In Person
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
As I write this I am being filmed! It's the last bits for the Inside Out film, so the team are in my room watching me looking as if I am concentrating, or writing great poetry. It's been an interesting process, and as we get to the editing stage the whole thing has tightened up and got more focused. I haven't seen the rought cut yet, just read the script which makes alot of sense. My fear is that it will be weepy...that however one presents cancer it has a built in misery factor. Incidentally, I have found a way to stop oneself from crying in public, which is, when the lump in the throat moment occurs, to visualise a stupid cat. Stupid cats are the opposite of tears!
I have been out in County Durham photographing dahlias with Sharon Bailey, the photographer. Also antimacassars, mantelpieces, and fruit bowls. It's a project of images and words about how people make artistic choices in their ordinary lives all the time. Mainly, it's provided Sharon and I with some fantastic days out. We walked along the swelling sea at Seaham Harbour, and went to the very peaceful church next to Seaham Hall. Aren't dahlias amazing? They almost make me believe in god, they are so unnecessary, yet full of euphoria and joy!
I'm sorry about the error in the last web log. I am not having chemotherapy, and the face mould is for keeping ones head still during radiotherapy. I went for my first blast this warning, and had a pleasant time in the waiting room making a hooky and proggy mat with the resident arts project. It quite transforms the experience of waiting, and I am quite looking forward to getting back to my 'seascape' tomorrow. The treatment was straightforward...a long buzz, while I lay on a hard bed with my moulded face tightly screwed to my real face.
Last night I heard the 'first drafts' of the musical settings of the poems in 'Sudden Collapses In Public Places'...it was a lovely experience, a gift. The music gives the poems new life and atmosphere. They will be performed at Live Theatre, sung by Zoe Lambert, with Dave Scott and Neil Blenkinsop and other musicians on 5th December.
Posted by julia @ 12:59 PM GMT
Thursday, September 23, 2004
I went to the hospital this morning to have my head moulded. You go in a little room with a hard couch in the middle of it, lie down, and a man puts a warm elastic mesh over your face that cools and hardens to the exact shape of ones features. Then the mould is used as a way of positioning ones head during radiotherapy. It looks quite interesting as an object and I think I might use it afterwards as a lampshade.
This week I am writing a short story for a festival of stories, based, or inspired by Raymond Carver and Chekhov. It's a bit daunting to have the great masters looking over ones shoulder, but I don't want to do a pastiche of their work either. In the end I am not sure if my story is anything like theirs, in fact I am sure it isn't. Also the film I have been doing with the BBC is nearly finished. I did a reading with the musician Tim Dalling on Tuesday to a dummy audience who pretended it was night time. They were mainly media students from Ashington College, and they hadn't been to a poetry reading before. I felt quite worried about them! Imagine being faced with two middle aged people who told you their inner thoughts! They were quiet, but polite. The film is being broadcast on 11th October. I feel worried about my mad video diaries, as I can't remember what I said, and I certainly didn't wash my face or brush my hair. Vanity never completely leaves us does it?
It's very bright and buzzy in the university. My corridor is full of writers and there's a smell of restless artists in the air! I have a sore throat and I feel as if I have swallowed a cold golf ball. Tomorrow I have a head scan, next week radiotherapy. Help!
Posted by julia @ 03:54 PM GMT
Sunday, September 19, 2004
I am finally returned from the merciless sun, slightly redder than before, but not much as I always sat in the shade.
I enjoyed my holiday in Ibiza immensely, but I am very relieved to return to England, land of hot water bottles,closed windows and heavy eiderdowns. Holidays are not very interesting unless something drastic happens, and on the whole it was accident free, so I shan't go on about it. It's not as if I went to Pacha every night. I have noticed that everywhere I go I compare it to the Isle of Wight, which shows how utterly English I am.
It is nice to be home, and I am feeling excited about Autumn and everything I am supposed to be doing. We have nearly finished the BBC film, and it will be shown in October. I am starting to regret the fact that I haven't brushed my hair much lately, and I probably could have done with a bit of lippy, especially on the video diaries. Never mind. I shall probably shut my eyes the whole way through anyway.
Over the next few weeks I have to have a quick blast of radiotherapy on the back of my head which I am not much looking forward to. I am worried that my brain might fry. However, I know it is very effective for bones, and worth doing. Otherwise I am feeling fine, especially now I am back with my lovely deep bath tub.
In early October , for National Poetry Day, I am hosting a 'poetry feast' at the Literary and Philosophical society in Newcastle. Lots of poets have written new poems about food, and we shall all be sitting round a long dinner table leaping to our feet and doing recitations. I am looking forward to wearing a new red velvet pointy hat that a friend brought back from Outer Mongolia. It seems absolutely the right moment for it.
I am thinking of writing a short handbook about how to behave with the ill. It would include useful tips like...'Do not squeeze the upper arm of the ill person' and 'Don't say HOW ARE YOU?' in a meaningful way. Also don't say 'You look well, much better than when I last saw you.' I think it could be a best seller. I hope you are all looking forward to the season of floating carrier bags and scared dogs. Love to all.
Posted by julia @ 05:58 PM GMT
Thursday, September 9, 2004
This week I have had a pamidromate drip, a blood transfusion, and an acupuncture treatment! My body takes so much tending. But I seem to have got myself in a good state for Ibiza, and I am looking forward to lying next to the pool, and having a proper holiday.
The workshop on pain on Wednesday was so interesting. The GPs and patients that attended were all such creative, open people. I know that it's always the radical forward thinking people that come to things like this, but it does give me such hope.
There were a few interesting things that came up, via the doctors and in discussion.
People tend to call their pain IT.
A 'shooting' or 'stabbing' pain is rarely used to describe a gun shot or knife wound.
People who are having the worst time with pain often describe it as an aggressive person ie I feel as if someone is stamping on my chest.
It is incredibly difficult to describe pain. We say things like 'it was a nightmare, it was indescribable, I didn't know what to do with myself.'
However, if you find a vocabulary or metaphor for pain, it can be really powerful, and help you feel in control of it.
We talked about asking questions in consultations like...what colour is your pain? What animal is it?
Or having words on a board that could be pointed at.I believe that people just need to be given permission to speak in this way!
It's all soft and sunny outside, and the students are back again, in bright yellow t.shirts, holding plastic cups full of beer. I am about to go to a meeting about my friend Andrea Badenoch's , who died in January of breast cancer. We are launching a prize for women writers in her honour. You have to be forty two to enter, the same age that Andrea was when she began to write.
And then I will go and pack my saris and massage oils!
Posted by julia @ 04:23 PM GMT
Monday, September 6, 2004
The flight back from Mauritius was interminable. It was creakingly uncomfortable, and I felt like 'self loading baggage' the term that is apparently used for economy passengers. Still, I wouldn't have missed the trip for anything. My highlight was watching older Hindu women in bright saris dancing in a small room before a wedding. My low point was a migraine during a sight seeing tour. Actually, I'm not so keen on sight seeing. I far prefer talking to people, and I met some great characters. I also saw my friend the novelist Lindsay Cullen and her husband Ram. Lindsay's latest book is called 'Boy' published by Bloomsbury, and she is a very interesting woman and writer. We had an evening at their house eating oddly shaped vegetables from their garden. It was my perfect night out, a sofa, and someone bringing me a tasty snack every so often.
Still, I am back now. There's no point talking about trips away unless they are interestingly awful, and this one was such a mixture of things. I feel as if I have glimpsed paradise, but it's nice to be back with marmite and PG Tips.This morning I had to go up to the hospital for my pamidromate drip, and they did a blood test and said my blood count had sunk to new depths. No wonder I feel a bit weepy and useless. We would all be crying if our brave red blood cells weren't marching about doing their job. Or is it the white ones? Today it's a grey, sullen kind of day, and I find I have so much to do it makes me dizzy. But it's rather busy and optimistic in the university, with people coming back from their summers, and all the workmen's ladders tidied away.
Tomorrow I am running a workshop with GPs about the vocabulary of pain. I really love doing these kinds of workshops. They feel rather useful, and always remind me of the power of words. We'll be doing writing exercises and reading things out, and hopefully everyone will go home with their vocabularies sharpened up, and their ears too. Then on Wednesday I have to have another long, boring blood transfusion. The thing I hate most about my condition is the time it requires. I suppose it has taught me to be patient, to learn how to do nothing, but I find it difficult.
I have read The Secret Life Of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd, which is delightful, and bound to become a feel good movie. Also Jill Dawson's Wild Boy, which is a fascinating read. She wrote a book called Fred and Edie which I loved, and is I think a very talented writer. And more Phillipa Gregory, and Clan of the Cave Bear, which I have thankfully nearly finished. It's a bit like binge eating, somehow, this kind of obsessive reading. My head is filled with salacious sex scenes!
Posted by julia @ 05:26 PM GMT
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