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Being A Writing Mentor …

carolyncordon

I’ve had a variety of people in my writing life who could be looked on as my ‘mentor’, two of them officially, others more informal mentors. These people have all helped in a variety of different ways.

And at the moment, I’m looking at the ins and outs of being a writing mentor for someone else, who asked me about taking on that role. I was glad to have been asked, and said yes. I feel I will be able to assist that writer in different ways, as I have to other people in the past

Now I’m thinking about the more practical aspects of taking on such a role. There is the question of how formal the mentor/mentee relationship might be, whether there needs to be any insurance, or other kinds of paperwork, and so on.

At the moment, I’m leaning towards informal, but with an agreement signed by us both … Insurance is a tricky thing, and expensive, if it is even possible to get it organised … I’ve done this role in an informal way in the past, but not for payment.

I’m looking forward to seeing what might come of the upcoming mentor position in the offing. Words will come of it, that is certain.

An Update On How Things Are Going

This mentor thing hasn’t begun as yet, we are still thinking about the how and what aspects, but we both definitely don’t want something formal. The mentee will share work, the mentor will give opinions. The mentor may also offer useful information about upcoming events, and perhaps ideas about possible publication options.

So basically, the update is that it is still a thing that will happen, but not quite yet. We were both at an event put on by my writing group on Sunday just past, and both felt it was an excellent event – a writing related workshop, and then a poetry reading.

I was able to give feedback about how I felt about a person in my mentee’s non-writing life who had said stupid and wrong things to them about their writing. My proposed mentee has definite talent with words, but a medical person told them they had no such talent.

Pretty well everybody at the event said that person was an idiot, and was wrong, and they have lots of talent!

But it has been postponed until after SA Writers Week, which my mentee is attending, but I am not, so nothing will happen until after that week is over. And if standing up for another writer is part of what a mentor is all about, I will gladly do that!

I have no idea why that person said what they said, which was that my mentee was delusional, if they thought their writing was any good, or something along those lines. It was an amazingly unhelpful thing to say, and ignorant, because this person is talented, for sure.

I will not be surprised if she produces a fine poetry collection, and gets it published, at the end of being mentored by me. I know things about the various processes involved in such things, and am more than happy to share my knowledge with other poets/writers.

The world is a big thing and there is always room for another book!

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When Things Go Bad, Writing About It Can Help …

carolyncordon

Choosing to look at the less than wonderful things that happen in your life can be hard, heartbreaking even (or that’s what it feels like). But actually, writing about things is a way your mind can begin to come to turns with the bad things, and understand how you can cope with it.

Dear Missy, you can never be replaced (author’s photo)

So the dog in that photograph, Missy, died recently. She was 14 years old, and had collapsed at home. We took her to the vet, but despite their work, we were left with having to make the decision on whether or not to let her go. We decided the time had come. And so MIssy is gone.

She was a good dog, and after living with her for those 14 years, the final years with her as our only dog, we learnt to love this girl more and more. Missy had suffered for much of her life with a disease – Canine Dry Eye, that required having gel-type medication in her eyes at least twice a day, morning and evening.

Missy put up with my at first clumsy efforts with this, and I gradually got better at doing it. Missy understood what she had to do – I’d tell her, “Eye time, Missy,” and she’d get up on her favourite, comfortable seat, (the one in the photo) where I would do my needed task.

Missy was compliant, which made me feel the gel medication must have felt soothing for her. I hope it did. She was so much more that just a dog with an eye disease though. Missy was a hunter, and when she was outside, would be looking for things to hunt, kill, and eat.

Pharaoh Hounds, which was Missy’s breed, are actually the National Breed of Malta, where they are called ‘Kelb tal-Fenek’ which means ‘hunter of rabbits. And Missy certainly had a keen hunter’s instinct. She would look for things to hunt (and kill if she could), whenever she was out in the back yard.

We almost lost Missy many years before her eventual death, because of that need to hunt. There was a Brown Snake in our back yard. Missy caught it, and almost killed it. But it bit her, and she would have died then, if we hadn’t rushed her to the vet … Missy received the appropriate treatment, and we were able to pick her up from the vet the next day.

And as soon as Missy was out in the back yard again, she was hunting for things again. Hunting is the driving force for most, if not all, of the breeds of dog in the ‘Hound’ group. If a hound is on the hunt, they stop listening to their humans, because their instinctual need to hunt is so strong.

We had been talking about getting another dog, as a companion for Missy, over the past few years, but never did much about actually getting such a dog. We knew what breed we would get, another from the hound group – a Greyhound. Our son has his own greyhound who he loves, and has convinced us that is what we have to get.

And having been owners and breeders of Pharaoh Hounds, which are similar to Greyhounds in many ways, I feel the move to that breed of dog will come easily to us. We just need to find the right one … A girl, or a boy, what age, colour, size? It will take some time, more time than usual, given the current Covid times we’re living in.

As I write these words, I can feel the tears are there, behind my eyes, waiting, but I don’t think those tears will come. I’ve been preparing myself for the ultimate death of Missy, because at her age and how things were going for her, well, we knew she was on her way out.

When you have a formerly active dog, that has begun spending more and more time fast asleep, well that’s a sign. People will often say, about their dog – but he’s still eating, so I know he’s going OK. But from my lengthy times with dogs, I know they will hold onto their appetite well up until they die …

So that’s how things were for Missy – she ate all of her lunch with relish. But some time later she collapsed, and couldn’t get up again. This happened yesterday (Sunday), and we rushed to find an emergency vet not too face away. Once found, we got there as quickly as we legally cound.

The people at the vet clinic did all they could, but Missy’s heart had stopped, got going again after CPR, but only just. Missy didn’t regain consciousness. When they asked, we made the best decision, to let Missy go to her peaceful death. There would have been no point in extending her suffering, at that stage.

Thank you for reading this. I feel better for having shared this story. Missy was a great dog, and I am glad we had her in our lives.

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As A Writer, I Have To Prioritise As Well

carolyncordon

I also have to realise I don’t have to do everything right now, I can plan them, and do some now, other things later. After thinking about this for a week or so, I’ve made a plan and a decision. This is it:

The next anthology I was going to get working on to launch later this year, will now happen toward the end of this year, with a possible launch in 2023.

Covid is a killer, and thousands of people are being affected every moment, with sickness and death, and then the terrible grieving that comes after. So the time to let this theme go, and move on to the next one, is clearly not here, not yet.

I wrote a blog post about this new anthology, and while it is still in the back of my mind. there are other things in my mind as well, further forward in the front of my mind, that will happen before the anthology. The subject of my first anthology I edited, the one titled “Plague Invasion” is still in the news , and it doesn’t feel the time to move away from that subject, when it is still so incredibly relevent to us all.

And I have other things happening with my writing and connected activities, even in this Covid restricted world. A poetry collection to come out in a five more months, the event to launch it, with guest writer/poet events with my writing group to be presented (if Covid allows it), at our usual venue – the Prince Albert Hotel in Gawler, in the months before m own personal event put on by our writing group.

I am one of the two organisers for these wonderful events at the Prince Albert hotel, and have to admit, I’ve been missing being there in recent times, because our writing group has been meeting online instead of in person, because of you know what, yes Covid …

And I don’t want to sound too much like I stuck on a theme in exclusion of everything else, but the monthly events our writing group puts on, are all reliant on us being able to meet in person, safely … I was at the hotel today, celebrating my wedding anniversary with my husband, actually, and took the opportunity to check out the areas where we usually hold our events.

And from what I saw, I can’t say for sure that it seemed likely that we’d be able to hold the Gawler Poets at the Pub events there, not just yet … having to keep socially distanced is a thing we have to do, in the interests of the safety of all. But sitting that far away means difficulties for all, and the need to wear a mask unless eating and drinking is another ‘issue’.

So thinking about whether we’re going to be able to hold these events, and whether our writing group are going to be able to meet up for real again soon, these are in my mind as well. And of course, there is the novel I’m writing, bit by tiny bit … I want to work a lot more on that for sure. I think a full day just doing that would be a great thing, but when …

The one thing I do, regarding writing is the monthly newsletter I edit, and that must be ready, and sent off to be printed by a certain day, to be printed and distributed before the end of the month, every month … The January issue is on it’s way, but not ready yet, so I’ know what I’ll be doing tomorrow – the chronicle, not my novel, or any work on an anthology that isn’t going to be released until next year …

Writing that down, shows me I have a plan, and I can stick with it, doing my homework, and the writing exercises with the writing group, at the proper time. Working on the newsletter in the moments that become available, and waiting until my poetry collection is ready to launch in May. Fingers crossed to it being OK to meet up for book launches again by then.

I’m triple vaccinated, and I hope most other people are as well, so we can all safely gather together, and even give hugs to people! Won’t that be a glorious thing? I’d love to prioritise a time for that to happen!

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From Mouse(s) In The House, To Fool In The Pool

carolyncordon

Mice, in the kitchen! Yuck I hate it when they invade our main cooking space! So we set traps, and then have the task of disposing of the trapped and dead creatures. Or not dead, then ‘finishing them off’. I hate it all, every step of the process, the final step of which is the releasing of the dead body back to Nature …

That final step is the part that may bring some comfort to my mind, even if only a little. I don’t like to kill things. I watch out for ants that I know will be on my path down to our pond, stepping over the line they’ve made over time from so many ants tramping along to or from their nest not that many metres away.

And if I hit a bird when I am driving, I feel pain in my mind and heart, and I will slow down to avoid such a thing if I see the bird (or other creature) in time. So mice in the kitchen, hate them, but today? I was in the back yard, watering some of our plants by the swimming pool, and noticed something was making ripples in the pool. So I went and looked.

I was worried it maybe have been a baby snake, in which case I would have had to ‘get rid of it’, which would have entailed catching it and drowning it. The only snakes we ever get at our place are poisonous ones, and I suspect my husband is going to want to get in the pool for a swim when he gets home. Having a snake in the pool could lead to disaster, with a snake bite followed by urgent medical treatment to save his life!

Anyway, no such things had to happen, the creature that had caused the pool ripples was a tiny little mouse, swimming in the deep end of the pool. I looked at it, and it looked at me, its eyes pleading with me to save its life. A mouse, a creature we callously kill if they ever enter our house and are victim to the traps we set to kill them.

So what did I do? I reached over, and very gently grasped the mouse by the tail, and set it free, on the other side of the pool fence, away from the house. And I felt good about saving that little creature’s life, because I admired it’s bravery, and perseverance, paddling away the way it was.

So I will never know if that foolish mouse that fell in our pool might be the same foolish mouse that gets trapped in a trap in our house, but at least I have done it a favour at least once … Life and Nature can become extraordinarily confused at times, and that is why thinking on life is important, when such matters occur …

A life saved is a chance for better life choices to be taken … May that mouse be content to scurry around in the grass and plants outside, and stay away from both the pool, and our kitchen!