The Word Cloud

It's so strange. Since I took up writing some 14 years ago I haven't been able to write very much at all! You could say I have had a bad case of "the block" for that entire period. Sure, I worked as a copywriter in that time. Writing was my living. But when it came to creative writing like short stories and articles and attempts at a novel I would just dry up. I would stare at the blank screen mentally paralysed. My dream of being a successul novelist was evaporating. I even spent over £200 on a course from the Writer's Bureau 10 years ago to try and get me motivated but I gave up with it. 

Then something weird and miraculous happened this year. 

After 14 years I just suddenly started writing like a thing possessed. Over a period of just 3 months this year I have written about 10 short stories (which I have submitted to magazines), entered two writing competitions and have written three TV scripts too. I haven't heard anything from the mags yet it's early days, and it could all be just a load of drivel. But the point is that all of a sudden I've been able to find a writing voice. And that's a wonderful thing. Now I just can't stop. It's like a compulsion. An obsession.  

When my big brother Paul died in February this year I was utterly devastated. We were more than just siblings. We were great friends. Back in 2006 we even shared a flat together when we found ourselves single again and we took great care of eachother. 

It's been so hard coming to terms with the fact that I will never see him again. The pain of grief is like no pain I have ever felt before but one thing is helping me enormously. It's better than any Prozac I could ever take to overcome the depression of my grief. It's writing.

A couple of month's after his death I just suddenly started doing it out of the blue and the block just lifted. It's like someone opened a door in my mind that had been firmly locked before . When I am writing my mind is totally absorbed and I can deal with my grief so much better.

Now if I were one to believe in the after life and spirits and all that I would think that it's my brother is helping me. It's him with the key to the lock. He was always on at me to better myself and to make the most of my talents. He would lecture me about it constantly.Paul was profoundly dyslexic so it's kind of ironic that he would be the one to release me from my writer's block chains! 

So maybe it's Paul, maybe it isn't but either way I am honouring his memory by doing something he wanted me to do. To follow my dream. Yet even if I never make it as a successful novelist at least I will have enjoyed the journey because I'm now discovering  what a great thing this writing lark is!