As of Wednesday, I've been on sabbatical. It wasn't in the plan. But is anything these days? My main client has closed down all the projects I work on and won't be initiating any new ones until September at the earliest. And who knows what the world, or their business or my life will look like then.
It's taking some getting-my-head-around, this. I don't know how I'll spend my days. I don't know how long it will go on. I don't know if work will go back to what it was. It's 20 years since life last felt as uncertain as this (although in reality, it's always that way). Back then, uncertainty was something I chose. I took redundancy from Diageo having no idea what lay ahead. If I hadn't done it, I wouldn't have become a freelance writer. You never know what life's going to throw at you or when. If this is one of those moments, I want to be ready to catch it (whatever "it" is).
Friends have been asking me what I will do. Most have assumed that I will write a book. Maybe I will. And maybe I won't. And if I do what will it be? Fiction? Autobiography? A bit of both? I don't know. The only thing I do know is... I will write.
To write, I need ideas. The act of travelling inspires me to write. It gives me time. Time that can't be spent doing. Time that is for thinking. For letting ideas out. I could be on a flight bound for Malaysia, a train speeding through the forests of Sweden or on the top deck of the number 65 bus to Kingston. Being on the move brings on the writer in me. But I can't be on the move now.
Being somewhere different sparks ideas too. Many times, I've fantasised about going on sabbatical to write a book. Six months in a cottage in South Wales or on the Suffolk coast. Dedicated to writing and running. Or Interrailing round Europe. Like when I was 22. Como, Venice, Florence, Rome, Corfu. Corfu! Maybe I'll stay at the cafe with orange chairs again. Where the smiling Greek lady waved us down as we got off the ferry. "Come stay with me. You have lovely room. And I will be your mama." Who could resist an offer like that? Travelling from place to place. Having experience after experience. Exploring and writing. While still working. That was my idea. But I can't go travelling now.
Simply being out of my home can trigger the writer in me. The conversations I've had and heard in the coffee shops of Ealing! The man who told me about growing up in South Africa and being beaten by his step-father. The ex-wife who regaled her friend with every detail of her divorce (you could see the friend had heard it all before). A trio of lawyers discussing the details of ongoing cases. An executive from a large multinational dairy company talking yoghurt tactics with an agency. A manager giving a member of his sales force a (none too complementary) appraisal. A woman expounding the wonders of her recent facelift (unfortunately I had my back to her). All rich pickings for a writer. Beware your coffee shop conversations! We're always lurking around in the likes of Pret, seeking inspiration. But right now, I can't get close enough to anyone to eavesdrop.
I can't do any of these things because I'm a captive, of sorts. So what can I do?
One of the things I'm doing with my newly acquired time, is re-reading Terry Waite's book,"Taken on Trust". It's about his 5 years in captivity in the Lebanon. Terry had a lot fewer sources of inspiration than me. But he still wrote a book. He couldn't observe the world on a morning run or a visit to the Co-op to top up his cheese stocks. He was chained to the wall other than during his daily trip to the bathroom. He had no books. So couldn't step into another world for inspiration. And he certainly wasn't Zooming his mates back home or his boss, the Archbishop of Canterbury. He was kept in solitary confinement and had to put a blindfold on whenever his captors were present. He didn't even have a pen and paper to write a book with. So he wrote it in his head and committed it to paper after he was freed.
Terry Waite lived through the kind of experience that the world wants to hear about - captivity. I too am living in unique circumstances that many people find fascinating - lockdown. Terry wrote of his memories - from the earliest (hearing a gramophone play Run Rabbit Run) through to his negotiations and kidnap. I too have memories. I could even write about the cafe with orange chairs! I have all the inspiration and ideas I need. Right here. Right now.
I don't suppose that Terry intended these words for someone living in a comfortable flat in Ealing with no guard on the door, who can run to Richmond and back if she wants, who can open a bottle of Rioja and order a pizza via Deliveroo: "If you read this book as a captive, take heart. Your spirit can never be chained." But they inspired me anyway.