Monique! I'm sorry that my intensive working away from home this weekend has made a delay in my acknowledging your beautiful tribute to a writer I also love - but now want to return to because of how you've described her here (I realise I have only read and reread I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings and some of her interviews. There is much more to learn...)
Every piece you contribute and each of your generous comments to others on here speaks so clearly to your values of open-heartedness and encouragment. It was moving therefore to read about how you've been influenced by Angelou.
I watched him through a lens of shyness. But mainly I read, researched, and thought. He made me want to. Back then, I was too busy making teenage sense of Homer, Thucydides and Plato to appreciate his influence fully. It’s so much easier now that I’ve walked in his shoes.
Gerald Thompson was a West Riding grammar school boy, with brainpower that allowed him to enjoy the same sort of mildly intoxicating Cambridge years he helped me to experience. Perhaps his ‘humble’ origins made him more at home in my unpretentious East Riding hometown. Larkin called us a ‘cut-price crowd’, but Gerald didn’t treat us like that. He wanted so much for us. He showed us the beauty of learning, and the narrowness of the syllabus. Above all, he gave us an example in how to live. I’ve never seen a teacher suggest so unintentionally that it wasn’t about money or status. He stood out.
Every boy in the school called him ‘Hermes’. And why not? He might as well have been Greek. In time, that was his identity: citizenship, orthodoxy, ways. He walked away from the unromantic restrictions of a heavy-handed management brigade. I know that walk now…
Gerald lies buried in a cemetery on Aegina, the island that became home for him. Our school trip to Greece in 1979 included a few days there. Remembering how at ease he seemed in that environment, it was no surprise that he settled into a life there so completely. We can all learn something from Gerald about marrying temperament with rhythm and milieu.
It was some years into my teaching career before I realised that I was holding the baton which Gerald had gently passed to me. I tried to grip it firmly and proudly. And I passed it on, Gerald.
Thank you for being so encouraging in your comments, Monique. I’m sure I was a relatively watchful teenager, and think I understand why that was so. Once we moved on to studying literature, we always seemed to study it with an eye on the human psyche. I think that must have been helpful in switching us on. I wouldn’t underestimate too the fortune we had in having such a gifted teacher for successive years (in my case, that was four). These days, teaching can be very piecemeal. Everyone got to know each other’s foibles in those classes… and teacher/student barriers were as good as non-existent.
Thankfully, Gerald knew the joy I found in my own teaching. 🙏🏻 I never sought to imitate his style btw. We had quite different temperaments, for all the values we shared.
Paul, this is a truly beautiful tribute to your teacher and also to that transmission of values that spreads outwards & sustains from these rare good people. I have read this over & again. I love the measure if your prose, how it gives me a living sense of your lessons with him. ‘We can all learn something from Gerald about marrying temperament with rhythm and milieu.’ ‘Larkin called us a ‘cut-price crowd’, but Gerald didn’t treat us like that. He wanted so much for us. He showed us the beauty of learning, and the narrowness of the syllabus.’ Wow. I will add this by you to the archive next week when I return to my desk after this weekend teaching. And will return here to give you the link. Thank you. I’d love to see how you respond to other themes in the archive if you ever have time/interest.
Thank you so much for your generous comments - and for making them so soon after I posted. Those lessons with Gerald were in the 1970s, but I still feed off the joy that I (and others) found in them. You're right.... the transmission of values is such a key element of teaching. I also feel grateful that I grew up in the town which Larkin observed and where he composed. It's given me an added reason to be interested in him.
I'm really looking forward to putting together responses to other themes in your list. Again, thank you for your encouragement!
The transmissions and transfusions of those mentors and elders who lovingly sculpt our souls! Such are the gifts that last a lifetime...and aren't the moments exquisite when we realize that we are infusing others with those qualities of being...
Yes, to feel part of handing on the good that was given us... as we are all doing here by reading and responding to one another's words. It's a fine feeling. x
What a lovely tribute to your teacher, really captures his spirit of generosity. I don't know if I can explain this properly, but I just felt a calmness when I was reading this, I imagine like the calmness his students must have felt being encouraged and fully accepted.
I think you have explained a key aspect of the experience, Sheila! We did have a sense of calmness in that classroom. It had a different feel to any other I entered as a pupil. Not because of any material differences, but because of the level of respect we were accorded. It was a very gentle encouragement too - nothing noisy about Gerald, even on the many occasions he burst into song…
Hello again Paul. Later than usual due to my working away this week, here is a link to your powerful tribute ('Gerald of Wakefield': what a title; what a mentor).
And my warmest congratulations once again on your essay published by Little Toller in The Clearing this week. It is rightly being read and shared far and wide. Here is a link to it for anyone here coming to this thread who'd like to discover your fine work beyond this project:
Thank you so much, Tanya! Doubly so, when you have been on the move and very busy.
Your encouragement is so valued - and I am excited to contribute further, be assured of that. Hope you have found space for some relaxation after your travelling! ✨
Paul, I’ve read the piece in The Clearing twice now, it is beautiful. I loved how the ending tied back to the beginning. Such poignancy, so many parallels between place and your life. A piece in place that touches on so many human emotions. Just wonderful! Also enjoyed the pictures. Your teacher would be so proud.
Your words mean so much to me, Sheila. In writing about Spurn, my feelings for the place deepened further. And it really is as beautiful and dramatic as the pictures suggest. If you've not been there yet, I hope you make it one day. But don't leave it too long.... Thank you!
Not realising it at the time, my elementary school headmaster was a mentor. He was kind and opened this heart and school to those who did not have a place anywhere else. And he wanted us to learn, experience the things we did not have in our rural households. He opened up our worlds and was a great story teller. He lived his motto, I feel, 'knowlegde and patience is power'. I hope I repay his debt in small ways by helping and encouraging others.
‘Knowledge and patience is power’ - oh how much these values mean to me, & how I wish I’d had a earlier teacher figures, as you had in this man, to give me a sense that patience, time, caretaking were good ways to live. What a beautiful tribute: I will add it to the story archive when I return from a weekend teaching away - and will come back here to give you the link to it. Thank you. Tanya x
The power of story telling, the reason we are all here! Such a sweet tribute. I think of the patience and sense of hope that teachers must have, going to work each day and knowing that the fruits of their labor are often far into the future.
Hello again Sara. Sorry for the delay in adding your piece to the book's story archive: this month is a rare one in which I've been working away from home, and with another week away still to come in it. Thank you again for your words. Your headmaster's motto has been copied into my diary. Here is your link:
She was the quieter one, kept things turning over in a house with more children than money, scraped mud off potatoes and sliced knobbly carrots while he led us on adventures into the mountains or unexplored corners of the city. “Nice time?” she would ask as, with a toddler in arms, she paddled through soapy puddles - the overflow from the clothes wringer – to put steaming soup on the table.
While we debated politics, music or books, around plates of stew or Queen of Puddings, her fingernails would drum continuously on the tin teapot, her gaze drifting towards the windows.
There were hints that, at one time, she led a more interesting life: a pink silk ballgown in the dressing-up clothes, cracked leather ice-skates in a plastic bag under the stairs, a collection of stilettos and old perfume bottles in the dressing table made from wooden fruit boxes.
“Never let your interests go,” she would softly suggest, as she led me across the peninsula before everyone woke up, to paint watercolours or watch rabbits; “find something you love,” she would tell us as she snatched moments to escape into novels and biographies; “you need to find a way to support yourself for the rest of your life” she would say as we moaned about homework, “you may not have a man to support you.” And as she organised yet another flag day or bring-and-buy she would declare firmly “remember how lucky you are.”
It took until my middle years to understand how effectively the quieter one had led me, from behind; how she lost sight of no-one as she navigated the world she found herself in, least of all herself. In the drifting gaze and the drumming fingernails she was holding on to her very soul.
Thank you, Monique. I was thinking about that generation of women, many of whom who gave up so much when they became mothers. How, as children, we took her care for granted and how she held onto some sense of herself when surrounded by chaos. Your lovely piece about Maya Angelou ( truly a leader for so many of us, something you articulate so well) is another reminder of how important it can be to hold onto a piece of your private world, no matter how hard. I love how you phrase the simple truth we all mustn't lose sight of, to "come home to ourselves when life takes us down strange and unfamiliar paths." Wonderful.
Sheila. I've read this aloud in my quiet Saturday afternoon writing room, wanting to honour your quieter one, and your tribute to her, with my voice, by sounding her out loud.
What a rare presence to have had in your childhood. Each time you've shared a glimpse of your childhood and adult life on here, I marvel not only in how beautifully you write, but also in the goodness of the people around you. As the world gets ever darker, I need these proofs of love, skill, kindness more and more.
I'm sorry if I've asked you before and forgotten (Covid at start of year has seemed to have damaged for good what was always my almost total recall - I'm feeling it as a real loss and shame also): are you working on a book-length project? I'd be so interested to know and to support you in any way as a peer if so...
Thanks so much for all you offer, Tanya. As I explore finding my voice through words, it is so interesting to have the opportunity to see the words printed. It enables some objectivity. However your supportive comments take the experience into a different level. Thank you again. As to a longer piece, I’m not sure where I’m going just yet but hugely appreciate your offer which I will remember and hold close. As to the CoVid memory thing… it’s tough and no apology necessary. You’re not alone. Wishing you continued success in all your work, I really love the breadth of your artistry. Xs
Oh my.... what an example you were given by 'the quieter one'. How she preserved her identity despite, on the face of it, losing opportunities. But she had the opportunity to nurture you and others, an opportunity she took selflessly and with beautiful generosity. Details that some would call mundane (eg dealing with potatoes and carrots....) suggest so much more than the activity. I love the combination of political discussion with consumption of stew and puddings - that leads me into the imagination of an animated scene so vividly. It's not an easy existence she has (those drumming fingernails...), but she has a proud determination.
Frustrations there may have been in her life ('she snatched moments...'), but, possessing an abundance of love, she somehow performed the remarkable balancing act of keeping her own head high while showing you how to look for the most important things in life. And how deliciously your final sentence reminds us of one of the top priorities!
It's a privileged glimpse into the core of your upbringing that you give us, Sheila. Knowing you as I do, and indeed your always powerful writing, I now see who it was that set you on a clear path to wisdom and sensitivity. I'm so pleased you wrote this and shared it. Thank you!
I knew my mentor was close by. In the field where the black knapweed grew, at dusk, where the fox cubs fell over themselves to tear at the sole of an old shoe, and a roe deer looked me in the eye, she was beside me. Her hand on my shoulder told me not to move. Her whisper in my ear slowing my breath, and I clung to her signs, desperately wanting to understand the nature she was showing me. If I devoured every morsel, I was sure I’d find an inner peace, could cope better in a world turned upside-down. But peace was fleeting. Soon, inevitably, I’d need to leave. But for a few precious minutes each evening, my mentor would sit with me, and life seemed a little easier to bear.
Extraordinary how - in so few words - you have made a breath-held space here with this piece. I was absolutely there, wanting with each careful word then sentence to know where you were taking me. I think I had once a really deep and daily practice of those precious minutes, and this by you reminds me I need to return to them. Apprentice myself once more. Thank you.
Here is your link to your piece in the book's story archive. I hope some of the other always-open themes from previous months might also interest to try...
Thank you, Tanya, as always, for your encouraging words. I think I was prompted to write this as I need (or needed) to do the same. It creeps up on you, doesn't it! However, this weekend I've spent hours in a wood listening to the screams of deer, and hours walking on a deserted beach with only the sound of the waves as company, so I'm feeling decidedly smug.
Beautiful, Jane, hope you remind me of the value of each moment, of the power of listening to your innards, to allow feelings to displace cognitive or thinking. And I love your use of language. Xs
I’ve stood (secretly) open since memory first came to me, open souled, open handed, open eyes, waiting, wishing, hoping. Rocks unearthed, trees felled, relationships excavated, letters written, windows watched from. I’ve looked, searched, scoured, begged, whispered, pleaded, first feet, then hands, then knees, until I’ve found myself laid upon the floor in recent life with little search left in me. An only, of a single mother, unrooted to place, running into stories, books, movies, a screaming scared child asking, waiting, watching, a mother now, and wife, hoping, and looking and yes, still asking in cities, fields, oceans if there was one, just one who would stop and look and take my hand, and lead and help and guide. So I stumble, when feet are once again found, and I make my own way while (secretly) waiting, and yes, still I wait. And yes, I hope. That just maybe.
Sabrina, how very good it is to receive this beautifully written piece from you so full of honest searching and hope. There is pain in it but also a courage to be and stay open to that discomfort so that you might indeed find what you need. I hope that in a small way this space - as well as the one in other online community where we first met this week - will be part of meeting that need. You will certainly be read by other good people here, as you can see from the way fellow contributors are receiving one another's words (some of whom are new to the project, as you are). Here is your link directly to your piece in The Cure For Sleep story archive:
I never thought I would say these words , but I have a sponsor !
She has my back , she freely shares the wisdom that was passed onto her from her sponsor , she is without judgment.
Stopping drinking was the first best decision I made and the second was letting the small and committed meditation group that I am part of , know this in our WhatsApp group chat one day.
Later that day I heard a *Ping* , it was a private text message from a women in the group , she had picked up on my mentioning that I had stopped drinking and was reaching out to say , that she stopped drinking 14 years ago and she was 'here' should I need to chat. I found this sweet at the time but little did I know how important her reaching out would turn out to be.
I had been riding my new found sobriety wave for over a year by then and the novelty was starting to wear off , I had read 'all ' of the sobriety books and had become increasingly irritable , I was also isolating a lot. At work I would micro - manage everyone and gossip. At home I would crash on the sofa and experience suicidal thoughts. I later found that the term for what I was experiencing is ' dry drunk' and that I had been 'white knuckling ' my sobriety .
When I started to obsess and worry about a 'possible' holiday plan to visit my partners family in Italy in a just under a years time , I knew I was in trouble . What if I relapsed ? It would be so easy with the wine flowing and lets face it sobriety wasn't looking so great either at that point .
I made the call . The women from my meditation group answered and she listened . She listened so well . She suggested that I attend an AA meeting , " but I don't drink anymore ", I gasped "But you did and you will ", she responded .
I attended and I cried . I cried with relief , the warped thoughts of what I thought AA would be like dissolved , I felt accepted and understood . I wanted a slice of this ! I was no longer alone !
I attended meetings and slowly developed an understanding of this mysterious programme. I was encouraged to find a sponsor so I could start to work the 12 steps. "Choose carefully " other AA women would say . "Choose someone who has a good length of sobriety , works their programme well and has values that seems to align with your own."
Today the women from my meditation group is my sponsor .
I have not drank alcohol in nearly 2.5 years but only when I started on this honest programme of recovery did I start to become emotionally sober .
Whenever one person reaches out in this intuitive way to another...and when that gesture is accepted...how that changes both people: I think what you've written here and shared so generously is at the heart of why I've made this story-telling space. Each time a writer like you shares one of this surprising moments of human connection, it becomes a ration of courage for others reading who haven't yet had someone reach out like that...or have, but turned away from it, or didn't quite believe such support was truly being offered.
It takes courage to be the one who offers and the one who accepts, both.
So moved by your story. Thank you.
I will add it to the story archive tomorrow and come back here with your link to it when I have.
Really so moved by the depth of your honesty and insight in this piece and the Longing one you have also contributed this month. Here, as promised in my earlier reply, is your direct link to your words in the project website. Thank you again. Tx
A leap of life took me from flicking pitted marbles in a secondary school playground, to being mesmerised by a long - flowing skirt; flapping like sea sails in a grasping wind. She sailed through the school gates like a jamboree on wheels; all festival, fiesta and carnival unravelled into one. A red beret poppy topped her head; a parade of roses flowed around her ankles; her thick knitted cardigan bulged with heads of cauliflowers.
There was I, lost in my tracks. a newly fledged teacher at twenty seven. A late starter digging into a dream of making a difference; a mere puppy in the hands of others. She strode across to me cutting through the air with sharpness of intent. Her right hand, gloved up to the elbow in black satin shot out, arrow straight towards me waiting for a connection. I stalled, cut out and faltered; self conscious waves slapped my insides, made me unsteady-unsure-unable to couple with the velvety thrust of hand. She flowed closer towards me casting a shadow over my feet. " Hi " she said. " I'm Jan" She looked into my eyes and grasped me from within. I unlocked my arm and invited her hand into mine. The lustrous, sheeny cloth felt comfortable and safe. I stuttered out images of words which she made whole by a squeeze of hand. She loosened her grip, then tangled me up in her gaze.
I knew she was special, an angel fallen into the laps of children; her heart an Aladdin's cave of kindness. Me! I was uncut-unpolished-unshaven for such honest tenderness from a stranger. Her smile unknotted the tightness of my breath and settled my near casualty of heart. The hands of friendship was written in law that day. The chemistry of life makes alchemists of us all.
Wow. What an astonishing connection, and the way you've written it communicates all that bodily sensation that goes with these rare moments. I love the triple-word usage that repeats several times - 'unsteady-unsure-unable', 'uncut-unpolished-unshaven'. The style is, as always, so uniquely your own, but I love how there is a slight sense here of what I love in some of Bob Dylan's story songs (I'm thinking particularly of She Belongs to Me and Tangled Up in Blue...)
I'd love to hear you read this and some of your other pieces one day. I'm quite shy about organising Zoom sessions as I'm not at all leading in-person workshops, speaking on live radio, or being onstage at large festival events. I think I'm nervous of hosting tech-wise... but if I can master the controls, I'm dreaming now of an end of year Zoom gathering where you and some of the other regular contributors could do a reading... I wonder if you'd be interested?
Hi Tanya, As always thanks for your constructive comments. I wanted to try the triple word combination to see what it looked like, to see if it had an awkwardness about it. I think it gave a certain strength to the feeling being projected and if read would give it momentum and energy. I hope using these triple words had a genuineness and honesty and didn't jar the eye when read.. I would be interested in reading some of my work at an end of year Zoom gathering. Great idea, it will be another first for me. I think you are so brave to get up and talk in front of so many people as you have done this year. I salute you. It would give me the shakes.
And even though I've received hard news overnight that means I might be living away from home to care for my mum from December onwards for a while, I will still try to arrange a Zoom gathering for those of us here who'd like to see one another and read aloud...
I remember our first meeting; in a narrow room, beige and bland. The window, hastily covered with cardboard to hide the famous face inside. The singing teacher asked me to take part in this event. I owed him a favour. Could I be a sparring partner for the famous face to test their new skill before showcasing it to the world? I was a safe pair of hands, and you the voice of reason, able to give critical feedback without ruffling feathers.
During the first break you beelined over introducing yourself unnecessarily, because I, of course, knew who you were. The words came flooding out like a dream: I’d like to work with you. I let them hang in the air to savour as I gave you my number, holding my breath while you rang it there and then, so that I had your number too.
Wow. You really meant it.
Then we worked. Oh, how I loved it. I loved it more than I could ever tell you. More than you will ever know. You told me to be bigger, bigger, bigger yet still there was room to grow. Braver. Deeper. More honest. More raw. You told me to trade pretty for real. And I did…just as you did not.
Someone younger, bolder, more-connected with grander prospects tag-teamed me out. An easy swap for which I don’t blame you. Such possibility, such adventure - who could resist? She soars so lofty now and shines so bright - even I pay for her glow. But she’s forgotten it was on your wings she once flew.
So here we are. Again. All these years later. Emerging from boxes we didn’t know we were in. You the resentful sage and me the path not taken.
Oh my! Debbie - this was electrifying. A true story, but written like a scene in a film or novel: me holding my breath to find out what was going to happen. What an extraordinary sequence of events - and I love the possibility, the frankness, the generosity of your closing sentences.
Thank you SO much for joining this project after our meeting this month on the Hagitude program. I hope you will find some of the other prompts interesting to respond to as well...
Here is your link direct to your piece in The Cure For Sleep story archive:
Thank you Tanya. I’m so glad to have met you and been introduced to your work. The Cure For Sleep has changed me, and your encouragement and conversation is bringing me back to the creative life. I’d been a little burnt by it, and retreated too far into my cave.
I’m looking forward to working on more of your prompts here. Thank you for the welcome. I feel like I’m coming home. X
Well that is the best possible reason for me to continue this project for the long term, however else I end up earning my money after next year when the last of the advance has been paid: to think of this space as a place where people can grow or recover their creative confidence. I'll be so interested to see how you use the other prompts that speak to you! xx
She used to read Thomas Hardy while drying her hair. A nugget I still remember fondly as I blitz my own with an empty left hand. A love of ink on a page that seemed out of reach.
Structured, unrelenting and purposeful in her teaching, there was no immediate rapport. I cannot pinpoint a specific moment of inspiration but can retrieve the sensation I started to feel that summer; to be engaged, enthralled and excited by the world and texts surrounding me.
As she introduced me to the Brontë sisters, her favourite Mr Hardy, and Much Ado about Nothing. As we argued for hours over her love for John Donne sat in the relic classrooms of my comprehensive. By now, reading constantly, I was relishing in the sunbeams that she emitted; soaking up every last inch of sunlight from her lessons.
As a teacher myself now, understanding the sacrifices it takes to be a good one, I walk into my local swimming pool. It’s six am. There she is, almost a decade later, in the changing rooms. I greet her as if no time has past and I can see her struggling for my name. We have an amiable conversation but I arrived unprepared for such a rare opportunity; blurry eyed and tired from a week of school.
You showed me how to love books. You showed me how to be a woman living on her own, divorced and real. You helped prepare me for a life of One’s own.
None of those words came to me as I stood on the tiled floor in the chlorinated changing rooms that morning. But, as I left, like exiting the airport and arriving home to British rain, I was rejuvenated once more, by the simple presence of her rays.
This is such a beautiful tribute to your teacher - and (from one writer to another) I love how you have used the swimming pool and the hair-drying to ground or frame the memory. This is what I always respond to most strongly in memoir writing: when remembered relationships or emotions are anchored to actions or objects. It's done less and less and so I'm increasingly hungry for it.
Here is a direct link to your piece in the story archive:
My dad died on January the 8th, 22 days exactly before I would be 18. Life really changed in a moment. I don't know quite how I got through all the crying, no the wailing and all the pain. Pain like I'd never ever known and hope I will never know again. It was the suddenness, I think. No planning, no goodbyes except the one in the mortuary, a place no child should have to visit like this.
I did get through though. And I never really thanked some of the people along the way.
Maybe this short tale will go part way to a thank you to Miss.Bliss.
I'm nearing the end of my A ‘levels but I have my geography course work to complete. Not too much to go but I can't fathom where to begin let alone how to meet the 3 week dead line. Time's gone weird on me. Everything looks, tastes, feels, sounds different.
My "Project “is all about towns and people, roads and shops and the routes taken over and over again. It's human geography, the stuff I like best. But I'm struggling to get out of bed, to function, to take the routes I've always taken. To the park to walk with the dog, on the bus to cook at the care home or to college with friends. It's all so difficult and all so filled with random tears.
Until Miss.Bliss helps. I'm at sixth form college and we're on first name terms, Sophie Bliss turns out to be just who I need to pull me through the next month.
Come to mine she says, on Saturday morning, we’ll look at your course work together. Can you get there for 10? Really? She's going to give up her own time to help me? How does she know I just can't do it on my own? How does she know how broken I feel?
It doesn't much matter. But it matters that she asks and that she's noticed me. I'd never been to a teacher's house before, but then Dad hadn't died suddenly on the way to hospital before either. Like I said, the world was altered beyond recognition.
I arrived at her flat at 10 am. Walked up the steps and rang the doorbell before she opened the door to let me in to her neat little grown-up space. I sat at her kitchen table, and we looked at my project so far. Diagrams, tables, results and conclusions. It could be salvaged. Her voice encouraged, and I managed to put it in order, to make sense of it and get it into the WHSmith folder I'd bought especially.
Miss. Bliss had shown me it was all going to be OK. Not straight away, not really for some years. I would need others to notice me, others to listen as I retold the trauma I'd lived through and others to be kind. But she was the first and I will always remember her.
Well I was in full tears reading this, Louise. For your loss, for the kindness of Miss Bliss, for your courage in going with your work and broken heart to her house for help. You've written such an exquisite tribute to her kindness and to how these hours - or even minutes - of attention from others can help our lives begin their slow recovery after terrible accidents, emergencies and illnesses. I so hope Miss Bliss somehow sees these words now that your story has been added to the archive and can be found on the web...
My mentor lives deep inside me. I’ve come to realise that for way too many years I’ve ignored her, overruled her, shut her down, dismissed her. And yet, there she is always loving me, patiently waiting for my silence allowing her to speak. Some days she’s my younger self, the little girl I have a black and white photo of that sits on my desk. That Rebecca is about 3 years old and sits on a swing staring into the camera some distance off with a furrowed brow which I like to believe is a ‘don’t mess with me’ look. I love her, she’s cared for me many times in my life, during post natal depression, during my divorce, during my daughter’s anorexia. She takes no nonsense, she believes in me utterly and completely. She gets me moving when I simply want to curl up in a ball. She strokes my head gently and says, ‘you’ve got this.’
Sometimes my mentor is an older version of myself. A wise woman with a big heart. She holds me closely. She knows me intimately. When times feel incredibly tough and I start to imagine and believe all the wild stories I’m creating in my head, she simply says, ‘No, not now, these are not true.’
They love me endlessly.
They love me unquestioningly.
They’ve been speaking up more recently, in fact since my breast cancer diagnosis in November last year. As my world was shaken to its core, they stepped forward and held me close, whispered in my ear that all was well, that between us we are resilient, courageous, open hearted, in love with life and ready for healing. I know I’m not on this journey alone and that gives me confidence and hope.
Rebecca, moved to tears by what you've written here - the beauty and self-compassion of it. The vision, too, that it offers others who will read it but are without that. To whom it might never have occured that the harsh voices they've internalised from school, family, society might be replaced by wiser guides made up from their own selves. How beautiful that you've joined our project here with this piece - which gives me and others in the community such a deep sense of you. I do hope you will respond to other prompts (all stay open): I'd love to see how your mind works with them.
Here is your link to your words in the story archive:
Thank you Tanya for your kind words. I've been unable to write since my diagnosis apart from diary entries. I came across you via another contributor and these prompts are the perfect introduction back into writing for me. I'm grateful for this space.
'He’s an ass,' someone wrote on the professor rating website. 'All ego,' wrote another. 'Yes, a dick, but a creative writing genius,' a third.
During our first class reading, I rattled off an embarrassing cliché, more bothered by my fear of public speaking than the mess of words I’d clattered out the night before.
I don’t remember the seconds following my story; I feel them. An edgy, 20-something man sat to my left. Untidy hair, confident storytelling. And to my right, Professor American Book Award.
I finished my short story to silence. Not shuffling papers, not the creak of old classroom chairs. Just the thud of blood in my ears. A sad agreement settled over the story circle.
'Well,' the professor sighed and put down his pen.
My cheeks burned, my scalp itched, pores opening. The rest of the period is a blank. I turned inward, nauseous. My insecurity feasted on my innards.
Another day, another story. With more honesty, as he taught me. I told the story of a young girl who sold her books to help her mother pay the bills. At the shop window, a phantasma of authors clambered to bid farewell. Shakespeare turned his hand with his words, 'parting is such sweet sorrow.'
It all rang true for me – a struggling family, books as living things.
'Well, hello,' the professor smiled. As if to say, welcome to the class.
'What happened?' he later asked.
The worst had, I thought. And it didn’t kill me.
He encouraged me to apply to the university’s master’s program. He pestered his colleague into opening up a study abroad program a month early. And in my signed copy of his novel, he inscribed, 'To a student worth the studenting.'
He taught me that in writerly matters, I could and should.
Lauren! Welcome to the project - what a powerful first piece. I'm in awe of the courage and resilience it takes to share creative writing in a student setting - nothing I've ever done, and although sometimes now I am a visiting lecturer and workshop leader, I still don't think I'd have what it takes to be physically present when offering work in progress to peers. I think it ends more emerging writers than it makes... so I'm glad that mentor was there for you, so that your words didn't go underground and stay there. And it makes you joining this project feel like privilege - I hope this space might also be a good one for you. I love how you use dialogue in this, and I'm hoping other themes will interest you to write for. Here is your link and I'm adding you to the A to Z of contributors on the book site but also in the By Readers tab on my Substack.
Thank you so much, Tanya! I am thrilled to join. It feels reality-shifting to do so. Though I say that this mentor encouraged me to join the master's program, to study abroad, etc., I let my fear, insecurity, and financial situation stop any of those things from happening. I moved home, got married, and now guide two gorgeous little souls through life. But the ache you so perfectly illustrate in The Cure for Sleep has consumed me. The need to create outside of my editing job is overwhelming and terrifying. This feels like a step in the right direction, a timid staking of my place as a writer. Thanks for having me!
'A timid staking of my place' - it's important to tell you that while you might have been full of fear and trembling submitting your piece and waiting for my response... your story-telling itself is strong and assured. It can take the weight of what you hope to do with it... xx
I was seventeen; a first-time camp counselor. A cabin had been repeatedly vandalized; we first-years were assigned the scutwork of being belly-down sentinels in the dirt under the adjacent cabin. I witnessed another destructive spree: a girl, far from home and deranged with missing her family, threw other campers' sleeping bags, pillows, blankets, into the lake. I quaked with the shame of thinking myself a snitch as I reported what I'd seen to the camp director, who treated the rager with an empathy that I could not comprehend. Yes, she was to be sent home, and arrangements were made to replace the flung items, but the girl was not punished. She was heard, tended, reprimanded with respect.
I went to the director's cabin that evening, pierced to the core with ethical agony. She, silent and serene, listened to and witnessed me. She assured me that I had done the right thing; that the heartsick girl had been understood.
I could not comprehend such kindness. I felt coated with black tar. My mentor stood in front of me as I was about to bolt from her cabin, opened her arms, drew me in, and simply held me for several astonishing moments in silence. I'd never been held before. I'd never melted into the existential safety of being held; being gently rocked on my feet in a strong, soft set of arms, next to a heart. Never had the nape of my neck cradled.
I skipped from her cabin to mine, electrified by joy.
What did I learn?--that touch could melt a rigid, petrified soul. That joy was a through-and-through truth. That to embrace another can save a life. My vocational path was woven with that wisdom...I know in my marrow what a hand can do with loving intent.
Catherine, this second piece from you is stunning. A perfectly-told short true tale - with that heart-aching short sentence in the middle of the third paragraph which opens up so much depth, as well as raising the stakes. We, the reader, feel for you - the child who was not held, the adult who has survived to tell the tale and live differently - but it also makes us reflect on what riches we had, those of us who did receive safe, loving touch: even while we were oftentimes perhaps more aware of things we wanted and did not have.
So many lines I would love to read aloud to you so you could hear back what you've given us here. 'A strong, soft set of arms, next to a heart.' 'I know in my marrow what a hand can do with loving intent.'
Monique! I'm sorry that my intensive working away from home this weekend has made a delay in my acknowledging your beautiful tribute to a writer I also love - but now want to return to because of how you've described her here (I realise I have only read and reread I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings and some of her interviews. There is much more to learn...)
Every piece you contribute and each of your generous comments to others on here speaks so clearly to your values of open-heartedness and encouragment. It was moving therefore to read about how you've been influenced by Angelou.
Here is your link:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#moniquekennedy
Tx
A beautiful tribute Monique. I did not know these things about Dr Maya Angelou, I only knew of her inspiring words, so thank you for sharing.
Tracey x
Ah! Big smile reading this from you! I will look forward - as always - to seeing what you do with the invitation. x
Gerald, of Wakefield.
I watched him through a lens of shyness. But mainly I read, researched, and thought. He made me want to. Back then, I was too busy making teenage sense of Homer, Thucydides and Plato to appreciate his influence fully. It’s so much easier now that I’ve walked in his shoes.
Gerald Thompson was a West Riding grammar school boy, with brainpower that allowed him to enjoy the same sort of mildly intoxicating Cambridge years he helped me to experience. Perhaps his ‘humble’ origins made him more at home in my unpretentious East Riding hometown. Larkin called us a ‘cut-price crowd’, but Gerald didn’t treat us like that. He wanted so much for us. He showed us the beauty of learning, and the narrowness of the syllabus. Above all, he gave us an example in how to live. I’ve never seen a teacher suggest so unintentionally that it wasn’t about money or status. He stood out.
Every boy in the school called him ‘Hermes’. And why not? He might as well have been Greek. In time, that was his identity: citizenship, orthodoxy, ways. He walked away from the unromantic restrictions of a heavy-handed management brigade. I know that walk now…
Gerald lies buried in a cemetery on Aegina, the island that became home for him. Our school trip to Greece in 1979 included a few days there. Remembering how at ease he seemed in that environment, it was no surprise that he settled into a life there so completely. We can all learn something from Gerald about marrying temperament with rhythm and milieu.
It was some years into my teaching career before I realised that I was holding the baton which Gerald had gently passed to me. I tried to grip it firmly and proudly. And I passed it on, Gerald.
Contribution offered by Paul Gamble
Twitter: @gegegamble
Thank you for being so encouraging in your comments, Monique. I’m sure I was a relatively watchful teenager, and think I understand why that was so. Once we moved on to studying literature, we always seemed to study it with an eye on the human psyche. I think that must have been helpful in switching us on. I wouldn’t underestimate too the fortune we had in having such a gifted teacher for successive years (in my case, that was four). These days, teaching can be very piecemeal. Everyone got to know each other’s foibles in those classes… and teacher/student barriers were as good as non-existent.
Thankfully, Gerald knew the joy I found in my own teaching. 🙏🏻 I never sought to imitate his style btw. We had quite different temperaments, for all the values we shared.
Paul, this is a truly beautiful tribute to your teacher and also to that transmission of values that spreads outwards & sustains from these rare good people. I have read this over & again. I love the measure if your prose, how it gives me a living sense of your lessons with him. ‘We can all learn something from Gerald about marrying temperament with rhythm and milieu.’ ‘Larkin called us a ‘cut-price crowd’, but Gerald didn’t treat us like that. He wanted so much for us. He showed us the beauty of learning, and the narrowness of the syllabus.’ Wow. I will add this by you to the archive next week when I return to my desk after this weekend teaching. And will return here to give you the link. Thank you. I’d love to see how you respond to other themes in the archive if you ever have time/interest.
Thank you so much for your generous comments - and for making them so soon after I posted. Those lessons with Gerald were in the 1970s, but I still feed off the joy that I (and others) found in them. You're right.... the transmission of values is such a key element of teaching. I also feel grateful that I grew up in the town which Larkin observed and where he composed. It's given me an added reason to be interested in him.
I'm really looking forward to putting together responses to other themes in your list. Again, thank you for your encouragement!
The transmissions and transfusions of those mentors and elders who lovingly sculpt our souls! Such are the gifts that last a lifetime...and aren't the moments exquisite when we realize that we are infusing others with those qualities of being...
Yes, to feel part of handing on the good that was given us... as we are all doing here by reading and responding to one another's words. It's a fine feeling. x
What a lovely tribute to your teacher, really captures his spirit of generosity. I don't know if I can explain this properly, but I just felt a calmness when I was reading this, I imagine like the calmness his students must have felt being encouraged and fully accepted.
I think you have explained a key aspect of the experience, Sheila! We did have a sense of calmness in that classroom. It had a different feel to any other I entered as a pupil. Not because of any material differences, but because of the level of respect we were accorded. It was a very gentle encouragement too - nothing noisy about Gerald, even on the many occasions he burst into song…
Thank you for your generous comments!
That is wonderful to hear that!
Hello again Paul. Later than usual due to my working away this week, here is a link to your powerful tribute ('Gerald of Wakefield': what a title; what a mentor).
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#paulgamble
And my warmest congratulations once again on your essay published by Little Toller in The Clearing this week. It is rightly being read and shared far and wide. Here is a link to it for anyone here coming to this thread who'd like to discover your fine work beyond this project:
https://www.littletoller.co.uk/the-clearing/ends-the-land-suddenly-by-paul-gamble/
Thank you for joining our endeavour here, and I hope other of the (always open) themes might interest you to try.
Tanya x
Thank you so much, Tanya! Doubly so, when you have been on the move and very busy.
Your encouragement is so valued - and I am excited to contribute further, be assured of that. Hope you have found space for some relaxation after your travelling! ✨
Paul, I’ve read the piece in The Clearing twice now, it is beautiful. I loved how the ending tied back to the beginning. Such poignancy, so many parallels between place and your life. A piece in place that touches on so many human emotions. Just wonderful! Also enjoyed the pictures. Your teacher would be so proud.
Your words mean so much to me, Sheila. In writing about Spurn, my feelings for the place deepened further. And it really is as beautiful and dramatic as the pictures suggest. If you've not been there yet, I hope you make it one day. But don't leave it too long.... Thank you!
Not realising it at the time, my elementary school headmaster was a mentor. He was kind and opened this heart and school to those who did not have a place anywhere else. And he wanted us to learn, experience the things we did not have in our rural households. He opened up our worlds and was a great story teller. He lived his motto, I feel, 'knowlegde and patience is power'. I hope I repay his debt in small ways by helping and encouraging others.
It is often that in hindsight we see what was right under our noses all that time.
Most definitely!
‘Knowledge and patience is power’ - oh how much these values mean to me, & how I wish I’d had a earlier teacher figures, as you had in this man, to give me a sense that patience, time, caretaking were good ways to live. What a beautiful tribute: I will add it to the story archive when I return from a weekend teaching away - and will come back here to give you the link to it. Thank you. Tanya x
The power of story telling, the reason we are all here! Such a sweet tribute. I think of the patience and sense of hope that teachers must have, going to work each day and knowing that the fruits of their labor are often far into the future.
Hello again Sara. Sorry for the delay in adding your piece to the book's story archive: this month is a rare one in which I've been working away from home, and with another week away still to come in it. Thank you again for your words. Your headmaster's motto has been copied into my diary. Here is your link:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#sarastegen
Tanya x
Thank you. That is so kind. Nice to see him remembered!
Oh what a blessing Sara to have a teacher like this! What a difference it can make in one's life. Thank you for sharing.
Tracey x
The Quieter One
She was the quieter one, kept things turning over in a house with more children than money, scraped mud off potatoes and sliced knobbly carrots while he led us on adventures into the mountains or unexplored corners of the city. “Nice time?” she would ask as, with a toddler in arms, she paddled through soapy puddles - the overflow from the clothes wringer – to put steaming soup on the table.
While we debated politics, music or books, around plates of stew or Queen of Puddings, her fingernails would drum continuously on the tin teapot, her gaze drifting towards the windows.
There were hints that, at one time, she led a more interesting life: a pink silk ballgown in the dressing-up clothes, cracked leather ice-skates in a plastic bag under the stairs, a collection of stilettos and old perfume bottles in the dressing table made from wooden fruit boxes.
“Never let your interests go,” she would softly suggest, as she led me across the peninsula before everyone woke up, to paint watercolours or watch rabbits; “find something you love,” she would tell us as she snatched moments to escape into novels and biographies; “you need to find a way to support yourself for the rest of your life” she would say as we moaned about homework, “you may not have a man to support you.” And as she organised yet another flag day or bring-and-buy she would declare firmly “remember how lucky you are.”
It took until my middle years to understand how effectively the quieter one had led me, from behind; how she lost sight of no-one as she navigated the world she found herself in, least of all herself. In the drifting gaze and the drumming fingernails she was holding on to her very soul.
Thank you, Monique. I was thinking about that generation of women, many of whom who gave up so much when they became mothers. How, as children, we took her care for granted and how she held onto some sense of herself when surrounded by chaos. Your lovely piece about Maya Angelou ( truly a leader for so many of us, something you articulate so well) is another reminder of how important it can be to hold onto a piece of your private world, no matter how hard. I love how you phrase the simple truth we all mustn't lose sight of, to "come home to ourselves when life takes us down strange and unfamiliar paths." Wonderful.
Sheila. I've read this aloud in my quiet Saturday afternoon writing room, wanting to honour your quieter one, and your tribute to her, with my voice, by sounding her out loud.
What a rare presence to have had in your childhood. Each time you've shared a glimpse of your childhood and adult life on here, I marvel not only in how beautifully you write, but also in the goodness of the people around you. As the world gets ever darker, I need these proofs of love, skill, kindness more and more.
I'm sorry if I've asked you before and forgotten (Covid at start of year has seemed to have damaged for good what was always my almost total recall - I'm feeling it as a real loss and shame also): are you working on a book-length project? I'd be so interested to know and to support you in any way as a peer if so...
Here is your link:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#sheiladecourcy
Thanks so much for all you offer, Tanya. As I explore finding my voice through words, it is so interesting to have the opportunity to see the words printed. It enables some objectivity. However your supportive comments take the experience into a different level. Thank you again. As to a longer piece, I’m not sure where I’m going just yet but hugely appreciate your offer which I will remember and hold close. As to the CoVid memory thing… it’s tough and no apology necessary. You’re not alone. Wishing you continued success in all your work, I really love the breadth of your artistry. Xs
Oh my.... what an example you were given by 'the quieter one'. How she preserved her identity despite, on the face of it, losing opportunities. But she had the opportunity to nurture you and others, an opportunity she took selflessly and with beautiful generosity. Details that some would call mundane (eg dealing with potatoes and carrots....) suggest so much more than the activity. I love the combination of political discussion with consumption of stew and puddings - that leads me into the imagination of an animated scene so vividly. It's not an easy existence she has (those drumming fingernails...), but she has a proud determination.
Frustrations there may have been in her life ('she snatched moments...'), but, possessing an abundance of love, she somehow performed the remarkable balancing act of keeping her own head high while showing you how to look for the most important things in life. And how deliciously your final sentence reminds us of one of the top priorities!
It's a privileged glimpse into the core of your upbringing that you give us, Sheila. Knowing you as I do, and indeed your always powerful writing, I now see who it was that set you on a clear path to wisdom and sensitivity. I'm so pleased you wrote this and shared it. Thank you!
From a time many years ago...
I knew my mentor was close by. In the field where the black knapweed grew, at dusk, where the fox cubs fell over themselves to tear at the sole of an old shoe, and a roe deer looked me in the eye, she was beside me. Her hand on my shoulder told me not to move. Her whisper in my ear slowing my breath, and I clung to her signs, desperately wanting to understand the nature she was showing me. If I devoured every morsel, I was sure I’d find an inner peace, could cope better in a world turned upside-down. But peace was fleeting. Soon, inevitably, I’d need to leave. But for a few precious minutes each evening, my mentor would sit with me, and life seemed a little easier to bear.
Extraordinary how - in so few words - you have made a breath-held space here with this piece. I was absolutely there, wanting with each careful word then sentence to know where you were taking me. I think I had once a really deep and daily practice of those precious minutes, and this by you reminds me I need to return to them. Apprentice myself once more. Thank you.
Here is your link to your piece in the book's story archive. I hope some of the other always-open themes from previous months might also interest to try...
Tx
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#janeadams
Thank you, Tanya, as always, for your encouraging words. I think I was prompted to write this as I need (or needed) to do the same. It creeps up on you, doesn't it! However, this weekend I've spent hours in a wood listening to the screams of deer, and hours walking on a deserted beach with only the sound of the waves as company, so I'm feeling decidedly smug.
Beautiful, Jane, hope you remind me of the value of each moment, of the power of listening to your innards, to allow feelings to displace cognitive or thinking. And I love your use of language. Xs
Thank you, Sheila. That's so kind of you! x
This is so beautiful, Jane.
Thank you, Sabrina. It's funny, when you write things down you never think anyone is going to read them, and it's so lovely when people do.
I’ve stood (secretly) open since memory first came to me, open souled, open handed, open eyes, waiting, wishing, hoping. Rocks unearthed, trees felled, relationships excavated, letters written, windows watched from. I’ve looked, searched, scoured, begged, whispered, pleaded, first feet, then hands, then knees, until I’ve found myself laid upon the floor in recent life with little search left in me. An only, of a single mother, unrooted to place, running into stories, books, movies, a screaming scared child asking, waiting, watching, a mother now, and wife, hoping, and looking and yes, still asking in cities, fields, oceans if there was one, just one who would stop and look and take my hand, and lead and help and guide. So I stumble, when feet are once again found, and I make my own way while (secretly) waiting, and yes, still I wait. And yes, I hope. That just maybe.
Sabrina, how very good it is to receive this beautifully written piece from you so full of honest searching and hope. There is pain in it but also a courage to be and stay open to that discomfort so that you might indeed find what you need. I hope that in a small way this space - as well as the one in other online community where we first met this week - will be part of meeting that need. You will certainly be read by other good people here, as you can see from the way fellow contributors are receiving one another's words (some of whom are new to the project, as you are). Here is your link directly to your piece in The Cure For Sleep story archive:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#sabrina
Tanya xx
I never thought I would say these words , but I have a sponsor !
She has my back , she freely shares the wisdom that was passed onto her from her sponsor , she is without judgment.
Stopping drinking was the first best decision I made and the second was letting the small and committed meditation group that I am part of , know this in our WhatsApp group chat one day.
Later that day I heard a *Ping* , it was a private text message from a women in the group , she had picked up on my mentioning that I had stopped drinking and was reaching out to say , that she stopped drinking 14 years ago and she was 'here' should I need to chat. I found this sweet at the time but little did I know how important her reaching out would turn out to be.
I had been riding my new found sobriety wave for over a year by then and the novelty was starting to wear off , I had read 'all ' of the sobriety books and had become increasingly irritable , I was also isolating a lot. At work I would micro - manage everyone and gossip. At home I would crash on the sofa and experience suicidal thoughts. I later found that the term for what I was experiencing is ' dry drunk' and that I had been 'white knuckling ' my sobriety .
When I started to obsess and worry about a 'possible' holiday plan to visit my partners family in Italy in a just under a years time , I knew I was in trouble . What if I relapsed ? It would be so easy with the wine flowing and lets face it sobriety wasn't looking so great either at that point .
I made the call . The women from my meditation group answered and she listened . She listened so well . She suggested that I attend an AA meeting , " but I don't drink anymore ", I gasped "But you did and you will ", she responded .
I attended and I cried . I cried with relief , the warped thoughts of what I thought AA would be like dissolved , I felt accepted and understood . I wanted a slice of this ! I was no longer alone !
I attended meetings and slowly developed an understanding of this mysterious programme. I was encouraged to find a sponsor so I could start to work the 12 steps. "Choose carefully " other AA women would say . "Choose someone who has a good length of sobriety , works their programme well and has values that seems to align with your own."
Today the women from my meditation group is my sponsor .
I have not drank alcohol in nearly 2.5 years but only when I started on this honest programme of recovery did I start to become emotionally sober .
Whenever one person reaches out in this intuitive way to another...and when that gesture is accepted...how that changes both people: I think what you've written here and shared so generously is at the heart of why I've made this story-telling space. Each time a writer like you shares one of this surprising moments of human connection, it becomes a ration of courage for others reading who haven't yet had someone reach out like that...or have, but turned away from it, or didn't quite believe such support was truly being offered.
It takes courage to be the one who offers and the one who accepts, both.
So moved by your story. Thank you.
I will add it to the story archive tomorrow and come back here with your link to it when I have.
Txx
Thank you for your response Tanya , I do love your words , so this means a lot to me . Thanks x
Really so moved by the depth of your honesty and insight in this piece and the Longing one you have also contributed this month. Here, as promised in my earlier reply, is your direct link to your words in the project website. Thank you again. Tx
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#charlottedawson
Jan
A leap of life took me from flicking pitted marbles in a secondary school playground, to being mesmerised by a long - flowing skirt; flapping like sea sails in a grasping wind. She sailed through the school gates like a jamboree on wheels; all festival, fiesta and carnival unravelled into one. A red beret poppy topped her head; a parade of roses flowed around her ankles; her thick knitted cardigan bulged with heads of cauliflowers.
There was I, lost in my tracks. a newly fledged teacher at twenty seven. A late starter digging into a dream of making a difference; a mere puppy in the hands of others. She strode across to me cutting through the air with sharpness of intent. Her right hand, gloved up to the elbow in black satin shot out, arrow straight towards me waiting for a connection. I stalled, cut out and faltered; self conscious waves slapped my insides, made me unsteady-unsure-unable to couple with the velvety thrust of hand. She flowed closer towards me casting a shadow over my feet. " Hi " she said. " I'm Jan" She looked into my eyes and grasped me from within. I unlocked my arm and invited her hand into mine. The lustrous, sheeny cloth felt comfortable and safe. I stuttered out images of words which she made whole by a squeeze of hand. She loosened her grip, then tangled me up in her gaze.
I knew she was special, an angel fallen into the laps of children; her heart an Aladdin's cave of kindness. Me! I was uncut-unpolished-unshaven for such honest tenderness from a stranger. Her smile unknotted the tightness of my breath and settled my near casualty of heart. The hands of friendship was written in law that day. The chemistry of life makes alchemists of us all.
Wow. What an astonishing connection, and the way you've written it communicates all that bodily sensation that goes with these rare moments. I love the triple-word usage that repeats several times - 'unsteady-unsure-unable', 'uncut-unpolished-unshaven'. The style is, as always, so uniquely your own, but I love how there is a slight sense here of what I love in some of Bob Dylan's story songs (I'm thinking particularly of She Belongs to Me and Tangled Up in Blue...)
I'd love to hear you read this and some of your other pieces one day. I'm quite shy about organising Zoom sessions as I'm not at all leading in-person workshops, speaking on live radio, or being onstage at large festival events. I think I'm nervous of hosting tech-wise... but if I can master the controls, I'm dreaming now of an end of year Zoom gathering where you and some of the other regular contributors could do a reading... I wonder if you'd be interested?
Here is your latest link:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#steveharrison
Hi Tanya, As always thanks for your constructive comments. I wanted to try the triple word combination to see what it looked like, to see if it had an awkwardness about it. I think it gave a certain strength to the feeling being projected and if read would give it momentum and energy. I hope using these triple words had a genuineness and honesty and didn't jar the eye when read.. I would be interested in reading some of my work at an end of year Zoom gathering. Great idea, it will be another first for me. I think you are so brave to get up and talk in front of so many people as you have done this year. I salute you. It would give me the shakes.
It works very well for me....
And even though I've received hard news overnight that means I might be living away from home to care for my mum from December onwards for a while, I will still try to arrange a Zoom gathering for those of us here who'd like to see one another and read aloud...
Dear B
I remember our first meeting; in a narrow room, beige and bland. The window, hastily covered with cardboard to hide the famous face inside. The singing teacher asked me to take part in this event. I owed him a favour. Could I be a sparring partner for the famous face to test their new skill before showcasing it to the world? I was a safe pair of hands, and you the voice of reason, able to give critical feedback without ruffling feathers.
During the first break you beelined over introducing yourself unnecessarily, because I, of course, knew who you were. The words came flooding out like a dream: I’d like to work with you. I let them hang in the air to savour as I gave you my number, holding my breath while you rang it there and then, so that I had your number too.
Wow. You really meant it.
Then we worked. Oh, how I loved it. I loved it more than I could ever tell you. More than you will ever know. You told me to be bigger, bigger, bigger yet still there was room to grow. Braver. Deeper. More honest. More raw. You told me to trade pretty for real. And I did…just as you did not.
Someone younger, bolder, more-connected with grander prospects tag-teamed me out. An easy swap for which I don’t blame you. Such possibility, such adventure - who could resist? She soars so lofty now and shines so bright - even I pay for her glow. But she’s forgotten it was on your wings she once flew.
So here we are. Again. All these years later. Emerging from boxes we didn’t know we were in. You the resentful sage and me the path not taken.
Whaddya reckon, friend? Shall we go again?
Oh my! Debbie - this was electrifying. A true story, but written like a scene in a film or novel: me holding my breath to find out what was going to happen. What an extraordinary sequence of events - and I love the possibility, the frankness, the generosity of your closing sentences.
Thank you SO much for joining this project after our meeting this month on the Hagitude program. I hope you will find some of the other prompts interesting to respond to as well...
Here is your link direct to your piece in The Cure For Sleep story archive:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#debbieyearsleydavidson
Txx
Thank you Tanya. I’m so glad to have met you and been introduced to your work. The Cure For Sleep has changed me, and your encouragement and conversation is bringing me back to the creative life. I’d been a little burnt by it, and retreated too far into my cave.
I’m looking forward to working on more of your prompts here. Thank you for the welcome. I feel like I’m coming home. X
Well that is the best possible reason for me to continue this project for the long term, however else I end up earning my money after next year when the last of the advance has been paid: to think of this space as a place where people can grow or recover their creative confidence. I'll be so interested to see how you use the other prompts that speak to you! xx
She used to read Thomas Hardy while drying her hair. A nugget I still remember fondly as I blitz my own with an empty left hand. A love of ink on a page that seemed out of reach.
Structured, unrelenting and purposeful in her teaching, there was no immediate rapport. I cannot pinpoint a specific moment of inspiration but can retrieve the sensation I started to feel that summer; to be engaged, enthralled and excited by the world and texts surrounding me.
As she introduced me to the Brontë sisters, her favourite Mr Hardy, and Much Ado about Nothing. As we argued for hours over her love for John Donne sat in the relic classrooms of my comprehensive. By now, reading constantly, I was relishing in the sunbeams that she emitted; soaking up every last inch of sunlight from her lessons.
As a teacher myself now, understanding the sacrifices it takes to be a good one, I walk into my local swimming pool. It’s six am. There she is, almost a decade later, in the changing rooms. I greet her as if no time has past and I can see her struggling for my name. We have an amiable conversation but I arrived unprepared for such a rare opportunity; blurry eyed and tired from a week of school.
You showed me how to love books. You showed me how to be a woman living on her own, divorced and real. You helped prepare me for a life of One’s own.
None of those words came to me as I stood on the tiled floor in the chlorinated changing rooms that morning. But, as I left, like exiting the airport and arriving home to British rain, I was rejuvenated once more, by the simple presence of her rays.
Caitlin Cornec
Instagram: @caitlincornec
This is such a beautiful tribute to your teacher - and (from one writer to another) I love how you have used the swimming pool and the hair-drying to ground or frame the memory. This is what I always respond to most strongly in memoir writing: when remembered relationships or emotions are anchored to actions or objects. It's done less and less and so I'm increasingly hungry for it.
Here is a direct link to your piece in the story archive:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#caitlincornec
I so hope that you will be interested to respond to other themes in the project: I'll be fascinated to see what you do with them!
Tanya xx
Thank you very much for reading Tanya. I’ve just finished the book and thought it was brilliant!
Oh thank you! xxx
My dad died on January the 8th, 22 days exactly before I would be 18. Life really changed in a moment. I don't know quite how I got through all the crying, no the wailing and all the pain. Pain like I'd never ever known and hope I will never know again. It was the suddenness, I think. No planning, no goodbyes except the one in the mortuary, a place no child should have to visit like this.
I did get through though. And I never really thanked some of the people along the way.
Maybe this short tale will go part way to a thank you to Miss.Bliss.
I'm nearing the end of my A ‘levels but I have my geography course work to complete. Not too much to go but I can't fathom where to begin let alone how to meet the 3 week dead line. Time's gone weird on me. Everything looks, tastes, feels, sounds different.
My "Project “is all about towns and people, roads and shops and the routes taken over and over again. It's human geography, the stuff I like best. But I'm struggling to get out of bed, to function, to take the routes I've always taken. To the park to walk with the dog, on the bus to cook at the care home or to college with friends. It's all so difficult and all so filled with random tears.
Until Miss.Bliss helps. I'm at sixth form college and we're on first name terms, Sophie Bliss turns out to be just who I need to pull me through the next month.
Come to mine she says, on Saturday morning, we’ll look at your course work together. Can you get there for 10? Really? She's going to give up her own time to help me? How does she know I just can't do it on my own? How does she know how broken I feel?
It doesn't much matter. But it matters that she asks and that she's noticed me. I'd never been to a teacher's house before, but then Dad hadn't died suddenly on the way to hospital before either. Like I said, the world was altered beyond recognition.
I arrived at her flat at 10 am. Walked up the steps and rang the doorbell before she opened the door to let me in to her neat little grown-up space. I sat at her kitchen table, and we looked at my project so far. Diagrams, tables, results and conclusions. It could be salvaged. Her voice encouraged, and I managed to put it in order, to make sense of it and get it into the WHSmith folder I'd bought especially.
Miss. Bliss had shown me it was all going to be OK. Not straight away, not really for some years. I would need others to notice me, others to listen as I retold the trauma I'd lived through and others to be kind. But she was the first and I will always remember her.
Well I was in full tears reading this, Louise. For your loss, for the kindness of Miss Bliss, for your courage in going with your work and broken heart to her house for help. You've written such an exquisite tribute to her kindness and to how these hours - or even minutes - of attention from others can help our lives begin their slow recovery after terrible accidents, emergencies and illnesses. I so hope Miss Bliss somehow sees these words now that your story has been added to the archive and can be found on the web...
Here is your link:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#louisestead
So very glad this project brought you and I into alignment.
Txx
My mentor lives deep inside me. I’ve come to realise that for way too many years I’ve ignored her, overruled her, shut her down, dismissed her. And yet, there she is always loving me, patiently waiting for my silence allowing her to speak. Some days she’s my younger self, the little girl I have a black and white photo of that sits on my desk. That Rebecca is about 3 years old and sits on a swing staring into the camera some distance off with a furrowed brow which I like to believe is a ‘don’t mess with me’ look. I love her, she’s cared for me many times in my life, during post natal depression, during my divorce, during my daughter’s anorexia. She takes no nonsense, she believes in me utterly and completely. She gets me moving when I simply want to curl up in a ball. She strokes my head gently and says, ‘you’ve got this.’
Sometimes my mentor is an older version of myself. A wise woman with a big heart. She holds me closely. She knows me intimately. When times feel incredibly tough and I start to imagine and believe all the wild stories I’m creating in my head, she simply says, ‘No, not now, these are not true.’
They love me endlessly.
They love me unquestioningly.
They’ve been speaking up more recently, in fact since my breast cancer diagnosis in November last year. As my world was shaken to its core, they stepped forward and held me close, whispered in my ear that all was well, that between us we are resilient, courageous, open hearted, in love with life and ready for healing. I know I’m not on this journey alone and that gives me confidence and hope.
Rebecca, moved to tears by what you've written here - the beauty and self-compassion of it. The vision, too, that it offers others who will read it but are without that. To whom it might never have occured that the harsh voices they've internalised from school, family, society might be replaced by wiser guides made up from their own selves. How beautiful that you've joined our project here with this piece - which gives me and others in the community such a deep sense of you. I do hope you will respond to other prompts (all stay open): I'd love to see how your mind works with them.
Here is your link to your words in the story archive:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#rebeccaperkins
And I've already added you to the ever-growing A to Z of contributors on my Substack page By Readers...:
https://tanyashadrick.substack.com/p/readers-stories
Thank you . Tanya xx
Thank you Tanya for your kind words. I've been unable to write since my diagnosis apart from diary entries. I came across you via another contributor and these prompts are the perfect introduction back into writing for me. I'm grateful for this space.
'He’s an ass,' someone wrote on the professor rating website. 'All ego,' wrote another. 'Yes, a dick, but a creative writing genius,' a third.
During our first class reading, I rattled off an embarrassing cliché, more bothered by my fear of public speaking than the mess of words I’d clattered out the night before.
I don’t remember the seconds following my story; I feel them. An edgy, 20-something man sat to my left. Untidy hair, confident storytelling. And to my right, Professor American Book Award.
I finished my short story to silence. Not shuffling papers, not the creak of old classroom chairs. Just the thud of blood in my ears. A sad agreement settled over the story circle.
'Well,' the professor sighed and put down his pen.
My cheeks burned, my scalp itched, pores opening. The rest of the period is a blank. I turned inward, nauseous. My insecurity feasted on my innards.
Another day, another story. With more honesty, as he taught me. I told the story of a young girl who sold her books to help her mother pay the bills. At the shop window, a phantasma of authors clambered to bid farewell. Shakespeare turned his hand with his words, 'parting is such sweet sorrow.'
It all rang true for me – a struggling family, books as living things.
'Well, hello,' the professor smiled. As if to say, welcome to the class.
'What happened?' he later asked.
The worst had, I thought. And it didn’t kill me.
He encouraged me to apply to the university’s master’s program. He pestered his colleague into opening up a study abroad program a month early. And in my signed copy of his novel, he inscribed, 'To a student worth the studenting.'
He taught me that in writerly matters, I could and should.
Lauren! Welcome to the project - what a powerful first piece. I'm in awe of the courage and resilience it takes to share creative writing in a student setting - nothing I've ever done, and although sometimes now I am a visiting lecturer and workshop leader, I still don't think I'd have what it takes to be physically present when offering work in progress to peers. I think it ends more emerging writers than it makes... so I'm glad that mentor was there for you, so that your words didn't go underground and stay there. And it makes you joining this project feel like privilege - I hope this space might also be a good one for you. I love how you use dialogue in this, and I'm hoping other themes will interest you to write for. Here is your link and I'm adding you to the A to Z of contributors on the book site but also in the By Readers tab on my Substack.
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#laurenmcgregor
Tanya xx
Thank you so much, Tanya! I am thrilled to join. It feels reality-shifting to do so. Though I say that this mentor encouraged me to join the master's program, to study abroad, etc., I let my fear, insecurity, and financial situation stop any of those things from happening. I moved home, got married, and now guide two gorgeous little souls through life. But the ache you so perfectly illustrate in The Cure for Sleep has consumed me. The need to create outside of my editing job is overwhelming and terrifying. This feels like a step in the right direction, a timid staking of my place as a writer. Thanks for having me!
'A timid staking of my place' - it's important to tell you that while you might have been full of fear and trembling submitting your piece and waiting for my response... your story-telling itself is strong and assured. It can take the weight of what you hope to do with it... xx
I was seventeen; a first-time camp counselor. A cabin had been repeatedly vandalized; we first-years were assigned the scutwork of being belly-down sentinels in the dirt under the adjacent cabin. I witnessed another destructive spree: a girl, far from home and deranged with missing her family, threw other campers' sleeping bags, pillows, blankets, into the lake. I quaked with the shame of thinking myself a snitch as I reported what I'd seen to the camp director, who treated the rager with an empathy that I could not comprehend. Yes, she was to be sent home, and arrangements were made to replace the flung items, but the girl was not punished. She was heard, tended, reprimanded with respect.
I went to the director's cabin that evening, pierced to the core with ethical agony. She, silent and serene, listened to and witnessed me. She assured me that I had done the right thing; that the heartsick girl had been understood.
I could not comprehend such kindness. I felt coated with black tar. My mentor stood in front of me as I was about to bolt from her cabin, opened her arms, drew me in, and simply held me for several astonishing moments in silence. I'd never been held before. I'd never melted into the existential safety of being held; being gently rocked on my feet in a strong, soft set of arms, next to a heart. Never had the nape of my neck cradled.
I skipped from her cabin to mine, electrified by joy.
What did I learn?--that touch could melt a rigid, petrified soul. That joy was a through-and-through truth. That to embrace another can save a life. My vocational path was woven with that wisdom...I know in my marrow what a hand can do with loving intent.
Catherine, this second piece from you is stunning. A perfectly-told short true tale - with that heart-aching short sentence in the middle of the third paragraph which opens up so much depth, as well as raising the stakes. We, the reader, feel for you - the child who was not held, the adult who has survived to tell the tale and live differently - but it also makes us reflect on what riches we had, those of us who did receive safe, loving touch: even while we were oftentimes perhaps more aware of things we wanted and did not have.
So many lines I would love to read aloud to you so you could hear back what you've given us here. 'A strong, soft set of arms, next to a heart.' 'I know in my marrow what a hand can do with loving intent.'
Thank you for writing it. Here is your link:
https://thecureforsleep.com/september-issue-mentors/#catherinedavies
Tanya xx