Boscastle

I’ve always lived in the city, so my visit to Boscastle was a nice change.

I’m not stranger to quaint villages such as this one; some of my relatives live in the middle of nowhere, and my sister got married in a pleasant little village called Stedham. This is, however, my first time staying at a village without family. I’m on a Writer’s Retreat with some friends at university, so I’m not exactly on my own, but having to pay attention to getting my own food and certain other necessities within this one village is a new experience.

There are certain signifiers I keep pointing out that remind me I’m in Cornwall. For instance, it seems that the only general store in Boscastle is a small Spar corner shop, and one of its main advertising points is the possession of an ATM that doesn’t charge you when you withdraw money. I’ve not seen another cash machine so far. Other signifiers include the sheer friendliness of everyone we encounter, everyone’s familiarity with each other, the word “Cornwall” being proudly plastered on most shop signs and the uneven ratio of the amount of tourists to the amount of locals wondering around. (Tourists win that one.)

One of the intentional features of this Writer’s Retreat is the lack of Wi-Fi and less-than-abundant phone signal. I mentioned in a previous blog post that being away from Wi-Fi for too long incites a strange loneliness in me, but that hasn’t been the case during my stay here. Or, so far, at least; I’ve only been here for a day. I’ll be posting this when I return. I think it’s the communal atmosphere of the hostel that prevents the Wi-Fi withdrawal. It’s relaxing and calm, but talkative and fun all at once. I’ve read a lot of the fifth Song of Ice and Fire book already, but there’s been Mario Kart 7 tournaments, a walk along the coast and just general nitter-natter. It’s cosy and comfortable and I wish it didn’t have to end.

We went on a walk at one point, out to the cliffs. The only place in the whole of Boscastle that had halfway decent phone signal was on the cliffs, so that was one reason we went there. Mostly, though, it was to brave the fresh air and hope that the sun doesn’t take vengeance on me for shunning it. It was nice. The waves crashing up against the rocks below reminded me of cream running down a portion of chocolate gateau. This may seem like a random observation to make, but chocolate gateau reminds me of when I was younger, when I took trips up to my nans’.

At one point, a third year read out a piece of writing for their dissertation. This was when I noticed that I still have a lot of work to do as a writer. Many people say that they have the problem wherein they abuse the show-don’t-tell rule by telling the reader too much. I’m entirely the opposite; I overestimate people’s imaginations and write my stories as if they were scripts instead. I think this has come from lack of practice, but quite often a character will pop up out of nowhere with no description but plenty of dialogue. I’ve found a frighteningly large number of times in which I hardly establish setting at all. This third year student, however, had perfected the balance between showing and telling and reminded me where I was going wrong.

I’m back home, now. I never quite finished this blog post, and reading back over it makes me want to go back to Boscastle. I feel like I’m living in a bit of a rut at the moment, and Boscastle was a brilliant way of getting out of that. But here I am again.

I miss the youth hostel. It had heated flooring.