On Becoming An Author

And going on tour!

Hey friends - well done for making it through all 500 days of January.

My mum loves running. She is so committed to parkrun that she took my dad to the Netherlands so complete Zuiderpark so she could tick off Z on her A-Z list, and if my partner hadn’t already won her over pretty much instantly on meeting, then running the Palestine Marathon early on in our relationship almost certainly sealed the deal.

In her book Run For Your Life she details her journey of being diagnosed with breast cancer and running through it, and in one chapter she asks What makes you a runner? - and suggests that whether it is a one-off, a couch-to-5k, a parkrun or a full blown marathon, the only thing you need to do to be a runner is - run!

I think about this a lot. In my early days of writing and performing poems I would add in qualifiers such as performance poet or slam poet as I had my own baggage about what I thought it was to claim to be a poet, whereas now it is a label that a love, someone who chooses to pay attention to the world and imagine it differently, whether that is something written for yourself, a friend, or up to 10,000 strangers around the UK as part of your upcoming tour (more on that below). Indeed if anyone asks me what it takes to be a poet I would simply say - write a poem!

That being said, this week I was asked to send off an author photo and I felt those waves of imposter syndrome come crawling back. Despite having written three books (!) most of poems find their home first and foremost on stage, and my current images for tour feel (too?) bright and fun and flamingo/umbrella-based and not what I imagine adorning the sleeve of a weighty tome. I think the only time I have claimed to be an author to date was getting car insurance when they misheard poet as pirate over the phone and understandably wanted to up my premium before I backtracked.

Yet just as me and Chris feigned outrage when Vodka Boy my friend Dave declared over Christmas that he obviously didn’t consider us comedians despite us having been precisely that for the last five years, I know that all it takes to be a writer is to write, and all it takes to be an author is to auth? also write(!). This week I submitted something that’s going to be published in someone else’s book for the first time, and I am working towards a much bigger project that these photos were needed for in the first place. In the coming months I am going to be wrestling more and more with where I might fit in the world of mainstream publishing, so I decided not to overthink it and instead sent off a photo of me on stage doing what I love and looking happy, and reasoned any photo of me is an author photo because - I am an author!

On Becoming a Radio Presenter

One of the other hats I wear is I occasionally write reflections for the Radio, whether they take the form of a Thought for the Day, a prayer, or in this case a daily service. It is 15 minutes long and includes a talk, a reading, some songs, and a space to pray (Everyone else chooses hymns but I didn’t get the memo so just picked my favourite songs first time around and have got away with it ever since). I wrote it in such a haze that I couldn’t remember what I’d said so it was a treat to listen back and be reminded that a) my partner has a better reading voice than me despite me being an Author, and b) that I was really happy with what I’d written. Even if you don’t fancy the whole thing I recommend listening to Laura Marling’s Child Of Mine - possibly my favourite song from last year (although shout out to Kendrick for a close second)!

On Becoming A Tour Manager

The biggest news this month (alongside our car breaking, the boy learning to roll over, and being granted an allotment after being on a waiting list for five years) is that I have announced this years tour dates! As soon as I press send here we will be making our way to the Eurostar for our first family holiday as a three to Amsterdam for the first of about 40 dates, and I would love to see you at one of them! You can get tickets for all dates here and I wanted to especially shout out Birmingham and Margate as dates earlier on that could do with a nudge. Some of the others have already sold out so be sure to get in there early for all of our peace of mind. The show will be a mix of old and new stuff and I’m really excited to get back out there and do my very best being a Poet !

On Becoming A Podcaster

Meanwhile back home my podcast Something Borrowed is going from strength to strength. I’m aware not everyone will be able to make it to the tour dates, so I’m committed to keeping putting these out for free to you can listen wherever you are. November’s episode with Theresa Lola is now live and in December we took the show on the road to London Bloomsbury Theatre with Your mum does the washing himself, Joshua Idehen. As of about midnight last night that is available to listen too. I’ve linked to Spotify but you can get it in all the good podcast places:

In January we recorded maybe my favourite episode ever with the phenomenal Jasmine Gardosi, and on Feb 26th we’ve got Rob Auton in Margate, before another mega-lineup in Bath with Hollie Mcnish and Vanessa Kisuule (which at the time of writing only has four tickets left!) - Let me know if you have any favourite poets you would like to see on it, I’m always looking for more brilliant people !

On Becoming A Substacker

That’s all for now. Whenever I have a tour to promote it reminds me that social media can be a gift and a curse in that lots of people who might want to come and see shows don’t hear about them until afterwards, so I love having a smaller, more reliable (and dare I say more attractive?) mailing list on here that I can share stuff with. I’m enjoying my new home on Substack, so please do send anyone this way if you think they would enjoy my monthly musings/updates on whatever adventures I happen to have going on. If you wanted to also tell people about the tour that would, of course, make you even more lovely and attractive.

Until next time, stay brilliant x