South Downs NWP Group Convener and NWP Website Editor Theresa Gooda shares what she has learned from visiting other NWP groups.

In these pandemic times I have managed to travel the country through writing, ‘attending’ meetings in East Anglia, London and Sussex in recent weeks. I have been guilty of repeatedly gatecrashing other groups - remotely of course.

Today marks Day 50 of Lockdown 3 in my part of the world, and writing has been my solace through this most brutal of years. Because I run a group myself, one that has continued to meet via Zoom since March last year, I find that during our meeting time I am not able to truly relax and write. It might be because I’m wondering how everyone else in the group is getting on, reflecting on how I’ve introduced a poem or prompt, checking on what comes next.

So it has been a wonderful privilege to join in with other groups, where I have found my fellow writers so welcoming. And it simply wouldn’t be possible in ‘ordinary’ times.

It has been fascinating to see how each group has its own identity and operates slightly differently. Some share words and drafts and thoughts frequently throughout their session; some save the sharing to the end. Some are asked to think about a theme in advance or bring something along to a Zoom meeting. Some go away from the screen to write, returning to the Zoom call after a certain amount of time. Some keep their cameras on all the way through. Some write one week and share the next. Some collate their drafted writing; others keep their finished work private. Some meet weekly, some monthly, some half-termly.

I’m also struck though, by some of the similarities between them:

Firstly, the warmth, humour and laughter. Is that writers? Teachers? Writing teachers? NWP writing teachers? It permeates everywhere.

Secondly, the recommendations - for books, memoirs, plays, poetry, resources, classroom ideas. There is a constant sharing as reference to one thing triggers memory of another. My ‘to be read’ pile grows and grows, and I am grateful.

Thirdly, the imaginative, creative responses where there are always, always, ‘diamonds’ to be found ‘in the dustheap’ of raw, unpolished writing - as Virginia Woolf might say. I wonder how tired teachers at the end of long days working under the toughest of circumstances pull off such magical images and ideas - but they do it without fail.

Last night, as we were writing ‘I’m from’ lists in response to George Ella Lyon’s ‘Where I’m From’ poem, one member wrote that they were from the ‘tap end of the bath’. The image resonated with me - as the oldest of three siblings, I too was saddled with the tap end. Those five words conjured a childhood world - scorching drips, protruding metal. No, insisted the writer - the tap end is the best part, the warmest part, in control of topping up the water when it’s needed.

So perhaps I can push it to serve as a rich metaphor for the project itself: as NWP members we are very much at the tap end, being ‘refilled’ with each visit.