Twittering Away

Wait for it! You’re not going to believe this … but I am now on…. Twitter !!

It was a struggle.

Until now, I’ve left all this social networking to the younger people in my team at work who seem to be on Facebook all the time. It has just never appealed to me although I have increasingly noticed that at events, people I meet often invite me to find them on Facebook or LinkedIn! Why do that? Why not just give me a good, old-fashioned business card ?

Anyway, recently I have noticed that my colleagues have been keeping abreast of news and events by following Twitter and so when I expressed a vague interest in how it works, one of them took me aside and showed me, with great delight, just how useful it is, as a PR tool.

So, I have become a convert and now I tweet away. Initially, I just stalked a few people and companies and then I started putting out a few tweets about events we were involved with and now I regularly treat the world to my personal insights and I seem to have amassed quite a few followers.

I’m a bit disappointed that I enjoy it so much as I wanted to maintain my curmudgeonly attitude to it all. But it’s OK as I can still do that with Facebook ! Thing is, I totally get Twitter as a work aide but I don’t really understand the pleasure I get in announcing that I’m about to watch #Jamie Oliver. Who cares?

Also, I follow a few celebrities (some of whom I have actually met) but I keep falling into the trap of thinking when they tweet, somehow they are interested in my response …amongst the thousands of others they get ! And then I feel stupid that I did it, and that everyone can see what I sent, even though I’m not doing it as a pathetic fan desperate for attention but as someone who has interacted with them in the past ….even if only for a few minutes. I must stop doing that, but it’s still a learning process.

I’m afraid you probably won’t find me, if you look, as I’m there under my @realname but if you are on Twitter and notice an unfamiliar follower reading your tweets, you may find you do know her after all !

Tweet-tweet !!

Pride And Joy

Warning: severe gushing about to be unleashed. Read on with care!

I do love my children. They make me so proud.

In August, Kyle found out he got an A in all his AS-level subjects and an A* in the A-level he took a year early. We are very proud of him and for the first time, he has started to believe that actually he is capable of great things. His school have been telling him for some time that he’s a potential Oxbridge student but I don’t think it was until he got these latest results that he started to believe it. And so he agreed to apply to Oxford to study law! It’s all so exciting.

We went at the end of September to one of the open days and it’s such a beautiful place. It would be such a privilege to study there. Obviously I’d be the proudest mother in the world if he got in but I’m trying really hard not to allow my thinking to influence him. After that trip though, I can see he’s keen l Their sporting facilities are second to none and he’s even talking about taking up rowing !!

Anyway, he re-wrote his personal statement and last month, he had to take the LNAT (Law National Admission Test) which forms part of his application and he thinks it went OK…. though he has moments of anxiety that maybe he completely misunderstood the essay question. Anyway, we’re all waiting now to see if he gets selected for interview.

And it’s not just my son who is causing my pride-ometer to rise….

Sasha is now writing her second musical for the youngsters at the youth centre where she helps out. After attending a residential composers’ course in the summer, she came back full of ideas and spends all her time at the piano. I’m so impressed with her. She’s turned into such a beautiful, compassionate young woman. She is now part of the management team for the soup kitchen where she has also been helping out for about a year and she has done some serious fund-raising and found them some local sponsorship.

Her relationship with young Freddie seems to be going from strength to strength and he is so proud and supportive of her. I hope she hangs on to him – he is lovely and they are a really handsome couple. He took her to his university ball last term and the photos were amazing. I bought three !

I must keep my dreams in check though. As much as I can see myself saying things in a very posh voice, like “My son? Oh yes he’s a student. Where? Oh, at Oxford. Oxford University” !! …..or, picturing myself in tears as I watch Freddie’s reaction to my beautiful Sasha coming up the aisle on her father’s arm in the most amazing wedding dress….. I must stop myself from getting too carried away or I’ll end up being disappointed and worse, I’ll subconsciously pile on the pressure for the two people I love most in the world.

I don’t need to look ahead though because whatever happens they have made me so proud already.

I’m a very lucky mum.

Decision Made

Thank you for all your lovely comments and emails.

I thought about it long and hard and I have decided not to publish here. Not yet anyway ! I’ve found a writers group that offers feedback and advice for each other at whatever point they are with their writing. I thought I would give that a go and will go along to their next meeting in a couple of weeks

Meanwhile, I’m still writing my short stories and have now amassed quite a collection. I may well just drop one into the blog every so often when I can’t think of anything else to write.

But for now, this will stay as a record of my life…..although I may, just may, have to change the title, very soon !!

The Urge To Write

In the last few months, as I’ve been travelling from one end of the country to the other, I’ve started writing. I’ve had a book in my head for some time but I’m always pushing it away as I want to write it when I have time to sit down and just do it, rather than trying to fit it in between so many other things.

One day, when I was on one of my long train journeys, I suddenly thought of JK Rowling and how she apparently formulated Harry Potter on the train to Manchester. I also happened to be on the train to Manchester !!

So, I started to put down on paper the elements of my story and the characters …..and it felt really good. The words were just flowing from my pen with hardly any effort and I got very excited at the thought of writing it. I was planning to start it on the journey back but I was so tired that I slept all the way. And since then, I haven’t been able to get back into it. It’s as if something is physically stopping me.

I’m guessing it’s fear. All the time that the book was in my head, it was a bit of a fantasy that I could dismiss fairly easily as something to be done in the future. After putting down my thoughts on paper though, it has become much more real and I could end up writing this and it could be rubbish. I don’t have a clue how to write a book. I don’t even know if I have style that would or could engage readers. So I have not gone back to it at all. I’m such a coward.

However, whenever I travel by train now, I have an irrational desire to write. I probably should just write the book and then put it away and look at it again next year, or something. But like I said, I can’t. So instead, I have found that by watching people on the train, ideas suddenly pop into my head and I have now written a number of short stories.

I don’t know if they’re any good but I have just read the first one, which I wrote a couple of months ago and I think I like it but I really want to get some honest opinions. I don’t know if I have the guts to publish it here and I may never be able to do it……..

…..but, if I were to put it on this blog, would you be willing to read it and give me your brutally frank, critical opinions ???

Did You Miss Me ???

Oh, it’s been a very long time !

Lots of reasons. Primarily work. In June, we were given a last-minute contract to work on a huge project and so everyone in the company has dropped everything to concentrate on what we need to do. My role has seen me travelling up and down the country, meeting with various people and although I do love that, it has been so incredibly tiring.

In between that I have had to fit in with my family, trying to join them for bits of holiday in Cornwall, the Peak District and Ireland. They seemed to be quite happy carrying on without me!

And then, in the odd bits of time I have had free, I’ve tried to blog but I often couldn’t access my site. When it did let me log on, I had no access to my blogroll of fellow blogger sites or to my followers. I can’t tell you how frustrating that was, especially as sometimes it would let me comment on some blogs but most of the time, it wouldn’t even let me type in the comment box.

I toyed with the idea of giving it all up, especially as the next year is going to be so busy for me but the thought of that was too distressing and so I persevered whenever I had an opportunity. And then finally this week, (and don’t laugh, you all know how technically rubbish I am!!), I noticed a warning that I swear I never saw before, that said my blog was no longer supported by Internet Explorer. OK, OK, I can hear you all laughing, but why should I know that ??!! So, I’ve switched browsers and now I have my precious blog back to how it was, with pictures of followers and My Blog List back and I can’t tell you how happy I am – it’s as exciting as when I first started. I just have to hope that you lot are all there and haven’t abandoned me. We shall see ………

Anyway, thanks for those who emailed and commented, wondering where I was. It was nice to be missed.

And for those of you who didn’t, DID YOU EVEN REALISE I WAS GONE ????

Trying My Hand At Adult Behaviour

Since Matt, I have tried very hard not to allow my head to be turned by men and their flattery.

I realised a while back that until now, I have let that happen too easily. Someone would start to flirt and I would flirt back and before I knew it I would be in a situation that I didn’t know how to get out of. And so, on three occasions in my married life an affair has started and on numerous other occasions I have just cut off contact with various men in a bid to rid myself of difficulties. That in turn, has caused me all sorts of anxieties about what the other person must think of me, leading me to dislike myself more for getting into that position in the first place.

Oh, I’m so ridiculous.

Anyway, I’ve decided to take more control. Not so difficult now I have to admit, because I notice that as I get older, there is not so much attention. Tracy Emin said it best in a recent interview, when she said women of our age suddenly become invisible and it takes some getting used to !!

However, saying that, Norman has shown an interest !

He is one of our Directors and he has a fearsome reputation. He knows what he wants, he always gets results, he doesn’t tolerate fools and he shouts…. a lot. He has never really been involved with me and my team but whenever we have been at a meeting or in a room together, he has studiously ignored me.

In spite of that, or maybe because of it, I've always been quite fascinated by him.

He’s in his sixties and not an obviously good-looking man but he keeps himself trim and dresses well and actually there is something quite attractive about him. The fact that he’s brusque and seems to get bored easily, seems to add to the appeal.

Anyway, a few months ago, he wandered into my office and threw a folder down on the desk. “I was told you might be interested in this so you are welcome to it as it doesn’t do a thing for me. If you don’t fancy it, find someone else to do it.” And with that he stalked out again.

I looked in the folder and it was a brief to work with a very well known dance company and exactly the sort of thing I love. So, I made a few calls and it wasn’t long before I was on the case. A few weeks later, I got an email from Norman asking how it was going. I told him it was going well and thanked him belatedly for passing the job on to me. I cheekily added that he should have given it a go as it was fun and I had already got a free dance class out of it. He messaged back that dancing wasn’t his idea of a good time and when I asked him what was he told me to take a double expresso into his office and he would tell me. Given that this man had never shown any interest in me until now, I decided to do just that. And actually, that afternoon in his office was very entertaining as he told me a lot about himself and revealed that he had often wanted to talk to me as he was impressed with the way I worked and fascinated by my loud laugh.

The next day he asked me out to lunch and since then, that has been a regular thing and we have become quite good friends.

That whole gruff thing is a bit of a front and actually, I have realised that the people who work with him have a huge amount of respect for him despite the fact that he shouts a lot. He’s very intelligent and is very up on his news and current affairs. In addition, he loves reading, especially anything to do with history and goes to the theatre as often as he can. Trouble is, he has no one to share it with. His wife left him a long time ago as their marriage fell apart when their eldest child died suddenly and he took refuge in his work. From what he says, it seems he doesn’t feel worthy of a partner which is a great shame. He knows women like him but he feels that they are drawn to him because he has money and anyway, the whole business of trying to meet the right person, he says, takes too much energy.

I know he likes me. The old me would, for some reason, have made it easier for him to make a move but I have been very aware that I have kept up a guard to stop him crossing any line. He will often say that he wishes he could meet someone like me who is funny and intelligent and I immediately then talk about Ewan so that he knows I’m not available. Trouble is, I think my natural flirtatiousness sends mixed messages so he doesn’t really know where he stands. I feel quite sorry for him really but I’m trying to behave like an adult so that I don’t have to suddenly stop meeting up with him as I really would miss his company.

It’s hard but I think I’m finally learning !

Back To Therapy

I signed on to an anger management course and yesterday I went along to the first of six group sessions.

I’m not going to document every last detail but I thought some of what was said was very interesting. It’s probably what most people know but for me it was a bit of a revelation.

Namely, that:
a) anger is a natural emotion – a simple release of energy
b) it’s OK to be angry because it is part of the human condition
c) anger is a way of saying “no thank you”, “I don’t agree with that” or “stop it”
d) anger can be healing
e) we shouldn’t tell our children that they shouldn’t express their anger or that anger is bad
f) it is what we do with our anger that may not bring benefit so we should use it as a tool
g) it’s not helpful to hold in anger as that repression often leads to rage which is not a good thing.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be learning how to use anger as a tool and how to cut off the path to rage in “healthy, non-threatening and non-damaging” ways.

Watch this space ….