Yesterday – Mother’s Day – I stole myself from my family into the quiet solitude of a writing retreat, and I was amazed at what I achieved away from the distractions of home.
It was only a small group of women, and one bloke – all writers – there were journalists, degree students and some on their third or fourth novel.
Is a master’s degree in creative writing necessary to write well?
“Hello, I’m a full-time mum, and I’ve been blogging for nearly two years…”
I have to admit, that didn’t sound very impressive when the words escaped my mouth.
At first I did feel a little daunted rubbing shoulders with some story telling pros.
But after we’d all grabbed a coffee or tea and a large slice of yummy chocolate banana loaf or lemon drizzle cake – I wrapped my lips around both – and sat down in our chosen position, dotted around the white bricked room, it didn’t matter at all.
Apart from quick chit-chat over lunch – ‘So what’s your story about?’ ‘Finished the first draft yet?’ – with sandwiches and crisps and chocolate nests – there was a lot of sugar digested – the day was consumed by silence – only the sound of tapping on computers and faint beats from ear phones.
And I wrote between 1,000 and 1,500 words which I’m very pleased with since I’m quite a slow writer, dither about and sabotage myself with Twitter – incidentally I had no internet connection which was a very, very good thing.
Someone wrote 5,500 words!
Today I glanced over what I’d written yesterday – and it’s going to need some tweaking.
But hey, this is only the first draft – plenty of time for fancy prose in the edits to come.
Getting the damn thing written is all I want for now.
Sadie Hanson 
AWESOMEness 🙂 x
Cheers lovely! X.
That sounds heavenly…..
It was!
Hurrah! That’s great news. I know that not having an internet connection would have helped me considerably too!
And I certainly found that writing away from home really made a difference too (and not having the internet)!
Fantastic…I’m also trying to “get the damn thing written”….mighty impressed that you went to a writing day retreat…twitter is the killer…sometimes I wonder how much of a draft all my 140 characters would be if I laid them all down next to each other! But then without social media I wouldn’t be reading your blog now would I? And wouldn’t be inspired to keep bashing away at the flippin’ thing…
Great post 😉 can’t wait to read the novel 😉 😉
Ooooooooh – what are you writing? The retreat is based in London – have a look at the link at the top of the post. I think all my 140 characters would make a novel too – ha ha ha. Thank you – it’s good to know someone out there in blogland is bashing out a book too!
Brilliant! Well done.
Cheers lovely!
What a great way to spend mothers day, something for you. Sounds like heaven and you did so well. Keep up the good work I can’t wait…
It was thank you and it was great! I’m pretty determined to get it finished now!
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What a fabulous thing to do, well done you! 🙂
Cannot wait to read the next instalment you will post. xx
It was – it was great. Thank you – another installment coming up next week hopefully. X.