Sketch Friday 1st October 2021

So many missed Sketch Fridays. This virus has been so horrible. I have hardly written or drawn a thing. But I’m finally, for real, coming back now. Yes. YES.

My friend Sue (who has been down with the same thing. A horrid not covid thing) described it as ‘like sitting through the worst, never ending, TV series ever made’. That sums it up really well.

But some good things have happened.

As such. While I haven’t done much for the last 2 months, and when I have most of the time it’s been very boring and shit, some awesome things have happened.

Here’s a list of the good things I’ve done or thought about:

We had a week away in Grasmere: We went with our friend Jo and her little dude Ivo (more on him soon). I spent a lot of the time being ill in bed but the curtains were lovely. So that was a bonus. Also, when I wasn’t feeling pants we had ice cream and watched sheep. And there was a huge oak tree just near where we were staying. I cuddled it. And we went to a lovely bookshop and an art shop and sat in Rydal Hall and I managed to gatecrash a drawing class accidentally. And the teacher came and looked at my sketch and he was nice about it. I bet his residential would be fun. A week of drawing. I think that would be a perfect way to spend time.

Rest really is awesome. And useful. Rest is probably the most useful thing ever invented. I have intentions to keep doing rest, even once I’m fully better again. If you are someone not accustomed to resting, I expect that you’ll have read the sentence above and only heard ‘blah blah blah rest blah blah blah useful blah’ within your minds ear. I have spent years ignoring the idea of rest. I will not be making that mistake again.

Doing less is more. I’ve not been able to do much of my own writing work, but I had promised to do reading and notes for some writers I’ve been working with. And I didn’t want to let them down. So I said to them. ‘Hey. i’m sorry. I can’t do notes right now. I can do some reading and a bit of thinking. And then some talking. But not written notes. Writing the notes will kill me. Is it ok if I don’t do the notes?’ They all kindly said ‘its ok. don’t do the notes’. But what I’ve discovered is that the conversations without the notes have been much more interesting. More conversational. More exploratory. More collaborative. Less teacherly somehow. I don’t think I’m going back to writing notes.

Learning to walk is not something that just happens. I got to spend time with my new surrogate-nephew Ivo. It’s a lovely thing to be asked to be someone’s nephew. To be chosen to do that job. I feel very excited. Anyway, me and Janey got to hang out with him. He’s been learning to walk. And last weekend he took his first proper solo, unaided steps. I had not realised what an intentional thing learning to walk is. I imagined it as something that just kinda happens. I thought it must simply be a natural urge that one day gets answered with a step. And I’m sure to an extent that’s true. A call to walk must happen. But watching him, it was clear there was a ton of focused effort going on too. There was his clear intention versus his bumble body that didn’t want to do what he wanted. He was deciding to walk. He was deciding to balance. To stand up from sitting, to stumble forward. A baby, deciding to be, is quite an awesome thing to witness. What joy he felt when he managed it. It made me think about the way we (as adults) expect our lives to kind of move forward in spontaneous, unplanned ways. To flow. And that if we plan things, they are almost somehow less real? Less authentic? But maybe spontaneity is just intention practiced over and over again until it feels so smooth we mistake it for fate?

So that’s made me think about what I write and how I write it.

I’ve started taking some tiny new creative steps.

Little seeds of new possibility I’m beginning to practice and do.

New habits. Nothing huge. Just little things. Done. In between plenty of rest. I think I’m doing this, to ready myself, while I haven’t been able to do much, for the time I will be well again and can do more.

No doubt I’ll bang on about this tons in the weeks to come.

What else?

I can’t stand salt and vinegar crisps anymore. Awful. They just taste really wrong now. Horrid.

I really like hot chocolate now. I’ve had more hot chocolate in the last week than I have had in the last 5 years. Hot chocolate is fabulous.

Matt Lucas is lovely. I would never have chosen to listen to his biography. But my audible tokens ran out, so I chose his book because I recognised his face and it was free. I was expecting to find him annoying. But even something annoying can promise to be a relief when you’re stuck with a really boring virus. I don’t know why I thought I didn’t like him. It’s quite strange to realise I’d made an opinion about someone based on stuff I’d inadvertently sucked into my brain without much thought. Not a nice thing to realise. Anyway, it turns out he’s delightful. And I’ve decided my personal campaign to boycott The Great British Bake Off since C4 stole it from Mel and Sue is going to end. I’m going to watch Matt Lucas on bake off. Thank you lovely Matt Lucas for being lovely.

And that’s it. Other than to say:

Holy fuck. I have two months worth of detritus on my desk that has built up into a mega storm of paper, notebooks, half started things, half started books, pens, posits, teacups, ink bottles, to-do lists, old banana skins and more. One day very soon, I’m going to clean my desk.

That’s the news.

Love to all x

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