So Rock and Roll

I love knitting. I’ve learned to knit many times over the years. I was probably six or seven the first time and every time I want to do it again, I have to relearn. I’m clearly a bit dim when it comes to knitting.

I can’t remember if my Granny or Vera was my first knitting tutor. I think Granny’s speciality was crocheting so it was probably Vera. Vera lived in the village; she and her husband had lots of feral cats and no children. They had a cat called Winky, which was the euphemism our Mum used for front bottoms; I was a bit shocked by this.

There was no pattern Vera couldn’t knit. I remember her knitting tiny intricate Fair Isle patterns – and I was already in love with Tristan Farnon of All Creatures Great and Small who wore Fair Isle jumpers - I so hoped one day to have a husband who wore Fair Isle jumpers. (I grew out of that.) And she did that magic thing that several of my knitting teachers have done… she didn’t look at her knitting while she did it: she watched TV. To this day, I can’t take my eyes of my growing knots knits.

Vera used to hand knit jumpers for shops in London. She’d get about £2.50 per jumper and the shop would sell them for £80. I can remember being outraged on her behalf.

Although I was okay at knitting straight lines: the first successful project I remember was a Tom Baker Dr Who-like scarf for my brother, and actually the lines weren’t that straight but it was really long. Thinking about it, it might have been my only successful project until recent years. Success has to be measured by completion and not by the recipient wearing/using it. In my gap year, I tried to knit a jumper but it was abandoned half way down the second side. Thank god; frankly, it was hideous.

Having not knitted for years, I had to learn to knit all over again for a project I did at art school. I had to learn to increase and decrease stitches for a project on personal identity. This time my knitting teacher was my lovely mother in law.

I shall leave you with two knitted Jennies from my foundation course. Tomorrow, I’ll try to come to the point on why I started knitting stories.

Why why why? And what?

Since September/October I’ve been in a regular habit of blogging nearly every day but since Christmas I’ve been a very bad blogger.

I’m not quite sure why. It’s not for lack of material. I’ve started lots of posts - I know because I write them in Word first – and then thought ‘Oh deary me; they won’t want to know that.’ And then I haven’t posted them.

Sometimes I think this blog get a bit confused – it has a bit of an identity crisis. It isn’t quite sure if it’s an ‘I live in Thailand … Isn’t that different?’ blog or an ‘I am trying to write a book’ blog. It is definitely an ‘I am trying to write a book’ blog but … well … I do live in Thailand…

It started life because I wanted to join the Novel Racers but honestly, the writing angst drivel of that first year, makes me wonder why the comments didn’t dwindle dramatically rather than build slowly.

When I am writing well, (producing words rather than producing high quality prose!) I don’t have much to say about the process. And I am obsessed with visuals … funnily dressed Thai promotional people or impressive decorations.

So why do you come here? What do you like? (I can’t promise it’ll mean a change in my posts but at least I’ll know whether to have a full blown identity crisis or not.)

I've been outed!

My friend Carol, who I’ve coyly referred to as C on my blog has outed me in my comments to Today is for writing: she called me ‘Jen’ because that’s who I am. (Then she apologized and said she’d got confused – she's easily discombobulated, bless her.)

I’m fascinated by the notion of naming and identity. We do it as writers, don’t we? And bloggers do it too, to not be identified, or to be free to write without judgement.

I thought a lot about names and identity when I started my blog. When I signed up to the novel racers there was already someone on board with my name, (Hello Jen at spiralskies!) so rather than let it get complicated I created an alias, JJ because they are my first two initials.

That’s complete bollocks. I was too shy to say ‘here I am, this is me…’

But over the last few weeks I’ve been thinking of identifying myself. I have no reason to be anonymous – I no longer feel scared/shy. I can see why people who are blogging about their jobs invent an alter ego – Zinnia Cyclamen, (I am so jealous of your name, it’s sooooo utterly fabulous), and Ms Melancholy because professionally they need anonymity. Then there's someone's real identity, like Caroline Smailes and Kate Harrison who are both blogging as a communication tool but I don't fit into that category either. Feeling brave now I realise with what I’ve revealed in my blog, it wouldn’t take Sherlock Holmes to track down the real me. So why worry?

We talked to a friend today who has just got married and so has changed her name. She’s married relatively late, so she’d been with her name for 40 years. She got confused by a name she saw on a sign up sheet today until she realized it was her new married name. I remember worrying after I got married that the people who knew me only as Jenny Beattie didn’t know who Jenny Stevens was. She was part of my identity – I had been her for 25 years – and I worried that they’d never understand me if they had never known her.

Now, as I sit and look at that name: Jenny Stevens, I can hardly remember who she was, like someone I once knew.

One of my favourite name things is that game where you discover your porn star name. Mine is spectacular (I think). The game's been around for ever, but just incase you don’t know how to do it; you take the name of your first pet you ever had as your first name, and your mother’s maiden name as your surname:

That makes my porn star name: Honey Layzell, but you should probably still call me JJ.