Rules of writing

There are three rules for writing. Unfortunately, no one can agree what they are - Somerset Maugham

I think I learnt one of the three rules today -  constantly save the document you're working on. Every five minutes according to my techie brother, any less and you're a fool apparently.You may risk RSI, but at least your work won't be gone with the wind when your computer crashes! 

How to avoid writers 101

Street art, Berlin

Did it feel like you were being watched today? 

If you were in Sydney it was more than likely you were being scrutinised by professional ‘people watchers’. They would have almost certainly taken notes too. Detailed notes.

So as a public health and safety warning - watch what you say on the streets of Sydney this week – it may just end up on the pages of the next bestseller.

It's the Sydney writers’ festival this week.

Sydneysiders, you may have noticed an influx of tweed & cardigans. Library bags and ink stained fingertips. The plethora of people reading whilst propped by a tree or lounging on a grassy knoll*. Or realized that every bench in the CBD has been commandeered by pen toting types, waxing lyrical about Proust between furiously scribbling notes.

It has been said that you shouldn’t befriend a writer. Not because occupational isolation has left them defunct of rudimentary social skills. Writers are generally affable types - when highly caffeinated and not forced to stand in direct sunlight.

Though they will use you. And more than likely without you even being aware of it. I’m not suggesting that they will fossick through the back of your sofa for loose coins whilst you boil the kettle. But they may just silently extract elements of your personality and graft it into a character in their novel.

This wouldn’t faze most people. In fact it could almost been seen as a compliment if a writer has decided to create a character based on you. You of all people! Think of it as an honour!**

But if you have a particular character foible that you don’t want to have fictionalised, and you reside in Sydney, perhaps it’s best you lay low for the next week. 

Or if you must get out, to buy the milk or insist on topping up your precious vitamin D, here is a quick guide to help you identify writers. It was written for people wanting to look like writers.

Besides the obvious – carrying a notebook, pen or book – there are a few odd pointers. Take a deep nasally whiff of the suspect writer. If they smell “nostalgic” then step away.  Or if they are wearing a used duct tape rolls, step away quickly.  Clearly they are keen on cracking this writing malarkey (why else would they have googled “How to look like a writer”?) so they would be hunger for any stories. Even yours.

*Note the pre-requisite for lumbar support for writers - the hours spent battering away at keys in a dark room results in appalling posture and bones brittle from vitamin D deficiency. So

**Of course as a writer I am somewhat biased and will paint personality pilfering in it’s most positive light – it’s most honour worthy light

Writing Task #5: pungent prompts

mouth watering aroma

This pungent task has been taken from Adair Lara's 'Naked, Drunk and writing' book.




Choose three from the following list, and write 100 words on each, telling is what memories the smell evokes for you. Use all five sense: smell, taste, hearing, sight, and touch:


Melted tar                                  Tobacco
Noxzema                                     Exhaust
Suntan lotion                               Lunch Box
Bug Spray                                   Play-Doh

Vive la revolution!

I’ve been having an awful day. A day full of straggled sobs and salty tears. I got some sad news regarding my darling Nan*.

Earlier in the week I was actually knocking together a post about happiness. I had come to the realization the more I tried to force creativity, the more I struggled to produce anything. Well nothing other than a set of shoulders knotted with stress.

Whilst I am aiming to make a living from writing, I have inadvertently been sucking the life out of my writing. Extreme expectations, intense workloads, strict deadlines etc.  So it’s almost no wonder that writing was making me feel rather stressed and anxious.

I was feeling so miserable I started reading ‘The Happiness Project’ and this quote hit me like ton of bricks:

“There is no duty we so much underrate as the duty of being happy.” Robert Louis Stevenson.

Today this seems particularly potent, as I've been painfully reminded about the fragility of life. It makes me even more determined to prioritise happiness.

Last week, after reading that quote, I let go of the self-imposed pressures and just chilled out*. 

Once I stopped forcing myself to produce work that would make O. Henry go “oh my!” - I found that ideas starting popping up faster than corn kernels in a hot pan.

Like they say - a happy worker is a healthy worker.  In fact I stumbled across this report “Making employees happy, healthy and productive”

"First, consider the domino effect. Employees are overworked. This overworked environment encourages stress and stress-inducing behaviors and illnesses, which in turn increase turnover, absenteeism and employee dissatisfaction and ultimately costs employers billions in higher healthcare and labor costs" **

It feels like I’ve just given the one finger salute to a bitch of a boss.  I’m now working in a much healthier (and happier) working environment.

I’m learning to be the nice boss. The one who says things like “my door is always a open“, ”free muffins for all!” and “of course flannelette is appropriate for casual Friday!”

Of course there will still be demands, I won’t allow my writing to slip to just jotting down shopping lists, but I can already see that happiness doesn’t hinder productivity.

Whilst Red Smith famously said “There's nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein”

I think that would be a dreadfully messy business to engage in on a daily basis. I definitely think experiencing a spectrum of emotions is important to foster a sense of honesty and excitement in writing (I can attest to braving the stormy swell of emotions today). But I think that one needs to establish a happy working environment to ensure that the creative muse turns up and clocks on.

So Vive la revolution! Farwell Fi the dictator! And hello happy little camper!

Every revolution needs a couple of smashed eggs

*She is just the best.  Plain and simply – the best.

The woman herself! [photo taken 3years ago, during a freezing Irish winter!]

** This may have coincided with the discovery of the truly amazing show – Downton Abbey AND the hilarious podcast 'The Minutes'

**Note that this report was written for actual corporations, so perhaps it's prudent I edit out the word 'billions' for - “ultimately cost employers (read: Fi)…a fine button collection, a stack of tatty band posters and her sanity”. I think that this gives a clearer indication of my fiscal relationship with my writing!

Writing Task #4: Proust it!

I've been reading The Memoir Book by Patti Miller. Her chapter on memory has been greatly influenced by the Proust. Miller defines memory as either being ‘original’ or ‘remembered’. 


‘Remembered’ memory is simply your ability to recall events, ‘this is the extracted idea of the memory’ as it may feel as though you are ‘watching’ the events. Whereas ‘original’ memory is ‘the product of a sensory stimulus’ and you ‘relive the experience’ hence the heavy referencing to Proust.

So this week’s writing task is to find your own madeleines. Try and unlock some original memories by setting up some sensory cues – whether this means going for a slice of cake, sniffing out the spice rack, listening to music, touching silk or corduroy - anything that may trigger of some memories.

According to Miller, Proust said reverie was his favourite emotional state and the one he believed all good writing ought to induce. So allow yourself to slip into "a state of being pleasantly lost in one's thoughts; a daydream" and record all the words/memories associated with the sensory stimulus you have selected. 

Punch drunk for pens and paper

'Alcohol' in Iran

'You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you.'  Ray Bradbury