If God Existed He'd Fucking Love JibbaJabba!

Sunday 18th November 2012

The early call of nature is really annoying. “It just knacks your morning up!” I moan. Jennie laughs and says, “No wonder you find it easy to be miserable, if that’s all it takes to ruin things.” We have a laugh.

   Last night’s JibbaJabba was brilliant. Dominic Berry was on top form. I’d say he’s possibly the best performance poet on the scene at present. And the entire Jibba audience would probably agree with that. He totally stormed the place. Interacted with the audience and used the whole room. Very camp and theatrical and really playing on the energy of the people there. I’ve seen him do this kind of walkabout in York at the slam. It was so much better to see him at Jibba than Lamplight. Jen says if the gigs had been the other way round he’d sell out the Lamplight. Just fucking brilliant. Never seen any poet sell as many books at Jibba. Great stuff.

   Sheila Wakefield was on the bill and gave a great set – lots of humour, lots of audience response. She won them over. And was dead chuffed to perform on this particular night, the last one at the Trent. Next month is the Xmas party at Bar Loco. The tag line Jen came up with this morning was: If God existed he'd fucking love JibbaJabba. I want it on a t-shirt.

   Okay, I’m doing Sigil Sammy for Scratch Tyne rehearsal today. Hope it’s good enough. Dominic is leading the session from three till six. Then we have the performance evening. It’s been a mint week for North East poetry. Great to see so many people just gobsmacked last night. I’m sure Dominic is really chuffed with that. 8.57 am.

Had a lazy morning then out to Dominic’s workshop. A lot of stuff on pace, dealing with forgetting lines on stage, eye contact, articulation, gesticulation. I reworked an old piece “Risk”. Slowed down the stanzas after fast-paced opening. Some very fine performances from the rather large gathering of participants.

   Had pizza on way through town to Central station. Really tired. Wanted to read on bus but asleep most of the journey. Finding that I do that quite regularly these days. Tomorrow will be a bit less hectic but still a workshop in the afternoon. 11.44pm.

Monday 19th November 2012

Wake up really tired and the room is cold and I don’t want to get up but my bladder is almost bursting. It’s after eight and I hate Mondays at the best of times, more so when I have to go out and do a workshop. I need a full day alone to decompress, get stuff prepped for the week. Today is the MIND workshop switched from Tuesday. I’m a bit burnt out on education stuff. It’s a bit overwhelming, constantly coming up with models and templates. I want to get my chapbook done and I want a rest. Don’t want to be wrecked by taking on too much. Will be doing creative stuff in a different way next year. I looked at Donut Press chapbooks yesterday. Some limited edition were twenty quid. One was fifty. Sheila said I should check them out as she reckons I’m pricing mine too low at a fiver. Maybe I’ll do a few copies with hand drawn covers and sell them as art pieces, stamped private edition. 8.40am.

On the couch. Really tired. Falling asleep. Had a great workshop this afternoon at MIND in Chester le Street. Got home at eight o’clock and answered emails, facebook stuff. Day has been work, work, work. Just want to sleep coz I have another busy day at the DLI Museum tomorrow. Jenni has announced the SLAMalgamate spoken word event for January 2013. Really want to get my book sorted in the next couple of weeks. Gonna put it out January or February. Time is ticking on. A bit burnt out. But in a good mood. Will be in bed soon. Hope I sleep well. Early start. 10.20pm.

Tuesday 20th November 2012

Quarter to six and I’m ready to make a start. Woke from dreams bizarre: staying in a country mansion. It gets to midnight and a departed friend is with us, he says the circus will be here by one and sure enough, in rolls the caravan and before long the energy of acrobats fills the room, keeping us going till four in the morning. Little monsters do backflips off the sofa. A woman in her twenties stands thirty six inches tall. Next thing I’m walking through London and all is hushed as Queen’s Love of my Life plays out over loudspeakers. On a big screen Freddy Mercury is sitting in an alley, crying his way through the song, his skin getting grubbier by the second, his beard growing thicker, then turning into dreadlocks. Before long Brian May signs autographs then strides off into the Live Aid sunshine, sporting dark blue denim flares, white clogs and an untucked pale blue denim shirt, his fantastic curly hair flying in all directions. Then I’m on a skateboard. A young black boy is riding across rows of milk crates and challenges me to make a six-foot drop-off. I say my knees won’t take it so he lowers the height to three foot. Then the crates turn into a rusty tin box which won’t hold my weight. Moments later I’m beaming as I stroll by County Hall in Durham. It’s great having these little adventures, I think to myself.

   A short while later I’m awake and amazed that if I think hard enough and really focus I can see half the lines of the poem I took to Scratch but didn't do on Sunday. I reckon if I write them out a few times they’ll stick well enough for me to be able to claw my way through and practise up to speed. Then I’ll learn the rest, fill in the gaps.

   Me and Jenni are meeting the DLI team at half nine this morning. Don’t know how it’s going to go but arriving with lots of enthusiasm will help. Not sure what to expect. And until I actually get there I won’t be able to plan anything. Obviously I’d like it to go well. Hopefully we’ll be really inspired by what we see and hear and I’ll be able to do the job. If everything goes as well as yesterday’s MIND workshop my confidence would go through the roof. Anyway, today will be a new challenge. 6.05am.

SHIT DAY! Tired, stressed. Pissed off! Was in two minds about participation in a project and today clinched it for me. Wrote a long rant about it that I don’t want to reproduce here. I write what I want when I can and don’t want my chosen medium of expression to become a straightjacket. Don’t tell me how to use it. I write to escape conformity, not to embrace it. I have done eight days of work in a row and I’m a wee bit frazzled. Pleased tomorrow is only half a day. I have a splitting headache and all I really want to do is sleep. I’m ready for my winter rest.

   I can only spend so long out there. I get sick of having to be public Steve. Get tired of having to be pleasant when I feel like shit. I’m tired. I’m tired of hitting my head off the wall. I’m sick of boring repetitious patterns of working. I’m sick of apathy. Sick of just having to be ‘on’ when I could do with about a month straight of not having to answer to anyone. I don’t even want to finish this fucking page. I was going to cut and paste my rant into an email to explain my withdrawal from a project but Jenni thinks it’s not a good idea. She’s probably right. I might turn it into a poem of some sort.

   I was never comfortable with school. I’m not comfortable with orthodox teaching. I get away with workshops, but I’m not mister education with a capital E. Maybe I’ll feel okay in a day or two. Right now the idea of running a workshop in a school is worse than stacking shelves. I am not mister sociable. I get by best I can but on certain days the best policy is to stay the fuck away from people. I’m just a bit frazzled at present. Pleased to fill this fucking page. And soon I’ll be resting, resting. Soon I’ll be resting. 8.32pm.

Wednesday 21st November 2012

A wise decision for me not to do the DLI project. I want my winter free. So long as I get paid what I’m due, I can live on a hundred a week. I don’t think I’ll be doing as many gigs next year. Really want to recharge the batteries, get some new sets together and just read a lot more books. Going into Waddy to do the writing half-marathon today. So pleased I don’t have to be anywhere this weekend. Want to be at home for a while. Want peace and quiet until Lamplight on Monday. I’m reading a few poems there but that’s all. The only full-on performance I’m giving before 2013 is my York gig. Must remember to order a train ticket for that. The way I feel at present I couldn’t care less if I never do another workshop in my life. I fucking hate pretending to be something I’m not. Bukowski had the right set-up: stay at home, write, and let someone else assemble the books. He never ran workshops. I do them to survive. It’s always love and hate with them. Participation as tedious as running them sometimes. I know these thoughts are just how I’m feeling at present. I had a great session at Mind on Monday. If I’m to continue doing those I’m ditching the film aspect unless it’s poetry or author documentaries and performance clips. If watching film really inspired creative writing I’d be glued to the tv with notebook at the ready. Reel therapy is for people who need stimulus in order to connect to and process their own troubles in conjunction with a trained counsellor or psychologist. I am neither. I never claimed to be. And I’m not mister Education either. Fuck, I get so tired of saying all this shit. The reason I can cope with workshops is coz they’re only a couple of hours a day. And the prep, much as I hate it, can be done in solitude. I’m looking forward to being able to make my own books from home. Looking forward to being able to read some good books. Looking forward to a month without workshops. So pleased I got out of that war project. People don’t seem to learn from history. Governments spend billions on war – it will always be a constant threat. Spend the money on peace. I know, that’s idealistic, but why don’t they? Why are people so greedy for more than their own breathing space? Why do people keep breeding slaves? Life really fucks me up at times. I’m forty-three next birthday and still as disgusted by the set-up as I was at sixteen. It amazes me that I’ve got this far. I haven’t a clue what I’m going to do in the marathon but won’t bank on there being many happy-clappy holiday vignettes from my pen. Just got to get through two hours then I’m free. 7.30am.

Woke as tired as I went to bed. Wrote a long miserable ramble about work. Just made it out in time for the mini-link. Read some Portable Rollins on the way to Waddy. Set up the marathon. Started slow but had six people in by eleven. Pretty good going considering two regulars were missing. Wrote about half a dozen short pieces in the marathon. Might be able to use one or two. Finished late, had a quick tall tin of beef and vegetable Heinz Big Soup then bus back to Consett. Read bits of the Metro, too tired for a book. Back home the kitchen annoyed me. Washed up and had a hot cross bun. Keyed in some journal then went to Newcastle for Sheree Mack’s Pecha Kucha at Lit and Phil. Slide shows with travel writing over the top. Jenni was there. I got the 9.20pm bus back to Consett. Walked home to fruit flies in the kitchen. Had a mince pie, checked facebook, wrote this. Really tired again. Grateful for a couple of days off. Don’t have to be anywhere. Trying to keep my spirits up but feel like shit. I have no idea if I’ll be able to stay financially solvent in 2013. Hope I don’t have to take some bullshit straight job. Hopefully I’ve earned enough to tide me over till springtime. Just so fucking drained. Hopefully I’ll feel a bit better tomorrow. A big lie in for me in the morning. 11.04pm.

Thursday 22nd November 2012

Woke at twenty to seven, turned over for what I thought was five minutes, next thing I know it’s twenty past eight. Stayed in bed till half nine.

It’s been good to have the day at home. I’ve been chipping away at this and that. Uploaded 72 stills cut from last weekend’s Red Squirrel Press Split Screen event vid snippets. Checked out Happenstance pamphlet press and put a link to Black Sabbath’s War Pigs on my facebook wall coz it fitted my mood of late. I made a little A6 perfect bound book this evening. Gonna give it some hell and see how well it stands up to the abuse. No good glueing up a publication only to find it falls to bits after being thumbed a few times.

   Really enjoyed Sheree Mack’s Pecha Kucha event at the Lit and Phil last night. Travel slides and spoken word. Some beautiful poetry and images – particularly liked Amina Evans and Maggie Tate, Wajid Hussain was really funny but my favourite was Kirsten Luckins. I loved her sound poem. With a seamless blend of anecdote, prose narration, character voices and attention to poetic form, she is one superb writer and performer. Top stuff.

   Aidan Clarke recited some selections from his poetry menu. Marie Lightman was inspired by the board game Othello and Simon James closed with poetry and humour from his Lands End to John O Groats charity bike ride.

   Sheila has been in touch a few times. Needs more copies of Limerance for upcoming gigs. Good, good.

   I need to crack on with my chapbook but recovery has been the order of the day for me.

   Been listening to Tori Amos for hours. Would be great to see another one of her concerts some time. Baker, Baker – great song. 10.53pm.