I have just had a wonderful week and I am excited about the month ahead. I am back in my bed after a week in Galway with my lovely friend who is now swanning about with other friends in Tipp. It is a Sunday morning of a bank holiday weekend and I feel the day stretches ahead in that luxurious, Judy Garland sort of way. Outside, I hear birdsong. I think the chirrup of the Robin is the lead, but the trills of the Finches and notes of the Blackbird are clear in the chorus. The sky is glowing pink in the East. I feel content and there is the crux of the matter. If I am happy, I tend to be ‘off doing’, not writing. A conundrum: I love to write and I love to be ‘off doing’ and the two do not entwine well.
Every morning last week, I would wake to the trills of friend, alongside the cries of the gulls, and immediately I would join in. There is nothing better first thing, after opening your eyes, than continuing the conversation of the night before, unless it is starting a new one. So, I might say, ‘Good morning, friend, what did you think of the President’s visit to England?’ And friend will regale me with views and opinions and soon we will be laughing our way into the day. It was absolute pleasure. But it meant I didn’t write. I talked and laughed instead. We also shopped, walked, ate cakes, and climbed Diamond Hill in Letterfrack on the most amazing morning, the sort of morning that only exists on Diamond Hill in Letterfrack, Connemara.
This coming week is very exciting too. There is the first night of my AT The Edge, Cavan (thanks to the wee bit of support from the Cavan Arts Office) which I am very excited and nervous about. I am doing a three day training course in facilitative leadership and I am going to a formal party where I have to dress up and look my best. This means I have to buy new sandals because Poppins, our new puppy, chewed up my pair from last year . This means a shopping expedition, where ‘I absolutely have to‘ buy shoes. I will feel I am a proper woman. And then, after that, I am going to Spain with friend: Malaga, Granada, Sierra Nevada, Alicante. There is no time to write. I am excited and this makes me very sad for, as every writer knows, the only true driving force for creative brilliance is misery, mayhem, and melancholia.
Ah well, I’ll try… but now I simply have to get up and go off and do…later, my friends, later.
Kate Ennals 
Anther thought provoking blog, Kate. As Carol Ann Duffy said, ‘Happiness writes white’. On the other hand, Auden said that if a young writer asked whether he should go to a party or stay in and write, he always said go to the party. He thought you had to go out and do some living to have anything to write about.
I think the misery and melancholy one is harder, especially if one has done a lot of journal writing. I find that if I pick up a notebook and a pen, something in me automatically remembers being depressed! Anyway,well done for actually writing among all the ‘doing’, even if it’s about not writing. Good luck with At the Edge, and I hope you found the perfect pair of shoes.
Thank you, Martine!