advent

Tomorrow is Advent Sunday. Advent. It's full of anticipation, mist and mystery, frost, sparkle, and hope. Hope, not fingers-crossed hope, but really, positive hope, hope for change in and around us. And it's demanding, too, because if there is a possibility of change we must be ready to change, and make changes in the world. It is the opening of a door. It tingles. Christmas is when heaven meets earth, and Advent is when we prepare for it.

I've been making Advent wreaths, one for a church and one for home. Tomorrow, we'll light them and sing. One of my German friends taught me to make advent wreaths - people from Germany and thereabouts are good at Advent and Christmas.

And this morning I had the most wonderful, unexpected surprise. A package too big to get through the letterbox proved to be the most unexpected and perfect present. My elder son had sent me a large and stunningly beautiful Germann advent calendar, all the more exciting for not being anticipated. I had to tell you about this, but I can't begin to explain how beautiful it is or how happy it makes me.

things I've learned this week

This week I've learned -

that carpet cleaning wipes are really good for cleaning teddy bears -

that if you want to go to an event it helps if you turn up on the right day -

that if you turn up on the wrong day it isn't catastrophic -

that Betty's of York make stunningly wonderful franzipan mince pies -

that St Bede's Pastoral Centre was the best place in the world for me to be today -

that the toddler group can run perfectly well without me.

People who've brightened up my life this week (apart from my family)

Our friends in the north, Emily, my agent, the lady at Duttons, the man in the music shop, the man in the post office, the staff at the Bar Convent, the DHL man, Sister Cecilia and the people at the Pastoral centre, Jo, Kayleigh, the people on the train, and a guy who just sent us an e-mail for Hanukah and Christmas. There's a lot of love and a lot of good people around.

northumberland

For a few too short days, I have been back where I belong. I've been past the house where I first saw Crispin (or Yo-yo, as he was then) running up and down the beech tree. I've got down on my knees at the church that inspired 'A Friend for Rachel', otherwise known as 'The Secret Mice', my first published book. I've filled up with wide Northumbrian skies, and heard the accent that immediately makes me feel welcome. Most of all, I've enjoyed the company and hospitality of very special friends.

I've visited some lovely places in my life, many of which I've loved and want to go back to. Breathtaking, beautiful places. But if God made anywhere better than Northumberland, he's keeping it to himself.

the naming of

Juliet might have said 'what's in a name', but Shakespeare, speaking for himself, might have said 'a lot'. Why else would he name his characters as he did? Even allowing for the fact that he nicked all of his plots before anyone had learned how to sue for breach of copyright, he had some choice over names. Look at Midsummer Night's Dream. Not a name out of place.

I was reminded of the significance of names by an e-mail from one of my young readers, who very thoughtfully suggested names for possible future characters, some of them very good ones. Characters in books won't tolerate having names thrown at them - there is only one right name for a character, and sometimes you have to go on trying them out until you find the right one. Some strong personalities,like Crispin and Padra, arrive with their own names, and there's not a thing you can do about it. In 'The Octave of Angels' a small and determined young person appeared, and her name was Myrrh. How can anyone be called Myrrh? But she was, so I had to find a reason for it.

Yesterday, I found a packet of bluebell bulbs that I'd mislaid, and finally got them planted. Now there's a sensible name. Tells you exactly what it is. Here's ginger-hair-funny-face signing off for the night.

every good boy deserves favour

I never had piano lessons when I was a child. I could have either music or dance, but not both, and I really wanted to dance. I wasn't that good, but I loved it, and it meant that a sport-hating kid took lots of exercise.

(Note to all other sport hating kids. The only thing I know about hockey is that if you run down the pitch wiith your stick higher than your shoulder, you get sent off. That means you have to take a warm shower and sit in the changing rooms with a book.)

But that isn't what I meant to write about. Finally, when I was grown up enough to have a daughter doing a music degree and a piano in the house with nobody playing it, I decided to have piano lessons. Maybe I'd just do it for a little while to see if I was any good. I don't think I have any natural talent, I hate making mistakes, and I'm long past the age where the brain just gulps down everything new, but after a lifetime of not even knowing where Middle C was, it's a great joy to be able to play anything at all. (For me, not for my family. One more stumble through Scarborough Fair and they'll be howling at the moon.)

This afternoon I went to the most fantastic concert, arranged by my piano teacher to give her younger (decades younger) pupils the chance to perform. There they were, all the way from six year old dots plinking their way through nursery rhymes while their party shoes dangled two feet above the pedals to assured young people swishing through Bach and serious jazz.

Being able to make music is the most wonderful thing. I loved every note, and I loved their readiness to play, whether they were dying to perform or terrified of it. Watching the skill and hearing the music pouring (or trickling) through those young people was uplifting. Do they know how privileged they are?

I could have danced all the way home.

zooming (with help from Gleaner the Squirrel)

Sorry, I haven't blogged for a week, but I've been zooming about.

ZOOMING! SHE CALLS IT ZOOMING! GETTING ON AND OFF TRAINS IS WHAT I CALL IT. PACKING STUFF IN A BAG. WHEELING A CASE AROUND. I DON'T CALL THAT ZOOMING.

Thank you, Gleaner. First to York for a very successful signing, and many thanks to all who came, bought books, chatted, met the animals

SHE DIDN'T TAKE ME. NOT THAT I WOULD HAVE GONE.

and did rubber stamping, and thanks to Kirstie and all those lovely people at Borders. Then a couple of days to turn around and catch up with everything here,

YOU'D THINK IT WOULD ALL FALL APART WITHOUT HER, WOULDN'T YOU?

(actually, Gleaner, I think it might) - then off to Sheffield for a quick visit to my long-standing long-suffering

WHY DOESN'T SHE SIT DOWN THEN?

friend. Just got back this evening to find that the kitchen angel had organised the evening meal.

SOME PEOPLE ARE JUST SO SPOILED.

Gleaner, dear, if you were just a little more sociable you'd have lots of animals to share meals with, and...

OH, YES, AND WHAT ABOUT THE THING I DO IN 'URCHIN AND THE RAVEN WAR'? JUST HOW COULD I DO THAT IF I WERE WASTING TIME BEING SOCIABLE? IN THAT BOOK I'M THE...

Gleaner! Be quiet at once! No spoilers!

TYPICAL!

and the answer is

Big Bo-Peep

A frustrating morning trying to find really just right advent calendars without success.   No chocolate, no cartoons, just beautiful, magical, ooh-factor advent calendars.  It's too much to
hope that I'll find the enchanting, whimsical German ones my sister and I used to get, but I know there are companies making really lovely advent calendars SO WHY DOESN'T ANYBODY ROUND
HERE SELL THEM?

Grrr

If anybody I work for is reading this I have done lots of work today as well  : )

signing

Who lost a herd of elephants?

My son came home from school asking me that, many years ago.  I was reminded of it just now, when we were all passing silly jokes around.  This is just a quick blog to let you know
that I will be signing copies of the Mistmantle Chronicles at Borders bookshop in York (on
Davygate, opposite Betty's) on Saturday, 8 November from about eleven in the morning to
four or five or whenever they chuck me out.  

Answer in the next blog.

Also Ran

A few days of silence from the house of stories generally means one thing.  I wish it meant a deep state of contemplative silence or a furious outburst of creativity, but it doesn't, it's a migraine.  However, the little goblin with the drill has now left my left temple and the keyboard stays still when I look at it.  Nasty things, migraines.

November the first and second are All Saints and All Souls Day.  I love the idea of the great throng of heaven all having a party.  I think the idea is that All Saints are the official Saints, and All Souls are all the millions of loved and holy ones who don't get a mention in any books or lists.

Today, I've been thinking that 3 November should be All-So Ran day.  Remember all the people who might have lived great and holy lives or even simply loving and helpful lives if their potential hadn't been crushed.  The ones who had the warmth starved or beaten or terrified out of them, the ones who learned to live with their mouths shut and their heads down, the ones who'd love to believe in God but simply can't, the ones who were sent to fight wars they didn't understand and died still not understanding, 
or carried the weight of those wars for the rest of their lives.

Today is nearly over, so do something tomorrow to feed a child, to warm a heart, to stand up for
the weak.  God bless the Also Rans, and God bless you.