In Person
Monday, January 31, 2005
Here I am again. Sorry I have been a bit quiet. I hope no one has been worried. It's entirely due to my latest obsession with knitting which has absorbed me for weeks. I have knitted three things now ( a baby's scarf, a teenager's scarf, and a shawl ) and although they are holey and incompetent I think my state of mind is much calmer. I have also spent much time in wool departments, smelling and touching lovely wools, and saying words like alpaca and fair isle. I want to make a strange blanket next. I think I might be more of an arty knitter than a crafty one. At least, I'm not very good with patterns. My attitude is very similar to my feelings about writing actually.
Last week I had my first injection of the new drug, faslodex) in my poor bottom! The nurse said the hypodermic was terrifying , and I got myself into a right lather worrying about it in advance, but it didn't hurt at all thanks to Emla cream. And now I am feeling much, much better, although that could be coincidence as it's very early days. I'm also having a course of hypnotherapy on the NHS that I am enjoying very much. I have never been very good at relaxing, but what with my affirmative tapes and knitting I feel like a sponge pudding of peace.
I'm getting very excited about The Manifesto For A new City that I have been working on with Northern Stage. This is opening at the end of March, and it's a night of songs and opinion about my city and how it has developed. It's a rant against property developers and capitalism really. Predictably, I want everyone to take up knitting and eat porridge and ride a bike. I want us to do more than consume coffees in expensive bars. But that doesn't mean I don't approve of the lovely Sage Building (did I tell you I have joined a choir), or the Baltic, or the elegant bridge. I just feel that my world has gone out of control when planning permission can be obtained to build a glass tower of luxury flats that blocks the council tenant's in the Byker Wall's view of the River Tyne. I know that I am not the only one who thinks this...there are lots of people opposing all kinds of things, but the manifesto is my own personal utopian rant. I shall put up dates on this site soon.
Last week I went to Cambridge for a Royal Literary Fund day, as I have become a mentor for an emerging novelist, and all mentors and mentees met for a day. I am proud to be a mentor, though I still don't really know how to write a novel myself. There is no easy formula. Still, I hope that I won't do any harm, and I always found that being allowed to talk about writing to a listener made me feel excited and positive, so I shall do my best. The main thing is I love my mentees work, and long for the next episode.
On the way back from Cambridge I got on a scuddy little train with the poet Gillian Allnut who is also a mentor, and guess what? The queen was on the train too! It was the most silly, unlikely thing. So we travelled with her Maj to Ely, when we got off. I mean she had her own carriage and police and everything. Fancy! What shall I do with this strange experience?
If you live in the North East, I am reading at the Blue Room in the Bridge Hotel this Sunday at 8.00 p.m. It's a good night, and there's some other brilliant writers on ...Paula Cunningham, Helen Burke, Tess Hudson, and musician Steve Jinski and his band. I shall probably read my new instructions poems, which are pouring out of me like volcanic lava!
I am about to read Small Island..the book that has won two prizes. I am nervous about starting it. It must be so very, very good!
Otherwise, I am listening to Nina Simone, growing narcissi on the mantelpiece, and trying to work out how to write, or type onto bandage type material as I want to make some 'poetry bandages.'
I hope you are all well out there! Didn't we manage January well? Ha Ha hypotherma and cold bones..you can't get me!Just Feb to go and then nothing can stop us!
Posted by julia @ 02:30 PM GMT
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
Today I am going to record the story for Saturday's The Verb on Radio Three. I'm doing it down the line from Newcastle, which is a shame because it's always nice to meet people face to face, but the journey is so long and impractical. The other guests are Tom Paulin and Tony Harrison, and I have a feeling that my piece about knitting will seem rather fluffy!
My health is still good, with fantastic deep velvetty sleeps, although the face ache comes back sometimes. I'm less interested in baths, because my bones have warmed up, and generally more energetic. On Friday, I start the new drug, Faslodex. I'm a bit nervous, as it means saying goodbye to my dear friend Tamoxifen. You have to believe and trust in drugs for them to work, I think, and Faslodex is a new aquaintance. Still, it will be great if it does work. They give you an injection once a month, so it's not too gruelling. Side effects are minimal too. It works hormonally, stopping cancer cells from being able to grow by sort of starving them. I love the thought of them gathering around feeding troughs to find nothing there. Ha Ha.
So that's all good.
This January I am feeling very decisive. I am going to finish my Brazilian novel this year. I've been offered a retreat in an Umbrian Castle in early summer and I think it will be a really good opportunity to work on the book. It sems to have taken ages, but actually, I think I needed to distance myself from the trip to Brazil before I could write about it. Things have to grow in an imaginary way before you can make them into fiction and Brazil felt too real. Now it's a vague memory and I am free to make stuff up.Here in Newcastle I am rather busy....running workshops and doing readings and cooking soups and knitting things. In the frosty garden all kinds of things are beginning to sprout. I am working on a first aid kit for the mind...a box of poems and images and spells and recipes, with the artist Emma Holliday. We're going to produce a limited number of boxes that people can use to get through crisis situations!
I'm just writing a critique of poems written in response to the Guardian Online Poetry workshop. I love them. They are all in the form of instructions. Do go to the site and read them if you get a chance.My best bath stuff is Dr Hoeky something (in clear botles/ looks very clinical)...sage bath....written in german though as SAGE BAD. Costs a fortune, but smells amazing.
Best colour, shady turquoise.
Best soup...mediterranean bean and rosemary.
Favourite poetry collection: The Tree House by Kathleen Jamie.
Posted by julia @ 11:47 AM GMT
Tuesday, January 11, 2005
I am in a really good mood. My blood count is going up, and my face has stopped hurting, and the old woman who haunts my bones has gone on holiday. But the question is, why? What has happened in the last week to trigger such a marked improvement? Well, it could be that I have taken up knitting and that it has helped me to relax. I have spent several evenings knitting shapeless squares. Or it could be something else entirely. I wish I knew. It's a lovely feeling, this warm boned, light weight sensation. I am really bouncy. And I'm not even taking any drugs in particular.
Perhaps it was Manchester. I spent three days in a very odd hotel next to the BBC called the Palace. It's the colour of melancholy, old grey tiled and ragged carpets, creaking lifts, heavy chandeliers. The tune 'Ain't nobody's business if I do,' played constantly. My room was right next to the railway line, which I enjoyed. I love the sound of trains chunting past. I had a vast, wooden floored bathroom, with strange plants in tall vases standing on a small table. At nights I couldn't sleep at all as my face hurt, so I ambled around knitting in my nightdress, providing a surreal image for anyone passing on a late train.
During the day we recorded Appointments at the BBC. The producer Sue Roberts, is just fantastic. She makes everything and everyone work seamlessly. The actors all gave their best, and in two days the plays transferred from my muddled brain to radio. They are being broadcast on the week beginning 21st Feb. For lunch we all ate things like rice pudding and mashed potato in the BBC canteen, which serves a high proportion of comfort food. I expected to be exhausted after Manchester, but actually I felt rather rejuvenated.
Tomorrow I am meeting my consultant to discuss the new drug he wants to give me. I feel like saying 'Don't worry, I'm fine, ' but then I might not be tomorrow. I am writing a piece about waiting for Radio Three's The Verb. I know an awful lot about waiting, maybe too much. I shall take my knitting with me to the waiting room tomorrow anyway. Maybe knitting is the new chemo!
Posted by julia @ 04:37 PM GMT
Tuesday, January 4, 2005
Just had a lovely facial. I am feeling really well after some fantastic sleeps...the kind of sleeps that make you feel as if you are floating in a field of feathers. I have had some good negotiations with my face pain. I think this is how one must deal with symptoms...sit them down and talk to them, and work out what gets them going. I reckon I have been giving my face too much attention. It needs a hot water bottle and a stern attitude. It hasn't been half so bad recently.
Gradually normal life re-establishes itself...writers are drifting back into the English school where I work. Computers are humming, waste paper baskets are being emptied.
I have taken up knitting. It gives me enormous pleasure and I am sure it works as well as meditation. I am knitting scarves with holes in them for every member of my family!
This week I am going to Manchester to record 'Appointments.' I'll be taking the knitting and a range of bath stuffs so that I can have swift recuperating breaks. I'm reading Bob Dylan's autobiography....god, he was a bit of an old grump....not exactly a bundle of laughs. Yet, in Chronicles, there are some astounding passages of description and opinion. It's worth looking at just for that. I was thinking how the song lyrics that we listened to as teenagers are ground into the core of our hearts, much more than any poem. I can recite Bob Dylan, Van Morrison, Patti Smith, Joan Armatrading. Songs are so important..we carry them with us throughout our lives.My New Year was delightful. I danced up and down the street with the neighbours and hung out with glowing friends. I really enjoyed myself, drank alot of cava and ate large amounts of sweet cake.
But I like this January spartan feeling...I love clearing up the tinsel and baubles. I like the bare, hard look of things. I have bought a black jumper. Roll on 2005!!Posted by julia @ 03:19 PM GMT
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