Directory

Access tools

Set Text size

A

|

A

|

A

Set Contrast

A

|

A

|

A

Text only
Translation
Listen

News

'My Own Words' project

My Own Words is a year long project ending May 2007. This is organised through a local charity, Help and Care, supported by the mayor of Poole. This innovative project has been working with a variety of Poole’s residents with the intention of drawing together a selection of people’s experiences and stories of Poole life. We wanted to experiment with the idea that writing is an exciting way of learning to understand each other better and bridging gaps between generations and individuals. The project aims to encourage people to contribute with their own words and ideas, regardless of their level of ability so as to provide opportunity and encouragement to have a go at writing. We want to give people the chance to share their experiences, thoughts, and memories, in a different way, and to explore their creative side!

Some of the writing created through this project will be displayed in  Poole Central Library during Adult Learning Week May 19th - 25th. In the lead up to this some individual’s work will be shown on the library website.

This week's featured pieces:

Robbely

This is a word my daughter made up when she was about 7 years old. Her father used to take her sailing in his dinghy. When they came back, and I asked whether she had enjoyed it. She would say, “Oh yes but the water was so robbely”. She meant choppy, but didn’t know that word, it was so
expressive. “Was the water robbely today” we asked if there was a wind. Then it came to be applied to the land as well. Cart tracks are obviously robbely, as you bump over the stones. So are roads which need re-surfacing.
Thirty years on we still frequently use that most expressive word.
Three cheers for ROBBELY, which may reach the OED one day!

Beryl

Happiness

That elusive, exquisite emotion that at times, unbidden, comes bubbling up from the core of our being. Midnight and mid-January, a bleak, no man’s land time, and yet there is a lone curlew out there; its gentle call echoing around the silent bay sends out a message that Spring is not too far away. By some osmotic process this is absorbed and we fall into a deep and happy sleep. For some, happiness is integral to their genetic make-up, sights and sounds have a more profound effect upon their emotions. Perhaps they need less to make them happy, or they observe and absorb from a heightened level of consciousness. We see children gambolling on the beach and in the park. From the perspective of age and experience what, if we could, would we wish for them? Top of the list must surely be the gift of the happiness gene.

Shirley

Jenny Oliver