Reasons to Write Part 2: Press Trips

'I'm eating your tree - you cool with that?'

So what do you want to gain out of this writing gig then?  Money, fame, adulation?  We may not all get to be Hunter S Thompson, JK Rowling or Stephen King but if there is one thing that writing is near guaranteed to give you, it's new experiences.   I hadn't thought much about Victoria Falls before I went there last week.  Sure I liked travelling and getting to do some travel writing was one of the reasons I started hassling everyone I could for writing work a couple of years back.  But one of the many privileges of being a writer is that you can experience the world in a way that someone who chose a profession other than journalism would.  You can live like a King.  This was the thought that struck me as I sat on a small island of a bed looking down the lawn to the Zambezi in Zambia, just after I had been introduced to the butler I had been told to call on whenever I needed to.  I would think it again in a small gazebo as a masseur kneaded and pummelled relaxation into my body as the gurgles of the river tickled my ears.  A giraffe outside my room certainly made a nice change from pigeons scavenging discarded takeaways back home in London too.

Press trips can be good for more than boasting opportunities, they're pretty good for networking too.  I discussed one of the other titles that I write for with the PR that was with us in Africa and it's likely we'll be working together again later this year.  The more I meet other journalists, the more I find out how they can write for a living.  I discovered that working for a news organisation in the North West of England means you can afford a house with a garden; the guy who works for one down here is sharing a house with three of his mates in an area where it's increasingly likely he'll get mugged.

Lastly, press trips are good for getting some perspective.  While we were in Zambia, we visited an AIDS hospice, an orphanage and most inspiring of all, a farm worked by blind people.  However frustrated and stressed you might get with your own life, there will always be someone out there in the world who's having a much tougher time of it than you.   There's no way of saying this without sounding like a schmaltzy soundbite from an overly sentimental movie but I'm going with it: we all need reminding of that sometimes.

Authonomy

By way of the writers group that I go to, I discovered Authonomy recently and thought it was worth a punt.  I've had the bones of a book written (100,000 words) for some time now and have been sporadically redrafting, which I find a bit of a chore (though I'm sure that it's absolutely essential).  I'm just at the point of sending off the first three chapters and a query letter to literary agents so Authonomy seemed like a good way to dip my toe in the water although I've had problems figuring out what genre it might fit into.  'Can't Be Sure' (the book what I wrote, as Eric and Ernie might have it) is the male version of chick lit, whatever that is ('dick lit' has been one friend's suggestion).  Fifteen years ago it would have been the same kind of thing that Hornby, Parsons et all were writing.  I've googled a bit and the closest genre description I've found is 'new lad lit'.  Unfortunately for me it's the genre the Telegraph were proclaiming the death of about ten years ago.  Authonomy suggests genres, so I've had to go with 'Fiction' 'Humour' 'Chick Lit' and 'Popular Culture'.  Not ideal, but that categorisation is bringing different types of readers to it, which is at least good for feedback.

Anyway, if you're reading this and you're interested, you can read it here.  I've found it useful having to write a 25 word description of it and having changed it a couple of times, I've gone with 'If you like chick lit, this is the book for you. But only if you're ready for the man's side of the story.' The longer version is '29 year old Andrew Winters is ready to settle down. He's moved in with his ambitious girlfriend Rachel, his best friend Paul is always up for a beer and he's got a steady job. The only problem is that he fancies his colleague Kate. Worse, she seems to like him too. People say you know when you've found the right person. But how can you be sure? 'Can't Be Sure' is a male take on the confusing business of finding 'the one'.  It's a lot about love, the choices we make and temptation.  There's quite a bit that should make you laugh and quite a bit of sex in it too.  Maybe it's a sex comedy - Woody Allen gets away with that doesn't he?  Hope you like it and your support, by way of comments, or backing me on the site, would be much appreciated.

Motivation

I'm making one of these for myself this weekend.

The subject writers most commonly write about is probably procrastination.  There are a million reasons not to write.  Some of mine currently are; the 40 hour a week job that I need to pay for the wedding, the wedding (organising invites, sorting hotels for the family, blah, blah), not spending so much time in front of the laptop and more with my partner...it goes on. 

I often ask my partner 'What's the difference between a reason and an excuse?' (this pops up a lot when we argue, funnily enough).  No one would say, I'm guessing, that I shouldn't spend more quality time with her rather than watching the telly or fannying about on Twitter.   The point is, my only real reason to write is in the hope of freedom.  I spend so much time in front of the laptop now in the hope that, in the future, all that time invested will have left me with a life where I can write a few hours a day and then have all the rest of the day to do what the hell I like.  All too often though, I forget that and occasionally I need to be reminded.  It's at times like these that I need a kick up the arse.

My wife to be is good at this.  God knows I don't like hearing it (I feel ashamed, like when I used to get told off by the teachers at school).  We're getting married, we live in a one bedroom flat that is struggling to contain all our shit and we're both hitting 40 this year.  I need to be a provider, both for her and, should we be lucky enough at our age, for a child that comes along.  And that child will need to be inspired by the choices that I made - it won't want a father that too regularly comes home frustrated and embittered because he was too scared to try and get the things that he wanted.  Scared to fail mostly.  A worry that, in the light of a short existence of 80 years give or take, seems ridiculous.

As a footnote on failure, I would also like to say thanks to an old friend who spotted that I had failed to keep to the resolution in my last post.  Like I said, sometimes I need the kick up the arse.  Thanks Sam.

Practice, Practice, Practice

This man has been hitting the keys HARD

If you read sites about or devoted to writing, they all say that you've got to practice.  As I've been scratching around for a new years resolution, practice is mine.  There's been a month between this blog post and the last.  That doesn't feel good enough, especially when I know that people are returning again and again to read the blog (Blogger stats back this up).  So from now on Sunday night is blog night.    If you're thinking of writing for a living, it's a good idea to practice.  I once wrote the first six chapters of a book by making sure I had an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening in front of a laptop.  Rules were, it didn't matter how many words I got down (but weirdly, there is something about sitting in front of a keyboard that will eventually produce something) and I could only eat something once the hour's work was done.  The carrot was literally being dangled. 

I need to practice because, to 'fess up, I've got little interest in writing presently.  I'm too comfortable.  The day job I took on the picture desk at the Mail, justifying to myself that it would only be for a year or so as I had a wedding to pay for, has come to be a regular 9-5.  I'm still freelance so there's zero job security but I have to admit, the regular paychecks make things easier for me.  It is stressful to be in debt and it's certainly nice to be able to pay for a wedding.  Not to mention going to the pub on a Friday, standing a few rounds and getting some grub because there's naff all in the fridge and you can't be arsed to cook after a long week.  In the current climate you feel lucky to even have a regular job.  Despite the money, the routine of the work makes life feel a bit dull.  I do the same walk to work every day, into the same office, with the same people and every week we put together a magazine that is more or less the same.

Which should, hopefully, prove motivation enough to get back to the writing.  There are not many jobs where you can work on a different subject every day, but journalism is one.   There is a plan of sorts and I'm going through the motions of that.  Even though I don't consider myself superstitious, I don't want to write it down here out of FEAR.  My fear is that if it doesn't work out, I'll look like a mug.  But equally, what is the point in caring what other people think?  And should we be afraid to fail anyway?  I think I've just given myself some subjects for the next blog post.  See, the practice is proving productive already.  See you next week.

City Olympic Heroes

I've been pretty happy this week.  Getting your name on the cover of a magazine will do that for you (it's the small stuff you can't read in the red ink).  It feels like another step in the right direction - if someone had told me that I'd get a cover byline a couple of years ago when I started writing it would certainly have instilled some belief. 

The feature came to me the way I hope all commissions come my way in the future.  Square Mile's Editor emailed me with the idea and asked me if I'd like to write it.  Wouldn't that be good, if you didn't actually have to pitch ideas to Editors and they came to you to put the feature together?  That's happened twice to me recently so karmically, I need to get some ideas to people.  Can't see them continuing to give me work if I'm not giving something back.

One of the most stimulating things about writing is the people it introduces you to.  The two people I interviewed for the City Olympic Heroes feature had very different personalities but they both exuded a clarity of purpose that, if I'm honest, I don't think I have.  As potential competitors at the London 2012 Olympics, both Phil Wicks (marathon) and Nick Brothers (hockey) know that a unique achievement is within their grasp and that they have the talent to get it.  The only difference between them is that Nick, as part of a team, is dependent on his team mates to perform as well as he no doubt will; Phil, as a marathon runner, only has to rely on himself.  A place in the history books, not to mention the love of a nation, awaits them.  You can read the feature here.

140 Characters

I've written before about Chris Floyd's '140 Characters' but that was before it had that title.  Previously it was his 'Portwit' project.  Chris social life had shrunk as the technological advances in his profession progressed.  Before he knew it, he was conversing more with people on Twitter than with some of his oldest friends.  So he set out to meet them, photograph them and find out what they thought of Twitter. 

The number of subjects soon racked up and an obvious number to stop at cropped up.  It was a brilliant idea that seems to have reinvigorated Chris.  It also inspired me to start thinking about how friendships were changing - pretty sure I've banged on about it on here before.  I was also inspired to tell the story of the 140 and it ended up being my first entry for the Huffington Post here.

The shot on the right is of Miranda Sawyer, one of the best writers around.  If you want something brilliant to read, particularly if you ever wondered what existence is all about,  you should find something thought provoking here.

What Kind of Writer Should You Be?

The answer to this is, of course, whatever kind of writer you want to be.  When I started, I didn't really have much interest in news.  I looked at headlines, without thinking about them very much and then decided I wasn't interested.  Take today's BBC home page for example.  'Armed guards to protect UK ships'.  Ok, there are pirates off the coast of Mogadishu - I know that and I don't care.  Let people wealthy enough to own yachts get mugged.  Trade ships?  What do I care if the pirates put a dent in some company's profits?  'Syrian President warns off Western intervention'.  Seems fair enough.  Would England like it if Syria meddled in their home affairs?

Behind the soundbite headlines, there are of course, people.  Who knows even where to start with Somalia?  Perhaps at Wikipedia, which tells you that it has no central government, is characterized as 'a failed state and is one of the most poorest and violent countries in the world.'  Imagine what it's like to live there - it must be absolutely desperate.  So then you start thinking about the people behind the headlines and you realise that maybe you are interested, out of sympathy for those less well off than yourself.  It also serves to bring welcome perspective to your own life.  We all think about how our lives could be better, but it's rarer that we consider how they could be worse.

I only wanted to write about the things I was interested in.  Travel, food, music, cycling...I could go on but basically, the things that make me happy.  I'm not sure I have the courage or the skill to report on subjects that need bringing to the wider attention of the world.  However, I'm grateful that those journalists are out there and I've even been privileged to meet one or two of them.  I recently got an email from a photojournalist called Robin Hammond that left me feeling humbled and in truth, a little ashamed of my own writing efforts.  Robin took the picture you're looking at on this page, of a mentally ill Somali man chained to his bed.  If you've read this far, I urge you to take 6 minutes out of your day to watch his film here.  I can't think of many worse forms of existence than being mentally ill in an impoverished country.  Give what you can and help Robin reach his goal.