More than Writers

There it sits - blank, clean, virgin-white - a new page on which to write. A fresh start. New work waiting to be expressed. So why does my heart palpate, find the blankness icily chilling instead of inviting? It's such a small thing to halt a writer with hesitation. All those what-ifs scream out our previous failures - ink-blotted scribbles, deficient daubs, lackadaisical prose and inability to colour well within the lines of art. It must be overcome, of course, or we would never start our potential masterpiece, beguiling blog post, pretty poetry, or just our everyday ordinary showing up to offer a faithful labour of love at the altar of creativity. All art begins with a mark. all creativity invites us to start with something. So where to begin to leave our mark when a mind feels bereft of thought? It's a dilemma whether we're staring at a blank screen or pristine page. Fear of making a mess can stop us in our tracks, because who wants to screw up before we've ...

We are at a crossroads in our daughter’s life: filling in her secondary school choice form with her. Yikes. As we have grammar schools in our area the competition for spaces is immense, with hundreds of pupils coming from out of borough to sit the test – and literally thousands taking it, even though there are limited spaces. With a birth boom in our daughter’s year, we already know there aren’t enough school place. We seem to live in a ‘black hole’ too, as we are out of the catchment area of schools – even those that we can walk to! So this first half term has been all about tests, musical auditions and open evenings for our daughter. Bless her – she has coped with the pressure so so well. We have felt the need to push each possible door that she has been happy to, but it means she has been tested and measured against so many others constantly. We keep reminding her that it isn’t a matter of failing if she doesn’t pass one or more of these evaluations. She is someone who puts...

I once heard a pastor talk about the difference between expectations and expectancy.  He said if we put expectations on someone we are putting them under law and it will frequently feel like a heavy burden. However, if we have a sense of expectancy about what a person can achieve it is grace not law. It will feel lighter and encouraging. I can see what he means.  If someone has expectations of me, I can feel oppressed by it. Am I good enough? Will I fail?  If someone (and that someone includes myself!) looks at me with expectancy it is because they believe in me, and my ability and I respond positively to it. An example of this is of one of my previous bosses. His name is Rev Matt Boyes. He was then the vicar at Christ Church Turnham Green, which was my last post as a parish evangelist 6 years ago. Matt didn't put expectations on me but he did have expectancy about what I could achieve with God and the support of the Church.  It made me the most product...

I have a confession. I’m a member of the spelling police. If there’s one thing sure to annoy me, it’s reading ‘you’re’ when I should be reading ‘your’. “Unbelievable! That sentence doesn’t even make sense ,” I mutter to myself indignantly as I sit on my hands to prevent myself taking a pen and correcting an official letter or document I’ve received. Or a public sign. Tempted though I am to commit what I’d consider to be justifiable graffiti, I haven’t. Yet. ‘A’ when I should be reading ‘an’ is guaranteed to annoy me, too. Recently, however, I discovered that my guarantee was, well, not guaranteed. I received a card from my god-daughter. It read: (NB She spells ‘favourite’ the American way.) Proudly, I noted she’d used ‘your’ correctly. Many others have fallen at that hurdle. But not her. I also noted that she’d used ‘a’ incorrectly. Guaranteed to annoy me, right? Wrong. As I looked at the card, I imagined her sitting at her little desk, c...

I am on my way to walk the Camino Ingles from Ferrol to Santiago de Compostela. It is not as well-known as the famous Camino route through France, but you are supposed to be able to walk the 118 kilometres in a week. Unlike my Kilimanjaro adventure, there will be no altitude sickness to worry about. However, there will also be no porters and no husband to carry my rucksack when I am tired – a great incentive to reduce the weight of my rucksack. The decision to leave books, my Kindle and knitting material at home was easy when I considered who would have to carry them. Every item had to earn its place in my bag, and I haggled for every gram of weight. (Did you know that you can save a few grams by taking a bamboo toothbrush and tooth powder instead of a regular toothbrush and travel toothpaste or that a small piece of Citronella soap can replace shower gel, shampoo and washing powder? It also serves as an insect repellent should there be any mosquitoes this late in the s...