Songwriting

In the aftermath of a relationship break-up last year, I moved into a kind friend's attic to recover. He had a piano and so began my new interest in songwriting.

I sat at that piano day in, day out, pouring my heart out on to the keys and soothing my broken heart and my frantic mind by putting it all into words and melodies.

I am still amazed at how much this helped me at the time and how much it has stayed with me now that I'm not feeling so teenage angsty.

I am also lucky enough to have the most wonderful group of friends known to man, who would come round to the house to eat, drink, and make up a daft song in a night. My personal fabvourite so far being the classic, 'Friends of Tickle Perkins'. 

At these delightfully silly nights, devoid of any ego, I tried playing the accordion (upside down), the saxophone, whistles, flutes and all kinds of jingly-jangly, shaky things. Most of all though, I have loved the singing. Singing with other people is one of the most joyous things a person can do. Finding harmonies that push against someone else's voice, making them both stronger and more beautiful, gives me tummy-jumps and now I'm not sure why everyone isn't doing it. I'm a fully-fledged musical evangelist. 

In the last few months I've made the leap into writing my own happy songs, songs of love and friendship and optimism about the future. It feels like I've opened a door in an old house that I've always walked past, never knowing what was inside. Now I've opened it, I realise it's the best room in the house and I can't believe I waited this long to check it out. 

There is still a slight problem in that I can't play an instrument well enough to accompany myself so my patient and talented friends are frequently roped in to be my musical-slaves while I say things like "no, not like that, more......(insert indiscernable noise and confusing hand gesture)...like that." I know what I want, I just don't know how to say it in words so they struggle on until I say "Yes!!!! Like that!!"

I write songs in my head while I'm jogging, sitting on the tube, cycling to Clapham Common and lazing in the bath.  I hope the door to my favourite room stays open now so I can continue to play in there forever more.

Has songwriting changed my life?
Yes! It really has. I actually feel like I am compositionally different, like I have a new constiutent part to my person and everything has shifted to accommodate it. It has enriched my life, been my therapy (for free) and an expression of joy and the joy itself.

Rating: 10/10
Comments: All the things I try in my life to be more like the person I want to be have never come as close to realising that desert mirage as songwriting. It has changed me from the inside out and changed how I think of myself (I'm like way cooler now!)
Development ideas: Onwards and upwards! I met a fellow songwriter on a course recently and we've decided to form a band. We haven't met up yet but the important thing is we've got a great band name - THE REFUSENIKS. Surely we are destined for greatness with a name like that. I can't wait to get stuck in and see where this yellow brick road takes me next.

Lindy Hop

Having had a short break from trying new things while navigating a life-bomb and its aftermath I am now in the 'swing' of lindy hop. 

Lindy hop is a swing dance a bit like jive with a lot of jumping, bouncing, flicking and wiggling. It's a cheeky wink of a dance and I love it!

A packed room above a pub hosts a crowd of eager and clueless strangers who are forced into extreme small-talk for an hour and a half while they try and learn a few cheeky dance steps. The men and women alternate in a large circle around the room and every two minutes the women rotate round the men (harumph). This means you get to dance with different people, some of whom are drowning in panic and their own sweat, while others demonstrate their confidence by leading you like you're a yo-yo on the end of their hand.

It also means that you have two minutes to say hello, make some small-talk, perhaps a joke, perhaps a supportive comment, before you move on to the next. It's quite exhausting, much more so than the actual dancing.

A fellow beginner told me that he was opening with “I'm shit. Just so you know” to every person he danced with. In the end he felt this was setting a negative tone (!) so he changed to a more neutral “how are you?”

I, on the other hand, go on the attack. I bounce in to place and take on the persona of an American motivational fitness guru with phrases like “Let's go!” and “we can do it!” I have no idea why this is my response to social awkwardness. Some people like it and others just look frightened.

I tend to turn up late because the first twenty minutes is so dull. “Step back on your right leg. Now let's do that again.” I think everyone in the room has mastered walking so can we move on? After that, though, I really love it. Especially the wiggling, moves that combine a wiggle with a hip-bump (like you're closing a drawer with your hip) make me very happy.

I love the teacher too, a friendly chap in a flat cap and spatz who makes me blush when he comes to fix my hand-hold (I actually giggled and averted my eyes like I was in a Jane Austen novel). When he wants you to stick your bum out more he refers to it as your 'attitude' which tickles me every time and I'm now thinking of adopting this as a euphemism.

I'm only a couple of months in but I think I can still confidently rate this activity.

Has lindy hop changed my life?

Yes! I think it has. As a new girl in a new town it's been a regular place to go with friendly people doing something I really enjoy. There's a great atmosphere, I always laugh my way through the whole night (though this is largely down to the social awkwardness element) and I get a real kick out of it when we get to dance the step we've learnt at the end of the night. I look forward to my Tuesday night fun-fest and I am not suffering from my usual 7-week itch when the new thing I'm doing starts to get old.

Rating: 8/10

Comments: I'd give it more but I don't want to tempt fate. Something that brings you happiness, fleeting or otherwise should always score big I think.

Development ideas: Next stop – the intermediate class. I went to one the other week and I was dance road-kill. I really enjoyed it though so I'm going to go back and get run over again. There's a ball this weekend where everyone gets dressed up and shakes their tail feathers. I'd love to go but it's a very London £35 so I'm waiting up for the fairy godmother and hoping for the best.

Baby Booties & The Rest

I'm at that age where my nearest and dearest are coupling up and sprouting sprogs. Having previously thought that children were annoying and noisy small people commonly found in supermarkets, I have been swayed by the unfathomable loveliness of my friends' children. I can watch them like a box set of Mad Men....for hours and hours. I am told parents have to do more than watch but, for me, the loveable 'aunty' figure, I can just sit and gawk at their little brain cogs whirring round as they find joy in the simplest of things.

This fleet of newborns required celebrating and traditional gift giving. Reluctant to feed the overweight monster that is the baby products market, I decided to make my own baby booties out of felt. I got a pattern off the internet and customised them with different colours, trims and ribbons. This was reasonably straight forward and enjoyable and I was actually quite pleased with the result. I got a bit carried away and started making baby booties for anyone I heard had reproduced recently, including my boyfriend's saxophone teacher !?!

I got so cocky I decided to branch out into accessories and toys. Big mistake. Turns out the general principles of felt booties can not be applied to hats, stuffed star fish and rattles. The first miniature disaster came in the form of a hat (or a bar mitzvah cap) for the delightful Caelan Sheehan ( who is not Jewish, incidentally). Here he is (pictured above left) sporting said hat/cap. He is one and a half now and I made it for him when he was still a baby but, even then, it was ridiculously small. A banana has been added on the right for scale. It is not included in the skull cap and booties gift set.

Having amused Caelan's parents with his miniature hat, I was not deterred. I embarked on two toy-making projects at the same time: a stuffed starfish teddy and a rattle. The starfish was a bit of the wonky raggy-doll variety but it was looking reasonably presentable half way through.....until I gave it a face. It had wide circular blue eyes and a red smiling mouth. I thought this would make it look friendly like a cartoon face. Instead it looked manic and frightening like a drag queen on crystal meth and vaguely reminiscent of Heath Ledger as The Joker. This little gem went off to the lovely Elisha Lewis who sucked it, which is a sure sign of approval in baby terms.

Hot on the heels of this triumph I turned my attention to the rattle. I filled a plastic bottle half full with rice. I fashioned a handle out of wire and stuck that to the top and covered the whole thing in green tissue paper. It was looking odd but salvageable at that stage. I thought all it needed was a bit of brightening up so I glued on lots of multi-coloured shoe laces. This looked quite good but the plastic tips would catch as you ran your fingers round it- not a good thing for a soft, scratchable baby with eyes! I stuck fluffy pom-poms on the scratchy bits (disaster and a choking hazzard),  I put ribbons round it that kept moving out of place and then, in a moment of desperation, I covered the whole thing in sellotape. This gave it a surprisingly disturbing quality. I think it was the layer of clear plastic wrap that gave it an air of bondage and made the whole thing look more like a cheerful sex toy than a baby's rattle. After I had that thought, there was no salvaging it. It went in the bin, never to be seen again.

Has making baby booties and the rest changed my life?
I am still a keen bootie-maker. They make a fine alternative to the branded, twee, overpriced tat from the high street and they have the love and time I put into them. I wouldn't say they had changed my life particularly but it does make me smile knowing that these little booties are going into boxes that will be dusted off one day as a fully grown person is told that they were their first shoes.....and something about what a wonderful friend I was....so talented....so giving....blah blah blah. Legacy! I've got legacy!
Rating: 4/10
Comment: I found the edge of my capabilities fairly quickly with this one. If I can't be brilliant at it then it's not going to give me what I'm looking for....an identity through genius. I have given lots of treasured presents to friends at a special time in their lives, though, which means a lot to me. I have also invented a new line in comedy - comedic toy-making. It's quite long-winded but the punch line is hilarious.
Development Ideas: Make adult size felt booties for my hippy-friends......or maybe I could do a line in cheerful sex toys??

Dancing Queen

Dancing is one activity that I can trace back to my childhood, offering a welcome counterweight to my fickle nature. Of course, beneath that veneer of continuity lies the same old story-  I've tried every type of dance going and, within my adult life at least, not stuck at one kind for more than 6 months at a time.

There are 2 kinds of dancing: one is an expression of something inside of you and, for most people, something that happens involuntarily when drunk. The other is the kind people teach you in a class. For professional dancers these two become one. They are so proficcient in their art that they can express themselves within the confines of the rules and steps of their dance. For the rest of us, it's one or t'other.

I have always loved my own perculiar brand of dancing. You couldn't teach it, there are no steps, definitely no rules and it's the most fun thing I do and have ever done. (I know what you're thinking, but I put that in a category of it's own for which 'fun' doesn't seem the right adjective). The kind of dancing I've done in classes has been more complicated and over the years has become part of my failed search for fulfillment.... and my failed search for thin-ness - double whammy! I've done ballet, salsa, hip-hop, popping, locking, street, contemporary and, most recently, Jive. I've been competant but not brilliant at any of the above which is the ever-repeating narrative of my pursuit of greatness.

After some months attending a beginners street dance class, I was getting quite confident and a bit bored so I decided to give the intermediate class a go. It was all going quite well until those dreaded words.....'partner work'. These are the words I dread hearing in a dance class. I don't want to dance 'with' (as in actually touching) other people in a dance class but even I didn't realise how bad it could be. It's important when doing a routine with someone else that you are a similar size. So, when I (a five foot and a fag end titch) got paired up with a six foot elephant woman, I was surprised, scared and too emabrrased to say anyhthing to the dance teacher who was giving me a wry smile. He went on to show us a routine which involved rolling over each others backs, swinging our legs round each other's heads, crawling under each other's legs and a fair bit of lifting / throwing. Whichever way round we started, we ended up stuck at some point with me supposed to be lifting her or swinging my leg over her head. This should have made us both laugh. There should have been jokes about mice and mountains but she just looked at me as if to say, "What? Stop wasting time and get your leg over my head you beginner class wannabee!!" She was sighing and tutting with impatience as she percieved my lack of ability to mount her as a sign of my dancing inexperience rather than her mammoth-like physique. It's hard to say "I could do this if you weren't so massive so back off!" That neverending dance class was a socially awkward nightmare with a shared performance at the end as the cherry on the cake.

I never went back to that class and thankfully never saw the elephant woman again. Although I went on to other dance classes after that, it did make me less adventurous in my approach and more likely to stand close to an exit at all times.

Has dancing changed my life?
The expressive dancing that comes from inside will always change my life. It brings alive a part of me which lies dormant in every day life and makes me feel something without thinking it first. Everyone should have something that does that. The dance of the class variety may be a thing of the past for me however, at least for now. I am so sick of the painfully slow step by step approach that takes all the enjoyment out of dancing....and the threat of being paired up with someone twice my size for contact work....shudder.
Rating: 8/10
Comments: Dancing is something I think I am actually good at and I enjoy it. It enrichens my life and makes me feel free from myself in fleeting moments of joy. It gets 2 points deducted because I don't have the discipline to make myself better at dancing so I feel like I haven't fulfilled my potential inviting that school report phrase, "Could have done better."
Development ideas: Go out dancing more and develop my own style to the next level until everyone wants to do it and it becomes the next craze sweeping the nation and then the world......by Tuesday week. 

Animation

The good thing about the futile search for meaning and a sense of self through leisure activities is that you get to try a lot of different things. None of them bring you what you want, of course, but it keeps life varied. Last year I started going to a short film night where I saw several charming and wondrous stop-motion animations. That familiar combination of awe, aspiration and an overwhelming disappointment and frustration with myself came over me. I have a voice in my head like one of those competitive parents in American films who say 'why couldn't you be more like that kid?' That's when I know I've found my next 'answer'. If only I could be like that, do that, make that.... I'd surely be all the things I want to be. There is a promise on the horizon and I set off at a sprint towards it but the closer I get, the more I can see the detail and the picture starts to look the same as the rest, the same as the present. Then I wait for the next promise on the horizon to appear.

My sprint towards becoming a charming and wondrous stop-motion animator began with a six week night course. We were advised to create something simple, perhaps moving bits of coloured paper around to music. So, inevitably, I created my own set and staged a scene from a live Bill Hicks show using cowboys from Poundland, real mud from the garden and hand-crafted tumbleweed. Apart from the college room having to be fumigated after my 'real mud' went really mouldy between sessions, the whole thing was a great success. I like to think of it as 'knowingly naive', which basically means it looks shit but I like it.
http://youtu.be/i27H7RyGMLE

Following this early triumph, I decided to enter a city-wide competition to create an animation to be set to a silent film score. The winner and the runners up would have their film shown at the Symphony Hall to an audience of 2500 people with the Birmingham Symphony Orchestra playing the score live. Deluded? Quite possibly but that is the nature of the sprint.

The rules dictated that the film had to be set to a given clip of music, it had to be about Birmingham and feature an iconic image of Birmingham. I chose a music clip that sounded like a chase scene and ended up creating a paper-model world of Birmingham where the Birmingham bull comes alive and wreaks havoc, gathering a throng of angry townspeople in his wake.

http://youtu.be/hwmNPTLLaRE

Following it's initial conception, the making of this short film was quite an up-hill struggle. There was a death in the family, the animation software I had acquired wouldn't work and I had just over a week till the deadline. However, me and my friend, Steve, had already spent several hours cutting out hundreds of tiny paper people so there was no going back. Chaos prevailed as I got closer to the finnish line. Two days before submission I had to travel home to Yorkshire to attend a funeral and a birthday party. All the footage had to be uploaded and roughly edited together so I could take it up there with me on a USB stick (where it would go on my brother's laptop for final editing).

The day before the train to Yorkshire I spent hours taking pictures of tiny people chasing a tiny bull round a tiny Birmingham. The drama culminated at the Custard Factory, where custard-calamity ensued. I had to get the consistency of the custard right so that I could pour it on to the set slowly enough to take individual pictures of it moving. To achieve this consistency I had filled every pot, pan, bowl, jug and empty vessel in my kitchen with custard and poured it on all the available flat surfaces. I finally got it right and shot the last scene. There was no time to clear up. I had to get on my motorbike with the footage and ride up to my boyfriend, Fitz's house where some totally legitimate, newly acquired software awaited me. I got it all into one movie file before bedtime. At the crack of dawn I had to get up to ride back to my flat, get my stuff (including outfits and cards suitable for both birthdays and funerals) and get to my train. My bike wouldn't start because it was frozen over so Fitz had to give me a lift and by the time I got home, it was time to leave.

I returned home four days later to find some very disturbing scenes in my flat. Tiny paper people lay strewn in set lakes of custard, their facial expressions still visible through a gelatinous yellow film. Paper limbs poked up though a rubbery yellow floor a mini-me lay face down, drowned in custard-lava. It was an odd experience clearing up the wreckage and disposing of the paper people and I felt a sadness while I did it (but then I still feel sorry for teddy-bears who are left by themselves).

It was all worth it because I discovered the unending joy of custard powder and cold water. It's amazing. I don't want to spoil it for you. If you have custard powder in the cupboard then you're all set for a fun night in. Oh yeah, and I got a runner up place so my film was screened at Symphony Hall!

Has animation changed my life?
I'm now working on my third animation so it does seem to have stuck longer than other things. It also takes a lot of patience (not a quality I have in abundance ) so I think it's good for me in that sense. I don't feel like it has changed my life, but it may have made a successful transition into being a past-time. I'd be amazed if I carried on with it (just because of my track record) but I hope I do because I think I actually enjoy it.
Rating: 6/10
Comments: Animation hasn't made me into the person I saw on the horizon so it can't score too highly on the scale. It has been full of adventure, though, in it's own way and I have discovered little parts of me that I didn't know were there.
Development ideas: Make short animations with a social comment to make people think about the world they live in and the people that live in it with them.

Activism

I've always had an earnest interest in current affairs and human rights issues but my short attention span and fickle lack of commitment to one thing for more than five minutes don't lend themselves to social activism. These traits are generally frowned upon by the brothers and sisters who fight for a cause that is right and true....to the end....not till you start hula hooping salsa classes.

This year I decided enough was enough. It was time to put my money where my mouth is. Less talking, more doing.  Having said that, the only examples I've got to share with you involve me sitting and listening to other people talk and some writing on post-it notes. I haven't tied myself to a railing yet or even been arrested. Nil points!

First I went to my local mosque for a talk about the East Africa crisis. I was late because I'd been having my hair done. Not a great start. They had already started so my friend, Pete, and I scurried in and sat at the back as inconspicuously as we could. At first I put the uncomfortable staring down to a general frowning upon lateness but it turns out it was much worse than that. Pete soon spotted that we had sat in the 'red chair' section, which had cleverly been separated off from the rest of the blue chairs in the room. This section was just for women. Not for Pete. Once we realised our error it was quite difficult to know which social taboo to break. Do we disrupt the event by getting up and moving to another seat thus drawing even more attention to our mistake, or do we stay there and undermine the whole red chair section, challenging the faith choices of the the 'red chair women'? Tricky. Our very British compulsion not to cause a fuss prevailed and we stayed put..and very uncomfortable.  Think Monty Python's 'The Life of Brian'. "Are there any men in the red chairs?""Noooo", he squealed.

I went to see Mark Thomas who got me all fired up about Palestine. That spurred me on to go and see a talk given by an ex-American soldier. That was an eye-opener and I left there thinking I had to 'do' something. Then I slept and it went away. Most recently I've been to a day run by CAAT (Campaign Against the Arms Trade). I was late (again) so I missed the handy bit where they show you a video which encapsulates everything you need to know in 5 minutes. I arrived just in time for excruciating 'audience participation' exercises with post-it notes. The most memorable part of that day was making small talk with a blind man in the break. I asked him why he'd come along. He worked at a local college and decided he needed to be better informed if he was going to teach others. I said, "yeah, otherwise it's be like the bl........ cough...splutter....good idea."

Has activism changed my life?
It's been a bit of a non-starter really. I do care about people and injustice but I haven't translated that into action yet. I'm also a bit intimidated by people that are so passionate and focused too because I just see a gaping void reflected back at me where my heart should be.


Rating: 4/10
Comments: It's a strange phenomenon but all the 'right-on' lefty do-gooders are also pale-faced, sandal-wearing misfits with awkward social skills. I'm with them to a point but I don't feel part of their family. I need to find my own way and a kind of protest that suits me. I like John and Yoko's idea of staying in bed. Now that's the kind of activism I could get involved with!

Development ideas: Come up with my own ingenious forms of protest....like watching Mad Men episodes with only cups of tea and salt and vinegar chip sticks to sustain me until they stop female genital mutilation.

Crafty Beggar Creations

Propelling me to the next roller-disco, motorbike and brass band is the possibility that I might find the answer. The question is more difficult to figure out but it is something like, why am I unhappy? Maybe it’s just the scourge of the middle classes: to be spoilt to the point of rendering everything meaningless. So I fret from this to that in search of a remedy, something to fill the void.

Being sat at a desk 8 hours a day staring at little letters appearing on a screen in front of me is contributing to my slow, dull mummification so, I have hatched reckless escape plans in the dead of night which have, so far, come to nothing.

One of these plans was to start my own business called 'Crafty Beggar Creations'. I wanted to make my own paper from which I could make greetings cards, diaries and scrapbooks. Everything I produced would be found or recycled and made into something new and beautiful. 

As with most ideas that go nowhere, I spent most of my time agonising over the name. I was quite set on it being something to do with the Wombles to start with, but they’re a protected name-species. Then the name ‘Crafty Beggar’ came to me in a ‘eureka’ moment. I was delighted with my punning genius until I found my thought-twin on the internet. It was too late. I had already named my child so I settled for adding the word ‘Creations’ on the end so I could secure my own domain name for a website.

The hours I spent consumed in this naming process seem a little wasted now given that I’ve done precisely nothing with it. The idea went up like a firework with a burst of light and sound cutting through the daily mediocrity of life and then faded to nothing in the night sky.

The stumbling block came when I tried to run before I could walk. What any 'normal' person would do is build up a stock of cards and other items to sell and start by flogging small numbers to local retailers, whilst beginning to sell items online with the view to developing a website. Not me. I hate waiting. I prefer to skip to the end. I wanted to give up my job and my flat and rent a unit at a local print-works which was being renovated to become a centre of artisan businesses. These units were advertised as combined working and living spaces so I thought I could cut down on my outgoings by living and running my new business in the same place. This all seemed quite feasible to me with my budget calculations and forecasts until I went to see the space. It was absolutely freezing….and dark….and damp. The units which were supposed to be suitable to live in had stairs leading up to a wooden platform which was almost big enough to put a single mattress on….welcome to the living quarters.

That was the end. The bubble popped. Paper production slowed down after that and has since ground to a halt. I still do handmade cards for friends and family but the website lies dormant.

Did Crafty Beggar Creations change my life?
Although my actual situation has not changed as a result of 'Crafty Beggar Creations', I think it did help me with a mental shift into conceiving of more possibilities for myself. I never even thought about setting up a business before so I think the whole process, although mostly hypothetical, did widen my horizons.

Rating: 3/10
Comments: I’m mostly just disappointed in myself when I think about 'Crafty Beggar' because it really shows up my lack of commitment to anything that doesn’t come easy to me. I think of myself as being quite a determined person and that whole ‘episode’ is like a blot on my self-perception, forcing me to face the truth – I’m a bit lazy really. 
Development Opportunities: I still have the website and all the equipment to make paper so I could continue to make cards as a hobby and even get a stall at a Christmas market and try and flog a few. I just need a few more hours in the day.