Sarah Pinborough's Blog, page 18

Sometimes you’ve got to laugh…Columns, columns, endless columns.

I don’t know if it’s just my twitter feed that I need to shake up, but it seems to me that my world has been filled with the opinions of columnists of late. I’m sure they’re making valid points about something, but it’s all becoming point-scoring white noise in my head. Sometimes I wonder if anything is about anything any more other than being heard the loudest. Or using the right phrase. Or being ripped apart for using the slightly wrong phrase regardless of context. 

 Sometimes it all makes me laugh so hard I want to cry. People so keen to ascertain their ‘working class credentials’ (what does that mean anyway? So someone born into one set of circumstances has an immediate validity over someone born into another set of circumstances regardless of personal intelligence/emotional intelligence/personality? Oh fuck off..)  while coming across as so middle-class smug. As I grit my teeth and read I’m reminded of my own middle-class smugness and I hate them all the more for that and their endless battles of semantics. 

Like anyone real actually cares.

I love words. Words are my business. Yet I hate the acid reflux of words that seem to fill my feed. The importance so many people attach to these weekly outpouring of words – then the twitter reactions that sometimes makes me imagine these women – nearly menopausal in their expensively bohemian cardigans and clutching wine at three in the afternoon and despairing of how they were simply trying to point out the ‘right’ way to the rest of us – when really, in the most part, it’s just whimsy. It doesn’t matter. It’s here and gone. A puff of hot air. 

Most people do not browse columns on the web all day. Most people are juggling families and jobs and shopping and marriages and keeping their heads above water. Some are out there (very few- most of us are filled with the 21st century ennuie that thinks that if we talk/write/bitch about the world’s problems for long enough then we’ll solve them) are out there doing something about making other people’s lives better.

But mainly, the people who think they’re changing things are actually sitting at home writing columns and getting paid to voice an opinion. Good luck to them. Sometimes they’re entertaining. Occasionally they make a valid point. But man, am I bored of the smug self-importance that comes with clicking so many of the links.

There are a thousand types of feminist – each of my female friends has a different view to me on the subject, and I to them. That’s as it should be. There’s no one way to be a woman. You just have to be happy in your way of doing it. Each to her own. That’s my view anyway. It bothers me that my instinct to rebel makes me read so many many column inches and think – you know nothing of my feminism. And stop sounding so goddamn self-righteous. I know girls who had babies at 15 while trying to do their GCSE’s and sharing rooms with several siblings.  I’d take advice from them. Middle-class, middle-aged liberals-and-dont-you-forget-it-cos-they’ll-fight-you-over-the-unintentional-use-of word-if-you-let-them. Not so much.

I guess I just need to vent an irrational anger I have.  Even as I write I’m trying to figure out what it is that makes me grit my teeth and make me want to laugh or cry. Maybe it’s because my heart is in the gutter. Where you can taste the earth, gritty and real. Maybe it’s just the sense of the over-importance of words. I love words. I love the shape of them. I love reading them. I love the sound of them from the mouth of someone I love.

But they’re just words. Breaths of air. Here. Gone. Skimmed. Deleted. Sometimes I wish everyone would shut the fuck up and get out there and do something if they care so much.

And then sometimes I remember, you’ve just got to laugh…

SP x

It’s a kind of magic…

When I was a little girl I spent a lot of time looking in the backs of cupboards for Narnia. Sometimes, if no one’s looking and the cupboard looks right, I still do. I don’t even know why.  I guess, when I was little and at boarding school, I was unhappy a lot of the time. Looking for escape. Where better to escape to than somewhere with a lamp post in the snow, and adventures at every turn. A different world. No lights out. No kid taking my pocket money every week. No being locked in a room for talking after lights out and being forgotten for hours. No long haul between one trip home and the next. I really wanted to find that world on the other side of the old wooden back behind the crush of clothes and coats.

I can understand why I did it as a child. But as an adult?

Why do we think another world would be more magical than our own? As if somewhere else can hold more adventure than our own lives? It’s silly really. But we all want it, I guess. Something magical. Something different.

Last night a friend took me to my first ever red carpet premiere. Even though I know that it’s all just a bright gloss over life, I laughed and ooh’d and aah’d every time a new famous face came into the bar and was like a child a christmas. Not my normal Monday night. A strange but wonderful peek into a world that seems so very different from my own. If not a step through the cupboard, then a cold breeze and the hint of hooves scurrying through the snow.

It was freezing last night but Leicester Square was filled with people wanting autographs and photos (not of me, obviously – damned philistines;-)), and as my friend did his work charming someone with a baby, a lady in a wheelchair told me she’d been there for hours. HOURS in the cold, waiting for Tom Cruise and other sparkly beautiful people to smile at her, say a few words and sign something. Maybe get a picture.

Sometimes I think movies are the magic for grown-ups. There is a light about them and those who work under their spotlight. It’s easy to think that they have charmed lives. Magical lives. They don’t, of course. People are just people. Lives are just lives. We all just try and make sense of shit as it happens whoever we are. Bad things happen. Good things happen. If you’re lucky then the latter outweigh the former, but it’s all just random.

But movies…stories make sense in movies. In movies the hero is never just in the wrong place at the wrong time and gets pushed onto a subway track and no one pulls them out in the long and terrifying thirty seconds before the train comes. In movies, scary or otherwise, there is a point to everyone’s story. A logic. The boy gets the girl. Or doesn’t, but loses her nobly. The bad guy gets his comeuppance. Something is learned at at the end.

When we’re little, we think when we grow up it will all make sense. We’ll have the answers. Then comes the lonely moment when you realise there aren’t any answers, you’re just older, wiser, more cynical and still wanting just a moment of magic. A moment of something making sense. Of a random encounter that becomes an adventure. A moment where anything could happen and it could be breath-takingingly wonderful.

But life so often isn’t like that, because we settle into it, forgetting just how short it can be. How little time we have to get it right. To have our adventures. Now I’m a grown up, I escape through the metaphorical cupboard to worlds of my own make-believe and I’m lucky enough to get paid for it. Mostly those worlds are pretty dark though.

I like adventures. I like happy endings.

I’m not so good at the real world.

Thank god for the movies…I love their magic.

SP x

The Next Big Thing preview: MAYHEM

So, last week, fabulous horror novelist Adam Nevill tagged me as part of the next big thing round robin blog – you can see his here –  http://www.adamlgnevill.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/house-of-small-shadows-preview-as-part.html

And so here are my answers on my Next Big Thing!

What is the working title of your next book?

The title of the next big novel is Mayhem. The second part which will be out the following year is Murder.

Where did the idea come from for the book?

While coming up with new pitch ideas after finishing the Dog-Faced Gods trilogy, I read Dan Simmons’ ‘The Terror.’ I really loved the way he’d used real events from history and real life characters but had woven his own version of their fates into it. That was my main inspirations I think. Plus, I’ve always enjoyed historical fiction, so at some point I was going to try it. The two things combined and the pitch for Mayhem/Murder was the result.

What genre does your book fall under?

As with a lot of my more recent work, this is a difficult question to answer. I would call it Historical Crime, but there is a very creepy element to it so I guess supernatural thriller would also work. I really enjoy crossing genre boundaries and pulling bits from different ones that suit the story. It’s a pain in the ass for marketing people though.;-)

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

It’s not something I give any thought to. I never actually ‘see’ the faces of my characters when I’m writing them, plus I think readers should be able to form their own image of them without anyone suggesting particular people. Although obviously I’d prefer really HOT actors. There would have to be set visits. Where I could lick them.

What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

I got away with selling it without one, so I don’t have one! Um…

As Jack the Ripper terrorises London, another serial murderer is at work, dumping dismembered bodies in the Thames. Dr Bond, working both cases, becomes drawn into a private hunt for the killer…but is he a man or a monster, or both?

Summat like that anyway…

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Mayhem comes out in hardback in May 2013 from Jo Fletcher Books (Quercus). You can read more about the imprint and Mayhem here: http://www.jofletcherbooks.com

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

I’m quite a planner so my first draft is normally just tidied up and then sent in. This took me longer than most books because of the historical/factual nature of the subject matter. I’d say six months.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

I’m not really sure! But if you like creepy fiction and history – especially the Jack the Ripper period, then you’ll like this!

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I’m a very driven person and I always try and challenge myself with new projects. I wanted to take my writing to a new level with this book, both in its structure and content, and I think I’ve achieved that. I’m mainly inspired by other writers’ work. John Connolly is, and always will be, a huge inspiration to my work even though this book isn’t like his work, he blends supernatural into crime with such flair and skill, and I’ll never match his ability but I will always aspire to. In terms of narrative structure, Dan Simmons’ The Terror was definitely an influence – moving between points in time not always chronologically – first person sections and third person sections. That kind of thing. I think that this is a far more crafted novel than any I’ve written before.

What else about the book might pique the reader’s interest?

The wonderful thing about writing about true unsolved crimes is layering your own solution into history. Most of the characters in the novel were real people and I’ve tried to stay as true to their movements as possible, while fitting them to my story. Although it’s not a Jack the Ripper novel, its in the same timeframe and there are cross-overs with the two sets of murders. I think I’ve got a really unusual take on the crime/horror novel in this book. Creepy, not gory.

 
Okay, so that’s me waffling about my next book – I’ve had to tag five others. Being me, I’ve only tagged four. I will no doubt burn in hell for this! But next week you can read about the books coming from the following authors:

Bill Hussey is an awesome YA author whose grisly Witchfinder series is well worth reading! Kids everywhere love it – adults too. Strange that someone so chirpy can write the death of children so well. That’s probably why I like him.
http://www.williamhussey.co.uk

Suzanne McLeod is an urban fantasy writer (if we must use genres!) whose Spellcracker series from Gollancz have done tremendously well. A saucy minx. We drink together.
http://www.spellcrackers.com

Jonathan Green is a prolific fiction and non-fiction writer who has covered a range of styles and genres in his time. He’s a steampunk king and a disco diva. I heart him.
http://jonathangreenauthor.blogspot.co.uk

Alexandra Sokoloff is a kick ass writer who grabbed my attention with her first novel The Harrowing, and we have been firm friends ever since. She’s blonde and mental in all the best ways. What’s not to like?;-)
http://www.alexandrasokoloff.com

So, that’s it from me. Wow. A blog actually about work. That’s a first.
x

The Next Big Thing preview . . .MAYHEM

So, last week, fabulous horror novelist Adam Nevill tagged me as part of the next big thing round robin blog – you can see his here –  http://www.adamlgnevill.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/house-of-small-shadows-preview-as-part.html

And so here are my answers on my Next Big Thing!

What is the working title of you next book?

The title of the next big novel is Mayhem. The second part which will be out the following year is Murder.

Where did the idea come from for the book?

While coming up with new pitch ideas after finishing the Dog-Faced Gods trilogy, I read Dan Simmons’ ‘The Terror.’ I really loved the way he’d used real events from history and real life characters but had woven his own version of their fates into it. That was my main inspirations I think. Plus, I’ve always enjoyed historical fiction, so at some point I was going to try it. The two things combined and the pitch for Mayhem/Murder was the result.

What genre does your book fall under?

As with a lot of my more recent work, this is a difficult question to answer. I would call it Historical Crime, but there is a very creepy element to it so I guess supernatural thriller would also work. I really enjoy crossing genre boundaries and pulling bits from different ones that suit the story. It’s a pain in the ass for marketing people though.;-)

What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?

It’s not something I give any thought to. I never actually ‘see’ the faces of my characters when I’m writing them, plus I think readers should be able to form their own image of them without anyone suggesting particular people. Although obviously I’d prefer really HOT actors. There would have to be set visits. Where I could lick them. 

What is the one sentence synopsis of your book?

I got away with selling it without one, so I don’t have one! Um…

As Jack the Ripper terrorises London, another serial murderer is at work, dumping dismembered bodies in the Thames. Dr Bond, working both cases, becomes drawn into a private hunt for the killer…but is he a man or a monster, or both? 

Summat like that anyway…

Will your book be self-published or represented by an agency?

Mayhem comes out in hardback in May 2013 from Jo Fletcher Books (Quercus). You can read more about the imprint and Mayhem here: http://www.jofletcherbooks.com

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?

I’m quite a planner so my first draft is normally just tidied up and then sent in. This took me longer than most books because of the historical/factual nature of the subject matter. I’d say six months.

What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?

I’m not really sure! But if you like creepy fiction and history – especially the Jack the Ripper period, then you’ll like this!

Who or what inspired you to write this book?

I’m a very driven person and I always try and challenge myself with new projects. I wanted to take my writing to a new level with this book, both in its structure and content, and I think I’ve achieved that. I’m mainly inspired by other writers’ work. John Connolly is, and always will be, a huge inspiration to my work even though this book isn’t like his work, he blends supernatural into crime with such flair and skill, and I’ll never match his ability but I will always aspire to. In terms of narrative structure, Dan Simmons’ The Terror was definitely an influence – moving between points in time not always chronologically – first person sections and third person sections. That kind of thing. I think that this is a far more crafted novel than any I’ve written before.

What else about the book might pique the reader’s interest?

The wonderful thing about writing about true unsolved crimes is layering your own solution into history. Most of the characters in the novel were real people and I’ve tried to stay as true to their movements as possible, while fitting them to my story. Although it’s not a Jack the Ripper novel, its in the same timeframe and there are cross-overs with the two sets of murders. I think I’ve got a really unusual take on the crime/horror novel in this book. Creepy, not gory.

 
Okay, so that’s me waffling about my next book – I’ve had to tag five others. Being me, I’ve only tagged four. I will no doubt burn in hell for this! But next week you can read about the books coming from the following authors:
 
Bill Hussey is an awesome YA author whose grisly Witchfinder series is well worth reading! Kids everywhere love it – adults too. Strange that someone so chirpy can write the death of children so well. That’s probably why I like him. 
http://www.williamhussey.co.uk
 
Suzanne McLeod is an urban fantasy writer (if we must use genres!) whose Spellcracker series from Gollancz have done tremendously well. A saucy minx. We drink together.
http://www.spellcrackers.com
 
Jonathan Green is a prolific fiction and non-fiction writer who has covered a range of styles and genres in his time. He’s a steampunk king and a disco diva. I heart him.
http://jonathangreenauthor.blogspot.co.uk
 
Alexandra Sokoloff is a kick ass writer who grabbed my attention with her first novel The Harrowing, and we have been firm friends ever since. She’s blonde and mental in all the best ways. What’s not to like?;-)
http://www.alexandrasokoloff.com
 
So, that’s it from me. Wow. A blog actually about work. That’s a first.
x
 

‘The Give’ and the Turnham Green zebra crossing.

Down by my tube station there’s a zebra crossing. It’s on a relatively busy road with people constantly scurrying to and from the trains or buses and trying to get to the shops and delis on either side. 

I’ve started to study that zebra crossing a little bit. You see, that zebra crossing tells me a lot about life and people and who we are. 

There are cars that just don’t stop even if the traffic the other way has.

There are people who don’t even look to see if the cars are stopping before they step onto the road.

And there are the people who don’t even look at the cars as they cross. 

Then there are the queues. Traffic can build up at a busy zebra crossing as people trickle over.

It’s the queues that get me. Every time. Sometimes, when I reach the edge of the green I can see that those cars have been waiting ages. You know what I do? I loiter a bit. Pretend to read a sign. Look in a shop window. Give the cars a second to go. If I do hurry across in the wake of a yummy mummy or mobile phone attached estate agent I always mouth a thank you at the cars on either side. Sometimes I get a smile back, and sometimes nothing but a frown, but that tells me as much about the world as the pedestrians do.

Yeah, I know it’s my RIGHT to cross that road. I know I should be able to step out and make them wait as I amble across, texting or emailing, as if they don’t exist. But sometimes, life is all in the give. In fact, life is ALWAYS in the give.

We’re a people obsessed with our rights. It’s my right to say whatever I want. It’s my right to have clean drinking water. It’s my right not to be murdered, raped, beaten or broken. Look at Twitter. We’re an angry first world pushing our rights, our values, onto each other. 

But you know what? We have no rights. None. If you think you do, then you’re the sort that steps onto the crossing without looking. We’re animals and the way we work is pack rule. We do what the biggest pack in the vicinity dictates and that becomes the law. Our rights are whimsy; they’re ethereal things. You can’t touch them. They can change. They’re dust in the wind.

I read an article on the Guardian website about people living under constant US drone attacks targeting the Taliban. Those people have no right to a decent night’s sleep. They have no right to go about their business.  They have no right to live without fear. One drone hit a bakery, killing the man and his family. He had no right to earn a living. And all because they were born in the wrong part of the world. Stories like that abound everywhere. Women with no right to fuck outside of marriage. Men with no right to speak their opinions out loud. People everywhere living in fear.

If you think you have rights, then think again. You know what we actually have? We have ‘the give’. The space between. We have to rely on our human decency for the rights we accord each other. Sometimes the world is about going without something you think is your right, so that someone else can have some peace.

And I guess that’s why I loiter at the Turnham Green tube station. And I guess that’s why I smile and say thank you to the cars that stop. It’s a nod to their rights and mine.

Because life is all in the give.

SP x

 

Please don’t ram your life down my throat, I’ll spit, not swallow.

Last week, at a late-night party, I made a woman cry.

I’m not exactly sure why (there was a lot of alcohol involved) but she had been discussing my ovaries – as women seem to feel they can do. She was overly distraught that I hadn’t used said ovaries. There was ‘still time’, apparently.  Even without a husband. (And why on earth wasn’t I married?) She squeezed my knee. But I don’t want children of my own, I said. She squeezed my knee again. This time with pity. With a sense that there was a whole part of the world I was foolishly missing out on.

She presumed, you see, that I didn’t like children. If I had one of my own apparently, this would rectify that. Preferably with a husband attached. And a house, big mortgage, semi-detached.

I swallowed a large mouthful of Mojito through gritted teeth. It’s such a presumption, isn’t it? Just because I don’t want to birth a child, it doesn’t mean I don’t like them. We’re all Cruella Deville to some mothers – us single women of a certain age. For the record, I once lived with a man for longer than I should have because I simply couldn’t bear the idea of no longer having his children in my life. When we finally broke up I became slightly obsessed with the possibilities of adoption. I was a teacher for 6 years – ‘inspirational’ according the the great God Ofsted – you can’t be that if you don’t like kids. I’m a pied piper with most kids. They like me. I like them. End of. I just didn’t push one out. So sue me.

There are a mulititude of private reasons I’ve chosen not to reproduce and most of them are due to various levels of personal fuckupery and nothing at all to do with small people. Mainly though, ladies, my reasons are not your business. Children and me are just fine. Mothers and me, not always. The older I get the more they look at me funny. ‘Why isn’t she married? Why does she find it so hard to make things work? But the last one was so nice.’

Anyway, In the end I pointed out to this drunkenly wasted-ovary-concerned woman that I was actually very happy in my life, had no child-envy, had exciting things going on, and my pelvic floor muscles were intact. Life was good. (I’ve got quite used to giving this speech). Her smile stretched further (picture Samantha Brick in full flow and you’re pretty much there) and she said, ‘Good for you! Let’s hug.’ 

‘Let’s really not,’ I answered.

She promptly called me a hard bitch and burst into tears.

A hard bitch. It stung a bit. Maybe it’s true. Or maybe her easy tears said more about her own life than they did about my poor ovaries. Or maybe a bit of both. I know some married people with children who are happy but I also know  a lot who swallow anti-depressants like Nurofen and are on the wine by three. Admittedly, I too can be at the wine by three but that’s just for the sisterhood. No, really.;-)

A old friend of mine (well the friendship’s old, she’s 33, hot and single) rang today and we had a long talk about life, the universe and everything (for this read ‘men’, obviously), and she pointed out that when she’s out in bars and men ask if she’s single and she says yes there is a long pause and they say, ‘Why? What’s wrong with you?’ 

I smiled and told her to wait till she’s 40. Boy, do people look at you funny then.

But the thing with me and Kelly is, we’ve been through the mill. She did the 13 year relationship. I went from man to man to man for years. But times change. People change. You get stronger. More confident. More secure. We are now very clear on what we want. We’re very happy with who we are. You can not just rock up and we’ll be impressed. We do not need anyone else to ‘complete’ us; not husband, not child. We are who we are. We’re free.

I’m happy for people who have happy families. I really am. But don’t presume that yours is the only way to live. Let the rest of us BREATHE. 

Am I a hard bitch? God knows.  But I did cry A LOT at ‘Once upon a Time’ when Rumplestiltskin realised Beauty was still alive (You know the episode..*sobs*) so maybe not. I think I’m just driven. I’m attracted to driven people. The semi-detached house is not so important to me. The spark between two people, however, has to stay alive. That’s what matters to me.

Do I believe in love? Yes. Most absolutely. 

Do I want to be in love? Yes. Absolutely. 

Do I want to settle? Absolutely not.

 Rant over. 

SP x

 

 

Topol, Time and Temperature . . .

Clear skies stained watercolour blue. The world backlit by sunshine. Heat suffocating the birds till dusk. Tingles on pink skin. Air indoors too thick to breathe. Salad bars scraped clean in supermarkets. Barbecues. Paddling pools.

All this in one day.

Summer has arrived in London. Finally.

The tension seeps out of me. I’m a smiley girl once again. I purr like a cat even when I’m on my own. Or perhaps especially when I’m on my own. I love the warmth. I live for summer. Maybe it’s a hangover from a childhood growing up in dusty dry heat, more likely it’s just human nature. Summer is a kind season. Aches and pains recede. The days are long and full. We take time to relax. Picnics. Pubs. Parks. Laughter.

I have a love affair with summer. I have love affairs in summer. It’s a cheeky season, that’s for sure. Why can’t summers last forever? Like they did when we were kids? Why can’t summers last until we’re so bored we’re sure we’ll die from it? Remember those days? Yesterday and not yesterday. Too many years gone by.

I went to LA last November. It was beautiful T-shirt weather the whole time. That was apparently the coldest it got. I always thought I’d like to live in a place like that, where the sun pretty much always shines. A place where you could face the morning with a smile. Endless summer. I hate the grey days of Autumn. The bleak, cold days of winter. I can be an Eeyore of a person and it’s invariably when the days get colder and darker that the black dog comes sniffing at my door. Christmas is a little bright light in the middle, but then it’s the long haul through the slush of February before spring and the promise of another summer on the way.

I spend a lot of time looking out the window and waiting for summer.

I might still go and spend six months in LA next year. But live there? No, I don’t think I could. That endless summer felt all wrong. It unsettled me. I need the seasons. We all need the seasons. As much as I might hate the autumn, get irritated with winter and barely tolerate spring, in a lot of ways they make summer more special. Like the bad times make the good time amazing. Like the memories of broken hearts make you love stronger the next time it rolls around.

More than that – and most importantly – the seasons give me the fear. They remind me of time passing. As soon as the chill creeps in and my heart tightens, I know its time to take stock. What haven’t I achieved? What didn’t I do? How much time have I wasted dicking around on Twitter and Facebook when the real things that are important to me are not to be found there. How many stories haven’t I written or read? How many friends haven’t I laughed with?

Every year that passes I need those seasons more. Every year that passes the time they signal gets more precious.  Yesterday and not yesterday. 10, 20, 30 and now 40. The seasons give the fleeting years deadlines. They give my life deadlines. The seasons are a constant reminder that summers don’t last. Nothing does. Not even you. Not even me.

When I was a kid my mum used to iron while watching a video (yes, a VHS) of The Fiddler on the Roof. I still love that musical, even though it kind of makes your heart ache. There was a song in it that always made me feel both melancholy and afraid. Just like autumn does. Even without the lyrics there was something in the music that spoke of sad truths. Of time, always just out of reach, running too fast to catch. The older I get, the more the song makes me shiver a little.

But still, a touch of fear can be good for the soul.

It’s why I couldn’t live in an endless summer. I might forget that the clock was ticking. I might forget the cold winter that gets us all eventually.

Anyway, here’s the song. Have a listen. It’s beautiful and haunting. Think about your time. Take stock.

Then smile, remember you’re still gloriously alive and get out there and enjoy the sunshine.

While it lasts.

SP x

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzK3Jl64dyc

First item of Gollancz news from me this month….

http://www.gollancz.co.uk/2012/06/gollancz-acquires-three-fairy-tale-novellas/

Sugar paper on the tongue…

I’ve been thinking about happiness a lot recently. Of all the abstract nouns it seems to be the one we all find the most abstract.

Are you happy? Am I happy? Could I be happier? If only we were as happy as they seem to be? If only I had this or that or him or her then I could be happy. Why can’t I just be happy? What would make you happy? Really happy?

Endless questions. Pointless questions.

I’m not a naturally happy person. I’m prone to being an internal Eeyore and someone once told me that they thought my dopamine receptors were off – I never take a moment to stop and celebrate achievements but am always, always pushing on to the next thing.

But you know, I don’t think that’s got anything to do with happiness. Maybe we’ve just forgotten what happiness actually is or should be.

Everyone’s looking for THE BIG HAPPY all the time, don’t you think? The grand passion, the surge of adrenaline, the X-Factor win in life’s events. It’s not enough to be happy, we have to be HAPPY. We must be physically perfect, beautiful, endlessly talented. Love has to be like something out of Notting Hill. To be happy, life must be PERFECT.

You know what? To equate HAPPINESS with PERFECTION is to keep it forever out of reach. THE BIG HAPPYS? They’re something else. In my head, those are called ‘moments’. You see a man across a room and you have a ‘moment’. You get that book/film/TV deal and you have one huge motherfucking moment – but that’s still all it is. A moment.

Happiness is something more subtle. Happiness is like sugar paper on the tongue.

I spend a lot of time chasing the ‘moments’. I’m one of those kind of people. But recently I’ve taken stock of everything else.

Life has changed over the past few weeks. I’ve moved to London (I know, I know, I’ve barely mentioned it). This has been both brilliant and a bit scary, but it’s certainly made my life busier and put me back in the world after my Miss Havisham existence in Milton Keynes. I have wonderful friends nearby who have been great during my whole moving house experience, I have a city I love on my doorstep,  and I’m loving writing at the moment.

My little flat is starting to feel like home. I’m buying stuff to ‘put in it’ – something I never did with the house I owned. Writery people abound in London and are always up for wine. I have the Keynes to escape to if I want quiet. The world seems warm. I’m smiling a lot.

I woke up yesterday and I realised that although I’ll always be prone to a little bit of darkness and fear, those things can’t be helped, and actually – all things considered I’m tentatively feeling happy. What a rare thing to feel in this age of DEMAND and WANT. It’s a quiet feeling, happiness. A gentle thing. Butterfly wings against the beat of your heart. In the rush of life, you can almost not notice it’s there until it’s gone again.

I have sugar paper on my tongue. I’m going to savour it.

SP x

‘I’m so vain…I always think this song is about me…’

I should really write this blog on my actual birthday but I’ll be in London being far too busy, so, in my usual tradition, I’m writing it in bed, after wine, and while my brain ticks over. 

Vanity is a funny thing.

I’m pretty vain, all things considered. If I’m passing a reflective surface, I’ll always peer in. Always have done. Check the size, shape, general appearance. Give myself the nod. Looks are important to a girl. Any girl who says otherwise is a liar. Like it or not, we know it counts. We know its usefulness. Trust me.

And yet here I am – 40 on Wednesday, and not feeling a moment’s misery over it. Comes as quite a surprise to the 21 year old I once was, if I’m honest. I thought 40 would reduce me to tears –  if not Botox. But no. As it turns out, I quite like the wrinkles I have. I feel I’ve earned them and most of them come from laughing so what’s not to like? If this is the half way mark then the second half has some keeping up to do. I quite like the idea of being 40. There’s a don’t-mess-with-me ness about it. I know who I am, what I want, and still feel like the world is my oyster.

I’m tipping the universe the wink and expecting it to deliver.

The thing is this – when I look at the life behind me I see adventures and happiness and heartache and insecurity, and when I look ahead, I see the same things. And that’s exactly how it should be. That’s what life – the future – is, after all. I hope I’ve learned from the past adventures. I hope I’m smarter than I was at 18. But in essence the future is as much a blank page as it ever was.  Time in itself is immaterial. My best friend died at 24. You can’t trust time. You just have to make sure you live in it.

Right now, I feel more alive than I have in ages. I’m moving to London. A new decade and new beginnings. I have my family and great, great friends; my writery friends, my ‘The Keynes’ friends, my actory friends and all the ones in between. They’re probably far better friends to me than I deserve.

My career? Well, that, as with all things creative will always bring ‘the Fear’ with it. But ‘the Fear’ makes us feel alive, and it just takes one good deal or one promise of a ‘maybe’ to make you buzz for days, and if that isn’t being alive then what is?

I might not have a lover, but I feel well-loved, and you can’t beat that, can you? Lovers come and go – there are always men – but people who really love you are rare. And I’m lucky to have a few. They see through the arrogance and the pride and the toughness. They help me when I’m down.  They know that I’m always full of self-doubt, and afraid and just want to hide from the world. And they tell me to buck the fuck up and get out there and show the world what I can do. I love them right back for that.

That’s the kind of shit that comes with age. People get to know you. Really know you. They can separate the wheat from the chaff. Sitting here on the cusp of 40, I realise that I love a lot of people. Properly love them. And that’s a great feeling. When you’re young, you take your friends for granted. As you get older, you choose them more wisely, but you hold them close. I intend to keep mine. They make me feel alive. 

I’m not going to tell you anything special about 40. There isn’t anything special about it. It’s just a number. I don’t feel any different than I did when I was 25 and maybe that’s the only secret. There are no answers in growing up. There are only more adventures. More adventures that YOU choose, because you know yourself better.

I’m a little sad that maybe there won’t be any babies, but at the same time, I know that when one door closes another opens, and there will be other doors open for me and who knows what adventures will be behind them?

On reflection, I was never that conventional anyway. I think life always wanted different things for me.

So come on forty, you look foxy enough for me. Let’s crack on, shall we?

SP x