Support Networks

And why everyone needs a mossy pole

I was reflecting with my husband the other day on our journey over the last three years and our chat turned to my fiction writing.

Even longer than three years ago, more like five, I was just starting to take my fiction seriously.

Back then I knew no one who wrote fiction. NO ONE.

Online I saw people chatting about writing groups, and how valuable they were. About sharing your work with other writers because giving and receiving feedback is one of the best ways to get better at writing. The other way is, of course, to read more books.

These days it's a different story. I'm privileged to be in a few writing groups. Like many writers, I use different groups for different things. Each group works slightly differently. I have a Horror group, a Flash Fiction group and a group where the commonality is that we are Mothers Who Write.

These are all groups that meet online. I've found this works best for me. There are a couple of local groups where I live, they meet in person, but I've found the timings just aren't suited to this point in my life. You've got to do what works for you.

These past weeks I leaned heavily on the Mums group. My laptop did the white screen of death and then wouldn't switch on. I thought I'd lost everything. I'd also done a tonne of plot work the previous day using Plottr, and once I'd fixed the laptop, ran diagnostics and tests... Well, I couldn't find all this work I'd done.

The laptop was close to going out of the window, I was so angry and upset. It took all day but I eventually found the file. Anyway, it felt like a test of How Much Do You Want This? And it turns out, quite a lot. 

Around the same time, I rescued a huge and neglected Mostera plant from someone who was struggling to look after it. I spent nearly a whole day cutting it from the pot it was in and untangling the roots and repotting it. I nipped out and bought a mossy pole to give it some better support as the multiple bamboo canes it’d come with, just weren't enough.

It struck me that we all need that mossy pole. We all need that strong support to lean on as we grow and strive to be who we want to be, bringing what is in our heads out into the material world. 

Here's a picture of the roots. They look like noodles!

It wasn't lost on me either that this is also a good analogy for my current editing situation. Unpicking, supporting and nurturing is exactly what I’m doing with my current novel in progress.

What support networks do you lean on?