Kate Keogan, one of our Arts Council supported mentees, on the ups and downs of the writerly Zoomscape

So. I’ve gone from being a Zoom newbie in March to attending five sessions in one week: two for NaPoWriMo; a mentoring catch-up meeting with Juliette from Dialect; the first of six Poetry and Journalling workshops; and Writers’ HQ’s weekly ‘flash face-off’ event’s 1st birthday party.

I have mixed feelings about Zoom. Yes, it makes ‘things’ possible (and I have attended readings and festivals etc. that were out of the question, pre-pandemic). But it does resemble an open-plan office. I find myself stressing about inefficiency every time the chat strays off-topic.

I do realise it is about more than getting work done and being efficient. And I do value being in a room with others who ‘get’ the writing thing, especially the poetry thing. I miss the monthly writing days with Writers’ HQ (and not just because of the sandwiches and cake, though that was obviously a draw). One of my worries about the mentoring is that when it comes to an end I will be returned to my disconnected, isolated routine, writing in a vacuum. I love my ‘anchorage’ and my solitude: loneliness is another matter altogether.

I would be more at ease on Zoom if I were good at making witty, insightful, or even coherent observations off the cuff. I like to consider things, have a good long think about them. I need to write things down (or draw, or paint them) to make sense of them. It surprises me this isn’t more of a writer-thing. The Whisperer, of course, tells me my lack of immediate response is construed as rudeness or stupidity. To my discredit, it’s the charge of ‘stupidity’ that bothers me the more of the two.

In more tech-related news, I have belatedly bought (pardon me, invested in!) a new tablet. My ancient laptop has become, at this point, a magic typewriter with email. I underestimated the degree to which it was exhausting me, all the hours spent peering into the screen of my phone. In the past fortnight, my new kit has gone from being a complete revelation to almost invisibility.

There is rather a lot of writing being done. In one week I have written good drafts of five new poems, all of them begun from prompts in the Zoom sessions. I am not necessarily writing the collection I thought I was, though. Some of the new pieces clearly belong to it, but other stuff is tugging at my sleeve, too. Is this a distraction? A new direction? I don’t know. Maybe I need to get these things out of my system, to clear the way for what I am meant to be writing. What I do not want to do at this stage is to veto anything.

This blog can also be read on Kate Keogan’s website here. You can follow Kate on Twitter @kathedron

Zooming, stumbling, feeling the way

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