Change and Upheaval

Once again I am finding the work/writing balance difficult to maintain. Upheaval and change in my working life seems to have a knock on effect on my writing, which is hardly surprising I suppose. I think the fact that some of my work is writing guest blog posts also has an impact - this week I have been using my creative muscle to write about online games rather than for writing and editing poetry. Of course I could just be making excuses - what I really need to do is finish writing my covering letter and send out my collection to publishers. I am hesitant though, when you have worked so long and hard on something, it can be quite a blow if it gets rejected.

On the plus side there have been some positive things happening - this week I ran a workshop called "How to love poetry" as one part of Writers' Centre Norwich's Summer Reads programme. I was very nervous - I had never tried this kind of workshop before, and I wasn't sure what kind of response to expect. It was a boiling hot day and I had massively over-prepared. I felt it went quite well, but I am my own worst critic so I came away just seeing all the things that I could have done better. Today, however, someone sent me a link to a blog post by one of the participants - her response was exactly the kind of thing I had hoped for - she is now wiling to give poetry another chance. I felt elated - what more could I ask for? You can read her blog post here.