The hated A3 sheets of paper!

This is probably a good time to point out that I am not a creative person. That may sound crazy, I am a writer, creation is in the name of the thing that I am. But, I have never felt like a creative writer.  I imagine stuff and I write that stuff down and it becomes words on a page. I cannot create diagrams and pieces of artwork to go with those words. If I had to write it down without a word processor it would be indecipherable, if I had to make a collage for it, it would just be unevenly cut squares stuck down on a page. I have no visual capabilities. And I know this because in my first year of uni they tried to help me develop them.

We had a class in which the tutor enjoyed pulling out big A3 sheets of paper and lots of coloured pens. She would give this huge inspirational speech about how we must fill these sheets with ideas.

'Draw!' she would cry, 'draw your ideas, draw spider diagrams and swirls and write all over everything!'

I would stare at my big piece of paper, select a pretty green pen, and proceed to list my ideas down one side of it. Yes, list. Now, do not misunderstand me. My first few attempts at creation were spider diagrams but, the ideas that came out of them felt deluded and unconnected. I cannot make connections in that way.

And, no matter how many times I have tried to draw one of my characters I never can. I study creative writing at university and many of my friends come out with these wonderful drawings that they can then find inspiration in. I have my lists.

So, when we were told that for our ECP (FYP, dissertation, whatever you want to call it) we could do whatever we wanted many of my friends began to get very excited.

The tutor was standing there like, 'you can make videos and paintings and sculpture or music or dance if you want to! As long as it adds to your final piece.'

And I am sitting there like, 'you will get 8 000 words of genius and you will like it!'

I have handed in my proposal for my piece, I have talked with my tutor. And yet I still do not know what it is I want to write. I know it isn't what I said in the proposal, and I know it isn't any of the ideas I have come up with so far. I have only just decided that I want to write a contained piece rather than an extract.

So, today I am going to sit in my room and go through all of my idea places (Notebook, phone, ipad wherever I've scribbled them) and I am not going to leave my room until I have something. Anything. Even a name would be good at this stage. I am going to write out lists and read books and probably make another blog post and tweet a lot, all in the name of story building procrastination.