Groove is in the words... (a big thank you).

Every record had to count. Each and every single one. I used to plan sets with so much thought, so much precision, second guessing the night's audience, picturing their reactions, their well honed tastes, and my strategy usually worked. Bulls eye. But I had to allow for flexibility, the ability to switch flow at the sight of flagging hips or flailing arms, or even worse, the sight of a naked dance floor. I had to move like water. Music weaves and circles and undulates; it isn't earth. Perhaps we could have flown through midnight stars into the electric heart of a supernova, or down into the purple depths where flesh pink jelly fish swim and moon white mermaids dance among beaded pearls in the four-four thump thump thump of the current. I was good. My selection, my timing, my connection to the dancing pulse. I thought it would last forever, that I'd always be a DJ, couldn't see anything else, certainly nothing beyond the grooves in the vinyl. I had no idea that this was only an apprenticeship, that I was learning to write, that every set I played had a beginning, a middle, and an end...

...The most creative insights aren't necessarily carved from smooth and easy surface, but from dark and grizzled crevasse, the jagged textures. Everything grows from shit. In transpersonal psychotherapy there is a saying; to breakdown to breakthrough. Who would have thought that the postnatal years would lead to possibly my life's work, aside from motherhood, writing. When I began blogging I never considered myself a writer, and here I am, several years on, with three blogs and a self-published anthology, Seasons of Motherhood. Maybe I am a writer after all (I've never harboured much confidence).

So I'm incredibly pleased to announce that I've been shortlisted as a semi finalist in the Writer Category of the BiBs, The Brilliance in Blogging Awards. I am chuffed to pieces about being selected; it actually means a lot to me. I want to thank you, my very loyal and wonderful readership, and anyone else who took the time to consider my blog and vote for Older Mum in a Muddle. There are readers, other bloggers, who have stuck with me since the very beginning, and some of you have become very real friends - this blogging malarky is an amazing thing.

And now I am in a muddle and feeling self conscious and embarrassed *urrgghh I don't like this* and have to ask for one last vote as I would dearly love to make the final six in my category, so er, please could you vote for me?

Every vote really counts. The Writer category this year is very tough, and I'm sadly competing against some of my very favourite bloggers..... so thank you, and thank you for reading me.

Angel Clouds

Maybe I had too much hot chocolate. All that sugar.

Up. Up. Up.

Like a hot air balloon. Light headed and floating among angel clouds.

Excited. The anticipation. The expectation.

Will I make it? Will I see my name in lights?

I know what's going on though, this want of recognition. I am hoping this time they will take note.

It arrives.

The results are in.

I scroll down the page. My name. My name. Where's my name?

It's not there.

Two minutes ago I had wings, now I'm falling like a bomb.

But... but... but... all that hard work I did? All those colourful words I wrote?

Crestfallen. Disappointed.

And it takes me back to the nine to three and break times and the stiff grey uniform and being that girl the boy never fancied and red marker all over my carefully crafted work. A perennial B student. The middling to bottom streams. Unclassified in maths O'level. Unclassified in general studies.

One solitary A in English though. And captain of the lacrosse team.

Is competition - hot housed in those early years - a good or a bad thing?

I don't like the effect it has on me. Brings out the best and the worst.

But I'm not bitter. Absolutely not.

So pleased at how far I have come.

So grateful to be a part of this landscape of words and friendship and support.

If anything, it helpfully mirrored back my eternal motivation.

What lies beneath.

That after all these years, I am still trying to please mum and dad.

Life Style is...

...A way of life or style of living that reflects the attitudes and values of a person or group.

Apparently.

Over the last day or so, I've been mulling over the style of my living - the daily routine, my values - or lack of, my emotional well being, my physical health. And I felt flummoxed after these brief analyses between loading washes, sealing up removal boxes - the best I could come up with was frustratingly undefinable, nebulous, smokey-grey. I'm er... my days are... I value - umm? Oh! I am a stay-at-home mum!... Er, er I write, um, I'm a writer... I'm healthy - pah! - you're kidding yer sen!    

I can say with absolute conviction that I'm not living in any style at present - the hair needs a radical re-colouring, the bed covers - well less said the better, there's strange green stuff - straggly seaweed - frozen onto the back of the fridge, and come Wednesday evening - today - we will all be eating pizza out of greasy cardboard...

...and... and... I bite my finger nails.

Life and the stylising of it, was once so simple, well it certainly felt that way, like furnishing a shop window display - every activity, every thought, every feeling had it's place. Life was ordered. Controlled. I meditated. I yoga'ed. I ta chi 'ed. I ran. I cycled. I swam. I had a job. I studied at college. I wore flattening'ish clothes. Even The Pendulati - my cumbersome breasts - knew their size, maintained their position above waist height. And life felt emotionally easier too - I had time to process, contain, accept. Feelings flowed, weren't buried under the demands of others...     

My life now, is, well, sort of more abstract, in a Mark Rothko kind of way - colours blending, merged, lacking any definition. I don't mind at all. It's just that it's a far cry from what I was once accustomed to. After three years, I am still acclimatising to motherhood. My days are a vacuum filled with routine and dirty dishes and folding clothes and emotional holding and meeting the demands of Little A. Don't you know this kind of day so well? And before I go to bed, waving another farewell to the hours behind me, I take my anti-depressants. I need them.

After the shock of birth, the trauma, the sky-raising anxiety, the depression, the one thing that has pulled me from domestic quick sand, that has moulded me into back a woman - a functioning one, has been my writing - this blog.

So I was really honoured, extremely taken a-back, to find that I had been shortlisted in the Britmum's BiBs Awards under Lifestyle. If I am honest, I was surprised to find myself in this category. I would never in a million years have classified my blog as a lifestyle one - I don't cover crafts or health or fashion, but I guess I do tell stories about my life. Still, there are readers out there who beg to differ. Thank you all very, very much, I am really grateful for your votes of appreciation.

I have never plugged my blog in this way before. I feel a little shy doing it. But as this is a once-in-a-blue-moon opportunity, I thought why not!  The next stage of the nominations is the voting which closes on May 12th. There will only be six finalists, two chosen by Britmums. Er, so, I am appealing to your generosity, your good will, to vote for me one final time. I would love to make the finals and Older Mum in a Muddle is up against some very stiff competition in this category - some really, really talented writers.

Your vote really counts - I'll buy you a bottle of champagne, make you lemon drizzle cake in return!

Thank you for reading Older Mum in a Muddle.

Vote Here
XXX