My Orange Duffle Coat - Susan Jane Sims

© Chris Sims November 2011

I am delighted  that so many people are taking an interest in this new dedicated competition site. Lots of people have written guest blog entries and if you look back over them all I think you will agree that they are all very inspiring.

This week has been particularly exciting  and I am putting this down to wearing my orange duffle coat nearly everywhere I have been. A long time ago my writing  mentor said to me: "find something to be a symbol for you, to give you confidence." For her it is a magic cloak, a metaphorical symbol that helps her to feel confident when standing up in front of a lot of people in a lecture hall  to give a presentation Me, I needed something real rather than metaphorical and I started to realise that whenever I wore my orange dufffle coat, now over ten years old I felt better about myself and wasn't scared to approach people and start a conversation.

 I have always loved the colour orange and as child in Bristol, leaving in a home behind a shop I sometimes felt invisible however what helped me then was helping Dad paint my room orange and having orange curtains at the windows. Mum made the curtains as that was something she did for a living. She made beautiful curtains and soft furnishings for total strangers, taking in the work through middlemen and women who delivered the material and orders to our door.  Much of the time I hated it as a Friday night delivery meant Mum, and also Dad ( because he helped her measure and cut the material), were working all weekend to have the curtains or cushion cover,s or whatever else finished by Monday morning. The demands were often totally unreasonable but the work had to be taken to pay the bills. This time though Mum made the curtains just for me. They were a beautiful shade of orange and not made from very thick material as we couldn't afford what Mum's customers could afford. However they were had sewn and lined with my mother's love, and as my room was a sunny room at the back of the house I would wake in the morning to a gorgeous orange glow that filled the room.

This week my orange coat worked its magic by taking me me into Foyles book shopin Quakers Friars, Bristol and now two brand new copies of Like It Is by Philip Lyons  are being on the shelves for people to walk in, browse and buy. Foyles' manager, Dave  has also agreed to Poetry Space putting on some events there in 2012 so do watch this space...

Bye for now,


Sue
www.poetryspace.co.uk


Like It Is by Philip Lyons, Poetry Space Ltd October 2011. ISBN 978-0-9565328-5-5


Coming up soon a guest blog entry by Bath poet, Nikki Bennett