Non-Fiction Update – Missing Stories

 

Hi all,

I just wanted to write this brief update to say I have finally caught up with some days which were missing stories so please look back though June and July to catch up on those.

I’ve been really lucky that I’ve still not had the corona virus but having to stay at home shielding has really effected my mental health. I’ve been suffering with an anxiety for awhile now and I’ve had in the past bouts of depression. Well these two things are really bad for me right now.

I’m anxiety about when things will go back to normal and if it will ever be safe for me. I’m depressed because I feel like I’ve had to put many things on hold and I’m stuck at home not able to have much freedom or inspiration in the outside world. I’ve also have insomnia which is part triggered by the other two but it means I don’t sleep much and then don’t feel like doing much during the day.

This has had a big effect on writing the stories for this blog and I think for the first time since starting to write way back in August 2014, I’ve let my writing slide so much. I hope to try and get back into writing as much as possible again soon. I’ve some longer short stories I’ve been working on and I’d like to share them.

It can be hard to find motivation when I’m feeling like this and everything that’s happening in the world, but I’m trying to get through. I hope you can carry on reading and enjoying my stories because I don’t want to stop writing even though I’m finding things tough right now.

Thank you for your support,

Hayley.

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Steps #Writephoto

My granny use to say, ‘if these steps could talk what stories they’d tell!’

I’d laugh and say ‘tell me a story then.’

She would whilst we sat on those steps outside her house with the summer sun on our faces and people waving as they went by.

Granny would spin truth and fiction together, making her simple life exciting for my childhood self. There’d be stories of her dancing the night away with my granddad, long days working in the cotton factory down the road and her adventures as a nanny in London.

My favourite stories were the ones set in the war. Granny was a teenager and whilst her brothers, baby sister and mother moved away to the Devon to live with cousins, granny stayed in Manchester and worked in a factory making uniforms and other clothes for the soldiers.

There was something that fascinated me about that time. It seemed a different world with secrets still unknown.

Years and years later, the sad time arrived and granny’s house was for sale. My parents lived in Devon and though I had stayed in the Manchester for work, I had my own place. I did debate having my granny’s house but too much work needed to be done and I couldn’t offered that. It was easier to sell the place and try to move on.

‘Is there anything else you want to take?’ one of the moving men I had hired asked.

I looked back at the house and saw the front steps. I nodded and said, ‘I want those steps.’

The man was confused and I realised it did sound little silly.

‘I think that’s slightly above me,’ the man replied slowly.

Argument bubbled on my tongue but I swallowed and told him to go get the others and I’d help.

After, with the worn stone steps heaved into the moving van, the man told me that was properly one of the oddest things he’d had to shift.

My granny’s steps are outside my front door now. I sit on them with my own children and tell them all kinds of stories.

Some true and some not quite.

 

(Inspired by; https://scvincent.com/2020/07/30/thursday-photo-prompt-worn-writephoto/ with thanks.)