Clare the wonder woman

I have a deliciously unexpected day to myself. I had a 24 hour tummy bug yesterday and thought I'd better cancel teaching for today in case it carried on....but it hasn't! And as it's thursday and my mother is looking after the children, this means I can do all my wonderful geeky writing things to my heart's content like submitting stories and poring over my Mslexia mag and reading lovely little titbits of literary tweet gossip - bliss! The floor that needs to be hoovered and the washing that needs to be hung up and the mountain of laundry that needs to be sorted can damn well wait.

On my writing travels this morning I also came across a lady called Clare Kirkpatrick who is a freelance writer and breastfeeding counsellor and co-edits a very interesting site called Women's views on news,a site dedicated to a female perspective on current affairs. Oh, did I also mention she has four children? Or that she suffers from depression? (How refreshing that she is being open and honest about it). And did I mention that she home-educates her four daughters? Yes - HOME EDUCATES. The reason I am getting my knickers in a twist here is that I just do not understand how this woman manages to write a wonderful blog + home educate FOUR kids no less + do tons of other writing + cope with depression. Blimey. Clearly there must be times when the picture is far from rosy for her but still, she actually DOES it. And here's me with just three children (definitely not home educated, as much as I love the idea of it), part-time TEFL teacher, scratching out a few sentences here and there, who admittedly suffers from bouts of horrible insomnia but all the same....am I just not managing my time right??!

Clare claims in her blog that she's no super-mum, but I'd beg to differ. Clare, you ARE a super-mum, in fact you are wonder woman incarnate. I could go on about this all day...but then that would be my gold-dust free day taken up.

Inspiration

'Inspiration doesn't descend like a lightning bolt from the gods. Inspiration comes instead from a steady breath, a solid foundation, and a commitment to the process. From a grounded breath, freedom blooms. From a grounded breath, your stories and poems can dance themselves awake on the page.'

Laraine Herring, from 'Writing begins with the breath.'

I am very interested to discover that the etymology of the word 'inspiration' is rooted in the idea of breathing. A stereotype of artists of all types conjures up the tortured soul, waiting for inspiration to come and grasp them and shake them into creative motion. But it's an interesting question this - whether inspiration comes from without or within.

 I don't doubt that there have been people over the years for whom the source of  inspiration has come from some outward divinities. I remember hearing a wonderful story about a writer many years ago in deep South America -  I forget the name - who was gripped by a physical presence of words that tumbled into her, almost like a giant ball of ideas and inspirations. And she just had to run, run, run as fast as her legs could carry her, in from the fields to get a pencil so she could write the words down, before the huge ball of energy and words was pulled out from the other side of her and would continue its journey till it found someone else. A fabulous story, but pretty rare! For many people who follow a creative path, inspiration comes more often from that still, quiet place within us. And as the breath anchors us to the present moment, there is so much that it can teach us.

I've just started reading the book that I took the quote above from, and I'm interested to see where it will take me and my writing (not that I'm actually getting round to doing any writing at the moment - grrrr! - but I'm thinking about it ALOT!)