Sledge rattles against the garage shelf. Rising and falling with the wind.Straining to be free.

Snow falls clumpily, urgently, heavily.

Sledge breathes, sighs, waits impatiently for his first outing of the year.

The Girl Behind

And I’m planning to lose myself a little more in Susannah’s Unravelling the Year Ahead ebook.

(Click on the link for your own free downloadable copy).

Before I even begin, I know that I won’t be quite the same when I’m done.

I need colours to do this. I need to draw swirls and lines, and to feel creative and arty even though I can’t really draw.

And the beautiful shiny Berol pens unravel me right back to being a child. I’ve often thought that I lived a brand-free childhood; no designer trainers, no logos on jackets. Standard-issue spectacles and very little that was trendy.

I’ve often thought that I was never much bothered about that stuff.

And then I remembered having Berol pens. Being ever-so-slightly cool.

When other people were fixating on shoes and coats, I was falling in love with stationery.

And that remembering’s without even having tried drawing with them yet.

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I found it at the Beamish museum this spring. In the bit of the afternoon where Mike and I had parted for some separate exploring.

And – historians forgive me – whilst a family were chatting to the guide, I leaned over the Do Not Touch rope and held my fingers on the cloth.

This was the tablecloth at my grandparents’ house in Goole. Or one very like it.

We would sit at the table for board games and card games and occasional painting. All of them disrupted by the fact that the cloth was so thick that nothing ever really sat on it neatly; everything sort of hovered.

There was a big window right in front of the table. And on many days a cloud above the window. As my little mind understood it then, a cloud where God was looking down on us. Probably shaking His head at my terrible efforts at painting.

At mealtimes, there was a second cloth – a white cotton one. There was a knack to putting it on so it didn’t drag over this one. But once on, it was the base for some of the best foods ever. Porridge for breakfast, soaked through overnight. Sunday lunches groaning with homegrown vegetables. Teatimes watching Countdown with the toaster on the table. And Boxing Day afternoons with tinned salmon sandwiches and a pork pie the size of my cousin David’s head.

After every meal, crumbs from the white cloth would be shaken across the lawn, and we’d watch in stillness as the birds came to enjoy our leftovers. Literally still, so we didn’t disturb the birds as my Grandad painted them.

At other times, people shared cigarettes, photographs, home perms and the comfort of having a hard chair to rest a dodgy back. And all of that was back with me in just a few seconds of touching.

There was a loo roll, too, in part of a bathroom exhibit. Lots of far less comfy memories from that one!

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The musicians and the boating people dominated the Jubilee celebrations.

The animal lovers celebrated Pudsey’s win on Britains Got Talent.

Everyone who’d ever been into athletics or had even a glimmer of interest in sports has had a fabulous summer with the Olympics.  Actually, most of us who’d never given sport more than a passing glance found ourselves swept up in it all.

And now, at the end of the year, there’s a little glimmer of hope that the geeks might have a win too.

Johnny Ball, the man who made his very best efforts to enthuse us about numbers and dress mathematics up in more jolity than it rightfully deserved, has entered this year’s Strictly Come Dancing.

As soon as he started talking on Saturday, his southern unplaceable accent had me right back at the flickery TV screen of my childhood.

He’s 74. I don’t think he’s ever danced before. I doubt he’ll win on dancefloor prowess.

But it would be great, wouldn’t it, for the mathematicians to have a little bit of mainstream celebration to finish off the year with.

Picture by Ewan McIntosh on Flickr

Oh, and I so wish I’d been the genius who tweeted “Think of a Rhumba” sometime on Saturday evening.

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There were stories of gloom every morning on the radio; people wanting to curb this and that, spectators being banned from taking all sorts of things into the Olympic Park and an army of people being sent out to patrol the cities of Britain and check whether anyone was misusing the Olympic brand. Or, seemingly more importantly, stepping on the toes of the huge corporations who’d sponsored parts of the games.

All of that changed from the Wednesday before the games began. Mrs Button took the afternoon off to travel down to London with a special ticket for the last rehearsal of the Opening Ceremony. One of those times when knowing someone who knows someone comes in ever so handy.

And she sent me a text, way after bedtime, telling me that it was all so exciting that I’d have been unable to cope with the emotion of being there.

It turned out that she wasn’t the only one. Twitter was going bonkers with Danny Boyle’s #savethesurprise hashtag.  I get a lot of my news via Twitter these days, and it astounded me that the people who’d seen the rehearsals all really were saving the surprise.

Two days later, I was awake ’till way after midnight and utterly mesmerised by the whole thing.  I’m still a little unsure of how bizarre it might have seemed to the rest of the world, but it was a fabulous celebration of Britishness.

I squealed a little when the Shipping Forecast spluttered across the opening.  I didn’t really stop gasping with pride and pleasure until Paul McCartney came on to his own spluttering soundtrack and closed the show.

I’ve never been so excited about anything sporty. And it’s been wonderful to share in the excitement online. I can’t imagine it would have been anything like as great if we’d done it without twitter and facebook.  But I’ve been on the edge of my seat at sports I’d never watched before, and I’ve cried along with the stories from the athletes and all of their support teams.

We needed this, I think.

I know all countries have times when things feel pretty grim, but we’d been feeling grimmer than I can remember for a pretty long time.

The momentum that had started with the Jubilee and the first of the torch runs has reached its perfect crescendo.

I’m not sporty. Not at all. I once scored a rounder, and I once managed to turn a single cartwheel. Both of them utter flukes, but both elating enough to help me know what a whisper of victory might feel like.

I know it’s the sport that counts, but it’s been so many other things too. The Royal Mail painting postboxes gold in our gold medalists’ home towns. The police officers striking poses to match winners. Athletes’ wives and partners talking about the sacrifices they’ve made for years for the sake of their loved one having a few moments to shine.

It’s been great because we’ve all been able to get on board with it.  Those are the moments that have made the Olympics.  And those are the moments that have made us proud to be British.

Photos are Creative Commons licenced and from The Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s flickr stream.

Mama Kat asked us to write about our favourite Olympic Moments this week.  Follow the link to join in with lots more prompts.

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I took quite a few more, though, and I’ve been wondering what to do with them. So here they are. Partly to show off some amazing achievements, and partly in case anyone who was in the run happens to look in here.

If you click on any of the thumbnails here, a box should come up with a slightly bigger version (and arrows to scroll through the rest of the album).

If you’re in any of the pictures and would like a bigger one, just use the contact tab above to send me a note. I just need the reference number – it starts with “TGB Doncaster 10k” and has a number in brackets – eg “TGB Doncaster 10k (52)”.  I’ll email you the original jpeg within a couple of days.

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I took this picture on the beach at Blyth. We were there a couple of weeks ago, and it was pretty cold and windy. It seems quite a bleak place, but then there are lots and lots of benches with bits of poetry and songs and quotations on them.

And Cole Porter really knew how to write about love.

(I’ve left this one full size, so if you click on it you get the big version).

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We don’t make a great deal of use of the spice rack, but Mike’s been tidying the kitchen and decided that he’d put all the herbs and spices into alphabetical order.

A lot of these are very old, and possibly the ones that came with the rack when I bought it about 10 years ago. I think the Herbes de Provence sell by date is showing there – certainly pre-2010.  I really ought to clear these out…

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Indoors because it’s a bit nippy outside (I can’t believe that this is the best that June can muster).

In a hurry because Mike’s being watching the football and has been doing that strange touchy-feeling thing that men do when they’re drunk.  I was partly safari-ing and partly fighting him off…

(He never drinks, so we’ll forgive him this once).

On with the show!

Mike’s shoe rack. It would be unfair to say that it genuinely pongs, but there’s a bit of a whiff a lot of the time.

Vodka – the reason for tonight’s over-affections. This has appeared in the fridge since this morning and is already much-diminished.

When we were in our teens, there was a weird myth that vodka didn’t smell and that we could get away with drinking it without anyone knowing. I don’t know whether we had a different sense of smell back then, or whether they’ve changed the formula in the last 25 years or so, or whether it was a sort of false sense of security thing that adults lulled us into.

But it definitely does smell and I can’t understand why we thought we’d ever get away with it.

Smelly cheese. We discovered this when we were in St Ives and had it as part of our lovely early evening meals on the balcony.

Mike’s always been a lover of stinky cheeses. I don’t usually like them, but I’ve really taken to this one. I don’t even mind that it makes the whole fridge smell.  In fact, I quite like the fact that it makes the whole fridge smell.

Weird.

Leather – my gorgeous leather satchel from Cybher this year. (I’ve just booked for next year’s event as well).  The ultimate conference bag, I reckon.

I absolutely love the smell of leather.  I have no idea why – it doesn’t remind me of anything or evoke any particular memory. But I could sit smelling that bag for hours.

Also weird (!)

I absolutely love the smell of baby powder, even though we’ve never had a baby. There’s something really comforting and smooth about it.

About a million years ago, I read in Cosmopolitan that baby powder was the most offputting smell to a boy who one was trying to entice. Something about it smelling of commitment, I think.

I often think of that when I’m covering myself in it.

Our soap. We have a running discussion about this. The open one there is Shield, which is cheap as chips and I love. It smells properly clean to me. Mike despises it and always wants us to have Imperial Leather.

I’m sure that we only ever had Imperial Leather at Christmas when I was growing up, and it feels too indulgent to have it all the time.

So we’ve come to a compromise and we alternate, which still feels decadent to me.

I don’t know whether this is over-gloomy.  I’m pretty certain that it’s over-sharing, but I couldn’t really write about smells and not write about this.

This shoebox sits in my wardrobe, kept closed and wrapped in a carrier bag to keep the smell in.

My Mum died 15 years ago this year. This box has her jewellery in.

And it has (it still has – I just checked) the tiniest hint of a smell of her too. I sure that, after all this time, it must be 99% imagination. But there’s definitely still a bit of her there.

I know that smells have a huge power over me, to take me back somewhere and remind me of something.

Anything from a wet pavement to a cafetiere full of great hot coffee.

From egg sandwiches to freshly mown grass.

When I’m anxious, I want to know that my hands smell clean.

And when I want to remember being young, I know I can find that memory by nipping into the Body Shop for a quick squirt of White Musk.

I have a bit more safari-ing to do this week, I think.

The Girl Behind

I’ve been playing around with Instagram lately, and am falling in love with the way that it can make a very simple photo into something really special. This isn’t an Instagram picture, but I’ve used Picasa to create a similar feel.

The Girl Behind

I don’t have lots of time this evening, but I had a bit of a creative burst and photographed a few bits at work as I was waiting for Mike to pick me up.  And then a few extra bits I found at home. I think that doing red made me all thrusting and urgent. I’m not sure I’d have felt the same if I was looking for yellow or pink.

I’m loving the new collage feature on picmonkey, by the way. Can you tell?

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I won us a night here back in February, thanks to Paul from baldhiker.com who ran the competition – I always thought I was one of those poor souls who never wins anything! We decided to treat ourselves to a couple of extra nights, too, and we arrived home on Monday after a wonderfully relaxing weekend.

Jonathan and Joanne are the perfect hosts; we had a lovely warm welcome on arrival, and then always a way of contacting them if we needed it, and a promise that Jonathan would pop up “genie-like” at the press of a button. We didn’t need it, of course – everything’s just perfect as it is.

Having Joanne looking after us at breakfast time was lovely too; if there’s ever a competition for sunniest hostess, Joanne would be a definite contender.  None of that warmth is at the expense of any privacy; it’s a very small place, but there’s never any intrusion and it’s as though both Jonathan and Joanne have a sense of exactly when to appear and when to slip away.

Breakfast was stunning, with everything being cooked from fresh and a good range to pick from. A good cooked breakfast is always a treat, and the local bacon and sausages were absolutely delicious.  I had kippers one morning, and they were perfect too.

Our room – the Mint Room – was sumptuous and very roomy, with everything we needed.  We had a couple of quite busy days while we were there, and it was good to have the space to be able to curl up and read in the evenings (there was a great TV in the room, too, but I’m a bit anti-telly when I’m on holiday so we didn’t have it on).

The location’s great; a very quiet terrace set just off the main road with just a few moments’ walk to the river.  Rothbury itself was just a stroll away, and Alnwick’s only a short drive.

We’d definitely recommend Linhope House for anyone wanting a little bit of luxury and some real peace and quiet.  We even had proper darkness at night, which is something we never have at home!

If you’d like to follow them on twitter, they’re @linhopehouse

The Girl Behind

I am thinking…that I should be ready for our trip out today, and that Mike will be upstairs to gather me up very shortly.  Him chivvying me along is part of the routine of us going anywhere. He pretends to be exasperated with me, but I think he secretly enjoys it.

I am thankful…for having had a two week rest from work. We’ve had a gorgeous holiday in St Ives followed by a few days at home. We’re setting out to Northumberland this morning for another little break, hopefully via a museum that I’ve wanted to go to for too many years.

In the kitchen…we have very little as we’ve been away and then here only briefly, and now we’re going away again. So we’ve been living on bits from the cupboard and the freezer. But then having very little for us isn’t really the case; I’m a terrible hoarder, and I do often joke that we seem to keep enough food in to survive a month with no shopping.

I am wearing…PJs, still. And I really ought to be having a shower.  But, you know, if I had the choice I’d wear PJs all the time.

I am creating…lots of part-posts for blog entries. I so wanted to spend some of my time off on writing more, but that wasn’t to be. I have two jotters for notes (one with butterflies and one with polka-dots, in case you were wondering). I carry them around with me and write beginnings of things and bits of inspiration. Sometimes just a post title or a little spider diagram.  I keep promising myself that I’ll find the time to work through them all and finish them.

I am going… to have a huge clear-out this coming month. We have a space booked at a table-top sale, and I so want to turn some of my old junk into a bit of spare cash.  I never throw anything away, and I just generally have far too much ‘stuff’.  I think I used to feel that ‘stuff’ was part of what defined us. Now it just seems to take up space and get in the way.

I am wondering…whether the weather will hold out for us this weekend, or whether I ought to be double-packing so that I have outfits for warm and cold weather.  I’ll probably double-pack anyway. I usually do.

I am reading…Bird By Bird by Anne Lamott.  I don’t often read real paper books these days, but I’d heard so many good things about this that I ordered a copy. I’m only part-way through and am loving it. I’ve actually filled up with tears twice because there are parts that are so incredibly insightful.

I am hoping…that work has been fairly smooth while I’ve been away. I’ve missed it more than I expected to, and I’m ready to throw myself back in next week.

I am looking forward to…spending lots of time with Mike at the weekend.  Hopefully daytimes taking some creative photographs in interesting places, and evenings of lovely food and romantic strolls.

I am learning…to be calmer and more laid back than I used to be.  I want to be more creative in my personal life, and I need somehow to be more floaty.  That’s the best way I have to explain it right now.

Around the house…we have piles and piles of freshly washed laundry waiting to be ironed.

I am pondering…on whether to take over a different corner of the house for my writing, instead of trying to do it in the same room as the TV.

A favourite quote for today…

“Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations. I may not reach them, but I can look up and see their beauty, believe in them, and try to follow where they lead.” - Louisa May Alcott

One of my favorite things…is – this is a bit of a silly one – a new Sherbert Lemon cordial drink we found this past week. We were in a different supermarket to our normal one, looking for summery drinks. I think this one’s meant for children, but I’m loving it!

A few plans for the rest of the week: Our trip. A day at home for tidying and so on. Back to work on Wednesday.

A peek into my day…Lazy day so far. About to spring into action once I’ve pressed the post button.

I came across this prompt list at The Simple Woman’s Daybook just a couple of days ago. Do follow the link to read others; there are some beautiful writers linking up.

The Girl Behind

The Girl Behind

The Girl Behind

The current theme is Picture Postcard.  We’re on holiday in St Ives this week, and the view from our balcony makes for a pretty good postcard scene. Taken just now, at about ten past eight in the evening. And all that blue’s genuine and untinkered with.

Bliss!

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I had a great time, and I came away with a head full of thoughts about blogging and where I want to go with it.

Cybher was one of those funny sorts of experiences where bits of organised learning combine with more general thoughts from chats with other people.  There are still things coming to me now, three days later, and everything’s beginning to slot together.

These are my ponderings

Niche is Important

Although there was some talk (on the day and afterwards) about our own lives being our niche, I’m not sure I agree with that.

All of the blogs I really enjoy have a really strong focus and style. I don’t feel that I have that; I’ve tried to be lots of different things in the one place.

I have a couple of ideas for things I’d like to work with – one is to have a diet / food blog separate to here, and the other is a more personal thing that came to me on the train on the way home – a collection of stories from different parts of my life. I’m still wrestling that one through in my head.

Blogging for Me is Important Too

I’ve seen a fair bit of post-Cybher tweeting about blogging for personal enjoyment. I really want to get some of that back. I’ve been feeling a bit of pressure to find a niche, but I’ve pretty much concluded that I do want to continue with a personal blog as well as a niche one.

Coincidentally, Darren Rowse tweeted yesterday

The way I ‘chose’ my niches was to have a personal blog. The categories that got ‘hot’ I broke out to blogs. #blogchat

— Darren Rowse (@problogger) May 14, 2012

That makes sense for me, too.  A personal blog is a great place to try out a whole range of categories, and to build a more relaxed space.  If I can feel OK about personal blogging, I can also put more of myself into it.

A Few Feelings about Sponsored Posts

Sponsored posts haven’t been a huge issue for me. The recent google issues haven’t impacted on my blogging plans, but the issues about paid posts have been really current at both of the blogging conferences I’ve been to.

When I started blogging again last year, I had no idea that such things existed.  I genuinely started for fun, and for me, and the whole monetisation thing can be a bit distracting at times.

There’s a definite excitement at first in being paid to write stuff.  Crikey, that makes us paid writers, doesn’t it?

Well, not really. Not when the actual bits we’re being paid for are the keywords given to us by the SEO company, and the rest of the post is effectively irrelevant.

Right now, I’m feeling pretty cynical about paid content.  I’ve certainly done a couple of things on here that I wouldn’t do again.

And Also…

I have pages of notes about safety online, feminism, striving for goals, building connections, generating ideas, photography, template design, plugins and so much more.  I have lots still to process in my head.

The event was great.  Totally different to Blogcamp (not better, just different), and a great chance to look at a range of new topics.

One of the things that’s amazed me about the blogging community is that there are so many women doing great things for others – the team who put Cybher together are a great example of that. Thanks to Sian and her colleagues for organising it, and particularly for making it open to all women and not just mums.

The Girl Behind

I think this is the first time I’ve ever actually watched an organised run.

I’m a long way from even being able to dream of doing it myself, but I do kind of ‘get’ running, and I can see why it’s so rewarding.

We often talk about goals in terms of journeys and races.

Wherever there’s a bunch of women gathered together to talk about goals, there’s always someone who’s planning a run or training for a run or able to reflect on how she did ever so well just a couple of months ago and completed the run she’d been planning for a year.

I really do see that.  And now I’ve seen it for real, with those hundreds of feet thundering past while I was snapping away and trying to capture some of their joy.

I loved seeing the different types of people taking part. From the serious runners in their club shirts, right through to the guy who made it round in the bear costume.  And all the amazing people in between.

I found myself wondering about their stories.

I’m guessing that some would have been there for personal challenge.

As they ran past me, there’d occasionally be someone running with a friend and willing them on with encouraging words;

“You’re doing great, keep it up.”

“Take it steady. Go at your own pace.”

And there were lots of people with charity slogans on their tops, perhaps running in memory of someone they loved.  Perhaps running for the first time.

There were all sorts of people.  Absolutely all sorts. People with wobbly bits, people with bits strapped up, people who were feeling the joy of every single step, and people who were focused and totally in the zone.

I had a wonderfully heart-warming couple of hours watching them.

If they run this again next year, I’d recommend it to everyone in Doncaster.  If you’re free, it’s well worth getting out there to cheer them on and help them on their way.

It’s great for the spirit.

Not just for the people who are running, but for any of us who’ve had a big unachievable goal or wondered what it might feel like to really reach for something and work hard for it.

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I’ve never really been a clothes sort of person.  Not that I’m going to alarm anyone by turning up in my birthday suit, but it’s just that I dress more for comfort than style.  And I worry more about the practical things that I’ll need on the day.

But then occasionally I do find something that I really love. Like these shoes. I’ve had them for a few years, and worn them only a couple of times.  I think that’s maybe because I normally go to places with other people and a lot of people would refuse to go out with me in them.

But for Cybher, I’m travelling alone and it’s all about having fun and being a bit more me than I normally get the chance to be. So the blue shoes it is.

The rest of me will probably be in jeans, and something from last season at Ann Harvey.

Oh, and my mid-life-crisis burgundy can’t-believe-it’s-not-leather leather-look jacket.

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I vowed I wasn’t going to play any more with him because it tends to descend into bickering. Normally around the time he tells me that the millionaire him couldn’t face life in a house that didn’t have a dedicated snooker room.

We always follow the same pattern. It starts with him talking about the economics, interest rates and how we could last on the interest alone if we put £Xm into a long-term savings fund (I can’t say how much the ‘X’ is there because I don’t really concentrate enough on that bit). Then we establish roughly how much we’d have left, usually settling on something around £6 million.

He’d like to travel, carrying a fabulous camera with him. Not to the normal places, but to the off-the-beaten-track, possibly-eaten-by-tigers-or-worse places. And he’d like to come home to a house with a snooker room.

I’d like to stay close to home. Possibly write. Possibly paint huge canvasses whilst floating around the garden with a scarf tied around my head. Naked, possibly, if we’re not overlooked. I’d like to dance, and I’d like to sing at the top of my voice with no risk of anyone hearing me.

We sort of meet in the middle when we talk about having a swimming pool. That’s the bit that we agree on.

And then we meander down another route for a while. One that talks about these some of these things being achievable with time rather than money, and about how both of us could put more energy into being creative for at least a few hours a week.

There are lots of us, it seems – I asked a couple of people at work – who play this game. Some of them don’t even play the lottery.

And I know that lots of money would answer lots of problems for lots of people. But it’s also about bravery and freedom. Money buys ‘stuff’ and takes some of the anxieties away. But it can’t hand us all of the answers we’re looking for.

It’d be nice, though. Wouldn’t it?

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And about how lovely the cake was.

There are a couple of events that are open to a wider audience this year, and the first was in Birmingham yesterday.

These are my 10 Things I Learned at BlogCamp.

1 – Be the most You that you can be. We need to have strong voices and develop our own style and tone, right down to key words and phrases.  Writing the way we speak is a great way to start.  The early part of blogging (when very few people are reading) is a great time to experiment with different styles.

Look at dooce.com and the Waterstones Oxford Street twitter feed for great examples.

2 – Have a view. Don’t do ‘opinion’ pieces that cover off all the sides of the argument; express personal thoughts and encourage people to debate with us. Much better to give that debate a strong starting point and let people react.

3 – Snarking about things that are really current, from current tabloid news and what brands like Starbucks or Sainsburys are doing this week, through to what’s happening on the tv screen right now, is a great way to engage with people and have fun.  Snarking about real people (even if they’re celebs) or about things you’re really bothered about, is where it’s more likely to get upsetting and difficult to take – so those of us who are on the delicate side need to steer away from that stuff.  And snarking isn’t the same as moaning.

4 – Creating e-courses about creativity and personal growth are lots of work to set up, but a great way to connect people (and a fairly strong source of income if done well as an offshoot of a successful blog).

5 – Great e-courses use a mix of video, written pieces, slideshows, community support and prompts / ‘homework’.  Leading real-life training sessions is a great way to develop some teaching skills.

See Camtasia software for recording the computer screen and talking through instructions at the same time.

6 – Google is totally fine with websites linking to each other; that’s how the web works. Google’s also fine with links being sold, but they must be set to ‘nofollow’. This is clear in Google’s terms and conditions, and it’s a big risk for anyone who wants google to recognise and rank their site. (Linking anywhere shares a bit of our Google pagerank with wherever we’re linking to.  Adding nofollow stops that happening).

7 – PRs building brand awareness are likely to be totally fine with nofollow.  SEO people are providing keywords and pages to link to; they’re less likely to want nofollow links (and there will always be new bloggers who are willing to give follow links in return for payment).

8 – Blogs need to be really simple for people to find, follow and share.  Marketing has to be part of what any blogger does, so going along to relevant events, promoting the blog wherever possible and making sure that it’s easy to navigate are important.  If we’re wanting contact from PR people, we need to make it simple for them to find our email and get in touch.

9 – Lots of us are quite sniffy about using press releases to inspire content because we don’t want to be doing that stuff for free.  To bloggers from journalism backgrounds in traditional media, it’s really normal to take content ideas from a range of sources – and press releases can be a great part of that.

10 – PR people have all sorts of spooky ways of analysing who’s being inflential online, what their followers are interested in and who’s talking about the things that relate to their product. They’re fine with being approached by bloggers (although not just for samples and free stuff), and are open to talking about new ways to present content about their products.

I have an eleventh point as well, which I guess would only apply to a few people. Mike was a BlogCamp participant too (he’s been doing a photo-blog this year, and he’s come away with loads of ideas). It was great to have someone to be with, but that was a bit too safe and I didn’t throw myself into mixing with other people. I’m kicking myself about that now, as I know that part of the point is to get involved in the community of bloggers. I think that’s what we call in youth work my “better for next time”.

The event was great. The points above were a struggle to cut down to 10.  I’m stupidly grateful for having had the chance to be among fellow bloggers for a day. Thanks to Sally and her team for putting it all together.

The Girl Behind

I’ve mentioned before that joining Toastmasters – an international speaking and leadership organisation – was perhaps an odd choice of hobby for me.

I have huge anxieties about public speaking.  I’m fine at reading aloud. I used to be alright at acting and hiding behind a character.  On lazy Sunday mornings, I can happily imagine that I could be a great orator. Even in my pyjamas.

But in front of anyone else, I worry that I’ll go to pieces.

I’m not alone. Apparently, fear of public speaking ranks higher than fear of death.

I guess that there are three main ways that people will deal with that fear; avoidance tactics and delegation (so one never has to do it at all), pushing through and doing it anyway (and I’m guessing that pretty often means doing it badly), or somehow working through it properly.

That’s what Toastmasters helps us to do – to work through the components of speaking and develop a whole range of skills.  Of course, it’s not just for people who arrive with a fear – some of the people in our club have been great speakers all the time I’ve been going and they seem to be totally at ease. But even they’ve made great strides forward in really honing their skills and being better every time.

I spent about two weeks practicing my Icebreaker.

I wrote it first just as I’d write a blog post. That was a little revelation to me; I’d thought that my blogging was quite conversational, but writing to speak is totally different.

The first time I did it as a speech – three Sundays ago – was just to Mike. I was awful. It took me about four attempts to get beyond a minute in because I was so anxious about it.

I practiced a few times on Mike over the two weeks, kept my script with me for any spare moments and had learned it by heart a couple of days before the session.

For my final run, I was just exactly as I’d be dressed at the session – even down to wearing my outdoor shoes on the lounge carpet. I think that was really important for me because most of my run-throughs had been disrupted by me fiddling with something I was either carrying or wearing.

I felt the kind of nervous theatrical thing I used to feel before being in a show – something I’ve not felt for years and years – and by the time it came to my turn to speak, I was really just wanting it over with.

But it was fine. I’d go so far as to say that I quite enjoyed it.  I got loads of lovely feedback from other members, and I was given the Best Speaker ribbon at the end of the night.

I actually feel that now I’ve got started and done one speech, the others are bound to be a little easier.  We have ten speeches to work though in our first section – the Competent Communicator.  Each builds in a new skill.

I can’t emphasise enough how this kind of system is better than any one-day seminar or practice course could ever be. This is twice a month for as long as I’m a member, with almost every session offering a chance to join in with either speaking or evaluation in some way. The group is fairly small and very committed to each other – so we’re all growing together.

There are so many of us who have something we want to say or share.  Possibly some of us are already doing that but could use some help and some genuine constructive feedback. It’s so sad that so many of us have this horrible fear – but I’m so glad I’ve found somewhere to work on it.

If you’d like to join your local branch of Toastmasters International – there are groups all across the world – click here to use the Club Finder.  Most groups seem to offer the first session free to guests.  I promise you that it’s well worth spending a couple of hours of your time to find out whether it might be for you.

The Girl Behind

Picture from Cute Little Factory

I’ve always loved words.

I was one of those children who read everything.

I’d read the words on the cereal boxes and whisper them so I could sense how they felt. Riboflavin. Thiamin. Magnesium.  I wondered a little about what they meant, and I loved the familiarity of seeing them every day.

I’d make little rhythms out of things written on the side of toys – “Safe, Non-Toxic, Colours Blend” on the edge of the play-dough tub became a little chant for me every time we played with it.

(I know. I was a strange child).

I’d read roadsigns and make words from car number plates.

I’d get caught up in the romantic poetry of Rogers and Hammerstein’s showtunes, and I’d sing them over and over.

I have two early memories of writing.

One is sitting with my grandad as he taught me to write my name pretty much as I still write it today.

The other is a story I wrote when I was about 9. I remember very little of it, other than that I wrote it out longhand on sheets of lined paper. And that it had a rabbit in it, although I don’t think it was actually about the rabbit.  I remember a bit of a fuss about it being good, and I remember a bit of me wanting it to be my thing and not something that other people got excited about.

Writing was my place to disappear to.

I’ve written throughout my life, whether it’s been to remember an experience, or to express something and persuade others.  I’ve written privately in diaries and found having that space to write hugely therapeutic when things have been really tough. That kind of writing comes really easily to me because I don’t have to worry about anyone else viewing it and judging it.

When I write knowing that my words will be read by someone else, though, I feel that I have to be more careful. I want to craft things properly, and sometimes I know that I over-craft things so much that they become stilted.

I’ve been writing this blog for almost a year now, and I’ve learned so much about writing.  I still feel that I’m at the beginning, though.

I guess that one year in marks a good time to set out some writing challenges for the next 12 months:

- Writing more regularly and focusing on practice rather than perfection.

- Following along with more challenges – including word limits – to help me focus on different aspects of writing.

- Attempting to pull a more natural voice through to my writing, so that I’m putting more of me into each post.

- Learning more about writing for speaking. I’ve just done my first prepared speech at Toastmasters, and I’ve really noticed how different my spoken voice is to my written one.  I’m guessing that writing for speaking will help with bringing a more natural style to all of my writing.

I want to continue to enjoy it too.  More than ever before, the writing I’ve done over the past year has given me huge enjoyment and a great sense of accomplishment. It’s helped me to express parts of me that I don’t normally share, and I’ve started to connect with other people who I admire hugely.  I’ve also had some lovely feedback and lots of encouragement.

I’m so very grateful for the privilege of an education that taught me to love words in so many ways.

I wrote this piece for the Dare to Share linkup about Relationships with Writing over at The Lightning and The Lightning Bug.

The Girl Behind

You’ve probably also noticed that I’m annoyingly sentimental.

But I don’t think I’ve mentioned that I hoard and retain and find it really hard to throw stuff away.

Put those three things together, and this week’s Listography – five favourite mugs – was a dream come true.

So here we go for a little pootle through the mugs of my life. My Mugography…

(I’m a bit late with this because I swear that somewhere there’s a film-tie-in mug that I bought after seeing Annie. Can’t find it, though. I’m suspecting my naughty little sister’s snaffled it).

Growing up in Goole was a sort of messy jumble of damp grass and wild adventure. And the exoticness that comes with having a town of two halves, separated by a working shipyard and a series of lock gates.

My friend lived in the other bit – the bit that involved risking possible death by drowning, or at least a stern telling off for those who were caught walking over bridges they shouldn’t be on.  But she was worth the effort, I suppose.  Her Mum was a bit of a leading light in the Church there, and we were occasionally invited to provide entertainments in the hall with our troop of performing children.  I think most people came for the cake raffle, really, but they were always very encouraging of our efforts in the way that Churchy people often are.

This is everything a mug should be; clearly commemorative, olde-worldy classy and dated to remind me that, at the age of 17, I was hanging around Church jubilee celebrations when I ought to have been out dancing.

My Aunty Margaret had moved from Goole to Sheffield in her early twenties, but was home once a fortnight to share tales of life in the city.

She would often talk about Sheffield Rag Week – the time when the students took almost everywhere over with their fundraising efforts and their excuses to dress up and entertain the locals.

So when I went away to Chester, I threw myself into the Rag Week thing there. It was only later that someone told me that Rag’s for the geeky kids. But it was fun, anyway.

The mug’s just a sort of ‘does what it says’ and cheap as chips option.

And it’s actually chipped as chips too, which really means I ought to be keeping paint brushes in it or something. I don’t. I keep it at the back of the cupboard and look at it wistfully every now and then when I think of my youth.

I stayed up through three days and nights on the trot during Rag Week and still had the energy to laugh along with being thrown in the college pond on Friday afternoon.  Oh, to have that energy again.

This one here – the Boss one – is my work one, obviously (I mean, you’d never get Mike admitting that I was Boss in the house!).

This was given to me by my PA at the time, somewhere around five years ago.  She was efficient and time-saving and knew that a gigantic mug meant that I wouldn’t be distracted by thirst when she was supplying me with chocolate biscuits. We had a rule that anything without a label on could only be counted as zero calorie, and that it would be impossible to try and guess its proper value.

We both ballooned during that stretch of time. No idea why.

I’ve positioned it here in front of my work and someone else’s to make me look horrifically busy. You should see how I’ve blazed through those piles this week (and broken my apostrophe key in the process, as per my previous blog post).

There’s a rumour that it was given ironically, and that I’m not actually the Best Boss at all. I think that one was started by Mrs Button, whereupon someone went out and bought her a coaster bearing a similar legend.

This is a little pause for an ‘ahhh’. Bought when we were first together, in those first flushes where everything’s just brimming with lovlieness and it’s as if no-one else ever thought of having a pink hearty mug with their name on.

I know I’ve said this before, but I never expected that I’d be loved like this.

And I never expected that I’d tolerate anyone who messes up the kitchen as much as Mike does (although at least he shared the Jaffa Cakes).

And this is the latest one in my collection.  Mike’s Mum normally gives us tokens or money at Christmas, but she likes to make sure that everyone has something to open too. She has a real knack of choosing things that I’d never have chosen myself but I manage to fall in love with.

Like this mug – a delicate little mug for a delicate sort of lady, which I’m not at all. But I really genuinely like this one. It makes me feel dainty and pretty.

The year before, she bought me an amarylis growing kit, which was so amazing that even I couldn’t manage to kill it off. It even managed to produce a flower.

I think she might be trying to work secret mother-in-law tricks on me…

The Girl Behind

And then the apostrophe / @ key came off while I was typing.

Two of my favourite symbols. I’m guessing it gave up from over-use.

The Girl Behind