KazG

Love the dialogue, Raine. Did you do that as you listened?

The I Remember is highly evocative! It’s turned into a piece about your Grandad, hasn’t it?

Oh my darling, that is so sad and beautiful, and I can almost see him in my mind’s eye. What a tender elegy, difficult to read, yes, but also utterly lovely.
I hope the eavesdropping and the time with the grandson have both been cheering. If nothing else, noting down the way small children talk is always a blast, I think.

Thanks, Bella. Tomorrow I’m spending some time in a coffee shop with my six-week-old grandson and a notebook and pencil. I’m hoping for some lightness and humour in my eavesdropping!

Appreciating hugs, tissues, tea, chocolate biscuits.

I’m sorry this is a sad piece. Perhaps this has something to do with why I’m feeling emotional about my writing.

Feel like I’ve got here when everyone else is leaving…
It’s been a funny couple of days, hasn’t it? What with Ath’s comp and these ‘I remembers’ some unexpected emotions have floated to the surface.

This served as a reminder of the things we go through as children. It’s quite harrowing, in a way, although thank goodness for Glenn’s mum!

Love the Scotsness of it (made up a word). The now, right enough, a wee bit.
My favourite bits of the I remember are the bus that didn’t come and his old hands cradling nothing.

I’ve used I remember for character, and I’m planning to do it again for my brand new novel in gestation.

I love this, Bella. I wonder – if you’d been asked to write about that incident without doing it as an ‘I remember’, do you think it would have turned out differently in other ways than simply not starting each sentence with that phrase? I agree it’s like a poem, and I especially like the line about Glenn’s mum who also ‘remembered’.

This is wonderful! I remember kissing a photo of David Cassidy which my friend had stuck to the mirror in her bedroom. (Donny Osmond was hers.) And there’s nothing wrong with wearing a bra AND a vest now – but there would have been then!

Aw @hilary that’s lovely! Sending you lots of hugs and tea!! I think the idea of being given prompts and free writing is such a liberating feeling, especially if other writing is proving a struggle. And being able to do so in a group makes the whole writing thing feel less lonely, I find. I know I have been really struggling with the urge to just…[Read more]

I never found out, he ran off yelling something in Gaelic!

These are gorgeous, Sea. I love the image of the pineapple seller, and picking the car lock with your fingernail! So many different childhood emotions encapsulated here with deceptively simple phrases, really nice.

This is so evocative and sweet! I totally agree re bananas in custard – ugh. But isn’t Glenn’s mum a gem! Like @squidge says – interesting to see it worked into a kind of story, it gives it almost a prose poetry feel to it.

Good luck!!

Well. I’ve read the Le Guin and Burroway chapters and have had a strong emotional reaction. Not to the gorgeous passages. But to the prospect of this whole MA, to notebooks and journals and free-writing, and sharing with you lot and telling the stories that matter to me. I’m sixty years old and I’m sitting here crying! Don’t worry – I won’t use…[Read more]

Right! Write! Read! I have 2.5 hours this morning, so I’m diving in. Splash!