It must be a little over twenty years since, following the unfortunate demise of a favourite typewriter, my elder son suggested that the AppleMac Classic which he was about to replace might be a sensible replacement. At that time, I had barely seen a personal computer - let alone operated one; so, taking advantage of a few days at home suffering from a bout of bronchitis, I set about trying to learn how to master the thing.
Incredibly, bearing in mind the fact that, apart from the opinion of a handwriting analyst that "I should become an author", the notion of writing had never occurred to me. Furthermore, to be perfectly honest, although I was an avid reader of newspapers and magazines, I rarely read books. However, in much the same way the cold 'poured out of me', so a did a 200+ page novel.
Interestingly, at that time, a frequent visitor to the house where my wife is Housekeeper, was a well-known (in the UK, at any rate) publisher who, intrigued (I suspect) by the fact that I was a coach driver, arranged for my work to be given the once-over by a writing editor or proofreader (I'm not sure of the title) who suggested it had the basis of something which might be published. So, I set about fine-tuning my original effort.
In the meantime, having been appointed manager of a large bus station in the southern counties, it seems the loss of the ability to mull over a storyline whilst driving for several hours caused me to develop what I believe is known as 'writer's block' which lasted for several years. Having said that, I did spend some time putting together various blogs and journals - but, IMHO, there's a subtle difference between writing fact and fiction.
Recently, however, although I don't drive around the country any more (apart from on Trixie), I have retired; so, the opportunity to 'mull over' things has returned and, as a consequence, I'm looking forward to trying to continue putting together a variation of the original storyline coupled with a new one.
Watch this space.
