The robin and the pigeons

Today I went upstairs to get dressed after a lazy start, and found a robin in my bedroom. It was plainly scared, and kept beating its wings against the big window pane, but couldn't find the opening. So I went and opened the window as wide as it would go and left it to find its way out. However, fifteen minutes later it was still there, and I decided I had better give it a gentle prod in the right direction with a newspaper.

While I was by the window I heard the strangest noise from outside - a rhythmic crunching, as though an army was approaching down the path. No sign of any such thing outside - but a few pigeons. Then I realised that the noise was coming from the pigeons as they were trampling on the dry oak leaves that surround the house. I made some scary gesture at the pigeons and about twelve of them went flying up. They had got into a real feeding frenzy because they could hear the beating of the wings of the trapped robin and knew it would die soon, and in their excitement they were going crunch, crunch with their feet on the leaves, in a yum, yum sort of rhythm.

So the coast was clear for it when I got the robin out, and I hope it survived its ordeal. Haven't had a robin in the house for years.

Bethnal Green

Yesterday I went to another comedy recording; and although it will be broadcast on Radio 4 I think it was not an "in house" production because it was recorded in a comedy club in Bethnal Green. Bethnal Green is in the East End of London, at one time it was a Jewish area and as I have never been there I though I would go early and see what it is like.

I think I was expecting towering council flats, and I didn't see them although they may be there. I saw streets of shops and small businesses, some buildings and pubs unimproved since Victorian times. I saw a high street of betting shops and pawn shops and the shops that unlock mobile phones and sell the accessories for them, and I went to Macdonald's. In Macdonald's I saw black schoolboys and girls in their early teens hanging out after school, dressed in blazers and school uniforms, speaking in English. Their parents may have come from many different places (Bangladesh and Somalia, among the mix) and English may be their second language, but altogether they speak English and they are not unmannerly. Seeing me waiting for the counter they moved out of my way, and I am sure if I had asked any of them for help with the self-service screen they would have helped. There were also mums of small children in MacD's; their toddlers in push-chairs and their older ones tearing around banging on the seats. Probably this is somewhere cheap where they can come and be warm and safe and well-lit for the price of a cup of tea. I imagine that most of these families are in pretty poor housing. There were also grandparents (white) minding grandchildren with a bit of "effing and blinding". There were also students coming in - very obviously students and not just people of the area. They were white, mainly, long-haired, in pairs. I found a few agencies for student rooms and a block of bedsits purpose-built for students. It reminded me of Selly Oak when I was a student. The trouble is that there is money in building student rooms and none in building good housing for immigrant families. But the immigrant families want to be there. A bad area of London is full of possibility for new immigrants to find work. Historically, this is the place. These children in their school uniforms and hefty shoes are the reason that the parents came to this country. I give credit to the teachers of Bethnal Green - they are doing a hard job, and not badly, I think. I also thought it was good for the students to live there amongst the poor. They need to know.

At my comedy show the audience was largely middle-aged, middle class and white, but not entirely. There were some quite eccentric looking people and some who looked as though they didn't get out much, as well as some worldly types showing off a bit. We enjoyed the show with John Finnemore's Teenage Diary although the humour felt a bit "bolted on" (a spy theme) which might be straightened out in the editing. He talked about going to work in Krakow as a teacher of English before he had even been to university - in short, he had nothing except intelligence on his side, and lacked a lot of training and subject knowledge.  But hey! this doesn't always hamper progress! It felt right to give John Finnemore a good big round of applause because his writing has given me so much delight and is always fun and good-humoured.

And look, he's got excellent teeth, too!

Sad about Brexit

I am still very sad about Brexit and I am worried about our economic future as an isolated country led by bullish but unreasonable men. I do mean men, because although Theresa May is a woman I feel she is not so much a leader as "oil and grease" between factions who can't bear each other. It is a great shame they are all Conservatives as they have a group mindset of being "winners" (like Donald Trump, their worst word is "loser") and they are too arrogant to listen to each others' bluster, let alone other points of view. Theresa May cares more about the Conservative party than she does about the U.K. She has been focused on that party for so long she simply can't see beyond it; which is why Brexit is being done badly. She can only see that her own party has Big Players (like Davis and Johnson and Gove) and that they must be involved in Brexit for her own security, but the fact that they might be the very worst team she can field internationally doesn't cloud her mind.

I am very disappointed in the Labour Party, who do want to present an alternative but have got it in their heads that European Union = Capitalism = bad. The European government is very strong in mitigating the effects of capitalism, with all its wonderful employment legislation and regulations about medications and foodstuffs and pollution and all kinds of things. That's how it has been good for us.

I believe many jobs will leave the country from the City and from European traders and we shall be much worse off. The rich will not feel the impact at all because their wealth can be stored anywhere, in any country's business, and so they will always be safe. I wish the Labour Party understood a great deal about wealth creation. I wish they would take lessons in economics. I am afraid they are a bunch of dreamers.

I might add things I'm reading online to this post. Here's one from Twitter:

The issue is that, to many who voted for #Trump or #Brexit, it feels like the first time they ever won. Many now see that the prize was a pie made of shit, but it's still the only thing they ever won. So they're determined to eat it, make yummy noises and insist we all have some.

     Alex Andreou‏Verified account @sturdyAlex                   

 

Reading to an audience - being a show-off

Today I took the book (my 2nd story book, it says on the front) in which I wrote when I was six and seven, and read from it to my fellow skiffers. I think it might have been an experiment. Why did I want my fellow skiffers to hear an account of a visit to Madame Tussaud's that my family made when I was six? Here and there I stopped and asked them if they remembered Mme Tussaud's when it had the Chamber of Horrors downstairs. It did generate some conversation.

What I am sorry about is that I clearly have a need to be a show-off. This is pretty annoying for everyone. A. says this: "Sometimes you're a bit showy." I don't like showy people myself. So why can I not hold this back?

When I was a teacher, I realised that I found teaching "a safe space" because my role was to hold the stage and communicate, and theirs was to communicate back within certain boundaries, and therefore I was in some way in control of the exchanges. So my problem is wanting to have control of a social situation, in which I possibly don't trust everyone, but I am also laying myself open. I am in some way being embarrassing, but I can't see how.

I must try to curtail this performing streak in myself.

But today I am also thinking that I need to get some form of therapy for my lack of emotion. I envy those who say that they feel some emotion about someone who died, as on the Marks and Spencer Twitter thread, where a woman writes that looking at the jumpers in M&S at Christmas reminds her so much of her lately deceased Dad, and it chokes her up. So many responses from people who miss their parents.

Problems of screenwriting

One of the problems of screenwriting is that it is useless, as far as I know, to write what one wants. A screenwriter who wants to make money has to say, "What does the market want?" and the market might say: we want thrillers, we want police procedurals featuring these characters (who have already been created), or we want dramas featuring strong women from the North. What some corporations want is a film like Made in Dagenham, which seemed a little formulaic to me (two of the Strong working class women must be estranged before the end, and then reconciled in the Grande Finale), but set in various different places and times, just that same story of lively working class women fighting for their rights, over and over again.

This is pretty much what I learned from Abi Morgan, speaking at the BFI last night. She does a great job of delivering drama to order.

What about dramas about men? Not popular. Not unless they are cracking up under the strain of being Strong Men. If there is a man in a leading role his boss must be a woman. Ideally, a black woman.

But it seems that screenwriters can write to please themselves, but these scripts are not likely to ever be made. I have read that you can publicise them to interest people in your talent as a writer (and your commitment in getting your story finished) but producers don't want them. They want what they have decided the public wants, and nothing else. It is a sad day for me because I realise that writing what I want to write may be an end in itself. How long will I have the heart to keep doing it?

The Russians are trolls

I am informed by "The Week" that the Russians are responsible for fomenting fear and anger on the Twittersphere by infiltrating Western Tweet networks with non-existent, but influential tweeters and producing hate tweets against those who voted Remain, for example, and I think they were pro-Trump too. I can see the point of this. It makes everyone feel sad and upset when they find so many of their fellow countrymen, who had seemed quite harmless or generally quite pleasant, were actually bigoted and sociopathic. It dilutes feelings of community and trust. It's effective, but it gains them nothing and it is wrong, in the same way that killing all the tigers is wrong, and deep sea fishing is wrong. It erodes the world's good nature, which took a very long time to develop, and will not be easily replaced.

Down in the dumps: Bye to my screenplay: achievements

Finished the eventful and gripping screenplay about these people: what a great story.

H.G.Wells, a charming man

Bland, a charming man.

Bland was also a quite frightening man.

The daughter who was caught between the two.

Shaw, who comes into the story because it is also a political story.

Yesterday I went on a cycle ride to Kingston, making the most of the fine autumnal weather (the trees are mainly green and only a few have shed their leaves) but it didn't make me feel better. Except when we rode around Bushy Park, that was fun, but I felt like a child. It made me feel as though I was wasting my time. Is this because I have finished the screenplay and feel bad about it? Worried that it won't interest anyone? I have to remember it was a first draft.

My blue bike with Karen's outside Hampton Court Palace.

I am now going to write another screenplay, but I first have my mother's photos to dispose of . And my superficial letters from years ago. I don't live in the past and I can't think why she kept all this wretched stuff, except that she thought I was having a really interesting life, maybe? I don't have much of a memory - I lived, I wrote it down, I moved on and forgot. Some people have amazing memories.  I guess my mother thought I would do amazing things, so she kept these letters in the expectation that someone would be interested in my biography. I have mixed feelings about this. I have always felt that my mother should achieve her own things, and I should achieve (or not achieve) mine, and the two are separate. Same with my father. I hope my daughter thinks the same - that her life will be about her own achievements, not mine or any other member of her family.