Welcome new readers! I send out a new story to this list every Thursday, and I’ve been going for over a year. If you want to read some of the earlier pieces, my favourites include Don’t Just Bury Your Trauma, The 4th Film, Distant Voices, and Skin Fever. As well as the story, I write a little about the background to writing it, and a recommendation.
Finding Shelter
There are many ways you can try to fight depression. Medication works for some. Others drink, even though that never fixes things. My friend Simon relied on umbrellas.
He'd buy them a dozen at a time, and boxfuls would travel from China to wait at the bottom of his wardrobe. He kept them there for when dark clouds gathered, literally and metaphorically. Then, as the rain hurled down, he'd throw the umbrellas into a bag and set out into the streets.
He'd look for people cowering in doorways or under awnings and eaves, the ones who’d been caught out by the weather. He'd hand them an umbrella, refusing any payment beyond a thank you. He liked seeing their joy and relief – it wasn't much, Simon admitted, but it was enough to keep him going.
Background
I spent a chunk of the last week at a writing retreat. It’s indulgent, but it’s been very useful. I’ve polished up a few stories like this one, but mostly I’ve been deleting old notes. Some of them were for ideas I’ve been carrying around for years.
All the best things I’ve written have been drafted in a single session, the stories coming from scribbling ideas and phrases until one takes root. I hate struggling to find something, but a thread will usually emerge if I keep at it.
I deleted tens of thousands of words this week, old drafts and sketches that I’ve kept around until they went stale. I’m looking forward to seeing what emerges from the space I’ve made.
Recommendations
Twee covers of inappropriate songs are an easy trick, but sometimes they do work, as with Charlotte Gainsbourg covering Kanye’s Runaway1. Comedian Allie Goertz’s album of Nine Inch Nails covers, Peeled Back is another example that avoids being a cheap joke. There is an interesting mix of songs, but I particularly like her cover of the instrumental, A Warm Place, which is probably my favourite NIN song. The best covers are the ones that show you something new about a song you love.
I miss the old Kanye.
Really loved this little story or perhaps I should say "vignette"!
I knew a clown who collected umbrellas...