The Journal: The Writing: An Update and a Challenge

7 thoughts on “The Journal: The Writing: An Update and a Challenge”

1. I block the internet to write, using either Anti-Social or Freedom on my Mac, if I’m having trouble focusing. It happens frequently with my particular kind of brain.

   I can always restart my computer and get rid of the blocking, but it takes a couple of minutes, and I rarely do it, so, whether I’m writing or not, I’m sitting in the right place, ready to.

   I use Siri on my iPhone for the quick research questions that would have led to wasting time – because I hate reading and typing on tiny screens. So I don’t dawdle – just get a quick answer and return to work. A business computer would be too much temptation for me.

   • I don’t use Apple, but my PC laptop has a button you can push to turn the internet off or on, no restart required. I keep it off on my writing ‘puter and keep it on on my business computer (the one I use for the Journal, to create covers, the internet, etc.).

     I’ve long advocated a separate computer just for writing. It can be any cheap little thing, even something you find at a garage sale as long as it will hold the word-processing program of your choice. Ideally it will have nothing else on it. When I sit down at my writing ‘puter, it’s a trigger. It tells my creative subconscious it’s time to play. (grin) It’s like throwing open the door for a crowd of five year olds.

     Of course, I understand that others use only one computer for everything, and that’s fine too.

2. Hi Harvey, good to read that you’re on with writing a Blackwell Ops novel. (I haven’t read any of the series — but intend to at some future point.) You mentioned Maputo and Mozambique and it triggered memories of my uncle — who was a real-life special agent and who was tasked with a special operation in Malawi for two years. Having served as a Redcap (Brit Army Military Police) he joined Her Majesty’s Customs & Excise as a uniformed officer. He spent time at Heathrow during the mid-60s and busted a then well-known Brit female folk singer for smuggling LSD hidden among a consignment of yams. He also busted the pop group, The Animals for smuggling — no, not drugs — but camera lenses made in what was then the Democratic Republic of East Germany. He was transferred into the plainclothes Special Investigations Branch and, in 1969 did a two-month stint with the FBI in the States. Unusually for any Brit law enforcement officer at the time he was lincensed to carry a sidearm. He worked undercover and would disappear for months at a time. This, obviously put a huge strain on his young family and he divorced. He never spoke about any operational details (apart from a stakeout he took part in when attached to the FBI) but he did occasionally bitch about office politics and desk-jockeys. One spectacular catch was the Cambridge educated, Howard Marks (AKA Mr. Nice:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr_Nice) who made fortune and became a cheeky chappy celebrity after his release from a book and stage tour, and a movie built around hogshit stories* as a drug lord. The family didn’t know of my uncle’s pivotal role in the case until long after he retired.
   Anyway, in the ’70s he was asked (not told) to head up a special unit based in Malawi to assist the Malawi government stem the distribution of Malawi Gold to Europe. My branch of the family looked after his two black labradors while he was in Malawi. He returned to the UK determined to retire at 50. Always remember him telling me that he would write and publish a novel before I did. He never did.
   He must have done a good job in Malawi because within a couple of months the Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher wrote to him personally to ask him to go to India for three years and assist the Indian government. (He framed and hung the letter in his bathroom) He declined, as the assignment would have eaten into two years of his retirement. She was furious apparently, as she’d promised his services to the then Indian Prime Minister. She had him busted down to a uniformed customs officer working out of Cardiff Airport for the last 6 months of his career.
   Now, finally, the reason I mention all this: After his second wife died of the Big C he went down a few steps, and then, a few years later, his oldest son died completely out of the blue (suffered a heart attack while sat at his desk), and, a year later, his youngest, IT whizzkid, so wealthy he spent most of his time surfing or procreating (he had six, yes six, daughters), suffered a life-changing stroke. And then, not so long after his 70th birthday, my uncle was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and the family decided to install him in a care home. When packing up all his stuff for the move he said to my mother, “Have we got any writers in the family?” “Why?” my mom asked. “I’ve all these boxes packed with some very interesting material, stuff I could never tell anyone, not even the family, because of the Official Secrets Act. Always meant to write it up as fiction, but never got around to it.” And my mother said…”No.” And they dumped all the material at the municipal dump. When my sister told me this I was furious.
   He’s still alive, and my mother and her sister each call him once a week.
   Moral of the story, I suppose, is writers should make it clear to all members of their families that they are writers and that they are always looking for material. As you can see above — I’ve got most of the backstory but none of the primary material.
   *As part of his defence in court he claimed he was recruited as an MI5 informant to help break the IRA. Utter bullshit according to my uncle.
   Thanks for your patience. All the best.

   • Thanks for my patience? Are you kidding? Thank YOU for sharing the story of such a truly great man. I wish I could have met him. Y’know, you have the raw material there for at least what, five or six novels? I wish you’d been able to receive all that “research” they dumped (probably illegally due to the Official Secrets Act) but even if he’d written the stories he would have fictionalize large parts of it. And you write fiction, right? Get after it, my friend.

3. A few corrections, the ‘well-known Brit female folk singer’ I refer to was actually a US citizen who moved to the UK in the early ’60s.
   I described Howard Marks as having attended Cambridge — wrong, he attended Oxford.

4. Thanks Harvey. As you know I live in Barcelona. I’m scheduled to visit family in the UK in July. You’ve equipped me with the courage to go visit my uncle, Syd. Thank you. I won’t interrogate, just hang out, and gently prompt. He’s a killer bridge player (or was). He second wife, a lovely, very down to earth woman, was a very keen golf player. Should our meeting happen I’ll report back — maybe in the form of a guest post — if that’s OK with you. Think he’d be modestly proud to hear you call him a ‘truly great man’. All the best to you and yours.

5. And, do you know what’s also absolutely true? I didn’t realise this for years, even though having a friend who lived in the same very small village, St. Buryan, (who now resides in a care home in Penzance) my uncle lived in the village at the same time as novelist David John Moore Cornwell, better known as John le Carré. I’m now thinking it was not a coincidence. Absolutely true. All the best.

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