Fallow Season

April 2024

The newsletter is going to be a short one this month because, apart from me having completed yet another revolution around the sun, my creativity seems to have entered a fallow season.

Source

Whilst I am still writing daily what I’ve found dribbling out of my pen¹ in fits and starts are snippets & snapshots, random ideas & half-formed thoughts, slivers of delight & shards of distress. Which is fine, I suppose, except for the fact that apart from one single solitary blog post written last Sunday² nothing I’ve committed to paper could be mistaken for something coherent³.

Aside from struggling for time and energy, when I look back at those words I can’t find anything in the frantically scribbled pages that I feel I could coax into something remotely close to a draft, never mind anything I would consider even vaguely approximating a piece of writing I could share.

Now, on the face of it, this isn’t a problem. I did, in fact, anticipate this happening, way back in January when I was making my writing plans. I gave myself the space for this year to be as fluid and undemanding as possible given what else I’m doing with my life. I chose “Filling the Well” as my theme to both help me make peace with the reduction of output and shift my focus to allowing rest and recuperation when I need it.

Yet despite all that I find myself feeling as if I’ve somehow failed, for the simple reason that my website metrics are continually reminding me that my post output over the last four months is significantly less than it was over the same period in 2023.

Having typed the paragraphs above, I took a look back at January’s newletter to see what else I said about my writing goals and reminded of something important. For lo and behold a theme wasn’t the only thing I chose for this year, I also took a motto; namely “comparison is the thief of joy”.  And yes, I did find my very effective demonstration of that above both amusing and exasperating. In fact I did wonder if I should scrap this whole post and pretend I wasn’t so daft but I believe in honesty so you get my face-palm realisation in real time.

And, while I’m pleased I know myself well enough to have anticipated this little crisis so effectively, I’m kicking myself that I didn’t think to put the motto up somewhere visible to keep it front and centre in my mind. So I rectified that omission via a quick image search and this cute illustrated version is about to be printed out and stuck both in the front of my journal and on the edge of my computer screen:

I believe this was created by Zoë Power but is no longer visible on her website

Furthermore, in the spirit of my motto, I’m going stop looking at the metrics page on my website (and do my best to ignore the one here, too, although that’s far more difficult given it’s front and centre every time you want to write something new) and instead embrace my fallow season wholeheartedly. I will allow myself to do as little or as much writing as I feel able, and simply see what happens. If all my creativity is channelled into crochet or sketching rather than shareable words then so be it. As long as what I’m doing helps keep my spirits up while I get on with the important work of being a carer and getting the house sold then that’s all that matters right now.

My brain has also been uncooperative with respect of my poetry project but I’m still going to share the one I’ve been trying to learn off by heart this month:

With Green Men in the Rafters
by Jay Hulme

One day the earth will overcome this place. Claim
back what it knows it is owed. Swallow the walls,
the prayers, the pews, the stones. Thrust a tree
through the pulpit, replace the vicar with leaves.

The hymns will be sung by the birds as they sweep
through the roof. A congregation of insects will
process up the aisles, muttering many-legged
prayers. God will look down on these garlands of
green, and bless every living thing there.

This is from Jay’s second poetry book, The Vanishing Song.

I’m learning the one on the right.

And finally, let’s see if my Prisma Visions tarot deck has any wisdom for us all for May:

When we find ourselves deluged - regardless of whether that deluge is a positive or negative experience - it can feel like there are only two options; be swept away or submerged. Yet there is a middle ground to be found. If we feel overwhelmed, we need to reach out and ask for help. If we are riding the current, cresting the wave, then we can reach out and catch up someone who needs a lift. That way we each become one side of the seesaw and together find the balance we need.

Until next time I wish you all a very merry month of May, filled with sunshine, flowers and joyous dances!

1. Handwriting has genuinely been the majority of my output in the time I have spare each day, usually once in bed and I no longer want to look at a screen.

2. Starting from the Wrong Place - a very short blog to commemorate Terry Pratchett Day, on what would have been his 76th Birthday.

3. Unless of course you count tangents springing from tangents that sprung from other tangents, with a side order of fear and fury at the state of the world, as coherent. I do not.