Sloughing my skin

It’s not a new beauty treatment, or any kind of ‘ought to’ activity for January. It’s that thing a snake does, when it sheds its skin, and leaves the old one behind.

Call it age increments. Call it January. Call it taking a stance against clutter. Call it spring cleaning, even.

Whichever of these it is – or isn’t – the archiving is continuing apace. New steps: tackling the collection of oddments in the tool cupboard that are often held onto ‘in case they turn out useful’.

With my parents happily using their woodburning stove, I now have a place for offcuts of wood. (I might even relegate the important stick collection in that direction too. Shh.)

We finally culled the poster collection – which has partly meant looking out pictures that we do like, and that haven’t actually made it onto the walls. They have been bumped up a notch, and others that we no longer love so well have been quietly recycled.

Time can be an asset here. I went back through some TEFL notes I had been keeping. I could tell that I didn’t need advice on how to use the-then all new, all singing and dancing interactive whiteboards. The information had already moved on a great deal.

We have created an archive cupboard – one that is normally hidden a bit by other furniture. It’s the new home of the much-thinned-down study notes collection. And the CDs, because we normally listen to an iPod. And so on. We’re not parting with them entirely, but we also don’t need to get to them that much.

We have started using terms like ‘let’s keep this for a [limited period of time], and if we haven’t used it, then out it goes’. For people who are good at keeping things, particularly if there’s any chance they might be useful, this is Progress.

I am even trying some things like electronically scanning receipts, so I don’t have to keep a pile of paper that may not get referred to anyway. If it’s important, it gets scanned. If not – you guessed it.

It’s not just an attempt at reducing clutter. The more folders and files I can get rid of, the more space I have for books, you see? Perfect.

Book space is more of an issue, since Junior Reader has now commandeered two large bookcases, and we got rid of one other one. (After 30 years of noble service, and increasing lean, it too went to the woodburner.)

Despite getting some new shelves tucked into the attic, we still have less shelf space than before. This thought exercises me from time to time.

So I part with what I can, and decide what needs to stay. (Need is a relative term, for book lovers, but perhaps it’s more related to those books we care about most.)

My inner environmentalist is generally happy, because, so far, we are finding useful homes for things.

A piece of flat pack furniture, now too big for the attic, that has been taken back to its constituent parts, and used as duck boards inside cupboards. (Easier to move heavy items around on them than on carpet.)

Clothes to give away; lots more scrap paper to draw on. Cardboard to recycle. And so on.

Thinking about a title for this post, I found an image of a snakeskin that had been shed. It is very fine, almost like a scarf. Something like I imagine a gold-threaded medieval belt to be.

They are beautiful in their own right, I can see that. Some people collect them, I understand.

For all that, I’ve decided not to do so. Too much effort going in to parting with old collecting habits, let alone acquiring new ones.

 

Lit Kid: first choose your title

More book sorting. Prospect of spring fair at school, running the book stall again (aka
I spoke up first so I got my stall of choice): I should at least provide a few books.

It’s not just a book stall: it’s also DVDs, the odd Nintendo game, and so on. But books is the main part, and it provides a good excuse to be wise about what we hang onto.

Between the school fair, and the book fairs in Peebles (also in the early part of the year), there are plenty of opportunities to gain more books: but I am strict about getting rid of some first.

Looking through them, though, I thought that there was merit in deciding what might make a good title, at least for a children’s book.

I should probably explain what I’m after: I do love a quirky title. I know it has to set up at least a little idea of what the story is about, but I think we can still do that and make people smile, don’t you?

Here’s my shortlist for now:

But I Am an Alligator – Lauren Child. This was the book that prompted today’s post. Lola, co-star of the book, has a favoured costume which she wants to wear everywhere. Can you guess what it is?

For all of Lola having a good line in dresses and butterfly hairslides, she’s not stuck in what I think of as ‘pink mode’. If you are going to wear a costume everywhere, it had better be a good one.

And I like the fact that her choices are just a bit edgy. This is the girl whose favourite library book is Beetles, Bugs and Butterflies. Onward, Lola.

A Boy Wants a Dinosaur – Hiawyn Oram, Satoshi Kitamura. On the face of it, this looks like a bit more of a ‘does what it says on the tin’ title.

But wait. The fun is in how the phrase occurs in the book. His grandfather says,

“A boy wants a dinosaur this much, a boy should have a dinosaur.”

Jewish phraseology, dinosaurs that eat everything, and pictures that beautifully capture the dinosaur’s bird-like qualities (just look at the mouth on the cover).

The Great Piratical Rumbustification – Margaret Mahy. I love Mahy’s work – both the books for younger readers and the older teen novels.

Mahy has a great sense of what I think of as ‘mouth chew for words’ – how they feel in your mouth when you read them aloud.

(Her piece de resistance, in this sense, is Bubble Trouble, an amazing poem about a baby accidentally captured inside a very large bubble, which I strongly urge you to order from the library at least.)

So I like an author who uses great chewy words like rumbustification – and truly, when pirates plan a knees-up, they do it well.

Another great title is Fattypuffs and Thinifers by Andre Maurois. I think I came across this in the library in my teens, or maybe a bit earlier.

It is one of those extended analogy books that sit well alongside the likes of The Phantom Tollbooth. It’s one I happily reaquainted myself with recently, reading some back entries on the children’s book blog Tygertale.

Imagine two kingdoms at war, one with citizens on the plumper side, one whose inhabitants are pretty skinny. Add in a couple of brothers who typify the two sides, and you have a great battle on your hands.

In a similar vein, I have to add Bottersnikes and Gumbles, a brilliant book by Australian author S.A. Wakefield.  A school friend introduced me to it, and I read, entranced.

(The pictures are fantastic. This link shows you lots – the text is in Chinese, but you get to see the various cover illustrations and a good number of others too.

And if you are unsure why the small cuddly characters are walking around in tin cans, it’s because the nasty long-nosed characters find jam tins the best things to catch them in.)

These books are harder to track down now, but it’s worth it if you can – and it’s a little series too, if you get hooked.

I discovered that they have also now been animated, so you can get a sneak preview of them in action here.

For another strangely named creature with a tricky attitude, try Bogwoppit, by Ursula Moray Williams.

(Pictures are by Shirley Hughes, one of my favourite illustrators, setting aside her own creation Alfie for the Bogwoppit, a frowning owl-like creature.)

There are many more such titles out there, I’m sure. Let me know if there’s any key ones I’ve missed.

For my money, if a title has a good mouth feel to it, a sense of al dente when you try it for size before your junior audience, it’s worth a go. All of these have. Tuck in.

Life begins?

This week brings with it what is sometimes termed a significant age increment.

Not so bad, is it? Dan has been there, tried it out for me. I get to call him old for a few months, then I catch up. Nothing to it.

After 25, it seems, there’s not much protocol for what birthdays are about. Except the ones that end in 0, and some that end in 5.

This one ends in 0.

—

Lots of things are said about this one. Some say ‘over the hill’. I remember my mum being given a hat that said ‘over the hill’, and we laughed a bit, and took some photos of her wearing it.

These days, goal posts have shifted on age. You can happily stick with ‘middle youth’ until your 50s, or so the dictionary tells me.

The other classic statement? ‘Life begins at 40’ – though some suggest that that too has been pushed back, almost as much as a decade and a half. (It only mentions men in the article, though.)

So who knows really what you are ‘meant’ to feel at a given age. ‘Life begins at 40’ was meant to suggest financial stability, a certain phase of childhood completed if you were parenting.

But I wonder whether ‘life begins’ can really mean anything I want it to. Like trying out retirement ideas early, for instance.

Maybe it’s a further jump in self-awareness, self-confidence. Others have spoken about it.
I felt it happen at 30, and I wouldn’t mind a further boost for a new decade.

Part of me thinks it’s already begun.

—

So. Here’s a little present from me to you, in birthday week.

I have been toying with a little bit of creative writing this month. Feeling the flow, enjoying it. Exploring the idea as I went along. All the kind of stuff I want to be doing, really.

I hadn’t planned to write a Christmas story last month. It just happened. I enjoyed it. That’s really what I want for writing, at the moment – to enjoy it. And maybe to find an audience to try it out on.

So here’s a bit more writing – a bit closer to the bone, perhaps. It happens to be an attempt at a science fiction short story – one of the other types of writing I love, and say from time to time that I want to do.

I feel a bit protective of this one – and also less clear on how others may take to it.

Here’s the plan. I’m going to give you an excerpt of it (also in the interests of safeguarding it as my own – still trying to figure out how to write creatively online, and not worry about what will happen to my words).

You can see what you think. If you like it, and want more, send me a comment, with your email address.

(All the comments are moderated, so your email address won’t go live – it just means I’ll be able to see who to send the whole story to.)

Whatever my conclusions about age, or youth, writing is where I want to be right now.
And on that side of things, life is just beginning.

====

This light

“This light. See, lady? Try it, lady.

Let it trickle through your fingers. New, see?”

He had been waiting for her, even as she set foot in the spaceport. Had he a sixth sense?

Lone woman, small suitcase, big spaceport. Someone who has had enough of life in this shape and form. Someone who is seeking something new.

“See, lady? Brand new light. Not part of the Big Bang. Latest model. Just for you.”

She had to smile. He was insistent, but touchingly polite with it. New light for old, lady.
Trade me some of your old light, and I will give you something new.

As if he could, of course. And where would she keep this new light? What would she do with it? Being light, surely it would simply move on to the next person as soon as she opened the container, wouldn’t it?

She thought back to the glimmerings of a song someone in the past used to sing. It was back in the early 10s, when bottling memories was all the rage. This one was bottled by a great-aunt or someone, thinking back to a song her parents used to sing:

“…swing on a star,
Carry moonbeams home in a jar.”

In what way could you even think about picking up light? You couldn’t, of course.
She knew that. But yes, she was that lone woman, with her deliberately small suitcase, carry on luggage really.

Omni-recorder, headphones, a few items of clothing.

A secret skein of beads in an inside pocket – insurance for situations where people might prefer something that looked more like hard currency, instead of the universal credit chip embedded in her hand. People who liked to see what they were getting.

She paused. She turned, and looked back at the little man, plying his trade, setting up and resetting and stacking his jars of light.

There wasn’t room in the case. She knew. It had to be this compact for her to keep it with her on the flight, instead of checking it in for the hold (and risking the contents being scanned).

Lone woman, small suitcase. BIG spaceport. A hundred thousand destinations – and a desire for no questions asked. Checking in luggage would only get in the way.

She hadn’t yet decided where she was going, anyway. It wasn’t like she was risking a departure gate closing. As long as she kept her case with her, maintained her citizenly blank expression, all was still going to plan.

She turned back in his direction. Instantly, he picked up on the movement, and started cradling his jars, stroking them, polishing them. For show, he pretended not to see her gaze, but she knew he knew. She was getting interested.

Lit Kid: something old, something new

It’s bookcase reorganisation time. A further spurt of the building project, a purchase of extensions for a couple of bookcases – and a whole heap of considering the children’s books we have in stock.

The extensions are interesting. Almost immediately on seeing them, I’m transported to a childhood memory: the flat belonging to my great-grandfather.

There was a big sitting room. You didn’t spot the bookcases as you came in, but when you looked back at the door, there they were: flanking both sides of the door, and continuing across the top.

[Warning: mention of lots of books coming. I’m not going to cite them all, just for now, but let me know if you want to hear about any of them in the meantime.]

Back in those days, my mother’s stash of childhood books was kept on the top shelf or so.
A run of Famous Fives in hardback. Mallory Towers. St Clare’s. The Chalet School series.

For someone starting to gain the reading bug, it was hugely exciting. There were the books, pretty much being held for me. I could come along and read the next one when I needed it. A bit like your own private library.

Junior Reader is reaching that stage. A welcome set of books at Christmas, and suddenly, the chapter book reading is taking off. Not yet a month since Christmas, and I think eight out of the ten books have been read already.

I remember that rush.

The book reorganisation is not designed around this reading spurt – it just happens to coincide nicely with it.

And so I lay out my wares, not just the books Junior Reader knows, but the others I have held in readiness.

===

There are the books that we have read, over the last few years, as we made the move into chapter books at bedtime. There they are, familiar, yet still for Junior Reader to tackle independently.

There are the classics that I am making my way through as read alouds – reserving the right, at least for now.

Wizard of Oz. Winnie the Pooh. Wind in the Willows (probably too early really, but Toad’s escape from prison found a willing audience).

Others remain on that same shelf, still to come: Treasure Island. The Phantom Tollbooth. Maybe more.

Part of the interest, for me at least, is seeing what’s out there now, as well as passing on the pleasures of my own reading childhood.

And with treats such as Cressida Cowell’s How to Train Your Dragon series, who’d want to miss out? Or Cows in Action?

Or Mr Gum, with the slightly scary covers, but with a narrative that reads like Spike Milligan is still alive and well. Or a succession of Dick King Smith animal stories.

I won’t recite the whole bookcase. Really, I won’t. I’ve got a year ahead of me to do that, with who knows what else that we might find in the library along the way.

But I am excited. Partly to share books that I have loved; partly to discover new loves.
Partly to see how Junior Reader gets on with the feast available.

January is often associated with dieting. But that doesn’t have to apply to books, does it?
And certainly not to children’s books.

Past my bedtime

There is something of a notion that parents should be going to bed early.

For whatever reason, we’ve not really got there. Both of us with night owl body clocks; the enjoyment of solo time after Junior Reader has gone to bed. No great ability at getting up in the mornings, beyond the absolutely necessary.

And as I write, I am also solo parent this evening, so there’s no one to nudge me to put the light out.

I love writing at night. In my teens, I had the chance to do it – and the constitution that would let me. (As well as parents that were understanding about the weekend lie-ins that would happen when you did need to catch up.)

The difficulty, these days, is that what I do in a given day has so many separate headings:

– cooking

– cleaning (well, at least at times)

– copy writing

– supervising homework

– parenting (the big catch-all)

– writing for myself

And many more. Whereas once, I would go to work, sit in an office, and maybe even work on the same thing for several hours at a time. (Not all the time, by any means, but it was possible at least to keep going on the same general area of work.)

Now, I may at times settle into an activity – and, quick as a flash, it’s time to go on to another. Because, you know, it’s coming, ready or not.

As a result, when I do get longer chunks of time, particularly for writing, I kind of don’t know when to stop.

I used to read in big chunks of time – inhaling words, piling my plate. Then, for long enough, I got put off reading books, because I lacked those times of uninterrupted troughing.

So I stuck to lots of tiny things to read, that could fit in the cracks between activities.

Since Christmas, really, I’ve dived back in. I can be doing other things, of course, but part of me is still treading water on the book, waiting for the other swimmers to move out the way so I can continue my reading lengths, up and down the book.

It is wonderful. But writing doesn’t always work so well that way. The short pieces, yes, which is why blog writing can be great (and micro-blogging, aka comments on Facebook, even more so).

Still, some posts need a bit more thinking – or researching, if I’m trying to turn up a particular quotation or picture book illustration.

And for those moments where (whisper it) I am actually doing some creative writing, that takes even longer.

There must be some kind of ratio, or timing, that I can work out. So many key strokes, however long spent tapping away, before the better ideas come out of hiding.

I don’t yet know what it is. And I like a bit of luxuriating in language where I can get it. Especially where the ideas start to take their own course as I write. Those are the exciting times.

I will of course keep going with the little moments too – because, writing about Moments, that’s sometimes very apt. (Plus I can type fast, so my Moments look longer, even if the time to write them is less.)

For now, it’s way past my bedtime. I will pay for it tomorrow, at some point.

But just for now, I’ll imagine I’m a teenager again, steering my ship in the night as the words form the waves that carry me forwards.

[Written last week – a spot of catching up in posting.]