Not so long ago I was enthusing about a local writing club. I had been involved in this group for a year and was looking forward to the new year (it’s meetings ran from October to July). Alas, a cloud has formed over that group and I find myself at loose ends.
Perhaps I should have seen that cloud on the horizon. Information about the Writers’ Collective disappeared from the KPL website. My email queries to the person from KPL who had faithfully organised the collective for some years went unanswered. And then for two months in a row I received no writing submissions from the other members of my group thereby obviating the point of any meeting.
Maybe it’s me. Last year the group to which I had been assigned seemed vibrant for about 4 months and then folded. I shifted over to another group within the collective for the remainder of the year. Now it too seems to have folded. I know that the two originating groups have persisted despite difficulties with communications (they have been sharing their work directly rather than going through the KPL intermediary). Since I have met some of the members of those groups, I could ask them if I could join in. But I think I would feel a bit like a distant relative who is taken in out of some misplaced familial obligation. (That’s only how I would feel, not how I expect I would be treated.)
It turns out that writing is indeed a solitary activity. To which the corollary can now be added that writing clubs, at least in my experience, tend towards solitariness. Which, I suppose, must contribute to more writing. Or at least I shall take that as my lesson and move on.
Good news. Although the group that I was participating in in the collective has been folded, I have recently been given the opportunity to join one of the remaining, and originating, groups. It’s been four or five months since my last group meeting, so I’m more than ready to both share some of my work with others. More important, however, I find I’m keen to get a further chance to read the new writing of some of my peers. Glad to be back in the collective.