…to say that I’m having a wonderful time in the old country and will try to tell you about it without boring you – starting in about two weeks.
Hang in there!
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Author: Miriam Drori
Author, editor, attempter of this thing called life. Social anxiety warrior. Re-Connections, a collection of short stories, published with Ocelot Press, 15/10/2025.
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An Amazing Contest
I’m supposed to be getting ready to go away, but I had to come back to tell you about this contest. You get a brief review of and suggestions for ways to improve the first three chapters of your manuscript whether you win or not. Can you resist it? I can’t.
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Catching Up
I’ve actually been doing things – like all-night dancing, walking by the sea in a heat wave and swimming in a private pool and a big lake. And in a few days I’m going away for a long time. See you after mid-September. Be good….
I’m going away
To the UK,
To the north to walk
And the south to talk.
But I’ll be back,
So keep on track,
And let me know
How things go.
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I feel honoured
That’s what it says here. Sounds good to me!
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Unbelievable
To tell you the truth, I’m having a hard time believing my last post but one. Yes, we’re all different. Yes, some people are better at some things while others are better at others. But there are certain things that everyone’s expected to be able to do.
It’s OK to say you can’t sing, can’t dance, can’t walk. But can’t talk? Everyone’s supposed to be able to talk, unless some physical disability prevents it.
All right, I talk. But sometimes I dry up, sometimes I don’t express myself well enough to be understood, and sometimes, in a group, I don’t join in for fear of drawing attention to my shortcomings. And when one of those things happens, my mood drops as eyebrows are raised, and I don’t feel at all proud of being me. Sorry.
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Writing Quotes
Some great quotes about writing, via Yeda:
This report, by its very length, defends itself against the risk of being read.~Winston ChurchillWriting is 1 percent inspiration, and 99 percent elimination.~Louise BrooksWrite without pay until someone offers pay. If nobody offers within three years, the candidate may look upon this as a sign that sawing wood is what he was intended for.~Mark Twain
Three years? Ahem. Does anyone have a wood saw?
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I am me. And proud of it!
Once, Jenni Murray, talking about exercising, said that women over fifty tend not to run up the stairs. I think of that every time I run up the stairs.
She has also said (can you tell I like to listen to Woman’s Hour?) that women are good at multi-tasking. I can listen to the radio and work in the kitchen at the same time, but that’s as far as it goes. If you talk to me, I’ll probably stop what I’m doing to answer you. I hasten to add, though, that I can drive and talk, and even know when something on the road needs to take precedence over talking.
I’ve spent too long thinking there’s something wrong with me if I don’t conform to the stereotype. So what if I’ll never be the world’s best conversationalist? I can do things that others can’t. I can sing, and dance, and write, and run up the stairs. I can even give a prepared talk in front of an audience and enjoy it.
Just as we don’t want to read about stereotypical characters, we don’t have to be those characters. We are individuals. Hurray!
I took Nick Hornby’s About a Boy out of the library. Yes, I know it’s from the last century, but it looked as if it might be interesting and it was – most of it.
As the blurb says, it’s really about two boys, one of twelve who acts too old for his age and one of thirty-six who needs to grow up. I identified with the twelve-year-old, but not because I ever acted older than my age. It’s because the boy didn’t fit in at school and was therefore bullied.
I enjoyed following the characters of this story, and especially the two main characters. I found their motivations believable and interesting. And I enjoyed the humour throughout. But I was disappointed by the ending.
Firstly, on page 265 out of 278, there is a typo. It says “Ruth” where I’m pretty sure it should say “Katrina.” Not very important, but that seems to herald the bad ending.
What happens at the end is what’s supposed to happen in all good stories. The characters change. The man becomes an adult and the boy becomes a normal boy who is no longer bullied. For me, it all happens too quickly. I don’t believe that the boy’s life could have changed so fast. I want to see how it happens. I want the author to show me the process.
But he doesn’t and I’m disappointed, even though I enjoyed reading 264 278ths of the book. That’s 95%.
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Going Back
I have a special relationship with Britain. Any other country I visit is foreign. I’m fascinated by the way the people live and I love to explore the countryside. But it remains a wonderful experience of something else, something I’m not part of.
Britain – or, more specifically, England – is different. It’s the place where I was born, where I grew up. It’s a part of me, even though it doesn’t play a part in my current everyday life.
I haven’t lived in England for…. Well, let’s just say that when I was growing up, calculating money involved the factors 12 and 20, and my favourite music was provided by four boys from Liverpool.
Going to England isn’t like going anywhere else. It’s not a visit to a foreign country. It’s a return to a life I left – to the bad times and the good, to people I knew then and places that have remained. And that connects nicely to those four boys:
There are places I remember
All my life though some have changed
Some forever not for better
Some have gone and some remain
All these places have their moments
With lovers and friends I still can recall
Some are dead and some are living
In my life I’ve loved them all
So I’m going back soon, first for two weeks with hubby in Scotland, then three weeks on my own in England. I’m starting to make plans. If anyone has any suggestions about what I could do at not too great an expense – literary of otherwise – for three weeks in August-September, do let me know.
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Understanding motivations
People are complicated. It’s often hard to understand why they behave in certain ways. Sometimes, it’s hard to understand your own behaviour. I’ve often failed to understand my reactions, although, as I get older and (hopefully) wiser, things are becoming clearer.
Cat of Daily Improvements wrote about people who behave out of character and about her own lapses when talking to officials. Many people will be surprised to learn that I also occasionally break out of my normal reserve and shout at people – strangers – including some who really don’t deserve such treatment. For years, I didn’t understand why I did this. Now I know that it’s my way of turning off social anxiety. Like Cat, I’m not proud of losing my temper in this way, but I understand where it comes from. My poor victims don’t understand.
Cat says she’s going to “try and be more aware of the motivations of other people and the mitigating factors that might explain their behaviour.” That’s good advice for anyone, but often it’s impossible to know what motivates others. We just have to be aware that everyone has motivations, and often things ain’t what they seem.
Miriam Drori, Author 