Sarah L Dixon Writer

I love the Medway River Lit Team and their volunteers for the brilliant festival weekend I had with them three weeks ago! They have been hosting several events every weekend in November and being in Huddersfield I could only make it over for 3 days. But what a three days!

Making connections on the journey over

On my bus from the valley to Huddersfield train station a passenger on the bus asks if I am going somewhere good with all my bags. Turns out she is called Ingrid and she has a Christmas card signed by Jim Bob somewhere at home.

I then met Cat on the train and she has dropped her car off for an MOT and was dreading the train journey, that was until we got chatting about everything and she asked ‘Why do I never meet anyone like you in Barnsley?’ and we both left the train with big grins at 10am.

On the next train (the long journey from Leeds to King’s Cross) I got strange looks for having books on the table and swapping those for other books and pens part way through the journey. Then, as I put my rucksack on and wheeled my case out into the aisle a woman in her late 50s asked me if I was ‘Doing anything fun?’ Oh yes, big grin back. She was excited for me, told me she was going to see her daughter and grandchildren and wished me luck.

Meanderslam

I arrived at Coffee Republic on Chatham High Street to many hugs and a huge cup of peppermint tea and a muffin. Great to meet up with many Medway poets, writers, friends, I hadn’t seen for 18 months and a more northern friend in a bright, chunky jumper who travelled up for the weekend. After travelling on 3 trains and a bus I was a bit tired and not at all sure about taking part in the slam as my material is not really the slam style I have seen before and I can’t memorise the pieces and this one was so new I didn’t know it well yet but I hoped it would connect with the audience and judges and I had said I would read if there was space for me. Guest poet at the slam, Lalah-Simone Springer was brilliant at warming up the crowd and I was convinced to buy the first book of many at the festival.

I performed my very new poem ‘Why I don’t sing for you.’ and this was well-received, actually so well-received the judges chose it as one of the four pieces they split the prize between. I wasn’t aware there was a prize for the slam. I was well-chuffed to be chosen and am looking forward to the feedback from the judges as they all made many notes as we were performing in order to pass these on to us after.

A dot-to-dot moment

I went for a couple of pints to celebrate my slam win and I got out my Medway festival bag with a puzzle booklet in it. My friend had gone for a cigarette so I decided to see what was in the booklet. Ah! A quick 50 dot puzzle, dots laid out in the shape of a puffin but I would get the satisfaction of joining the dots. I didn’t notice a local looking on with envy…

My friend returned to the table laughing ‘I knew it would be you… a guy just came out of the pub to his friends who were all talking about fixtures and football and he just breaks into the conversation to say ‘Fuck Me! There’s a woman in there doing a dot-to-dot… I want to do a dot-to-dot!!’ Thanks to Medway River Lit maybe someone has rediscovered the joy of dot to do between the important fixtures, obviously.

The Inner Dowsing Lightship – home for 2 nights

I decided I would book an extravagant place to stay for this weekend and settled on a retired lightship. I spent much of my Saturday in my cabin just chilling (something anyone who knows me will realise is a rare occurrence). I watched a film, had a bath, read on the deck with jumper and blanket (I lasted about 5 minutes).

As the gig I was preparing for approached I painted my nails the same colour as Jim’s and my books and narrowed down my 7 t-shirt choices to 3 and ordered myself an Uber to town. I bought a cake and transformed it into a book cake, had a pint next door to the venue and then walked into Chatham Library to hear we had sold out and the crowd were eagerly queueing along the path and around the corner. Please see my Jim Bob blog for full account of this event but here are some photos:

My book reading, Jim Bob interview and an acoustic set

Sunday events

Rosemary McLeish Prize ceremony

Zahra Barri and Maggie Harris interviews

Both interview styles were quite different and engaging and both the books were not ones I was planning to buy on arriving at the festival but the authors and the interviewers did such a great job of convincing me I returned home with a copy of both of the books.

Sam Fentiman-Hall interviewed Zahra Barri. Zahra read excerpts from her debut novel which is multi-generational and told from at least three viewpoints from characters with distinct voices and personality. This novel explores themes of queerness, revolution and Islamic sisterhood.

Anne-Marie Jordan interviewed Maggie Harris about her memoir ‘Kiskadee Girl’ and Maggie read engaging excerpts to us.

Big love to Barry and Sam for setting up the festival and continuing to grow it!

Thanks to all who made it such a great weekend of literature, love, poetry, music, hugs, beer, chat, friendship and connection.