Taking time out

Hello Dear Readers,

If you follow me on twitter, you have have noticed that I have been rather quiet lately, well, the reason for this is my impending wedding, which is now only five weeks away!  If you’ve ever been involved in organising a wedding, you’ll be well aware how much headspace it can take up.  As it draws closer, I am spending more and more time on what I am calling ‘wedding admin’ – counting rsvps, checking dietary requirements, updating table plans (and hoping X won’t mind being on the same table as Y), and so on.  The trouble is, as I am spending so much time on wedding admin, and of course there is work, other personal commitments, and trying to still find time to be creative, I am losing out on thinking time.

A while ago, I wrote a poem for a wedding, entitled ‘This is not just a wedding,’ and although the words were specific to this couple, the title rings true for me too.  This is not just a wedding, it’s a marriage.  It’s not about table plans and dietary requirements and whether people will get on and where we need to be and when… It’s about me, and him, coming together as a new family, and what that might mean for us.

So, I’m taking a ‘Time Out,’ to concentrate on my wedding, to enjoy my honeymoon, and to make sure I spend as much thinking time on my marriage, as I have been on my ‘wedding admin.’

I may pop up online (most likely on twitter) between now and June, but after that, I’ll effectively be offline until July, so I’ll see you back here then!

Creative destruction

A while ago, I blogged about my copy of Keri Smith’s book, ‘Wreck this journal,’ and how I had started to wreck it, abandoned it, and then wrecked it again.  Back then, I promised to post evidence of further destruction ‘in due course.’

Well, I got distracted.  However, this week I decided to experiment again with destruction as a form of creation.  So, I got the journal out again, followed some of the instructions, and took some photos.

It wasn’t quite as much fun as kicking it around the garden with a snow covered football, but still.  For me, it’s important to be destructive from time to time, and this is a good way to channel that.  Do you have destructive tendencies?  If so, how do you channel this part of you into your creative work?