Best-selling author and actress Kate Thompson tries solitary seaside living in the interests of writing. Would it work? Read Kate’s column over the next few weeks on the Country channel
Not long after depositing me in the village of Roundstone, my husband Malcolm returned to Dublin, leaving me with a bicycle as my only form of transport. It means that I have no option other than to write - which is, after all, the whole point of the exercise. I feel a bit like that princess who was locked into a tower by Rumplestiltskin so that she could spin gold from straw. My writing career doesn't amass me heaps of gold, but it's a sight more enjoyable way of earning a living than being incarcerated in a tower, messing around with straw.
I wave goodbye to Malcolm in the car park (‘Just go write the book, bitch!' he remarks jocularly as he takes off down the main street), and then I go morosely back into the apartment and sit down in front of the screen, wondering what on earth will materialise on it today.
I've evolved a daily routine. I do a bit of yoga and a bit of housework in the morning while I mess around with ideas in my head, and then I take myself off on my bicycle to Gurteen beach and run its length. This I have to do because sitting on my bum in front of a computer all day means that my bum is in danger of becoming obese. I get very miffed if there are other people walking the beach because there is nothing on earth quite so satisfying as seeing no footprints on an expanse of golden sand bar your own. Sometimes that beach is so damn breathtakingly beautiful that it's an effort to tear myself away.
Back home (see! I've even started calling my rented bolthole ‘home'!) I make a big pot of coffee and some cheese on toast and get down to work for six or seven hours without a break. Around seven o'clock I touch a match to the fire, then mosey down to O'Dowd's seafood pub for a bowl of chowder and a glass of wine. When I first came here I used to sit at a corner table by the fire on my own with a book, but I've made friends since then, and more often than not now someone will join me.
Strolling home after dinner, I always feel a sense of wonder at the sheer emptiness of the main street. Some day I expect to see tumbleweed rolling towards me as a stranger in a stetson ambles into town on his horse. If I'm lucky, I'll encounter the local stray dog, who has a more infectious smile than many of the humans I know. She'll follow me home and I'll put out a saucer of milk and a scrap of something for her to eat. She'll look at me entreatingly, hoping to be invited in, but I harden my heart, ignore her imploring eyes, and shut the door for the night.
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