays which have been performed. She is studying for the Creative Writing MA at Kingston University and is planning to move into writing for older readers.

Website; www.lucydanielraby.co.uk

Positive thinking is the way forward!

Forward thinking is the way forward!

And Glucosamine Sulphate is the way backwards. I met a neighbour on the train the other day who told me that if you take it regularly for about two million years, it replaces knee cartilage, turns back the clock to when you were able to do girl power kicks, play badminton without looking like a demented ballet dancer, ride horses and ski down red and black runs. That was the sort of thing I used to do, when Izzy was young. When I was younger. Now a flight of stairs is a major challenge. Could glucosamine sulphate be the Knee Fairy in disguise? I am off to Holland and Barrett tomorrow.

The knees are getting better, thanks for asking, getting used to this new active student life. Sometimes I can hear them singing ‘I will Survive’ very faintly. 

 Last week we went to see Midsummer Night’s Dream at the Noel Coward, with David Walliams as Bottom and Sheridan Smith as Tit. Fab production, very pagan-hippie, (as if the play wasn’t pagan enough already), all the fairies styled as festival goers from the 70s, crustie dreads, the lot. In the last production I saw the fairies were punks with shaved heads and Doc Martens. How times change. And OMG, why did I not notice that whole bestiality thing before? I must be really thick. Oberon had a West country accent, which seemed to change to an Irish one when he doubled as the Duke of Athens. The sets were superb, a massive moon against which David Walliams’s ass ears were silhouetted to great effect. He camped it up to the hilt, played it bi-sexual. Towards the end he lapsed into the Scottish hotelier in Little Britain mode. David Walliams was being David Walliams.  

I love Shakespeare. Who doesn’t? If you want to see this production, hurry before it closes on October 16th

 I got to walk across the fields at the back of my house the other day, after a 15 year gap, or is it 13 years? It was a beautiful Sunday evening with the sunlight slanting in that Autumnal way across the empty fields and the ring of trees all around us.  The farmyard is deserted now, not a cattle grid in sight and looking very forlorn. Unless our farmer friends get the tenancy soon, these beautiful fields, that I look out at from my bathroom window, will go to pot, full of thistles and weeds. That scrubby ‘set-aside’ look. 

 Izzy obligingly accompanied me and all the old memories came back.

 So Izzy and I recalled silly antics we did when she was a child and she went along with it, indulging her Mum. But then she had to get back to drive back home to Twickenham. Home. Her new home.

 I was going through the shoe baskets the other day and realised it was much emptier than it used to be. She and Dan have left home properly now. The shoes have gone with them. I do miss them. Them, not the shoes. Offspring do have to fly the nest eventually. And the birds do keep coming home to roost. If you’ve got a good relationship with your kids you will never lose them.

And this MA course is keeping me busy. It's getting interestinger and interestinger. There’s been a lot in our recent Critical Challenges reading about declining literary standards. It’s true, there is a lot of crap out there, but still some good stuff. And I do think that commercial success and literary quality can co-exist.

Our neighbouring farmer, has just delivered a trailer load of manure. You wouldn’t give it to someone as a Christmas present. But it’ll help me grow some spectacular vegetables next year. Not all shit is bad.

Friday September 27^th 2013

 I hate my f***ing knees! Where is that bloody knee fairy when you need her? I need a new pair of knees, like, now, not in ten years’ time.  Preferably along Cara Delevigne lines, or perhaps Sophia Loren, more age appropriate.

The tooth fairy was pretty reliable I seem to remember. Bang on time, sixpence under the pillow the next morning, or if you were lucky, a shilling. Enough for a liquorice sherbet. (In those days sweets were like drugs and your local confectioner was your local dealer.) But the Knee Fairy is very flaky and I have decided to stop believing in her. So there. That’ll teach her.

By the way hello! I am a bad housewife for many reasons, which will become apparent. 

And here’s one of them. 

Yes, this week the knees have been giving me extra gyp. Just when you need them to function at max. I’ve just started this fantastic course in Creative Writing at Kingston University. After 30 years of making a living at it, I’ve decided to learn how to do it properly.  I’m really excited about it, it is simultaneously scaring me and thrilling me to death.  We’re going to be challenged, stretched, jerked out of our writing ruts and comfort zones and ingrained habits and (in my case), smug white middle class assumptions and preconceptions about what we should be doing. And we’re hitting the ground running! Which is not good with bad knees.

I’m going in three times a week. There’s a bit of travelling on trains, up and down stairs, rucksack on back. And there I am, yesterday morning, going down the stairs at Surbiton station and feeling the paaaain and there’s a woman in front of me, also with a heavy rucksack, and a stick. And there’s that nice Film Studies lecturer I met the other day, also walking to the university, with a limp. And later, I’m catching the bus back to Surbiton station with my lovely new bezzie fellow student Alison, discussing what we’re going to write for our first assignments. Suddenly the bus screeches to a stop, and there’s a girl on foot, and with her a girl in a motorised wheelchair, and the ramp is lowered for her, and she zooms onto the bus, and it looks like she hasn’t even got knees. She’s smiling, really brave, just getting on with her life. At least I have knees. And I can walk.

 SO STOP MOANING BITCH!

There’s always someone worse off than you and you have to be thankful for what you’ve got.

Talking of walking, I have a dog to walk. She can talk the talk. Did you know border collies have a massive vocabulary? They understand over 240 words of their native language, more than the ape. Hence they seem, spookily, to understand what you’re saying and when you’re talking about them.  They are very, very intelligent. And I am hoping she might help me with my assignments. She will no doubt start her own Dog Blog soon, working in Woof for Windows.

She can also walk the walk. She is now glaring at me balefully with that look of doggy reproach, so in a minute I will take her up to the post box. Not to post her in it you understand, to post An Important Letter about cashing in an ancient  savings account to help pay for my course.

I went to pilates this morning, a stroll of bucolic splendour up the footpath to my friend’s studio. Everyone in the class has some problem. Neck, knee (that’s me), shoulder, arm, hip, tendonitis, arthritis. But Chris has got cancer and she’s being really brave about it. Yet another reason to feel humbled.

Did I mention that I live in the country? 33 years ago we bought a derelict bungalow in the middle of 10 acres of wasteland, for like, NO MONEY, and we’ve transformed it into a paradise. I say ‘we’ advisedly, since my husband did most of the building work, I just do the housework, laundry, shopping, cooking – oh and gardening. I grow flowers, mostly Mediterranean style, in pots, on top of china elephants and in anything I can find, like old sewage pipes. The herbaceous thing is a bit difficult in heavy clay and everything except shrubby stuff just gives up and slinks away when you’re not looking. I have statues of Buddhas and Greek gods and goddesses all over the place. Why are you not surprised? I am an old hippie. I also grow vegetables now, not very successfully this year, as I forgot to mulch the garden. Loads of runner beans though, so if you’re interested, apply here.

Gardening is a great counterpoint to writing and terribly good for the soul apparently. We farmed sheep for a while, and my daughter watched me deliver twin lambs once from her pushchair. (The lambs came out of the sheep’s bum not the pushchair.) She is now nearly 25, graduated and living mostly near work in London, although she keeps coming home with her laundry. Her place is a bus ride from the university, so I plan to turn up on her doorstep demanding hot meals and sympathy. Payback time! And I do miss her. Anyway, hence the empty nester decision to do this course. She doesn’t remember the woolly nativity scene, but I christened the lambs after her. Annoyingly they were boys, so it had to be Isambard and Florian. Pretentious? Moi?

Do not ask me how we farmed the sheep. Especially if you’re a vegetarian. We did sell the wool however.

Now we have our local farmer friends put their cattle on the fields. They look dead picturesque against that lush green background and they moo a lot when they’re hungry and bash their hooves against the water troughs. At night we hear of lot of murders going on around us, of the wildlife variety. And you get attuned to things like astronomy and birdsong. It’s all very earthy and spiritual. And we’re only an hour or so from London and Brighton.

So yes, I like it here. A lot.  It’s the best of all worlds, everything on your doorstep. But a lot to look after.

I am now going to ewalk my dog. That was a spelling mistake but I’ve decided to keep it in. It would be nice to take my dog for e walks, rather than real ones.

So I’m signing off now to stride purposefully around the fields and up the footpath, being brave about my knees because I’m lucky to have them and there’s always someone worse off than you, and post that Important Letter.

This is my first writing assignment on this course. It’s good to be writing again after a self imposed summer Sabbatical and I hope I have hit the ground running, or at least stumbling, in the right direction. I hope I can talk the talk and walk the walk.