Move over Dan and Pam

So last night I 'advertised' On Facebook for anyobody that would be interested in starting a writing group in the St Ives area.

 

I love writing - this is why I do this blog and I know at least 2 of my friends ( Debbie and Leanne ) would like to do it too.  I think it comes from my interesting in reading, for example, I've often finished a book and thought ''hang on , I could write something like this'' but it's plucking up the courage and mustering some motivation to do it.

 

My oldest and bestest friend Nicola has written a book and it is currently in the hands of a couple of agents. She has also written plays that have been performed  and been shortlisted to be a screenwriter for Hollyoaks so I take my hat off to her for actually doing something about her passion.

 

My favourite type of writing is poems. I write one every week after the live X Factor shows and I just find it very easy to string the words together so that they rhyme, and are hopefully quite funny. I have also written some serious poems - my husband still talks about 'mad, sad, lady' which was about a lonely female tramp but I cant hep comparing it to Ms Phoebe Bouffait's song 'Smelly Cat' in Friends. I incidentally wrote mine before Friends was even televised but I dont think anyone would believe me now.

 

If  I was to write a book I dont think ti would be either poetic or funny - I think it would be a thriller and quite dark. That is the sort of books I read so that is where my interest would lie.

 

I decided a few years ago to cash in on the trashy magazine trade of true life stories.

 This is what I did.

 

I wrote a garbled letter to Eva magazine around 1995 saying how I had betrayed my sister when we were teenagers and now I could never forgive myself. I was from a strict catholic family ( I wasn't ), I was jealous of my virtuous sister ( I dont have a sister ) and when I found out that she had been sleeping with Jason the frisky altar boy I had flushed her contraceptive pills down the loo every few days. As a consequence my scatterbrained  'sister' Nicola ( named hastily after the friend mentioned above) became pregnant and was disowned by my old fashioned and humiliated parents and they threw her out on the cold streets of Northumberland.

I then went on to say that I hadn't seen her since, and that I could barely live with the guilt of what I had done all those years ago. I swear, even I was crying by the time I had finished it.

 

It was a proper sob story and I thought no more of it .....................until I got THE phone call............

 

One of the writers from the magazine rang me and said they would love to put the story in their magazine  but needed to clarify a few points. I gulped and agreed. She then went on to conduct a half hour interview over the phone and was asking things like ''so, Elizabeth, do you ever cry about your sister'' and ''so, Elizabeth, was it a spur of the moment plan or had you planned it?'' etc etc. I managed to sound suitably angst ridden and then a few weeks later my true life story was published!

 

And I got a cheque for £100!

 

I then became hungry for fame and money so I  wrote another story to a a different magazine. This one was  about how I had been asked by my friend Mandy (who incidentally had a life threatening illness and an abusive husband and no money ) to buy her a lottery scratchcard with her last £1.

 I did  - and guess what? I won £1000! which I then spent on a holiday to Tenerife and obviously never told Mandy about it and she never suspected because I just simply bought her another £1 lottery scratchcard.

 

I was prepared this time - and lo and behold I was phoned up and interviewed and I managed to convey my guilt, anger at myself, self loathing quite well over the phone I think.

 

I got another cheque for £100.

 

You'll be relieved to know that I didn't send any more stories in after that and I often wonder whether they rumbled me and were humouring me because they were quite sensational tales and also if any of the other 'true' stories are actually true at all or whether there are just lots of frustrated writers around the UK that want to make a fast buck for a bit of drama?

 

My friend Nicola , when hearing the first story where she was the star character suggested that she should then write in and say ''it's me! I'm her long lost disowned sister'' but I declined the offer because I just knew that they would then want to do a 'sisters reunited' story with Nicola and I hugging emotionally on the front page.

 

If the writing group takes off then I think I should firstly confess all to the others about my sins against creative writing................or..................

 

Maybe I should just stick to funny poems?

 

Maybe I should write some profound and abstract poems about air and emotions and shapes?

 

Maybe I should just stick to this blog..................................