The long and winding road

Some of you will know already that I have a habit of taking circuitous routes home, instead of the direct, boring, motorway-to-motorway option.

I like to explore new areas, and I like a demanding drive.

Like this one:-


North of Grassington, in the Yorkshire Dales 

That was today's offering, up hill and down dale (literally) passing from glorious sunshine into drifting mist, with each blade of grass on the moorland outlined in frost. Walls and barns, lichen on the pale stone, highlighted in the setting sun. Dormant trees and shivering bushes, water in a rush to be somewhere else.

The perfect blissful wind-down to a hectic but fabulous weekend. I can't tell you how much it choked me up to see my brother in his scarlet mess dress. He was absolutely magnificent.

And I wasn't half bad, either.

Add to all that a revelation about one of my heroines-in-waiting that made me itch to start to get that story down. Up to that point I wasn't sure I was ever going to write that one, as I could see the hero clearly, but couldn't get a handle on the heroine. But I was listening to some music, and one line grabbed my throat. And then other elements joined in and made me pay attention.

You turn every head but you don't see me.

That was the one that grabbed my attention. It seems to be more the line that a man would sing, thinking of a woman, but I heard it in my heroine's voice, a little plaintive, and a little resigned, and I discovered her character on the thought.

Other words from the song conjured up a really pivotal scene:

You'll fall asleep and I'll put a spell on you. And when I wake you, I'll be the first thing you see. And you'll realise that you love me. *

Suddenly I know what she's like and what shaped her, and I can 'see' several scenes in her POV. Wonderful.

Don't you just love being a writer?

* Strange and Beautiful. Aqualung.