Social Prescribing advised me that this writing group was meeting monthly in Oldham Library, so I figured I’d try out Oldham Library Writers Group session on 4th February. Haven’t been to a writers session since some time before the pandemic, and haven’t written anything creative since some time before that meeting, but I figured I’d at least attend and see what the deal was with this new group and whether it would be worthwhile.
Gonna blow my own trumpet here: I’ve been writing for some time and I’ve had bits of things published here and there. I don’t claim to be particularly good at many things, but I can write. If I’m going to go to a writers’ group, I’m going to want to be surrounded by people who are going to push me to be better, and they need to be good too.
Oldham Library Writers Group are a well intentioned bunch, but I didn’t feel like they were going to help me to improve.
We did do an interesting writing exercise, though, in which we all had a sheet of paper each and started with the line, ‘He woke up to find the city deserted.’ We wrote for a few minutes, then when the timer went we passed the sheet on. Each iteration was the same length of writing time but with an increasing extended period beforehand to read over what had been written so far. It was difficult as nobody’s handwriting – not even my own block capitals – were clear enough for other people to read. There were, if I’ve got this right, 9 of us in the session, so the story below is written buy all the members of the group. We then read each story out, each member reading the story that they started to write.
I've typed out the piece featuring the opening section I wrote, and I've included an asterisk page break to show where the next person took over.
--
He woke up to find the city deserted. His back hurt from sleeping on the concrete bollard blocking the road, although he had no recollection of climbing onto it. He was very thirsty and his head pounded.
*
Thoughts of the night before invaded his mind. Too much alcohol, he thought. Oh, why did he have to drink so much? He hadn’t a clue of why he’d ended up here, and pondered why there was no-one else around. He picked himself up. His back was wet from sleeping in a puddle, his legs cold – one of his socks was missing. He felt a bruise on his arm. Was that mustard on his shirt?
*
He sniffed the shirt, not mustard, but something unpleasant. His nose wrinkled. ‘Oof.’ He spied the empty burger wrapper by his feet and heard his stomach growl in protest. A wave of nausea hit him then.
*
He was gross. The city may be empty, his life might be desolate but he needed to get his act together. “Ugh.” He slowly dragged himself to his feet and dragged himself forward. His body ache in places he did not know he could ache.
*
“Let’s do it,” he said to himself. “Let’s go.”
He didn’t know where he was going but actually moving physically was the best he could do. Somewhere in his psyche he knew that getting up would motivate him.
*
Where was he going? Who knows? Because he sure as hell didn’t. This is what life has come to? The endless self-deprecation questions swirled in his head, but life had challenged him every step of the way, and he always had a trick up his sleeve – he just needed to know what game this was.
*
He would not give up. So much was depending on him.
–
I think we really needed a little more time to flesh out the narrative each iteration. But most of the stories from this session followed the same 28-Days-Later theme.
The next session is Tuesday, 18th February.
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