Softly Shouting

Two exercises: Someone is waiting for a train.They have a suitcase that contains an object they wish to conceal.  1 What’s your name?  2 What do you do for a living?  3 Where do you live?  4 Do you have a family? If so, who are they?  5 What do you like to watch on TV?  6 What do you like to eat?  7 What are you wearing?  8 There’s something you’ve always wanted to do-what is it?  9 There’s somewhere you’ve always wanted to go -where is it?  10 There’s something you’ve never told anyone before–what is it? Stella feels awkward in her long, flowery dress and sturdy shoes. Every woman on the platform wears smart trousers or a pencil skirt. And shoes! Heels the size of trees! She is easy to spot. She would love to have a job. Feel comfortable with all those smart people around her, knowing where to go and what to do. She has barely enough money for a ticket to Glasgow and she hasn’t got a clue what to do when she gets there.   Search fo...

  Open the bloody door, for crying out loud! My balls are freezing off. That jobsworth knows fair well we're waiting.   Calm doon, Tam. The man’s only working. Here we are lads. In you go! Morning, driver. Four tickets to Inverness, please. With our hard-earned National Entitlement Card – so nae fee. Oh, wonderful. The fifth lot of heat-surfers this week, clogging up my bus. Heat-surfers? Pensioners in search of warmth. Getting on my bus for nothing and enjoying the heat. I get loads of them. Some have the cheek to say we need a coffee machine on board. We pay your wages, pal, and don’t you forget it. But right you are.   We expect three-and-a-half hours of warmth and Wi-Fi. With nae pay. Wi-Fi’s aff. What do you mean? It is in bloody big letters on the side of your bus. Free Wi-Fi. Don’t believe everything written on the side of a bus. Get in lads, some of us have to work. The Four musketeers: for warmth, companionship and we’ll get over the missing...

I know, I shouldn’t have.  But I did and I do. I occasionally trawl through the online comment forums of the papers- including those of the red-tops.  Call me masochistic. I pay particular attention to the rantings and ravings about immigration and the rights of EU citizens.  We are called parasites, scumbags, leftist bastards, freeloaders and that is from the comments that have not been deleted. EU citizens are ‘taking your jobs, your houses and your GPs’. We are being told to go: ‘eff all these immis home,’ and that when we do come to the UK, we ‘are pregnant or do any low wage job for couple of weeks and then get pregnant and claim destitution to get social housing for some random child.’.   We are: ‘EU dregs that come here purely to scrounge’ or ‘uneducated and here to pack shelves get free money’ and folk are happy to get rid of us: ‘We won: no more foreigners with horrible accents’.  More often than not, these rants are ill informed, full of mistakes and ...

  Fire Engine in New York Daddy told me the bus is going all the way to Inverness. ‘Can me and you go to Inverness, Daddy?’ ‘Maybe one day, son.   But not in the winter. See, it is already getting dark.   It will be pitch black by the time you come into Perth.’ The Big Blue bus is coming.   It stops at the bus stop.   There is a funny yellow man on the side of the bus. ‘Daddy, that man is also going to Inverness, isn’t he?’ The door swings open.   Two ladies step out and then a man who is as old as Gramps, though he doesn’t walk with a stick.   Then Mummy sticks her head through the door and waves to me. ‘Alright, young man,’ says Daddy, ‘in you go.’   And he lifts me up the first step.   My rucksack is in the way.   My new jammies are in there, the ones Daddy bought me yesterday.   He’s kept the old ones, for the next time I am coming. Then Mummy helps me up the next two steps.   The steps are really high.  ...

  They walk back to their hotel, holding hands.   She thinks how wonderful it is to find love later in life, to have a partner, a companion.   Someone to share things with.   They both love 17 th century art. No surprise that the honeymoon is in Amsterdam. In the hotel she changes into her negligée.   She has been unsure whether to buy one.   She doesn’t want something frilly and overly sexy but still it has to be a notch up from the baggy T-shirts she normally prefers.   They have had sex once, on the afternoon he proposed.   Giddy with drink and excitement they fell in his bed and made glorious and unexpected love.   She was surprised by it, the sheer force of lust, not felt for ten years or more. She props herself up in the bed.   He comes out of the bathroom and starts to take off his clothes, slowly, methodically, with his back to her; folding his socks and the trousers of his good suit.   When he drops his pants to put ...

At 7.29am precisely the coffee machine splutters two identical cups of perfect coffee. ‘Can you pick up my suit from the dry cleaners?’   Susan nods and puts the cup on the table .   Alan pushes the ticket in her direction. ‘I’ll need it tomorrow,’ he says. No you won’t , thinks Susan, but she doesn’t reply. Breakfast is in silence: two individuals drinking coffee and eating toast behind their paper, not even keeping up the pretence of a family.   Both finish at the same time, brush their teeth and get ready to go.   In passing, A lan pecks her cheek. ‘Don’t forget now’, he says.   Susan rolls her eyes.   At 7.55am they both start their cars.   Hers is a Mini, his, an Audi.   Both cars are clean, well-maintained and sit side by side in the driveway.   As per usual, the Audi is first on the road.   Susan in her Mini follows close behind. Just outside the village, the road forks.   They wave.   Alan goes right; Susa...

  Three people are ahead of him. It is decision time If he keeps it, he can pay the gas bill There may be enough left over to make a cot for the baby He is a capable joiner but there is no job for him Not with his past, anyway There could be enough for a new blanket for the wee one He would love to treat Jenny to a pub tea Would make a change from the tins they get from the food bank She looks worn-out since she’s had the bairn.   Two people are ahead of him. Won’t be long till Christmas More folk are buying the magazine With the Dalai Lama on the front cover he sold out within hours Rishi Sunak doesn’t sell    No surprise there The magazine gets soggy in the rain No surprise there either Perhaps seventy nine quid is someone’s budget for the month Although, with a Gold Visa card………..   who knows.   One person is ahead of him. His Mum taught him to be honest That was before the world spat him out Honesty is t...

  (Written when Theresa May was PM.) The Maybot was creating a crop circle in my wheat field, trampling up and down, muttering while she was doing it.   The ministerial car was parked at the side of the road and the escort vehicle behind it.   A worn-out looking aide was watching.   I walked up.   ‘ She is doing criminal damage to my field.' ‘I am so sorry,’ he said, ‘she needs recharging.   It won’t be long, they are on their way.’ The Maybot was walking up and down, around and about, making an intricate design.   She was muttering: strong and stable, strong and stable, stable and strong.   Gradually her movements became jerkier.   She reminded me of the battery advert, only less fluffy.   ‘Strang and stoble,’ she said.   Just then I heard a high pitched whine.   A flying disc was hovering over the wheat field; blue with yellow stars around the rim.   ‘Beam me up, Scottie,’ the Maybot said and she disappeared in thin air....

  Looking at the supermarket competition form, I hesitate.   Will I use my own name?     Apart from my best friend Tammy nobody uses my name anymore. Letters that come through the letterbox are addressed to Mr and Mrs Sean Lynch.   I am Mrs Sean Lynch.   On the form, you have to answer a question about oranges and the first prize is a cruise to the Mediterranean. Fourteen days for two, with full board on a luxury cruise liner, calling at ports in Italy, Spain, Malta and Greece.   Imagine…. The nearest I ever got to a cruise was the ferry from Dun Laoghaire to Holyhead, when we were going to a guesthouse in Blackpool on our honeymoon.   We felt very excited going abroad, even if it was only England.   For most of the journey we stood at the railing, holding hands.   When the boat had docked, we took a train to Blackpool, eating sandwiches and drinking from little bottles of juice that Sean bought in a kiosk.   I had never bought...

It hadn’t come yesterday and by now I was getting fairly impatient.  It said ‘dispatched’ on eBay, and I reckoned that with a first class stamp it should have arrived today by the latest.  Perhaps they had sent it economy.  Well, I had done so many days without; one more day wouldn’t harm. The description promised quality acrylic, in a natural shade very much like my own and exactly the size I needed.  Pre-loved, as they nowadays call used goods. I had ordered it from a specialised site; it would be checked for measurements and defects.   I was wondering what had happened to the last owner.  Had he- or she-died?  Bought a completely new one?  Being of modest means, I had opted for a second-hand one.  All in all, I would be very happy when I could remove the black cloth.  People stared at me in the streets; I had children coming up to me and asking awkward questions.  One mother snatched her child from me and made the sign of ...

  Still night, only just One brave bird calls out and sings; Winter turned to spring

  The Last Swan in Scotland.   The SRS (Swan Repatriation Society) is on track to remove the last swan from Scotland.   For the last seven years, the Society has worked tireless to remove all the King’s swans from Scotland to the Royal Swan reserve in Wraysbury. The SRS was set up in 2024 after Scotland became independent; the repatriation of the swans was part of the Independence Settlement. King Charles III has expressed his gratitude to all involved.   Brian Winter, the last remaining Royal Swan Marker told this paper: “We are looking for just the one swan.   We don’t know exactly where it is; the tracking device has fallen off or has been removed.   However, we know that the swan has last been seen in the vicinity of Glasgow- and that is where the search will start.   We would like to ask members of the public that if they know anything about the whereabouts of this animal to get in touch with us or with the local police.” Prime Minister Ch...

Writing exercise no.2 Select an image that appeals to you. Now, write a short scene from the viewpoint of a character who has just arrived at this location and is seeing it for the first time. Describe the setting through the character's eyes, paying particular attention to the mood that this image evokes in you. Now, write a second scene, with the same or a different character - and evoke just the OPPOSITE mood.   She walks from the warm, Mediterranean sunshine into the darkness. Suddenly, it is cold. She smells stagnant water and cooking smells: a waft of garlic and olive oil. Her tummy barks at her: time for food but she has no time: she is looking for him. Which way to go? Which way did he go? Why did he unexpectedly walk out on her?   Her hands touch the cold stone guiding her. Her feet gingerly probe the uneven path. An arrow. Crude, white, painted pointing left, through a narrow doorway over a high step. Going forward very careful, hesitant even, she steps ove...

  Writing exercise no1: write about something that has happened in ten seconds. Write a page. I write in longhand with a fountain pen. Via a handwriting recognition programme it is made into text - this is not edited apart from where the programme didn't recognise me. 😁 And then the big thug is pushing Ronnie,  I see it happen and see Red. Literally  Red! I jump forward to get in between Ronnie  and the thug but there is  another one, a little one, but for being  Little he is probably even meaner, so  when I jump in between Ronnie and t he big thug he grabs my arm, pulls  me and then slaps me in the face,  hard, one time and again and  I see red but it is the blood trickling  in my eyes, completely helpless but I rem ember that I have an umbrella  in my hand and I lift it up and  try to smash it in the big thug's  head but you know it's a most despicable and womanly attack  because I really don't want to  h...