Albany Ladies Club

So, after a long absence, I am going to embark on recording the comments that stay with me after a talk.

Today, at Burrhill Golf Club, in Hersham/Weybridge, I met a group of ladies with whom I could easily have spent all day.  In the q&a session following the talk, one asked if  it was true that everyone has a book in him/her.  I said, yes – to an extent – but it’s not aways the same type of book.  Not everyone can, or should, write a novel. Some people have heads full of stories and some have heads full of instructions, or comments or facts.

A lady then put her hand up and said that her husband had recorded some events from their life together but stopped and so she had taken it upon herself to complete the task.  She filled in the gaps with her memories and then lent the manuscript to her daughter to read.  The daughter returned the manuscript and said, ‘No – you’ve got it wrong.  That’s not how it happened…’ and so the mother, enthusiasm quashed, stopped writing.  And it made her SO sad.

It made me cross.

You see, the daughter may have experienced the event too but she cannot dictate how it happened because until her mother tells her, she does not know how it happened to anyone else.  My advice was that the mother’s instinct was right.  Things should be recorded, not because it will tell your chilren in years to come about events but because it will tell them about you – how you experienced them, what you felt, who YOU were.

It’s all down to point of view.

So – write.