Notes From Sarah's Desk

Important News

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 09:10:00 +0000

Please note that this blog is no longer updated. Instead, you'll find all the relevant content posted on A Life More Lived.

Hope to see you there.

Sarah x

Holiday time again

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 20:10:00 +0000

Yes, it's that time freelancers seem to dread again, school holidays. I've always cut down work during holiday periods, but I have to say, as The Boy has got older - he's 11 now - it has got easier. He's happy doing his own thing for a few hours at a time, but I always make sure we sit down and have snacks and meals and a chat together. I also plan trips out to the local museums and cafes so that he knows he's not a chore.

At the end of this holiday he'll be starting secondary school, so I want to make this time with him extra special, as the time will soon come when he's not so keen to be seen with his mum.

Let's hope the rain stops some time soon :)

National Motivation Day

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 19:01:00 +0000

was on 1st July 2010 and was the day I'd put aside to get my writing career back on track. I was supposed to take the day to think about where I am professionally and where I'd like to be in 100 days. Then I was going to write the 10 things I wanted to achieve in that timescale and choose the first three to tackle. That was the plan at least ...

Come the day and I had great feedback from my fiction writing tutor about my novel and a short story, so I was "slightly". cock-a-hoop about that.

Then I had really positive feedback from a magazine editor about a feature idea I'd pitched.

Suddenly, all thoughts of stopping to find motivation stopped, because I was motivated. Things were looking bright, so stopping and planning seemed a bit pointless.

Anyway, I did stop and plan - albeit 10 days later that I was supposed to. The 100 day plan is written, so now I know where I'm going until the middle of October. I'm hoping that knowing where I want to be will help me to actually get there.

And so, given that I'd promised to write about National Motivation Day, do I think it's a good thing? Yes, I do, halfway through the year is a great time to stop and review what's gone before and to plan the next step. It's definitely something I'll do again to keep my mind focussed on my goals.

www.nationalmotivationday.co.uk

In the thick of it

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 12:39:00 +0000

Such a change in the last couple of weeks (which is why I've gone a bit quiet). My writing tutor loved the work I've done on my novel and the short story I've written for a competition.

On top of that, my feature writing is picking up.

I'm also picking up a renewed interest in food - cooking it and writing about it. I don't know where I'm going to go with this one yet, so you'll have to watch this space.

Starting Over

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 15:19:00 +0000

Over the last couple of years I've watched my paid writing largely disappear as budgets have been slashed at some of the magazines I've worked for for years.

In the past I would have thrown all this up in despair and run off to find something else to do, but not any more.

Firstly, I know I'm a good writer. Okay, I'm struggling to get people to pay me at the moment, but that's not my fault. Secondly, I really enjoy writing, as simple as that.

I've branched out recently into writing fiction. I haven't written any since I did O' level English Language in 1984, so it's a bit of an adventure. I'd let my Comprehensive Writing Course slip for a long while, but picking it up again has really focussed my mind.

The wonderful Josie at Sleep is for the Weak runs a fantastic Writing Workshop every week (look out for the green logo on the blog), which is really inspirational and has given me loads of opportunities to write things I wouldn't have otherwise.

Finally, next Thursday is National Motivation Day and I'll be taking the chance to refocus myself by writing a 100 Day Plan (see here), then the only challenge is to stick to it!

Back on track

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 08:23:00 +0000

How is it possible to lose your way so completely? And how, having done so, is it possible to find your way back to the right path?

Honestly, I've spent the last couple of years just flailing about both professionally and personally. I've struggled to settle in our new home and I've done little more than tread water.

Professionally I've seen my career crumble as all the markets I've established have disappeared and I've completely lost confidence in my ability.

Now though, I've decided that to get what I want, to be what I want to be, I need to be much more selfish than I've ever been before. I need to put me first and not apologise for the fact that I need to work to re-establish myself in the world.

It's easy to be defeatist and give up, but I'm feeling strong enough to throw myself in to a bit of risk-taking to get what I want

Magazines

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 18:28:00 +0000

Every month I buy a few magazines, flick through them and then chuck them in the recycling. This enterprise must cost me the best part of 20 quid, Do I have 20 quid to burn? No! So, from now on, an magazine I buy, I need to read from cover to cover and if it fails to inspire, I wont buy it again. It's a pretty simple formula and considering part of my professional life should be reading, I'm not exactly sure why I should feel guilty or uninspired when it comes to doing it.

So, roll on the time I put aside for reading from now in and huzzah for not feeling guilty about it.

Not in cyberspace

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 18:20:00 +0000

Usually the first thing I do every morning after the DH leaves for work is to log on to the internet and check my emails, facebook and twitter. You never know, something mind blowingly exciting might have winged its way to e overnight.

Thing is though, that never has happened and I just spend ages then time-wasting, blindly surfing the net, not really doing anything.

When we first moved here we didn't have internet access at home because we had a rented house and weren't planning to stay there very long. I used to write at home, put everything on a data stick and then use the computers in the local library a couple of days a week to email stuff to editors and check my cyber existence.

Apart from keeping in touch with old friends for home, I seem to waste hours on the web doing nothing and achieving even less. So, I'm taking a break from social networking on the web, refocussing twitter as work-only and restricting email checking times to a few slots a day.

I've got to start from almost scratch in terms of my feature writing career, as my biggest market has gone, but I've succeeded before and I will again. I've got my determination back, now I just need to put the hours in.

So, if you're used to communicating with me via social media, try sending me a postcard.

Goodbye Chalkface

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 06:35:00 +0000

The time has finally come to wave goodbye to writing lesson and activity-led features for education magazines.

This was the first kind of writing I did professionally, so it is a bit of a sad day. Unfortunately though, this market is now officially dead.

The other day I got a rejection from the last possible magazine that could have taken the three features I worked up pitches for a few weeks ago.

A couple of editors said they loved the ideas, but simply had no available budget. Probably the best known magazine in the niche has always studiously avoided my attempts to interest it in features and my final editor turned the ideas down because she felt the ideas would be seen in other magazines.

I've tried extreme'y hard to keep this market alive and the editors have liked my ideas and have said they'd take them if they had budget, but realistically, without the ability to pay for what I can deliver, there's no point me pursuing the market any longer.

At the moment I'm concentrating on fiction writing and developing lifestyle features, so although I will mourn the passing of my initial writing niche, I don't have the time our resources to waste on a dead horse.Goodbye Chalkface

The time has finally come to wave goodbye to writing lesson and activity-led features for education magazines.

This was the first kind of writing I did professionally, so it is a bit of a sad day. Unfortunately though, this market is now officially dead.

The other day I got a rejection from the last possible magazine that could have taken the three features I worked up pitches for a few weeks ago.

At the moment I'm concentrating on fiction writing and developing lifestyle features, so although I will mourn the passing of my initial writing niche, I don't have the time our resources to waste on a dead horse.

Silence

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 15:24:00 +0000

I'm pitching to resounding silence again at the moment. On the positive side though, it does mean that the pieces haven't necessarily been rejected yet, so I can give a friendly reminder next week and still maybe get a yes!

Happy weekend x

Lazy Days and Reinventing Things

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 14:35:00 +0000

So, today I'm back at my desk after what should have been 5 days away from it. Actually, I was keeping an eye on social media and emails, but I wasn't commenting/responding - I did quite well to last until yesterday, but then I sort of pitched back in.

Anyway, I used the time to read things I usually ignore, like emails from LinkedIn groups I signed up to and promptly forgot about, ditto blogs. I found some really useful stuff that has prompted me to;

a) set aside specific time everyday to blog (hello!)

b) set up some Google Alerts to flag up things to read about subjects I'm interested in

c) make some time to re-position my business (I had rejections from mags I've written for in a niche market, not because the ideas weren't right for them, but because they don't have any spare budget (note to self - that means the niche has closed!)

d) observe things differently with a view to writing about them.

e) actually reading magazines when I buy them

Anyway, hopefully this is all going to lead to a continuing upward travel for my career. Watch this space ...

But ...

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Fri, 28 May 2010 10:39:00 +0000

I hate that word, it almost always precedes cr**py news. Today I got

"I like the ideas, but my budget is tied up with regular contributors at the moment."

Boo, I say! How about squirrelling a bit of budget away for when an awesome idea comes along from a freelancer?

On the other hand, I've also had

"Both pieces are really good; you have certainly put a lot of thought and work into them and I now know we have a great regular writer in you who can deliver empathetic copy in good time"

Yay, go me, and also yay for eds who take the time to write stuff like that.

Freelancing is such a great job, but I wouldn't change it for the world.

Writing for free

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Wed, 26 May 2010 09:45:00 +0000

I don't make a habit of writing for free, but every now and again I'm approached to write something I really believe in and I'd rather get it into the public domain, than not.

At the moment I'm writing a piece about 1st trimester miscarriage. Having gone through one myself, I wanted to help other women come to terms with the experience, by sharing some stories and sources of help.

It's not until you actually have one that you realise just how common miscarriage is, but it's a real taboo in our society. Early miscarriage is even harder to deal with because there's nothing to bury and no way that the life would be viable outside your womb, so there's really this limbo where you feel c**p, but you're not quite sure whether to grieve or just chalk it up to experience and get on with life.

Anyway, it was a piece I wanted to write and now I am. As soon as it's published, I'll post a link.

"Yes please, I'd like to commission" ...

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Wed, 05 May 2010 10:04:00 +0000

Oh the excitement. After months of pitching into a black hole, an editor has finally commissioned a piece.

Never have 450 words seemed so exciting!

Okay, so it's short, but it requires no research and is a topic I'm very familiar with (tracking signs and trails), so wont take long to write, making the fee a tidy one.

I'm just so pleased to have pulled a success out of the bag, constantly writing 'rejected', next to pitch ideas was slowly sapping my confidence. Hopefully this'll be the first "yes", of many.

Determination

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 20:31:00 +0000

This week I chose prompt 5: Pick an emotion that best represents your state of mind right now and write creatively on that theme.

Determination

I'm not sure if it's an emotion, but that's my overwhelming feeling at the moment, so ...

Give up or go on?

Go on.

Have to get out of this hole first though.

Slowly building a ladder, rung by rung,

Going back to the beginning and

Finding editors to trust me to put my pen

to paper.

I've always given up at this stage before,

So I don't really know what to expect.

I know I'm going to be slogging though.

Forging Ahead

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 17:25:00 +0000

I'm currently in that place where I usually throw my hands up in despair and give up on being a writer. I've done it before, but I always end up coming back, so this time I'm working through it.

I've been pitching and pitching and just getting lots of "not for us thanks", emails from editors. I have however made some inroads into fiction writing.

In a complete departure from anything I've one before, I've spent April taking part in the Script Frenzy event and have knocked together a radio drama based on a short story I wrote a while ago. Normally I'd chick the thing in a box and forget about it, but instead I'm going to send it to the BBC writersroom. It'll probably never see the light of day, but nothing ventured and whatnot.

I've also got an idea for a novel and I've started the research. I know there's enough in the idea, it's just a case of sitting down and delivering the characters/plot/conflicts, etc.

Giving up on writing would be so easy (I know 'cos I've done it before), but this time I feel confident enough to keep going to re-establish myself as a successful writer.

I've been in this place before...

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 22 Apr 2010 15:48:00 +0000

This place where there's only rejection.

This place where my ideas are met

with contempt, or utter silence.

This place is the fork in the road where I usually

veer off in another direction,

Find safety in an ordinary job that requires

no risk.

This place is the one where I can't see where

the road ahead leads.

This is the scary place.

I've never just carried on along the path

before,

I've always taken the easy route.

This time is different though.

This time the path looks the same, but I feel different.

This time I'm not giving up.

This time I'm staying on the path.

It's too dark to see where it's going to take me.

There might be monsters or bogeymen,

There might be more rejection and pain

before I come back into the light.

But this time

I'M NOT GIVING UP.

I'm not really getting very far with my job at the moment, every pitch I send to an editor is either completely ignored or rejected out of hand. Usually, when I get to this point in a job, I quit and find something less challenging to do, but I've spent the best part of 40 years wanting to be a writer, but being too timid to go for it.

Now, at nearly 42, I'm determined to keep plugging away at it until I actually succeed. The poem above just puts into words how I'm feeling.

"If I thought you were a stupid cow ...

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 09:15:00 +0000

I'd tell you to your face, not complain about you to a bunch of people who obviously have "issues", with me! Anyway, I'll go and see Jane tomorrow morning and tell her I'd like to leave the project. If she's agreeable, I'll move out tomorrow afternoon."

"I don't think there's any need for that is there? I'm sure we can work it out."

"No, we really can't, you obviously don't think very highly of me, and I'm not really comfortable living in the house with the other volunteers, so I think it would be better all round if I just left."

By lunchtime of the next day I was back from a meeting with the volunteer co-ordinator on the other side of Cardiff, I'd packed my stuff, my dad had picked me up and I'd gone home. I had lasted 1 week in my volunteer role.

At the time I was absolutely devastated and thought I was a real failure, but if I hadn't told my manager to stuff it, I would never have got a different volunteer placement. I would never had met Gareth and we would never have split up. I would never have met Leon and I wouldn't have married him. I would never have had Jonno. I wouldn't have had the miscarriage that made me chuck a job I hated and try my hand at writing. I would never have been here and been me.

Learning new skills

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 06:15:00 +0000

This in response to the writing prompt about learning new skills ...

Tomorrow I'm going on a Cub Leader training weekend. Amongst all the other stuff, I'd like to learn how to build and light a fire. I'd also like to learn how to make a Turks Head woggle (you REALLY need someone who knows to show you this, written instructions for them just don't make sense). I'd also like to learn how to abseil. I'll happily settle for one of the above, but all three would be nice.

I'd like to learn how to work more efficiently. In theory I know how to do this, but I haven't nailed it in practice yet.

I'd like to learn to be more confident about myself and my writing ability.

I'm almost 42, I'd like to learn how to grow old disgracefully!

I'd like to learn what it was like to be a kid again, to have no fear and just be able to try things without worrying about getting things wrong or looking a fool.

I like to learn, so I hope I never stop.

Shout out for anecdotes for possible features

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 14:43:00 +0000

I'm working on a few ideas at the moment and it would be great if you could help me out with anecdotes...

Writers, what are the things that stop you actually writing & what do you do to make yourself write?

If pasta be the food of love ... Did you fall in love over a bowl of pasta? Is it your favourite food? Was it one of your baby's first foods?

I would do anything for love, even ... Endure your new girlfriend using cherry flavoured lipgloss when you hate cherries? Eating food you don't like just because it's cooked by your (prospective) other half? Wearing a friendship bracelet because it was tied on before you could protest that you don't wear jewellery

What food, clothing, lifestyle horrors have you endured because you thought your partner was "The One"?

Any help you can give, please comment here, or email me at cruickshank35@gmail.com

Cheers

Sarah x

Linking to my new blog

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 19:40:00 +0000

Here's the latest post from my new blog A Life More Lived.

It's a "lifestyle" blog - really just a place to post stuff that doesn't sit happily in "writing" or "family". Anyway, drop by and check it out (it's very new, so give it a chance).

Sarah

Script Frenzy

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 08:38:00 +0000

So today I'm supposed to start the journey to writing a 100 page radio drama script in 30 days! Actually, I'm shutting down to take a few days off with my boys. Yeeees, I probably should have thought a bit more carefully about that one.

Anyway, I do have a starting point (a short story I wrote a little while ago), so I pretty happy that even though I'm going to be starting a little bit later than planned, I'm going to be able to do it.

I'm actually quite excited by the prospect of doing this, I've never written a radio script before, so it's going to be a bit of a steep learning curve, but it's just what I need to get me going again.

The black hole is back

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 11:50:00 +0000

Image from app.ucdavis.edu

I got back into serious pitching for work about three weeks ago, after a few months of fruitless searching for a job outside journalism.

I applied for loads of jobs and got nowhere and even tried signing up for temping agencies, but even they didn't have anything to offer.

I tried to get some supply teaching, but was told by one agency that I'd have to do lots of voluntary work in the locality so I could get an up to date reference and by another that I'd have to pay to do a child protection course before I could go into classrooms (this after being on their books for almost six months and receiving just one offer of a day's work).

So, I decided to re-launch my freelance career. My reasonably successful niche writing life (for education magazines), flatlined as a result of the economic downturn. Editors had budgets slashed and so started writing a lot of content for themselves.

Anyway, now I'm back and broadening my scope, but now there are a lot more freelance writers (having made redundant from staff jobs), chasing a smaller pot of money.

Still, I'm pitching as much as I can and keeping my blogs and profiles up to date, so that one day soon, someone will say 'yes', to an idea and I'll be back on the bandwagon again.

Letting go

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:24:00 +0000

My writing tutor told me the other day that whilst my writing was "good fluent writing with some lovely detailing", I shouldn't be afraid of "just letting go a bit more." The sentiment stuck with me when I was at my art class on Tuesday morning.

My art teacher always chuckles at the way my drawings and paintings are controlled and precise (which is true). Anyway, I thought I'd "let go", a bit, so I did the picture above, torn and crumpled tissue paper just glued down. I winced at every rip, but actually, by the time it was finished I was very happy with it.

If I can get my writing to free up a bit more, I'll be extremely happy to see it develop.

Of course, the trouble is, when I let go, I tend to be a bit of a ranty old bird. We'll see ;-)

Cobnuts

noreply@blogger.com (Sarah Cruickshank) — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 22:31:00 +0000

In the Cutting Edge documentary about The Lady [magazine] and the Revamp, new editor Rachel Johnson and some of the long-serving staff were talking about 'cobnut' pieces - features relating to stuff writers are interested to write just because they fancy it (the history of cucumbers was another one). That's the kind of writer I am really, I like writing about pretty random things that take my fancy. It's quite a challenging way to write actually, because its difficult to find a home that pays.

In the past, I've tried to write things that I've thought other people might want to read, but I've come to realise that actually, I much better at writing what I want to read myself. Anyway, that's the route I'm going to be taking for the next few months, just to see where I end up.