It really has been the most surreal of weeks, not just for me of course, but for everyone. We have so many questions, so many fears for our way of life, for our friends, for our families, for everything we hold dear. During World War Two, they used to use the phrase ‘for the duration’ it meant we will hold on, we will manage, we will persevere until this thing comes to an end. There is I think, a promise in the word ‘duration’ it’s a length of time, and this emergency, as World War Two did, will pass. Which leads me to what can we do to pass all the time that some of us are going to have in the next few weeks. Although, for the staff of the N.H.S. the ambulance service and all the other services that we rely on, life may well be considerably even busier than normal.
I have written in this column several times of the writing talent that exists in our town. I don’t’ think I ever mentioned though what really great people they all are, and how much I, for one, will miss everyone. We have such lovely times, both at the workshops at Langley Writers, Touchstones Writing Group and the Weaving word not to mention our open mike nights at the Baum. A wonderful hostelry that along with everything else in the hospitality business is now on hold for the ‘foreseeable’. That’s another word I always connect to World War Two.
As we can no longer get together, Katie Haigh, Robin Parker, Val Chapman and I have decided to get together, digitally of course, and put a series of workshops plus the feedback from the workshops on each other’s websites so there will be lots of writing activities to occupy us. The first workshop was Robin Parkers on the subject of Climate change. The second one is a base workshop on stimulating imagination from Eileen Earnshaw. From time to time some of the poetry and prose generated by the workshops will be printed in the Rochdale Observer, The Heywood advertiser and the Middleton Guardian. You can however read it on all the sites so, if like me you’re not all that familiar with social media you should be able to find us somewhere.
For Weaving Word https://www.facebook.com/groups/Weavingword.com
For Langley Writers
For Touchstones Writing Group
www. touchstonescreativewritinggroup.com
See you all in I.T. Land.