My Weekly Writing Wish for You

This week has been a crazy-wonderful-busy-exciting week. My mother and her partner arrived to visit me in Singapore in time for birthday cake – double birthday cake, actually, as Mum’s partner and I share a birthday (we’re super special people)!

It has been a week of sight-seeing, eating, and drinking (Dionysus would be proud). I’ve arrived at the end of their trip feeling exhausted, thrilled, and teary (despite the extra year on my age, a girl can still miss her Mummy).

I sat down with Mum today and looked at her (both of us bleary-eyed and wishing the chairs would turn into mattresses so we could fall into a deep slumber) and, stuttering, tried to explain why I was feeling so … well … blegh.

And then I realised it.

I haven’t written a single word this week. There has been little sleep, no reading, and no writing.

My post-it note is flapping in the breeze from the fan and thinking of my Writing Wish last week makes me feel suddenly false and unreal.

Now, looking through photos of birds and thinking about giggling on bumboats, I can’t help but feel like my post-it note is flapping with encouragement rather than a half-hearted “Hello, remember me?”

Lanterns in Chinatown, Singapore. Photo: Stef Thompson

What I’ve done in the past week is life. Sure, it was exhausting and wonderful at the same time, but that’s life, right? I’ve seen some amazing things and collected some fantastic stories – experience fuels the imagination, and my imagination is now on fire!

My writing wish for you this week is for you to experience something new. Go somewhere you’ve always meant to go (it doesn’t have to be another country)! When was the last time you went to the museum or took a drive out-of-town? Maybe it’s time to try out that new restaurant or wander through that strange-looking shop on the corner. Fuel your imagination and let the sparks fly!

This post has also been cross-posted at Budding Writer’s League.