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Creative Writing Holidayat Lee Abbey, North Devon 7-11 May 2007Our themes were ‘Ways, Means and Levels’ |
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We met in the Chapel and were mostly confined to the house as it hardly stopped raining long enough for us to enjoy the spectacular scenery and abundant wild flowers. Here are most of the 25 writers - an exceptional group of people. We had a great time despite the weather. Left to right (if you spot any mistakes please let Chris know!) Front row: Chris, Ivor, Sylvia, Mo, Cathy, Lois Missing from photo: Nicola from the Host Team, Sarah and Ozzie her guide-dog who have unfortunately disappeared off to the right, David, Sue and Rob who were unwell and John who was taking the photo. I’ve posted some of the work done during the holiday below. Please note that all are copyright to their original authors who give permission for these pieces to be read out loud but not copied in any form in print.
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Feedback in small groups was important. Here are ‘The Dreamers’ - Anne, Valerie, Ed, Rosemary and Jenny. Meals were just as good - here, for a last breakfast together are Cathy, Mo, Ann, Rosemary and her non-writing husband and Sylvena |
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WaysA Celtic Knot, by Olwen Davies Strands. Suddenly Forming Not too tight or too loose All strands perfectly placed Enabling each strand A safe, strong net ********** Sylvia and Ivor Green learnt a good deal about the ways of God and of man, to say nothing of long journeys, when they lived and worked with their young family in a very remote part of the world. Here Sylvia writes of their arrival Journey to the Tilopi My husband Ivor and our five year old son Tony had gone on the first flight with some of our things. I am now sitting on the right of three seats, next to an open door because of the overwhelming heat, flying above the canopy of jungle trees and sago swamps, the remainder of our equipment in the hold. Our seven year old daughter Elizabeth is on my left between myself and the pilot. The whirring of the small helicopter blades was overpowering the comments of our pilot. I watched as he marked in the land features we were flying over on his map and I saw that the whole area was in white with the words 'Uncharted Territory' written across it. My thoughts were saying, 'Most people would give their eye teeth to be where I am today so why am I afraid to be going into this godforsaken place?' And God said, 'Because I am with you and I am sending you, it is not God forsaken.' We landed safely on Dofu Hill in the Lakes Plains of Irian Jaya, our home to be, and the first words I heard and understood above the hubbub of the people waiting to welcome us was, 'Hello, Mum. This place is great. They have red mud.' Tony was already playing in the mud with his new friends. We were home. Sylvia Green © 2007 ********* Nicola Such wrote about ways of being in her poem ‘Drifting Days’ I am drifting, drifting Any moment storms could break I always sink, I have to say When will I learn that I can run ********************************* Sylvena Farrant is seconded by LCM to work in residential care and nursing homes and has an amazing understanding of the fears, needs and losses but also potential and belovedness of elderly people. She was thinking of Job 23:10 when she wrote this. ‘He knows the way that I take.’ GROWING OLD. “I’ve lost so many of my family and church “But I have lost my independence “But I have lost my garden and my home “But I have lost my mobility. “But I feel no use to anybody “But I am so bored, very often ignored, ******* Ann Anosike wrote this, inspired by the ways of God and man and in particular her attempts at pottery-painting, one of the optional activities on offer. Today, I made a stab at pottery. Then I marvelled at the scope of the Creator. **********
Valerie Waters wrote about ways and means of inspiration in writing... and life Never to have arrived at the right place But always to be about to begin again - later remembered in fading images. Waiting for the strong overwhelming voice; then the glimpsed figure standing at the door At last, opening the door for a shaft
Means Writer’s Block, by Olwen Davies Waiting, pen hovering, hesitant and uncertain. The page blank and the brain empty. ************** Making Sense of Meaning Because we had no language in common and no interpreter, many things puzzled us about the Tilopi. One question we asked ourselves was, “How can your older brother be younger than you?” In Elopi, a language of the Indonesian province of Papua, there is no general word for ‘brother’, only specific ones: ‘boi’ for your older brother, and ‘ida’ for your younger brother. These words are also used for your cousins. We realised that whether a cousin is your ‘boi’ or your ‘ida’ depends not on whether they are older than you but on whether their father is older or younger than your father. But there was something much stranger to us. It showed that although in our culture we basically use relationship terms to refer to biological relationships, in Elopi they primarily describe people with a certain set of responsibilities and privileges. We found that your mother's sisters are also your ‘mothers’ as in many countries, and that your mother's brothers are your ‘uncles’ as in our own culture, but we also found that all your father's brothers and sisters are also your ‘fathers’. So, many Tilopi have a female ‘father’. That was more unexpected. Ivor Green © 2007 ************** Mean Mean. Nasty. Selfish. Ungenerous. I know someone like that. There must be others too. They calculate everything, even their words, so that they can always get the upper hand and play the trump card. Writing this, however, although its true, has left me feeling very mean. Forgive me, Lord, and help me to forget the hurt. Sylvia Green © 2007 **************** ‘Shaun’ by Nicola Such Shaun stands there, Inside… I weep. Twenty minutes. Shaun… I wonder… how are you today? **************************
COVER UP by Jenny Speller You’ve got the best of all I have, I said. You must be living the I am, I said. Why don’t we put something Why don’t we? I said. We wish we could be so confident, so in demand, of who you are. I don’t, I said. ************** MEANING I didn't realise there was no meaning in my life, Gina Lipman © 9th May 2007 ******************
LevelsSHAPE 2000* by Olwen Davies Wide Horizons; those were the words we regularly prayed about during the six months we interceded for the team our church was sending out to Port Elizabeth in South Africa. By the time it came for the team members to leave, we the intercessors felt those going out to South Africa were our precious children and they were on loan only, to the congregation of Port Elizabeth Often the image when praying for SHAPE 2000* was of a wide horizon. It was not an image of high definition, but rather a blur of yellow and blue, as land meets sky, with smudges of green and brown in the distance. An image of a wide expanse of landscape, blurred by the haze of the heat and dust. There was stillness and a sense of waiting – the only movement was the heat in the distance. All was silent and still. I remember around that time being lead to read a book that referred to churches as being either settlers or pioneers. We thought the team members were the pioneers and we, the intercessors, who stayed at home to pray for them, the settlers. That was until, suddenly, in an instant, when not even thinking about South Africa, I realised that we had got it totally wrong. It was we, the intercessors who were the pioneers. Although we had never left the living room where we met to pray, while there, we had gone ahead, to Africa, to help prepare the way. Today, when thinking again about the image, it is less vivid than it was, but I notice something new. It is no longer silent. I can hear a distant rumble. (*SHAPE 2000 – the name of the project – St Hugh’s and Port Elizabeth) ************* Ed Olsworth-Peter wrote of his mother who died last year - reflecting how that feels, a year on Now, a Person of the Past ********** Unfortunately, Rob Cochrane fell ill part way through the holiday, but he still produced this autobiographical piece. CRESTS AND TROUGHS To live perpetually on the crest of some wave, borne towards an unknown but alluring shore, free alike from trailing sinuous sea-wrack that would ensnare and the cries of those battling for their very existence in the depths of those mountainous seas.... How thrilling. How enthralling. And how terrible never to experience the God-given rapture of lesser mortals when, for just a few moments maybe, one escapes the conflict to have just a glimpse of the vision being revealed right in front of our eyes. A view perhaps of unimaginable beauty which almost snatches away the breath in its loveliness. Or at least a sight that brings fresh belief that there is something there beyond the constant strivings. As a boy such thoughts never concerned me. I had problems enough of my own. When only three I managed to get meningitis, followed soon after with diphtheria – not the most promising of beginnings. Perhaps that was the start of it: the belief throughout almost all my working life that I would be promoted one step beyond my competence, with unmistakable results. And it made no difference that my life seemed to be progressing very well, thank you, in other spheres. Anyone but a fool would have seen the likely result of learning to play the organ, just for the pleasure of it. The inevitable happened when the organist/choirmaster of my church moved away and I was asked to take over, just until a permanent replacement could be found. But fifty years later I was still a church organist, periodically conducting performances of oratorios by joint choirs and loving every moment. My other great joy was the stage. When I first joined a major amateur operatic society, I was more than happy taking part as a simple chorus member. The producer, an unlikely squat fellow who always wore a flat cap atop his walrus moustache, had other ideas. For years he coached me unobtrusively in every aspect of stage work until years later _ against my every expectation or even wish _ I found myself the producer. With all the headaches and none of the rewards until I read the press coverage newspaper ‘Crit’ after each opening night. Then read it again almost unbelievingly. What followed was almost more unbelievable. My job took me to the London area where the pressures would leave me no time for such frivolities as organ playing or stage work. Or so I thought. But I had underestimated the Machiavellian minds of the local Presbyterian minister and his ally, the vicar. Enmeshing me in fresh organ playing was child’s play to such experts. But they reached new heights in persuading me produce a performance of the controversial ‘A Man Dies’ for the youth of both churches. The success was a mixed blessing, because they instantly demanded that I provide a repeat: and when I pleased that there was no obvious follow-up, the reply came ‘Well, write your own.’ I don’t expect anyone to believe what followed. My very first musical drama ‘My Son a Stranger´ was so well received that I found myself appointed to the Diocesan Drama Advisory Committee. (Without having been consulted.) But it was the sequel that I can still scarcely credit. Out of the blue came a telephone call asking if I would like to take part in recording some radio Biblical sketches. The mere opportunity was all but unbelievable. A chance to perform on radio, without even having to learn any lines in advance. My acceptance was all but incoherent, and the trouble only started when I joined the assembled group. All was going well when Chris, the BBC producer, called us to order ready to start the first recording. Which was when, to my utter horror, I found myself saying ‘But nobody would speak lines like these. Not in real life !’ Wishing instantly that the floor would swallow me up. Without blinking an eyelid Chris declared ‘Alright everybody, take five.’ Adding ‘Rob, edit those lines – and not just your own.’ Adding ‘It would be nice to finish this Lookout recording before midnight !’ We did. Even if I went home never expecting another phone call. I was wrong, even if it was another twelve months before a voice on the phone invited me to take a look at some more scripts. This time before the proposed recording session. I happily agreed, not in the least surprised when I read the bunch of scripts thrust into my hand before saying that some would be suitable after editing: but that the others just would not work. It was my honest opinion. I owed Christ nothing less. But nothing had prepared me for his bland reply ‘Then you had better get on with it. You are the script editor of Lookout !’ That was the beginning of six of the happiest years of my life. Having to produce a polished script against a weekly deadline, and to blazes with the pressures of my day to day life. A job made no easier because each sketch had to fit a set Biblical theme which would grab the attention of young teenagers who rarely (if ever) went to church. Dramatisation of Bible stories was no problem. It was the others which caused the headaches. Frequently the problem would be solved thanks to the introduction of the well-meaning if bemused Jim Burton, plus his son Dick and the lolloping hound Rufus. At other times more extreme measures were needed, such as the sketch Infernal Nuisance which started when the Principal of the Infernal Training College was lecturing to the third-year demons. The BBC Lookout series eventually ended to my intense regret, though at the time I had already got involved in other writing projects. And I was still enjoying life when it turned into a trauma which threatened a total nervous breakdown if not worse. My recovery took time. Ages during which I railed against God, demanding to know why he had not been more responsive to my desperate prayers. What followed eventually was something else again. My daughter had found for me a new home, which was good. But what mattered even more was the warm response of the church congregation I had just joined. For the first time in years I felt like the prodigal son, being welcomes back home. Right then only one thing more was needed, and that was finding myself once more on the organ stool playing for regular services. Except, of course, it didn’t stop there. Thinking back over my life, things I had taken for granted suddenly seemed different. Like my enjoyment of organ playing: not to mention the times I conducted a joint choir in a major work, feeling the response as they reacted to every direction. And suddenly I feel very humble, thanking God for the gifts that he had given me _ and hoping that I would use them to his greater glory. ****************** WALKING ON MANY LEVELS (a five-day walk in New Zealand) The beginning of the walk was exciting The day of the mountain arrives We reach the top, Joseph's Mount, by name A rest to admire the view Rest over, we go over the other side Heeeelllpppp...... Getting lower bit by bit Two days later and it's the day of the hills Next day, our final day, was a gentle walk Gina Lipman © 10th May 2007 Lee AbbeyThe two photos below that prove what a beautiful place Lee Abbey is when absence of rain allows you to see it - taken on the final morning when it cleared up just before we left!
Memories of Lee Abbey keep flowing through my mind, Set in dramatic landscape, hills, valleys and rock face, A library full of books, a peaceful place to be, Although called an Abbey, not a monk was in sight
Here is our host team leader, Dud Meese, looking unsually worried, with Joyce Elliot, one of our pastoral helpers.
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Valerie Hunter wrote this verse about the whole Lee Abbey experience after she arrived home. I’m sure the rest of us who were there would join our thanks to hers for all that Lee Abbey gave us. Apart from all that rain!
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