My scungy purple notebook

This blog is about my scungy purple notebook (pictured). Every word of that descriptive phrase is significant except for the word “purple”, which is really of no consequence. After all, the notebook could just as well be algae-coloured or tartan. It would make no difference.

Let me begin with the word “notebook”. It sounds innocent enough. But behind the mundane object named by that noun is quite a lot of my writing philosophy. You see, I’m a writer who gets a lot of odd ideas at odd times. If I don’t write them down (or sketch them, if they happen to be pictorial) I lose them. For ever. Thus this notebook is simply the latest in a long series of notebooks that I have used over the years. It is an extension of my mind. In it I jot down, well, whatever I think is worth jotting down, or putting into words, on a particular day: lines of poetry, plans, the beginnings of stories, journal entries, sketches, even blogs like this one. In fact, this particular blog was jotted down in this very notebook. The only reason you’re reading it now in typed form is because I then typed it up (editing it only slightly). But it was formed in this notebook.

There are also poems that have been birthed in this particular notebook, and the lyrics of a new song, plus a complete short story (that I’m not yet sure quite works), and ideas for blogs and social media posts, even the first halting paragraphs of a book idea. I’m sure I could use an electronic device for this sort of “noting” and “drafting” (lots of writers do), but for the moment I’m still doing what I’ve done (on and off), for years, carrying round the latest in a long series of notebooks.

Which brings me to my second point. It’s scungy. “Scungy” is a word that barely makes it into the dictionaries, since it’s an Australian and New Zealand colloquialism. It means decrepit, messed up, dirty, nasty. The pages of this notebook are starting to detach from the bottom third of the spiral binding. The cheap plastic cover is warped out of shape (that’s why it’s of no consequence that it’s purple, or any other colour). The page edges are getting a little frayed from constant thumbing. And that’s just the externals. Inside, the writing is rushed, barely legible, with multiple crossings-out and tiny scrawled-in additions. Even my family members say, “How can you even read that?” But I can. I can read it pretty easily, as if it’s an extension of my recent journey through life, which it is.

I suppose I should tell you one of the most significant points about its scunginess (and, hey, there’s a word that definitely doesn’t make it into normal dictionaries). Its scunginess is because I keep stuffing it into my backpack, taking it almost everywhere I go. It’s worn out because I’m travelling with it. But that’s the whole point. It means I’m “catching my thoughts” and “drafting new words” at all sorts of odd times in my life. Its scunginess is what makes it so organic, so connected with my journey through the real world.

Which brings me to my third and final point, the “my” in “my scungy purple notebook”. The “my” is what causes me not to care a fig about how scungy it’s getting. There’s so much of “me” now in that book that I’m connected to it by much more than its mere physical form and feel. There are words and sentences and whole written pieces in this notebook that are a key part of my creative journey over recent times.

If you are a fellow writer, then, as one of your kin, I can offer you few more heartfelt wishes than this: that you too will have your own “scungy purple notebook”—or whatever equivalent works best for you.

Happy writing.


© Peter Friend, 2019. All rights reserved.

Autumn in thirteen words

It’s the beginning of Autumn (at least in the Southern hemisphere). And to celebrate, I’m sharing with you my tiny Autumn poem, “Parachutist”, which some of you may have seen before.

It really is tiny. A single sentence in three short lines. If you know a little about poetry you might recognise it as a haiku—that amazing Japanese form-in-miniature, which consists of just five syllables in the first line, seven in the second line, and five again in the third line. That’s all. It’s a poem cut down to the barest essentials, and it’s a form I have grown to love.

In a way, I cheat. But then, so do many other modern poets. For, instead of keeping only to the five–seven–five syllables in three lines, we also add a title, as I have done. And the title actually helps a lot; it orients you towards a certain image, so that your mind is already engaging with an initial idea before the three lines begin. So really my poem is three lines plus an extra word. Read it again, and see how it all works together:

Parachutist

A leaf, unfastened,

launches itself on the breeze

for its one sky-dive.

I don’t know if this particular “take” on Autumn interests you. But I have found this idea of the once-only-ever fall of a leaf in Autumn very engaging. In a way, it’s taking the massive event of billions of leaves falling, and reducing it to the singular experience of one leaf. And for that one leaf, the moment of falling is momentous. It’s a once-only-ever experience, beginning with the leaf snapping from the tree, and finishing very soon afterwards with its landing on the ground. That’s why I like the idea of personifying it with the image of a parachutist. To me, it helps get across the idea of one momentous journey to the ground, which is then finished for ever.

You will notice that I think about images like this at some depth. A tiny part of nature can give rise to deep meditation on my part. Perhaps that’s why I write poems. Some people might find this odd, but I don’t really care. I prefer to think, and think deeply (and turn into a haiku), a single Autumn leaf than let this whole mighty season pass me by without a moment’s reflection.

This haiku, once written and committed to memory, allows me to revisit the moment again and again over the months and years in a way that I find special. That’s the value of haiku, as the Japanese discovered centuries ago. A haiku can celebrate a moment in nature that can then last a lifetime (or even, for the Japanese, centuries).

My “Parachutist” poem was published in a children’s magazine some years ago (Blast Off, May 2012), illustrated by Kim Gamble. I have since “published” it myself too online, with an illustration (pictured above) by my daughter, Cathy.

I like giving fresh life to poems if I can. I know this one only has thirteen words, but I still enjoy it. It helps put me in the mood for Autumn.

© Peter Friend, 2019. All rights reserved.