How It All Began

As I am fast approaching my twilight years, I feel like I have rediscovered my love of writing poetry - and reading it out loud!!

But it wasn't always that way.

As a child I was always a bit reserved and timid when it came to performing.

When I was 10 I was cast as Prince Charming in the school production of Sleeping Beauty, where I had one line and had to kiss Sleeping Beauty to awaken her. Well, as you can imagine, for a shy 10 year old to kiss a girl in front of the whole school, I was mortified.

The inevitable happened and the whole school sniggered as I bent over her prostrate body to plant a kiss on her lips (I didn't quite make contact as I wanted to get it over as soon as possible).

Now I'm not saying this one experience scarred me for life, but it sure as hell didn't help. After that I turned down some great parts in school and Sunday School plays because I couldn't face the humiliation I was expecting to receive.

I was happy to lark about with my friends and class mates and perform for them, but anything formal filled me with dread. Any performances I gave my friends were always silly and done in a strange voice. I didn't think I could be interesting using my own voice.

Growing up in a council house, sharing a room with my 3 older brothers, we would perform plays written by my brother and his friend. These weren't for outward consumption. They were just for us.

We recorded these plays on an old reel-to-reel tape recorder (I know I am showing my age here, but it was old even then) and they were very much in the style of the Goon Shows we had heard of - we were too young to have actually heard them on the radio but my brother had some LPs with them on, along with Monty Python. I loved the Goons single we had which had "I'm Walking Backwards for Christmas" and 2The Ying Tong Song” on it.

Anyway, I played the main character called Gimble Florence Goon who spoke in his own language and it involved me holding my nostrils together as I spoke. The adventures were him and his man-servant Squeaky Shoes, played by my friend from across the road.

My brother and his friend, and sometimes another of my brothers, would chip in with peripheral characters. We would love to listen to them back, and to us they were always hilarious. Sadly none of the recordings survive, not even when we "upgraded" to cassette tapes.

Apart from this, my performing was very much a niche audience (or a mirror) and always with a silly voice.

Fast-forward to my first experience of working, as a Junior Reporter on the local rag. I was still shy with people I didn't know, which was to be a great hinderance when gathering news of the local table-top sales and bridge competitions. I could write good copy, but was rubbish when it came to talking to new people. It didn't help that the editor of the paper was a complete psycho who enjoyed putting you down. None of the arm round the shoulder approach you would get today. This was 1981 and that approach hadn't reached this part of East Lancashire just yet. All I learned during this time was how to play cricket with rolled up newspaper in the reporters office and how to get your work done quickly on a Thursday (pay-day) so you could get down to the pub by lunchtime and stay there.

All through this and my previous teenage years, I had written poetry. I never showed anyone and sadly none have made it to today. They were always miserable and full of angst. I guess they reflected how I was feeling growing up and they were my way of getting it out of my brain. In some ways they kept me sane as I always felt a sense of relief when they were done.

Then life got in the way. Many short-lived jobs. Serious academic under achievement blighted my ability to do what I thought I wanted to do. Poor life choices - especially in the romance department - meant poetry was buried deep.

But not forever!

Love came along and poetry decided it was time to rise from the ashes and help me express my feelings.

By this time I was working in the cardboard box factory which my dad and brother worked at. It felt like I had come home as one of my earliest memories is the smell of damp cardboard on my dad's clothing when he came home from work. I adored my dad and sort of idolised him. So working with him was like putting on a comfy pair of shoes.

I worked my way up to be in charge of the shift I was on. This meant, when on the night shift, I got the guys going and then had a lot of free time to do what I liked.

Having met my future wife, a nurse at the local hospital, I was smitten. So I would borrow someone's computer at night, write her a love poem or two, print them out and then put them on the notice board at her hospital (in an envelope with her name on) for her to pick up when she started work.

I did this quite often. Sometimes when she would work at the weekend I would sneak down before her night shift and pin a message for her to read.

Once we were married, again life got in the way - and poetry went back in it's box. I was happy, so no need for angst or pleading love rhymes. The occasional poem would pop out, maybe on someone's leaving card or the odd ditty, but nothing to write home about.

In the past 18 months, after rediscovering the old poems written to my wife, which she had kept, I suddenly got the urge to write again.

But could I write when everything was good for me? No anguish, no first flush of romance. What would it look like? Only one way to find out.

A new voice was emerging. One that could enjoy the moment, comment on the things around me and have a bit of fun doing it.

I had been on Twitter for years and done nothing but browse. So I set myself a challenge. Write a poem every day, put it on Twitter and see what happens. They don't have to be good, they just have to be me.

And that's what I did!

With lots of positive encouragement from the lovely people in the Twitter poetry community and my lovely Facebook friends and family, I felt that maybe the next stage was to face my ultimate fear and perform.

So I signed up for an open mic night in Bolton.

Read my next blog to find out how that went