In which I ponder...

Last night I did my firt public guided tour in an absolute age. Let's give a little backstory here...I began working in the tourist industry back in '88 at the age of 23. My first gig? My beloved Dover Castle where I stayed for twelve years until giving birth to my second child and downsizing to part time work in a (wait for it) funeral directors. When I moved to Colchester I managed to get a job with the museum service here and have worked in one of the country's oldest castles for 10 years now.

At Dover Castle guided tours were something 'off menu'; not given as standard but a few of us did do them for interested visitors. They were fun, informal things. More a conversation than a lecture. Then the Wartime Tunnels opened and proper tours began and they were okay too; constantly evolving, less talking and more pressing buttons to listen to some out of work actor ramble on. When I came to work in my present job guided tours were done by Blue Badge Guides, revered creatures who had passed the historical equivilent of the London cabbies Knowledge. I elected to do the education tours - for school children usually under the age of 12. And that killed it for me because so few of us did it and because it became a daily thing and because the teachers had invariably no control over the kids it killed the love I had for imparting knowledge. It became a drag. A chore. A very 'unsmiley face'. So I quit that role and went back to being just a museum assistant.

Then I wrote a long paper on the keep at Colchester castle and thought that it would make a cool guided tour. Do it after hours, get in those who were really interested in the structure, have some fun. Last night was the night and what fun! I came home fired with enthusiasm. Filled with a buzz. Wide awake and very bushy tailed. But like all highs there then comes the low. The sugar rush is followed by the drop and the drop came in an email. Now, I think if I'd come to this email not feeling so up then the down wouldn't have been so hard but you know when you have the feeling you can DO ANYTHING because of one success, it's hard to take in that maybe you can't!

The email was from a production company, sent before the crash and burn phase of the writing. Disappointingly it appeared the person who sent it hadn't read my original email and, rather than just walking away, I replied with a thank you but a correction and within minutes he came back to me. I know he was being nice. I know he was probably giving me the heads up but it got me pondering. Basically, he said (and I don't doubt it's true) that as an untested writer I have a gnats chance in hell of getting anyone to produce my trilogy of radio programmes. In fact that's pretty much what he said. Then he said that my theme which was historical and a story of one part of the early 20th century women's movement 'had been done to death' and what BBC Radio 4 commissioners wanted was stories written today about today. And I thought, why should that be? Why should my work be less valid to anyone because I'm new. What if (and clearly I'm not saying I have)I had something truly awesome and no one wanted to see because I'm new. What if you had the same? How does one get someone to see what you have if no one is willing to look at anything unless it comes with a cast iron guarantee. I know, of course I know, that any company that says it will read anything will get thousands of scripts most of which will be dross. But what of that one person (and that's not me) who has a gem, who can't get it past someone like the man who wrote me and said he wasn't even willing to look at it because I was new?

Is breaking into the business luck? I know of writers that happened to be in the right place at the right time. Is it who you know...again a writer who happened to work with someone who had a relation high up in the broadcasting food chain. Is it a willo-the-wisp thing, intangable? I don't know but I do know that it's frustrating and I'm glad I've taken a step back from it because it's so easy to get consummed, to let it consume you. Being part of the 'newbie' scene even after all this time and success in things like the Red Planet Prize is like swimming with piranhas, all fighting over small, not very regualar opportunities to stop being 'new' and to get even the tiniest break so that someone like that man will take me seriously. Being professionally read. Being peered reviewed by recognised script industry people. It's not enough. It's just not enough. Where is the person willing to take the chance and do they, in reality, exist?

On a good note though my winnings from Prequel to Cannes is on it's way and I've decided to put it towards my new laptop fund.