Speaking Out

The other night, when Kath and I were sitting in bed doing our best Morecambe and Wise impression, we got talking about work. Kath is a nurse at a veterinary practice; a very good nurse with great empathy for her patients.

“We’ve got a kitten in at the moment,” she said, with the hint of sadness that usually means the animal in question has been mistreated in some respect.

I steeled my insides. One of the things I’ve gained from four-and-a-half years with Kath is greater compassion, as well as a better understanding of the feelings and personalities of animals. The downside of that is a struggle with the stories she brings home about injustice to innocent creatures.

You’d be amazed to discover the relationship a veterinary practice has with the RSPCA, for example; heaven knows how I’d cope if she worked with children from broken homes…

What the owner did I'm not allowed to say. It wasn't deliberate malice, but it was stupid and I could feel the anger rise. Anger that people can be so ignorant about taking on a pet. Anger at the burden that ignorance puts on Kath and her colleagues. And anger that I could do even less for the poor thing than she could.

There was frustration there as well – that Kath has a passionate voice for her work but lacks the means to make it heard. The passion she has for her profession, and specifically for the caring of her patients, is part of why I love her. And for that reason, I want to help her find that voice.

* * *

A few nights later, I was out driving in the small hours of the morning.

When I first owned a car there was nothing greater than the freedom of the road – particularly at night, when there was nobody else around to share it with. But as the years have gone on, my friends and I have succumbed to the inevitability of age and domestication, and late night drives are now something to simply get out of the way before retreating to the comforts of bed.

This night, though, was a throwback to those times a decade ago. The latest Ben Folds Five album was on the CD player; it was on loud, and I was rediscovering the beauty of songs I’d last listened to a few months previous. As often happens when you come back to something fresh, lyrics that had gone undeciphered before were suddenly becoming clear. Lyrics both beautiful and profound.

“It’s a frame, it’s oblique like life

Oh and how much now should we pay for the past

Cause you could age with grace if I freed you in my mind.”

(Away When You Were Here, Ben Folds Five)

I’ve always been jealous of musicians, the way they can express thoughts and feelings so completely in just two-and-a-half minutes. The way their music complements the lyrics and causes a great swell of emotion inside. I’ve never felt confident that anything I write can possibly achieve the same economy, or inspire feelings to a similar extent.

I wonder if other writers feel the same.

Yes, you can write in a certain rhythm or cadence, choose perfect words and demonstrate great profundity, but nothing quite matches soaring orchestral strings or the pain in a singer’s voice. Maybe the written word is simply more powerful when delivered out loud, rather than absorbed in silence by a solitary mind.

* * *

That last thought is, surely, hardly groundbreaking. After all, scripts are brought to life by actors, and poetry takes on a new life when delivered in performance.

None of this is to say that I think Kath should start writing ballads about animal cruelty or veterinary practice. More likely, she’ll one day start a business educating ordinary folk like you and I who want to own a dog but don’t know the first thing about their training and behaviour. Her business will have a website and hopefully I’ll get to write a few bits and pieces for it.

That is for another time. For now, this is a musing (if you will!) on what it means to be heard. Maybe, even, what it means to understand the expectations of your audience. I read novels when I want to enjoy a good story, I listen to music that suits my mood, and I devour information from the web when I have nothing better to do.

Everybody else, presumably, does the same. We pick our entertainment as we desire. Hopefully, people will one day read my work because it means as much to them as some other form of expression. To want it to be the best I can possibly make it is natural, but that won’t stop me envying those who express different emotions in other ways, and it won’t stop me envying those people who have found the format for their particular message.

The Circle Of Life

Rarely a day goes by when the human race does not disappoint me in one way or another. Usually that disappointment is simply the result of my own frailties and failings.

But then you meet a new baby, not more than 50 hours since your friends welcomed him into the world, and it cheers you.

Global over-population and food shortages. Over-exploitation of natural resources and economic inequality. All these things go to the back of your mind for as long as you cradle that sleeping body in your arms.

I admire the bravery of my friends, being willing to raise a child in a world facing problems as great as it’s ever had to face. I’m not sure I have that bravery (yet), but the child knows nothing of these issues.

He is a blank canvas. You look at his tiny hands, his toothless gums. You look at all his POTENTIAL. There are so many things to show him, to teach him. I can imagine not just responsibility, but also a great liberty in knowing there are so many good things in the world he can be exposed to.

Embrace that responsibility, and that liberty, and what is to say he can’t be one who helps find the solution?

We Are Go For Launch

As the day approaches where I have a completed piece of creative work to share with the world, so I allow the occasional fleeting thought to linger about how I might announce its availability. For anyone else – particularly anyone established – this would be a launch.

I’m not convinced I can legitimately ‘launch’ anything when I have no substantial audience to appeal to. The “fake it ‘till you make it” line springs to mind: shout about the project enough and people might be convinced a loyal band of supporters have been downloading for all they’re worth. And, as a result, they will feel compelled to join in. That’s the theory!

But is it really my style?

In truth, I don’t know what my style is. I might not know until I actually have the finished product. I’ve spent all my life in environments where the targets were effectively set for me – school, college, work. The end result was something required by someone else; success was born of achieving a clearly defined goal.

The work I’ve been doing, writing longer pieces on subjects that mean something to me rather than somebody else, has been a new experience. Which is all very well, but clearly I need to find a reason why other people should want to read it…

Two people have got me thinking about this subject. The first is Chris Gillebeau and a section in his 279 Days To Overnight Success manifesto, dealing directly with the launching of a product. Principally, the following sentence:

“Don’t just put up a link one day and say, hey, here’s my product.”

The second is Michael Nobbs and the launch of his new book, Drawing Your Life. I’ve recently become a member on Michael’s website, Sustainably Creative, because I wanted to read his books about taking small, measured steps to achieve long-term goals. I could have bought the books without becoming a member, but I also wanted to understand and experience his philosophy on a more day-to-day basis.

Joining the site has coincided with Michael launching a countdown to the publication date, and I’ll be watching with interest as that day approaches. For now, I’ll continue to ponder the potential launching of my work in the future, and share the video that Michael has created about his countdown.

Self Publisher-ing

Over Christmas, I wrote a 12,000-word guide to creative lessons that can be learnt from the sport of football. It’s not perfect (yet!), but it only needs a couple of weeks more work before it is ready to be unleashed.

The main thing I need to think about is presenting it; moulding the words I’ve so carefully crafted into something appealing and readable. I’m aware of Adobe InDesign, and I’ve read about Scribus, an open source desktop publishing program. The former would require a lot of expense and learning. The latter would merely require a lot of learning.

Either way, a lot of learning…

Just before Christmas, I bought a book to teach myself HTML and CSS programming. I’ve flicked through the book, and the prospect of learning it excites me. But then I settled down to doing actual writing and the programming suddenly didn’t seem quite so important. For now, my time is better spent doing and learning other things.

Some of the advice I’ve read about getting involved in the world of self-publishing can be boiled down to this: find your own method. Do it YOUR way.

So that’s what I want to try. The other day, in a quiet moment at work, I started playing around with Microsoft Publisher 2010. With a quality photograph downloaded under a Creative Commons license, I was able to mock up a decent-looking front cover for the guide. In the space of a few minutes, I went from Publisher? Yeah, right, to, This might be a genuine option.

I’m not saying it’ll be a long-term option. I might find the whole process harder than it needs to be. Hell, just writing a blog post in MS Word can be a frustrating experience at times! One day I’ll probably want to learn something more complex but now, while I’m finding my feet, it may well be the way I want to do it.

If I really want a challenge, I might mess around with making the guide in my ‘retro’ copy of Publisher 2000. I haven’t done the same upgrade at home that I’ve been given at work. The 2010 version of the Office suite can be bloated and frustrating, even impenetrable at times. But, to its credit, it does offer some features that could be considered attractive (while still offering the WordArt that screams ‘school project’ any time you see it used).

The onus, however, is on readability with these sorts of documents. Optimised for browsers and tablets, lots of white space, that sort of thing. Keeping it simple is the name of the game. Publisher 2000 might be enough.

I could have this all wrong. It could be that lots of people out there use Publisher for similar things. It seems unlikely, given the plethora of Apple products in the design world and the general attitude toward Microsoft, but I’d be happily proved wrong. If it turns out to be viable though, that might be a lesson that’s every bit as valuable as learning something three times as complex from scratch.

Good News!

Amid all the general progress of the last few weeks, a couple of bits of definitive positive news are worth noting.

First (though it happened second), my entry to Milo McLaughlin’s Seth Godin contest was selected as a winner. With Milo’s recent focus on Godin’s work, I’m excited to receive a copy of his new book, The Icarus Deception. Something different – potentially very different – to include on the 2013 reading list!

Secondly (though it happened … oh, you know what I mean), I’m delighted to have had a piece accepted for publication in #5, the impending new issue of Prototype magazine. Demonstrating the benefits of keeping a circle of creative friends and acquaintances – on this occasion, my good friend Katie – I only became aware of this publication thanks to good ol’ Twitter and the power of a retweet.

Sending off a submission involved some blind optimism, having no idea of the magazine’s style or whether I might be successful. Happily, Laura Allen – Prototype’s founder and editor – replied less than 24 hours later with a wonderfully positive e-mail, and I have the pleasure of looking forward to seeing my work in print.

Not just in print, but illustrated for good measure. I can’t wait to see how someone interprets my words.

Perhaps most exciting is the fact that Prototype is based in Newcastle. No, not that Newcastle. Newcastle-under-Lyme. The one just down the road from where I live. It’s the first proper hint I’ve had that a creative ‘scene’ exists somewhere in Stoke-on-Trent. A scene that might embrace the digital revolution that is happening around us. A scene that isn’t struggling to keep up with the ‘new’ way of doing things, but understands what it means to make things happen for itself, using local resources.

One of the beauties of the World Wide Web is that first W. It’s possible to get to know people anywhere, and that brings benefits of inspiration from cultures alternative to your own. But it can also be somewhat disconnecting. I’ve known for a while that I’d like to be involved in something more local, but I haven’t known where to start finding it.

This is only a first step, and it’s a step that may or may not lead to another one. But making just one step is very good news indeed.