They said, ‘Put yourself about.’

Now all the talks that were booked eighteen months ago are rolling in and it’s wonderful.  And so different.  Writing is a lonely occupation – hours spent in the head of (frequently) dark and troubled women.  If I don’t get out, these characters become even darker and the whole process oppressive so it’s lovely to go to a bright hall and meet real people.

That’s not to say the characters aren’t real – it’s just that while they are in my head they are real only to me and our exclusive relationship becomes too intense at times.

This week’s bright halls were in East Molesey (for the Ladies Probus Club); Cobham (for the Cedar Club WI) and Ashstead (for the Link Club).   The first was a well polished British Legion Hall – surprisingly spacious and comfortable and I was greeted with the happy news that all but two of the attendees hadn’t heard me before. Hurrrah!  Carte Blanche.  I was conscious of the two who had – had to check that they were entertained.  It was a good sized audience, very responsive and friendly.

I knew the hall the Cedar Club used and it’s a treat to arrive last and find that there’s a space – an accessible one – left for the speaker.

The last hall was St Georges Centre in Ashstead -  arrived at via a circuitous arrangement of roads and roundabouts and impossible signposts.  I challenge anyone who doubts the existence of a God to explain the invention of sat nav.   I also have to thank Gail, whose introduction was so well researched and prepared.   On a freezing night the warmth of her welcome made all the difference…

So was the audience last night.  Trumps Green WI meet in a well appointed Community Hall in Virginia Water and they are a friendly crowd – big age range and great sense of humour.  One lady asked me what they looked like from the front.  She often wondered if they were serious looking, off-putting – not at all. It’s lovely when you know the punchline is coming and you can see by the ripple of shuffling smiles that the audience is anticipating it too.

A young girl came up at the end and talked about her Creative Writing Course and the story she has to write by Friday.  Grace – I hope it goes well.

Today, at Burrhill Golf Club, in Hersham/Weybridge, I met a group of ladies with whom I could easily have spent all day.  In the q&a session following the talk, one asked if  it was true that everyone has a book in him/her.  I said, yes – to an extent – but it’s not aways the same type of book.  Not everyone can, or should, write a novel. Some people have heads full of stories and some have heads full of instructions, or comments or facts.

A lady then put her hand up and said that her husband had recorded some events from their life together but stopped and so she had taken it upon herself to complete the task.  She filled in the gaps with her memories and then lent the manuscript to her daughter to read.  The daughter returned the manuscript and said, ‘No – you’ve got it wrong.  That’s not how it happened…’ and so the mother, enthusiasm quashed, stopped writing.  And it made her SO sad.

It made me cross.

You see, the daughter may have experienced the event too but she cannot dictate how it happened because until her mother tells her, she does not know how it happened to anyone else.  My advice was that the mother’s instinct was right.  Things should be recorded, not because it will tell your chilren in years to come about events but because it will tell them about you – how you experienced them, what you felt, who YOU were.

It’s all down to point of view.

So – write.

‘You ought to get onto Facebook,’ I was told. ‘It’s a great way of keeping up with old friends and letting people know what you’re doing.’

Yea – right.   What I’m doing is chasing my tail and the thought of whittering away hours looking up what other people are doing as they get on with their lives seemed a retrograde step.  The friend who lives five minutes away sends me texts saying that we really have to get together and I say the same to her – and to others. And still we don’t.

Then I got an email. Found you on facebook it said,  Great to see your name but where are the photos? 

I don’t know.  I don’t even know how I managed to get there.  It might be a result of trying to open another email account or maybe a more efficient offspring but there it is – Adrienne Dines Facebook account.  Bizarre.

Then came the friend requests.  I didn’t know whether to click on them – more timewasting courtesy of the ether – but the temptation to have a quick peek is SOO difficult to fight off.  I determined it’d only be for five minutes – just to see what a couple looked like….and another one or two as well.

And it will be for only five minutes.

Says she.

I haven’t ; I’ve gone on the circuit.

Early 2010 has been a frenetic time.  I’ve spoken to WI’s, Wives Fellowships, Women’s Guilds, Soroptimists and various charity organisations and loved every second of it.   I’ve finished A Grand Illusion and sent it off to my agent and wandered around muttering to myself while the threads of the next story weave themselves into memories and impressions in my head.  I’ve given workshops and planned others and all the while the website slept in the background.

Not everyone minded.

There are regular queries from groups looking for a speaker or a tutor and occasionally ( and best of all) people who’ve attended talks and workshops in the past get in touch and say, ‘I did what you advised!  I’ve started/finished the book!’  A couple have even reached the publication stage and to them I say, ‘Well done you!’

Only one query was unsuccesssful so far.  Virginia Water Wine Appreciation Society - your email address isn’t working and my response bounces back with an undeliverable apology.  Can you get in touch again, please?  The answer to your query was, yes.

The first was a trip to Kilkenny in Ireland to watch my father, Tom Phillips, launch a book called In the Shadow of the Steeple.  It’s a compilation of articles written by historians, storytellers and locals who make up the Tullaherin Heritage Society.   This was number 10 in the series and it’s compelling – the sort of book that you read and you can feel your roots and know that they are strong.   It’s societies like this who have the foresight and expertise to commit our stories to paper so that they can be preserved.  Custodians of all our yesterdays – I felt very proud.

The other thing happened last night.  It was the first prizegiving evening for the Elmbridge Literary Festival  – the children’s evening.   The other readers were the poet, Agnes Meadows and the writer Simon Cherry.  I was first to read. It was a poem written by a six-year -old girl and I thought it might be nice (for her!) if I asked her advice beforehand on how to read it.  Very seriously, I read the first couple of lines and said, ‘Is that right?’

She rolled her eyes and looked at me as if I really hadn’t had my Weetabix.

‘Noooo,’ she said, ‘don’t sing it – just say the words!’

Right so.

Later they lined the children up for photographs with the Mayor.  To see a row of small kids, all clutching their certificates, with their chests stuck out so far they looked like chickens was a treat.

Tonight it’s the adults’ turn.  I have to read a story by a talented writer called Terry Ryan. There are a lot of song titles in it. I will not attempt to sing any of them.

I will just say the words…

I like to get out there.  I love the talks and the workshops and the people who walk up and say, ‘I read your book and I wanted to tell you something…’  and they do.  They’ve read the story more recently than I have and although I claim a mother’s knowledge of my characters, they claim a lover’s – there are things I don’t know and they are determined to tell me. I love that too.  Through the talks I’ve done this year I’ve met SO many people who don’t have computers, who think ‘blogging’ is a fancy name for bragging (and the answer to that one is??), who won’t ever read an ebook because they love the crack of a spine when you open a book for the first time and the smell of clean paper when the words are still on it, as yet unread.

And I chat to them – for ages.   It leaves little time for blogging and it makes me look inefficient to you if reading blogs is your thing.

But it’s human.  As one lady said recently, ‘Isn’t it nice that we can still do things are don’t require us to plug something in?’

They say ‘a change is as good as a rest’.  Isn’t  it lovely when things said are true?

Brockham turned out to be a gorgeous village, spread along both sides of green spaces with the hall in which I was speaking at the far end.  The ladies were lively, friendly and so welcoming that I didn’t bother with notes and just stood and talked.  Afterwards, two explained that they’d lived in the village all their lives and had their families there.   I left feeling buoyant and more than a little envious.

Peaslake is another rural village but this time, one hidden behind high hedges.  The house was along a lane that appeared to be leading nowhere.  Eventually I found it and a group of women who lifted my spirits.  Maybe it’s that I’m interested in people anyway but it seems that recently, the ones I’ve met leave me feeling vindicated in a long held belief that women are beautiful by virtue of what they possess and not what they lack.

The sort of vacuous polished faces that pout from the covers of weekly glossies leave me cold – It is in the vibrant, life-filled faces of the women I have met recently that real beauty exists.

She said, ‘I’ve been looking at your website, Adrienne, and I think it’s very nice but you really ought to update it more often.’

She’s right, of course, and I had every intention of getting right onto it and blogging something marvellously witty so that comments would flood in and I’d be innundated with things to say.  And that’s where it all went wrong.

I can’t cope with iny more nnundations at the moment.  ‘Innundated’ has become my default setting. It pertains to the plot lines of the book I’m workiing on (A Grand Illusion – that’s the title not a description of the work);  it pertains to the state of my house;  it pertains to the list of things I need to address.  It also pertains to the list of people on Facebook who have invited me to be their friend.

I’m very flattered.  Each of them is someone I would really like to sit down and have a chat with, see how they’re getting on and what they look like and what their families are up to but I know that if I accept their invitations, I will be consumed with keeping watch on all their cyberlives and lose track of what’s happening in the very real space around me.  My innundation obligations will grow and grow and I will be swamped.

So, I will systematically call them all, one by one and arrange to meet them for coffee, tea, lunch, supper or a drink – or all of the above and enjoy time with the real person. I have made a list and filed it .

Under ‘I’.

ps. Had I had time to blog in the last few weeks, I would have commented on a luncheon I had recently.  I was invited as guest speaker by the Walton and Weybridge Branch of Save the Children to talk at their 90th Anniversary Luncheon at Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Club.   What a lovely afternoon.  I met so many people who felt more like old friends than new acquaintances and was moved by the history and passion of this charity.  I look forward to meeting them again.