As the sun is rising on this cool spring Saturday morning, I hear the carol bird calling. Whoop! Whoop! The notes cut through the air, insistent, demanding attention. My heart listens, and I find myself logging into my blog:
Where the Carol Birds Sing.
Where have I been?
My fingers want to write, so I do. I write about unschooling because it’s important. It’s helpful. Unschooling is what people want to read about. But sometimes I want to leave helpful behind. Fly like my bird. Go somewhere different. Just write and see where my words lead.
I sit on the sofa in the semi-dark while my family sleeps and the carol bird calls, and I think about stories. I open the draft copy of my third children’s novel. I wrote it quite a few years ago.
“How’s your new book going?” a few people ask.
”I’m working on it,” I say.
And I do work on it for a while. But then other things, more useful things, grab my attention, and I put my stories aside.
Recently, in odd moments, I’ve reacquainted myself with my Angel family, reentering their fictional world. Yet again, I’m editing my book.
I scroll through the chapters of my novel and smile when I see the words Meeting Picasso at the Art Gallery. Oh yes, I remember: the Angels take Auntie Jenny and Uncle Charlie on the train to the art gallery in the city, and they meet their neighbour, Picasso Bell, who, fortunately, wanted to grow into the name he was given at birth: he’s a portrait artist. Imagine if he’d wanted to be a doctor: Dr Picasso. That wouldn’t seem quite right, would it? Picasso and his wife Mia have twin daughters. Picasso wanted to name them Cassat and O’Keefe, but Mia protested, and so the girls are Lily and Violet.
I write a few notes: update the details about the train tickets.
Time passes. Things change. We no longer buy tickets to travel on the train. Now we each need an Opal card. And so will the Angels.
I think about the day ahead. What will I do?
Shower.
Take Gemma-Rose to work.
Buy a new notebook,
Buy a coffee and sit at a table in the shopping centre’s food court.
Read my next novel story.
Make notes with my magical Sharpie gel pen.
Let my imagination go wild.
The carol bird calls again: Whoop! Whoop!
Yes! Yes!” I cry.
I’m going to forget important. At least for a while. I’m going to write about The Spy at the Zoo.
Photo
I’ve never seen my carol bird, so I have no idea what it looks like. But I’m sure it doesn’t look like the birds in this photo. How could a bird that size hide in the tree outside my window? I chose the picture because it makes me smile.
Photo by Dattatreya Patra on Unsplash
Reading your new blog post made me smile 🙂 Your Angel-books are now our english-curriculum, it makes me happy to hear that you are working on new stories!
How are you doing? Did you get used to Sophie not living at home anymore?
Sending you lots of warm greetings! Luana
Luana,
Your comment made me smile! I’m so glad you like my Angel stories. I have written 25 new stories. They need some more editing, but I’m working on them every day and making good progress with my book. I’ll let you know when I’ve finished. Maybe you and your children would like a copy of the next Angels book. You can then let me know what you think!
We’re all very well, thank you. Yes, although we miss Sophie, we’ve got used to her not being here. She phones and sends frequent text messages which is good. It’s always lovely to hear her latest news.
I hope you and your family are keeping well. Sending lots of love to you and your family, Sue xx
Sue, I`m so excited to hear you wrote 25!!! new Angel stories! Wonderful! Yes, keep on working on these!!! Our family will certainly enjoy your new book, I hope it will also be available on Amazon. Especially these days, it is so so important to have life-giving, sunny, loving and real stories to inspire us. Thank you for writing those!
Our family is in quarantene right now, one of us catched Covid. After few confusing first days we are actually having good time together! I`m so glad our family can enjoy “being stuck” together. One of us was sick like with a normal flu, 2 kids had a cold 1-2 days and the rest stayed healthy.
Luana,
I’m so sorry to hear your family caught the covid virus. I hope you’ve all now recovered. You’ve been in my thoughts and prayers.
Oh yes, I’ve written quite a few new Angel stories, though it’s taking me a long time to edit them. When I’m happy with the new book manuscript, can I send your family a copy? Yes, the book will be available on Amazon, but I’d love to hear your opinion before it is published.
Take care! May God bless you!
Seeing your post pop up was like rich, hot coffee on a rainy day. I find it very hard to forget work; it’s almost curse for me, work follows me everywhere. I need to find me a carol bird too, tether my heart to its feet so when it takes off, so will my heart too. Because every heart needs a rest.
I hope you did go out and get that coffee at the food court, Sue. Remember the not-so-distant days when cafes were closed to dine in’s and sit down’s? May those days never come again.
Caitlynne,
You have a gift for spreading joy. Thank you so much for your beautiful words. Weeks go by without me writing anything, but you’re still there, wanting to read my story. I appreciate that very much.
I’m sorry to hear that you have a lot of work that’s keeping you very busy. I hope you are able to take a break. Oh yes, we all need times when we can follow our hearts. If a carol bird called to you, where would he lead you?
My carol bird is tempting me away from my unschooling blog. And this is a bit scary. I’ve spent the last 10 years writing and speaking about unschooling. It’s what I know. But maybe there are new adventures ahead of me if only I am brave enough to let go of everything and follow my bird.
I did have coffee at the food court! Yes, it wasn’t that long ago that we couldn’t sit down in a cafe. Now we really appreciate being able to do that. Oh, I also hope those lockdown days never return!
I hope you and your family are doing well. I’m so glad you stopped by!