I’m so giddy…it’s time for my writer’s weekend! I’m heading out at lunchtime to spend the next three days at the Festival of Writing 2017 surrounded by arty creative types who do this shit for real and I just can’t wait. The very first seminar of the weekend is called From Pipe-dream to Publication, and I’m hoping there’ll be loads of folk just like me who bring enthusiasm over experience and  don’t have a highly polished manuscript up their sleeve. All I want to do is take a tentative step into that world and have a bit of a nose around, you know? Suss it all out.

I’ve got my clothes all picked out, and I’ve got my fake bake on so I’m sporting a healthy glow, or at least I will be when I’ve showered off the excess this morning…right now I look like I fell in a vat of gravy. I treated myself to a face pack last night so it’s as good as it’s going to get. I don’t want to spend the next three days worrying about how I look, but I’m well aware that first impressions count. Having said that, I want to look young and skinny so I’m screwed on both counts, right?

There was a time, where events like this would’ve been off-limits to someone like me. When I was at my fattest there’s no way I would’ve considered rocking up to a long weekend where I know nobody at all. I’ll have no choice but to mingle and put myself out there. Back then, it would have been the stuff of nightmares to be honest, no matter how interesting I might have found the workshops.

I would have worried about what people thought as I waddled around looking for somewhere to sit. I would’ve prayed that the lecture theatres were not too far from each other so I didn’t have to walk very far. I would’ve been stressed to the max about finding a chair big enough for my double arse and I would’ve tortured myself with the buffet in case anyone judged me for my food choices.

I would’ve known in advance exactly how miserable I’d be, and I would have allowed fat to get in the way of my dreams. Again. I just wouldn’t have gone.

This time, I’m not fazed by it. Any of it. Well, except maybe the buffet. I’m not in control of the menu for three whole days but I am in control of my mouth and what goes in it. To be fair, I’m so on it at the moment I’m happy that I can pull it off.

I’m not really big on networking and exchanging small-talk in a work situation, I find it irksome and I really can’t be arsed but this is different. I’m dying to meet other people who love to write, and people who’ve had their words published and most of all I’m dying to meet people who can open my eyes to the possibilities of it all.

Besides, for the first time in my life I can honestly say being fat opened the door…I might never have picked up a pen if I’d been living the dream in Skinny Town all these years, eh?

Have an awesome weekend folks, and I’ll see you on the other side 🙂

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