But I did it. Thanks in no small part to my Godfather's brother and family who live in Hull and took excellent care of me. I learnt a lot about devising theatre as opposed to writing it and came away with lots of ideas. I had one wobble on the 3rd day. The 'press' of 'press play' refers to THE press. We were looking at news stories, so many of them to do with pain and I got upset when some people in one of my groups wanted to put a 'clowning' effect on it. When the leader said clowning I think he was referring to facial expressions but we started to head more towards slapstick. A lovely beardy chap called Antonio tried to mediate and help but I couldn't take part in something I didn't agree with. You know how these things escalate into upset. I left and had a cry in the toilets. I couldn't run away. I'm not saying that I didn't want to, I just wasn't wearing shoes at the time. The hardest thing about getting upset like that is having to hold your head up and walk back into the room. I did, and was glad to see they had toned down the bits I had found offensive (though at the same time worried that the group leaders would think I had been making a fuss over nothing).
Even so, mostly it was really great. I lasted and learned and am more than a little bit proud of myself - I know some of the others were too. I wish I had been well enough to cope with study and these wonderful youth opportunities as I am now getting rapidly too old for them. I am toying with the idea of doing a short course at uni so I can get involved with some of the 'students only' stuff that goes on. Onwards and upwards.
