The Rooster #20
Things I want to remember in the week that April turned into May.
The Rooster is my newsletter. It includes a recommendation section for my paid subscribers, this week featuring a podcast you NEED to listen to if you are a woman who likes to work out, an incredible New Yorker article, advice from Cynthia Erivo and a book I don’t want to end. If you want to upgrade to being a paid subscriber you can do so here
Substack can sometimes make me feel that I need to condense my life into snappily premised articles with leading questions for title headings… I get stressed, trying to turn over the happenings of my days into magazine style content. Then I remember that I joined this place to try and build a community around being a writer. I can just be me and do things my way. I don’t tend to write think pieces. I don’t have answers. I don’t tie things up neatly. On The Rooster I tend to write to remember, to tie down my days into words so they won’t float away, and to connect of course, to share the feelings I have about those days with you.
This week has felt big. There have been lots of firsts. Here are the things I would like to remember.
The feeling of finishing draft three of my book. Euphoria. Relief. Pressing send on an email with it attached to my agent, then cycling down the road in the sunshine to meet her for lunch. For the first time I tell her about my hopes and dreams for the book. How it has felt to write it. She tells me that she will read it in a week and feedback. That feeling of a weight lifted - no matter what, no matter how bad the draft is, it’s team work now. I’m not on my own anymore.
The last training session with my football club. A long game. We are loose. Playing for enjoyment. A huddle at the end, tired, sweaty, a circle of women and our coach all reaching our arms into the middle of the circle, hands on hands on hands. ONE TWO THREE. U - D.
A cycle to the ponds on the first day of May. Beautiful sunshine - the water divinely cold and refreshing - fourteen degrees - pootling along with my friend in the water, we passed a rubber life ring that had been commandeered by a moorhen to build a huge nest. Mother moorhen sat in the middle of it guarding her eggs, imperious, as all the ladies glided by.
Being a volunteer on my son’s school trip. Twenty nine eight year olds in pairs, holding hands, chattering excitedly. I was in charge of eight of them. The tubby little boy who couldn’t stop taking about the chicken gyoza in his lunchbox and how excited he was to eat them, his partner, an adorable big eyed buck teethed Pixar cartoon-cute girl, skinny with a big head, like a doll. My child hand in hand with his best friend, talking about an imaginary bakery that they would like to own. The bakery is on Chocolate Chip lane. There is a meditation station. Self prescribed roles. His friend is the pastry man. My son is the muffin man. He makes up a song about the Muffin man, which involves a spoken word intro in which I have to take part.
My same child the following day, in a hospital in Isleworth going under sedation for another MRI. Him turning over to face me in his bed, asking me to give him a quiz. Becoming more sleepy with every question I put to him, answering each one with the same word, ‘donut’.
A marquee in Ayr in Scotland, metres from the sea. Standing with my tour manager, watching the DJs before me, waiting to go on. The sound from stage, slap back. Thumping bass and the roar of a crowd of thousands. The smell of dry-ice. Familiar scene, An awareness of all the stages, all the marquees that have come before.. all the faces all the hands in the air. A sort of homecoming feeling. I’m still here. I have changed. And I’m still here.
I’m going to try putting out The Rooster every fortnight for a while. Life is getting very busy at the moment and I want use what writing time I have to craft some bigger pieces for you over Spring/Summer. I hope this works for you. Thank you so much to everyone who took part in our community chat last Tuesday. I LOVE talking to you on there. The chat is still up there for any of you who missed it. We decided together that we’re going to do them every three weeks. I’ll post the date for the next one soon.
and for paid subscribers, my recommendations are below.. this week including a podcast you NEED to listen to if you are a woman who likes to work out, an incredible New Yorker article and a book I don’t want to end.