I've been very distracted. Sorry. Had a bit of trouble with crooks, idiots and blocked drains. The latter is sorted now, thanks, but sadly the former two may require further attention. However I plan to ignore them until the season of jollity and fun is over so that I can get on and write and blog and enjoy life.

Almost back on track with the book word count so I thought I'd treat myself to a little bit of blogging. It's been a while. Where was I? Can't remember. May need to write amnesia into the blog's title. 

There has been an interesting if a slightly alarming development on the writing front. I'd just found my word-churning stride when my two grand-daughters came to stay with me for a few days. This is always a delightful experience but on this occasion they provided Fragile Confidence with her mightiest weapon of writer destruction yet.

Let me explain.

It was bedtime and Willow and Bella wanted some stories.

"I'm sure Granny would love to read you some of her stories." Their Mum was all storied out, wanted (deserved) a night off. She knew that Granny could not resist an invitation to snuggle up in her big, comfy bed with the grandchildren for a bit of storytelling. "Bella, wouldn't you love for Granny to tell you the one about Arabella Rose and the Chalkdust Circus?" Bella's full name is, of course, Arabella Rose. She's very proud of the fact that her name appears in one of my picture book stories. She's equally proud of the fact the she is named after a real pirate.

"Pleeeease, Granny, pleeeeease." Bella and Willow were pyjama-ed and in my bed in a flash, arranging the pillows and making a perfectly-sized granny space for me right in the middle.

So we settle down to a lovely session of tales and talking, Willow on my right and Bella on my left. After a dramatic rendition of Arabella Rose and the Chalkdust Circus I read another of my stories to them, one called Jess and The Henbarrow Bus. They have an Auntie called Jess. I had to read Jess's story twice because Willow and Bella like to join in with that one. I was beginning to feel that Willow and Bella would keep me storying all night.

"Right my lovelies, teeth brushing time I think." I know, I know. You're thinking I'm a mean old party-pooper. The girls moaned and complained a bit but they're sweet little things. They slid off the bed and headed for the door.

Here comes the crunch.

Willow stopped in the doorway and turned to look at me. With a level gaze and in a quiet voice she said, "Granny. I have adventures too, you know."

I smiled at her.

"Yes. I do. And I really like animals. I thought you might like to know that, Granny."

These words, so precise and perfectly articulated for particular effect, were instantly translated in my head to mean, "So where the hell is my story, Granny?"

My mouth started working before the brain could intervene, as is its wont when it comes to the wishes and desires of the grandchildren.

"Would you like me to write a story for you, Willow?"

Her face lit up."Yes, Granny, I think I would." Then she turned and skipped off to the bathroom to brush her teeth.

I'd just been given my first commission....

Fragile Confidence exploded from the wardrobe.

"That'll be tricky. Got any ideas? No. Thought not. Well, you've promised her something now. Can't let her down. No backing out. Did you see the smile on her face when you said, 'Yes'? Aaw. She was tickled pink, chuffed as nine-pence." FC sat herself on the end of my bed (hate when she presumes to do that) and stared me down, with a sickly and somewhat menacing smile plastered over her smug face.

What had I just done?

Oh deary, deary me but the word count is not behaving. Perhaps I need to treat myself to some new pyjamas. Or may be I should try plumping the pillows... or adjusting the angle-poise.

I must NOT let the Shed contingent get wind of this hiatus.  Bed is best.

Believe me, do, when I say I am trying to be disciplined. I've locked Fragile Confidence in a wardrobe so she can't interfere and I've replenished the bedside supply of milk chocolate Hobnobs (true, that last act does not smack of self-discipline but it is essential). As anyone can see, despite our recent burglary, I'm doing my best, I'm soldiering on. However I have been knocked off track. I am utterly distracted; I can't for the life of me fathom why anyone would pinch my washing up basin, my washing up liquid and my washing up brush....

Perhaps my particular burglars suffer from some strange and debilitating form of Schizophrenia brought on by long years of thieving, a form of Schizophrenia that, ultimately, interferes with their 'value' judgements. It must be tricky locating a specialist fence for their brand of swag.

Will post again soon once my mists of confusion have dissipated and the word count has toe-ed the line.

Returning to Schizophrenia and its numerous manifestations.
     The next most prevalent variety that besets me would be the type of schizo behaviour my children and my nearest and dearest experience all too regularly. It's the form of WS (Writerly Schizophrenia) of which I believe I am least aware and that occurs when I've spent rather too long in bed with my characters. I emerge from my room and, to all intents and purposes, I am the matriarch, present once more at the heart of my household, capable of communicating with family and engaging in simple domestic affairs, such as cooking supper.
     Trouble is there is a timelag (oftentimes significant) between my mind emerging from the story and me physically exiting my bedroom. This causes problems. I call everybody by the wrong name, I think I have said/done things but apparently I have not, I am dazed, forget stuff and am generally useless as wife and companion. It irks me; especially when I find that our meal has been sitting in the oven for one-and-a-half hours but the oven is not lit.... Or, worse, I forget to pick a child up from an after school activity. As soon as my phone blips with that text saying, 'Where are you, Mum?', I'm rocketed back to real reality.
     These things happen yet I know I am a well-organised, highly efficient domestic dynamo. It happens because I have developed two realities: Bernie's World of Book and Bernie's World of Unbook. And it's hard to leap from one to the other.
     Fragile Conscience has a habit of putting her two-bits in at the most excruciating moments of forgetfulness that occur mid-leap between these worlds. While pointing out that the book may be getting a bit too plotty, or that the dialogue's taking over and the whole thing's looking like a script, she will also take the time to remark to me that I may be failing my family, chronically. But my gorgeous children and my lovely partner step in at these times and help me persuade Fragile Conscience to 'shut it'. There are times when they are not as gentle with her as I would like them to be but their methods generally work and she scuttles off.
     If I ever get a book to print (paper or e) I will have to include a long list of acknowledgements as I have five children to mention just as starters.
     I'm not sure FC will feature on the list though.
   

The Schizophrenia Bit Explained

Target word count duly clocked up - in fact yesterday was a good day. I exceeded my target. I'm feeling smug.This does not always happen, which leads me, nicely* to the nub of todays outpourings: The Schizophrenia Bit Explained.
     Today I am full of drive, ready to open the current draft of the new book, Recycling Dads, and crack right on. Today I love my story, my characters (even the nasty ones) and I can't wait to get with them again, find out where they'll take me. I am happy and enthused and this is good.
     But this is not always the case. When 'yesterdays' go wrong and the words jam and those characters just won't commune with me, subsequent 'todays' are bleak; beset with foreboding. I dread opening that draft. It is not my friend. We both, writer and story, are strangers to each other. It's an utterly un-nerving state of being and there's a voice in my head, one that grates and whines, one that undermines Fragile Confidence and screams at me, things like:

                                  What makes you think you can do this writing thing, fool?

      Your story is rubbish - best place for it is the shredder
   
                                                                        GET A PROPER JOB

           Laughable, that's what you are, laughable

                                                You call that a plot? Cat's cradle more like

 Then it whispers, Gollum-like:

          Give up. Give up. Give up...

      But I won't give up. Doing that Gollum impression is always a mistake. It irritates me. Fortunately the voice does not know this.
     I shut it out, have a cuppa, go for a walk, employ a few avoidance strategies (but never the ironing) and persuade myself after a suitable period of procrastination that my close acquaintance, Fragile Confidence, needs me to be strong. So I am... and I open up the draft... and I write some words while I murmur my much used mantra, 'any words are better than no words, any words are better than no words, any words are better than no words'.
      This is just one form of my writing-induced Schizophrenia. I'll fill you in on its other manifestations (there are a few) in my next blog. 
      Not wishing to sound unkind, I do so hope some of my fellow writers recognise this condition. If not, and I find myself alone in my writerly schizophrenia, Fragile Confidence may have a break down. She may never recover.



*Am I allowed to use this word, its root being 'nice', if I want to be taken seriously as a writer? Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Worry, worry, worry. FC

Welcome to Pyjama Days and Schizophrenia

So - hands up all you writers out there if you spend ninety percent of your lives in pyjamas or some kind of bed-suitable attire.
     Aha. Just as I thought. There's loads of you.
     I am not alone.
     And I was wondering, too, whether you find yourselves muttering far-fetched excuses to parcel delivery men, meter readers and suchlike who knock on your doors at 3.30 in the afternoon because they make you feel mildly ashamed to be in your pyjamas at such a decadent hour? Or maybe you just hide away until they've gone and resign yourself to the knowledge that you will have get into some proper clothes, drive to the main post office, shell out for exorbitant town centre parking so that you can collect the recorded letter... or parcel... or item marked 'insufficient postage paid'  just to avoid ever having to explain your state of pyjama-dness to anyone.
      Hah - the extremes we go to.
      The tactics are many but I have learned from a cousin's unfortunate experience that a mad dash to don one's day-wear doesn't necessarily work either. She's still smarting from the look of shock horror on the postman's face and his wry (and mildly lewd) comments about her state of dress (back to front, inside out and upside down blouse which proved more revealing in that particular arrangement than the skimpiest of negligees - not that she would ever wear one... I think) and, by all accounts, her little episode didn't occur as late in the day as 3.30p.m. I promised myself never to resort to the day-wear dash tactic.
      However I digress. For me it was a relief, a HUUUUUGE relief, to discover that this penchant for spending way above average hours clad in night attire is perfectly normal amongst writers. Writing in bed is the in thing. In fact it could be an important step along the path to true professionalism. It's true that there are those who prefer their sheds but beds are up there - right alongside all those famous sheds we are always hearing about.
     It would appear that taking to one's bed to write has long been fashionable in the authorial community. While listening to the wonderful Michael Morpurgo speak at Bath's Festival of Children's Literature last weekend I learned that he aped Robert Louis Stevenson's habit of recumbent writing, found it comfortable and relaxing, and stuck with it.      
      As you can see, it's been going on a long time and I plan to uphold this fine tradition of bed-ly writing and encourage more of it through my musings here in my blog, Pyjama Days and Schizophrenia. 
      Enough for today though - must get to some real writing. I'll give you the background to the 'schizophrenia' aspect of the blog shortly; once my next word count target is achieved which will be accomplished, of course, whilst snuggled up in the comfort of my lovely, cosy, big bed.