A WEEK IN THE LIFE
(From F&F#53 May 2005)

Part the nth in an ongoing, occasional series featuring anyone and everyone.

National Storytelling Week was a busy one for SHONALEIGH

Sunday January 30
Up with the lark (why do larks get up so early, even on a Sunday? They need a better union) for an interview on Radio Sheffield for National Storytelling Week. Can’t remember anything I said, but since they didn’t kick me off the air, I assume everything was fine. Back home to sort through paperwork – in spite of the physical impossibility, I’m convinced paperwork multiplies like rabbits – and prepare for the masterclass workshops I’ll be teaching next week. Out to do a big shop so my mum and son can eat while I’m gone. Pack, give my son Isaac lots of cuddles before bed, and hit the road to Much Wenlock at 8pm. Arrive 10:30 at the gorgeous Raven Hotel, an old coaching inn. The staff treat me like royalty (probably a minor branch, but I’m practising my wave, just in case), with a plate of sandwiches and a glass of wine. Watch 12 Monkeys, have a hot bath, and sleep deeply.

Monday January 31
Awake (thankfully not with the lark), and wondering for a minute where I was. I was the only person at breakfast in the hotel, receiving the full attention of staff, and the most beautifully presented plate of scrambled eggs in history. Trying to put on false eyelashes one dropped into my coffee and for a moment I thought it was a spider. Coffee and eyelashes down the loo. However, the lashes refuse to flush, floating there disconcertingly, and they’ll probably give a cleaner anxiety tomorrow. Interviewed by Radio Shropshire. Start of the workshops in the afternoon, and I have a lovely, mixed group. I limited them each to five minutes for now. It’s interesting how, right as I cut them off, they were reaching cliff hangers. Dealt with calls about a festival in Braga, Portugal, in May. In the evening went to hear Katy Cawkwell do a wonderful Rhiannon. After it was over, so entranced that I didn’t want to mingle socially, and returned to the hotel to prepare for tomorrow.

Tuesday February 1
Woke with a headache, which serves me right for having a glass of wine three nights in a row. Not the only one at breakfast today. In the morning we worked on midrashes, then all back to my place for the lunchtime buffet, with me ahead, making sure none of my smalls were on view. More workshop in the afternoon, and tutorials in the early evening, followed by a brilliant Iliad in the theatre. Remarkably, no embarrassing incidents today, other than being pulled out of a late night bath to answer the phone. And with no one there to see it that’s hardly embarrassing, is it?

Wednesday February 2
We worked on voices this morning, a very productive time – the people in my workshop are coming along very well. We’re doing the class in my hotel room since there’s more space there. Everything went swimmingly until my mouth ran ahead of my brain and I unintentionally said “I need to tinkle, but I can’t with you all here.” So, as I vanished into the loo, they all undertook a loud voice exercise, which provided a soundtrack to a quite surreal experience…The afternoon session and the tutorials all went well, with the students producing some lovely images, and they’re all coming along at such a rapid pace! Spent the evening in the hotel bar with a few friends.

Thursday February 3
Up late, and in my typical panic I flapped about, achieving very little. At least the workshops went well. I did indulge myself and buy a ring I’ve been coveting all week, which feels and looks perfect on my finger. In the afternoon workshop session I had the students encapsulating their stories as tabloid headlines, and DEVIL IN DILEMMA OVER GIFTS FOR MANKIND left me with the idea of Lucifer thinking, “Hmmm, eternal damnation or the crystallized fruits?” My friend Amy was performing in the evening, but I just felt absolutely shattered, so I sent a note of apology to the theatre. Tomorrow I’ll let the students really tell their stories!

Friday February 4
The final morning of workshops, and it was wonderful to hear the images the students came up with: Turtles on guard duty, willow women and walking sticks, eagles that had forgotten how to fly, a manger with a superiority complex, flute in a loincloth?!, a gossiping flame, Finn MacCool exfoliating with granite and a mouse that wanted to be a Buddhist because he felt he needed to slow down in life. We’d bonded over the course of the week, and in some ways I didn’t want to go. But I did tear myself away to drive to Mould in North Wales for a weekend workshop. Got a call saying my son had injured himself at school, and there was a frantic ten-minute period of calls back and forth before we established he’d fallen, grazed himself badly, but was okay. A friend took him home where my mother (a former nurse) established he was fine, enjoying the attention, and was now eating Cadbury’s Buttons. But I was torn between wanting to drive straight home and the guilt of being away when he needed me – a situation every single mother knows. Arrived in Mould, where I’m staying in a gigantic B&B, ate, and prepared for tomorrow before falling asleep.

Saturday February 5
Drove around for a while before finding the ‘60s shape of the Central Library, where the workshop is being held. A very nice group of students, but absolutely different from those I had in Much Wenlock, with different expectations and thoughts about storytelling. Had to go to McDonald’s and ate a salad, which is 75 pieces of lettuce, a piece of tomato, a crouton, and a piece of chicken-flavoured substance. Unfortunately, only the sauce makes it palatable and puts it up to 900 calories (I would like to disclaim this information if McDonald’s wants to sue me, on the grounds that I’m a storyteller). Called my son, and when he asked for a story, found myself telling him one incorporating the wonderful images of my Much Wenlock students.

Sunday February 6
If anyone’s travelling to Mould I can highly recommend the Plymouth House – very lovely place to stay. Back at the library I worked with the students on Nasraudin stories, very different from their experience, and they finished by telling a 10 minute story each, having come a long way from when they started yesterday. Hopefully this new journey will take them into many wonderful places. Drove home in the evening. Happy to be back in my space and cuddle my son with his poor bruised and grazed face. Put him to bed and settled down with him for a while. As I lay there, his little voice said ” love you, mummy, can you tell me a story in my head?” You can perform in big venues, you can tell stories to appreciative audiences, but in that moment telling a story to one small boy felt like the most important piece of storytelling I would ever do.

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