1 bit almost done.

Yippee yippee I have almost finished one bit of my practical work, a book showing my son growing up, but accompanied by theory ideas. For me the two work in conjunction, let's hope an audience will think the same,

Got to spend the weekend writing so need to go. It was useful however, talking to the Disability section, if I had realised earlier that they covered problems like mine I would have gone to them ages ago, rather than now when it is almost too late.

M.E scuppers progress

For the last week my M.E has really kicked in: the wobbly woman is back. When my M.E is really bad I cannot walk without wobbling. My thoughts are also wobblng, here I am at home, in theory in a position to do some work, but my energy has been so low that I am capable of virtually nothing. I have done a little sorting of material and that is all. But I am aware of a mountain ahead of me: The editing. At the moment it is all I can do to walk to the shops, but the editing seems a much harder task. I think knowing that by the time I am well enough to do it I will also be well enough to work means that everything will have to come at the same time, which for someone unable to work for four weeks so far seems a hell of a lot. I know that in theory the M.A is part time and not really even that many hours a week, but right now I wish I had a couple of months free and could really settle and think and do the work justice.

Knowing that my income is shot to pieces, my health is shot to pieces, I contacted my tutor. The one thing that I hope I can do is actually finish this units work and come away from the year with something to show for it, but the deadline is hurtling towards me and the work is mounting and apparently if I can get any extension from the university it will only be for two weeks. So the fear is that the qualification will be shot to pieces too. Which reminds me I must ring the university disability section.

In fear for my mental wellbeing.

Wrecked. My financial security, fragile though it is, has depended for the last few months, on money through the working tax credit system that I get because of my low income and my disability. At the beginning of this week, I got a call from the DWP and they tell me, that because I have not sent them evidence that I was in receipt of sick pay 7 years ago, that I am at risk of loosing the benefit they send me. I dont know how to survive without this help, it is as simple as that.

Wrecked. Very scary, very good, more than scary. I lead a workshop for BHM and the emotional challenge of this has both empowered and thrilled me, that people would come, share discuss, and allow me to participate in their understanding of African Caribbean representations in the era up to Obama, is overwhelming. It is also almost too overwhelming emotionally for my fragile mental health.

Syncronicity and out of sync.

So there I am at South Bank University doing video capture from Nathan's childhood films as part of my Masters, now Certificate. There are lots of children there, including two girls, both of whom are now studying at yes, South Bank University.!!!

I am very clever and far thinking. For instance when I left my job and went off to Senegal I made sure that I had had some experience of doing supply teaching locally and was signed on with the County for when I returned. And prior to deciding whether to hand my notice in to the Royal Opera House or not, I ensured that I had passed my appraisal and been informed that I was at the right standard and welcome to return to work with them in future. So why is it that my Plan B's have not ensured sufficient income to enable me to continue studying. Simple. When I returned from Senegal, Herts County Council went against their original decision and decided I was not able to work for them, and now the ROH has gone against their promise that I can return also. But with the economy inmeltdown, unless you are a billionaire banker, it looks like my present £10,000 a year annual salary and my £3000 a year transport costs will look good in years to come. It does however, mean, that continuing studying is absolutely out of the window.

Trying to pick up the pieces

A week on I at last have five minutes to try and actually do some work on the research. I have decided to try and retrace my steps and just see if there is any feedback to my posts on various blogs.

I could not remember which thread I had followed on Mumsnet, so started a new thread, asking for feedback on the topic and I immediately got an email from the organisation saying that I was doing research and therefore had to pay a fee? So when mums ask other mums a question that is not research, but when a mum asks other mums a question it is. Outed.

I have also tried re writing on the intermix site, but as always got an error message, so not sure if it will have gone on. And more frustratingly I cannot for the life of me remember a brilliant site I found. It had the names of loads of organisations working in this field. I wrote to everyone of these organisations asking if they wanted to be involved andmy intention was to follow this up with a phone call, if need be, but not one responded and now I cannot find their details for the follow up stage. Message to self on the minataur trail do not forget to lay down the string.

Seminar

I have a bad headache, one that just will not shift, but it is worth it. I think everyone on the Seminar had a good time. It really seems nice knowing we will meet, though I gravitate to the same people each time and I note other people do too. But that is okay. Everyone's work has progressed enormously. Wendy's works of art have been seen by several thousand people, Zoe's images, have gone from the rough paper, notes and concepts stage, which I loved, to a lean, clean, beautiful book. I would have liked to have looked more, Abisolah is as organised as ever and has a clear approach to her work with VB, I long to see Lara's work from Seven Sisters, but the talk was very interesting, etc, etc, Chris even presented a full 10 minutes video draft, which was of course brilliant. Compared to theirs my work looked very home spun, and even as I had made it I was worried about that, on the other hand it is a piece about domesticity in some ways. But as I drew it out of my bag and pined it up and talked about the relationship between it and the triptych etc, I realised that I do own this work and feel very good about it, even if I am not quite sure where it is going. It really made me just want to stay and work and work on it and not ever have to worry about mone or work again. One of the tutors responses was really helpful as he talked about a quote I had forgotten that I had dug out, I was too busy listening to write it down, but he absolutely nailed it. A couple of people gave me further feedback and I was pleased that my tutor also seemed to respond to the challenge of it. So I stayed for the Thursday afternoon session and crawled home to bed rather than heading for work. However, next day like most people I felt Daniel Rubinstein's seminar on Chomsky, Foucoult and Power was so good, so satisfying, that I felt that I needed some space so hurtled off to work and missed what was probably the most important part of the two days how to write the next piece!!!

The two/three days if I include Westminster have given me lots of ideas, and when the headache has gone,and the preparation for hours of teaching done, lets hope I can remember them and build on them.

Young People's Media Use and Creative Participation.

• Fatimah Awan, University of Westminster
• Alicia Blum-Ross, University of Oxford
• David Gauntlett
  
• Ranjana Das, LSE, University of London
• Reijo Kupiainen, University of Tampere
• Fiona Lennox, OFCOM
• Jane Rumble, OFCOM
  

A good day out in London. The University of Westminster held a special free day on Young Poeople's Media Use and Creative Participation. I had actually thought more young people would be in attendance, but it was more for academics, but it was good and very lively. I especially enjoyed seeing David Gauntlett as I have really enjoyed reading his books and look forward to reading his new book on creativity.

My original intention was to stay all day and therefore see everyone, but the urgent need to find work meant that I had to rush to the Opera House and then to Haringey in the search for work. But the morning speakers on research of media use in Cumbria, and then young people; filmaking and citizenship were excellent and even the potentially dry OFCOM talk was interesting and well presented. I even had the courage to ask a question. David Gauntlett had talked about how positive creativity can be, I know that to be true as this course shows, but I aslo know that for me there is a downside for being like this, that the striving and the connecting that Gauntlett anticipates, have rarely happened for me, so I am always feeling that I am out there, but not getting reinforcement as a result of my activities. For instance printing my books to raise money for the Babito clinic, but having virtually sold none. This may be a reflection of my writing, b ut even I think the book is worth more than the price of a coffee which is all the book costs!!! So leaving one feeling well...... But maybe that is just a reflection of my eeyore personality. However, the research in Cumbria also raised the possibility that certain types of young people who live in the country and who do not want to live there, may find access to the creativity of the net, a sad reminder of all that they do not have, but want. She felt therefore that these few people were "double isolated" because they were physically isolated and emotionally if you like isolated. Some of this had reasonances for me. The last speaker I heard also talked of the defiency approach to much funding for creative projects with young people, one that assumes that there has to be a deficite, that the project will fill, before funding will be allowed. And that although all the participants really got a lot from the experience, some were disappointed by the outcomes. Her research I think had some more resonances, because I think that the element of deficiency comes into my research, and the outcome may also be relevant. I therefore asked if she had come across this double isolation, but she felt that the positive elements of the process outweighed the downsides.

Tomorrow I have to go the seminar to present my work, but and a big but almost everything I had hoped would be ready to show them by now is still unfinished. I have captured some video but not edited. I have some photoshop photos to show people, and some media images to show, and virtually no media quotes, so a very long way short of my idea of a finished film to go with a physical representation of me and my son and his media use.