‘The light we can’t pin down,
coming only once to fill our days.’
from Portrait of my Father at 60 by Clare Crossman
Some days are hard going – I love to write and fight to find the time amongst all the organisation of my impending spoken word website listenupnorth.com. Currently, I’m stuck on Episode 4 of my steamy monologue ‘Celia’ about the affair of a married middle-aged woman. The only steam I’m working up at the moment is in a boiling hot conservatory full of dead flies – not the most inspiring place but it’s the furthest room in the house from my desk, which at this moment is covered with bills and statements which need to be sorted into the dreaded accounts.
Thank goodness there are lots of rewarding days to compensate. Recently, I recorded poet Clare Crossman reading some of her work. It was a joy to meet Clare, originally from the Cumbria/Northumberland border, now living in Cambridgeshire, and hear a selection of poetry that she read from ‘The Shape of Us’ (Shoestring Press). I am looking forward to hearing Clare’s edited recordings. I found her words intelligent and beautiful without being too abstract for the listener or reader to identify with them. After the recording, Clare and I took a well-deserved afternoon tea in the sunny courtyard of Aston Buckley in the Chare, Hexham.
Another great person I’ve met recently is actor Georgia Nicholson, extremely enthusiastic, she has come to my rescue recently taking up the role of Michelle in my supernatural thriller, ‘Dolly’s House’. During rehearsals I have benefited greatly from her insight and experience gained from numerous local productions. She is currently in the Greenshoe Performance Company, which played at the Edinburgh Festival last year.
Georgia has just been offered a place at the prestigious Academy of Live and Recorded Arts in London, one of forty students chosen from thousands of applicants nationally. At present she is trying to raise money for the fees, which are almost £12,000 a year. She is asking people if they could sponsor her for just £40 per year for three years so that she can take up this fantastic opportunity. If you feel you would like to help her, please contact Georgia on [email protected].
