LET GO AND LIVE….

by Rosemary Lord   

    

I went to the zoo. London Zoo. With my brother Ted. We took a picnic.

It was a lovely sunny day in May, shortly after my birthday, as we sat by the fountain enjoying our sandwiches. Just like we had done as small children – just yesterday!

Oh, the pleasure of revisiting such childhood memories.

Since then, the London Zoo has improved greatly, totally remodeled with expansive, imaginative new areas for the animals with the Global Wildlife Conservation programs. We saw the wonderful abandoned 1950s Indian railway station that is now The Land of Lions, complete with abandoned luggage, old handcarts and peeling, vintage Bollywood movie posters, to make these endangered Asiatic Lions feel they are still in Gujurat, India. The Sumatran tigers have their own roaming wilderness, as do the wild African rhinos. All endangered species, now thriving in this spacious conservation program. Even the butterflies have their own newly designed habitat. Each sanctuary was as fascinating as the last. It was an educational joyride.

Yes, I was in England visiting my family for the gathering of the Lord clan. After London, my siblings and I went back to the small fishing village in Greece that we’ve been returning to for several years. Not telling you where or it will get overrun with tourists! This is where we enjoyed leisurely dinners in the harbor, overlooking the small fishing boats. Souvlaki (chicken skewers) and moussaka still favorites – at around $14 a head including lots of wine and other dishes! We spoke of books and writers. We always come back to books and writers. Richard Osman’s Thursday Murder Club was much discussed as a well-thought-out Agatha Christie-style mystery. Also on the reading menu were Mick Herron’s Slow Horses, Victoria Hislop’s latest, The Figurine, and Sinclair McKay’s intriguing book about The Secret Life of Bletchley Park. I love those World War II books. And am fascinated to learn more about the young women at Bletchley Park, who, having signed the Official Secrets Act, never spoke of their heroic work.  

We wondered whether today’s kids will be as voracious readers as we were and still are…

We spent a couple of days in the delightful waterside town of Nafplio, an hour south of Athens. More delicious Greek food and friendly Greek hospitality.

Back in England, our wonderful, long-suffering brother-in-law, Peter, drove us to Broadstairs, in Kent – next to Ramsgate. What fun! It’s a lovely, old-fashioned ‘seaside’ town. It was one of Charles Dickens haunts. Bleak House stands on the top of the cliffs overlooking the expansive beaches. It’s a leisurely mix of old and new. The Edwardian and Victorian architecture, the Kent and Sussex painted wooden beach huts and wooden fishing and boat structures at the waters edge, unspoiled, next to charming new buildings. Beachside shops selling souvenirs, buckets and spades and saucy postcards. Fish and chips for lunch, of course. Perfect!

This was my much-needed escape from Hollywood and all the dramas of the Woman’s Club. To my jaded eyes, it seemed so much easier to be a writer in London now. Lots of cozy cafes in which to write the next best-seller and to swap literary tales with aspiring and established writers. They are everywhere in London.  Cafes and writers, that is. And there are endless magazines to read, too. Several have selections of short stories.  Where did the American writers’ magazines go?

And this time away gave me the chance to take a look at what I had been doing with my time and where I was going.

I read a piece by DJ Adams on ‘Letting Go of Expectations…’

She’s right.  As writers and artists – how perfect do we want to be? And who decides what is perfect? “To fully embrace your creative artists or muse,” she writes, “You must learn to let go. Let go of who you think you are, releasing your idea of what your creative gift is and what you expect to achieve. This is so contrary to everything we’ve been taught in order to be successful. So instead of holding on to who you think you are (noir novelist, oil paint artist, songwriter) stand back and observe your abilities. Just like our personalities are ever changing, so our muse has many faces. Our creative consciousness absorbs. Let yourself go. Experiment without considering the outcome. Stephen King said ‘Good writing is often about letting go of fear and affectation…’ Let go – to grow!”

Sounds good to me.

“It’s not where you start – it’s where you finish…” wrote Dorothy Fields, lyricist for the Broadway musical Seesaw, “It’s not how you go, it’s how you land.”

And Ralph Waldo Emerson put it another way: “Life is a journey, not a destination.”

And so, as I flew back to my Hollywood home, I thought a lot about those words.

I think many of us are still working with the adjustments forced on us by the Covid nightmare. And all of those challenges that crept up on us. Life is different now. Reading and writing habits have changed, too.

Now, I decided –  I wanna be FREE! I wanna be ME! I have so many untold books and stories in me, I feel I’m bursting at the seams. I gotta lotta writing to do!!

So, I’m ready for new horizons. I’m ready to let go. Not sure where or when. Not even sure who I am anymore. Just one big leap of faith into an amazing creative future.

Who do you think you are today? What do you expect of yourself? Or do you like where you are now? Eh?