So I did it! Some may remember that during COVID I disclosed I had likely seen all of the world I would see, thinking it would be many years before I felt comfortable to board a plane again. But I was wrong. After nearly five years of staycationing, I plunged back into the world with a two week trip to Ireland ending with a short stop in England. Built around a week-long stay with nine strangers at Donegal’s Irish Writing Retreat, many of the trip’s lessons relate to honing this craft. But many, as you’ll see from below, do not. 

Today I give you the first three of my top 15, some new, some confirmations of things I’d once known and had forgotten. 

1. Fiction is hard 

My fellow writers ranged from experienced book parents who’d birthed a couple of manuscripts already with more on the way; to those of us with concepts seeking the right publishing midwife; and others who were not necessarily planning book-kids, but weren’t taking precautions to avoid them either. 

The substance of our writing varied too. A few, like me, have life-stories they feel motivated to parent into volumes, in the hopes others could relate or even benefit. Some had conceived young adult fiction but were still working out the birth-plan. One, our youngest member at age 30, was two years into the gestation period of a fantasy novel, with plans for a family of three in the series. 

Given the group’s range, our instructor-couple crafted included some exercises to stretch muscles we didn’t know we had, and others that played to our strengths. The homework we had before we arrived, for example, was a dream assignment for the memoirist in me - a 300 word piece about a life turning point. My submission will doubtless form the basis of a future blog or perhaps a contest entry. 

The assignment that relied on a very dormant skillset in me, however, was the fiction exercise. Our classroom discussions were interspersed with cultural outings and on the second day, we boarded our van and relocated for the afternoon to a thatched cottage, famous for its history. After a local shared some folklore, our assignment was to write a 500 word piece of fiction set in a thatched cottage inspired by something we saw or heard there.

Non-fiction writing ideas come to me through a leaky tap - sometimes the water runs full-on, sometimes just a drip. But there’s always something coming. The requirement to write fiction, however, felt like someone had turned off the water at the main. I was overwhelmed without the constraint of an experience I’d had or a view I hold. I spent some time distracting myself by marvelling that my fantasy-fiction colleague could design a new world. I procrastinated by watching the Irish news loop about the pending Aer Lingus strike. I read a novel. I walked. And I finally buckled down and wrote something that could best be described as auto-fiction - a mashup of autobiography and fiction - but more or less met the assignment rules. 

It was the first time I’d written fiction since 40 years ago in high school English class. Is it quality work? No. But I did it. And for that I’m proud.

2. Dancing comes back 

On our first evening in Donegal, we were treated to a dancing demonstration of traditional Irish dancing. The couple who joined us was in their 70s and had been dancing together for decades. They reminded me of my own parents who taught dancing for years and maintained a strong relationship because of it. 

The activity that evening was to learn a couple of patterns from them and then on the 2nd night, the pub at our hotel had a Ceilí, a night of dancing for the community, accompanied by a local accordion player. We writers sat in and eventually the regulars pulled us into participate. It was a lot of fun and took me back to dances at the women’s institute hall not far from the farm where people would grab me to be the fourth in a rousing round of the schottisch or when I jumped at the chance to join in for the Mexican hat dance, and the bunnyhop.

3. I move best through the world alone   

Retreat life is new to me and while I’d mentally prepared myself for a lot of learning, thinking, and writing surrounded by my fellow attendees, I hadn’t anticipated the sense of social obligation I would feel and fail to meet. 

I am not a pack animal. I’ve known this for a long time but the pandemic solidified it for me. I can be social. I love nothing better than hosting a party, for example, but I’m best in a very small group (ideally one-on-one) with regular intermissions of alone time. As a precondition to my attending, I made sure we each had our own quarters at Donegal’s Teac Jack, the Inn where we lived, ate, learned, and socialized for seven days. I watched from the sidelines as the others in the group - all women as it turns out - travelled within our hotel and its environs like a 10 legged beast with two limbs missing (there was one other woman who also spent considerable time in her own corner). As with a three legged dog, the octet moved elegantly in spite of its disfigurement but it felt to me like it looked odd, like I was contributing to a lack of symmetry that could make it topple. 

Don’t get me wrong - I enjoyed meeting each of these women. The ones from the UK made me laugh with their quick wit and sense of absurdity at the mundane; the Americans softened some of the disdain for their country-people I’ve developed as I’ve watched the political shit-storm brewing stateside; and I had common ground with the other Canadian confirming that we are set apart from our neighbours to the south and our colonizers to the east. 

A piece of me felt relief tinged with guilt and FOMO at separating myself emotionally from the pack so soon and so permanently. Oh sure, I attended everything, but I did so almost as an observer, in awe of the speed with which they became so enmeshed in each others’ lives. Two weeks after we’ve parted company, the WhatsApp group chat still generates regular pictures and comments, not just of things we did together, but of their separate lives, as though this gang will endure. I read their comments but so far, haven’t the social confidence to weigh in.

That’s it for this week. Stay tuned for next week and those that follow for the rest of my list.

(pictured above the writing group; below:: my view of the pub as I write, I enjoy a laugh with the other Canadian, I demonstrate my dancing, and some of the breathtaking scenery)

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