Stephen King wrote a book called ‘On writing’ which is about… writing. If you don’t know him, he is a man who has written an estimated 71 books. Some of his works have been made into very famous films like Carrie, Stand by Me, The Shining & The Shawshank Redemption. So if you want to learn about writing, he’s a good man to listen to.
The most striking thing about this book is that the first chapter has a very simple title: “C.V.” What follows is over 100 pages telling the story of King’s life. The chapters are short, fast and punchy with some chapters as short as one page. He takes us from his early childhood with his single mother, moving frequently across the US with little money, through to his days as a gas pump attendant, industrial laundry worker, a janitor and eventually an English teacher with a young family and a drug and alcohol addiction. (He is 76 now and sober for decades).
It’s so engrossing that you get to the end of that section of the book, completely forgetting that you are reading a book about writing! It’s nearly halfway into the book before he starts talking about the toolbox that he recommends you have to start working as a writer. Why? His point is, that everything in his life up until that point formed him as a writer. You can have all the writing skills in the world, but they are all useless unless you bring the most important thing to the table. Yourself. He is highlighting that this completely unplanned, random and sometimes chaotic life still formed his place in the world.
It’s the first thing most people ask me when they find out I am a Standup Comedian: ‘How did you get into that?’ It’s a long story, but you know what? I don’t think of myself as a ‘Standup Comedian’, it’s just something I do. I do a lot of things. I have also done, lots of things
In the next few posts I will attempt to write you my working CV. It turns out there is no sense to how you end up working as a Stand up Comedian but take a look and see if you think I qualify for the job.
C.V.
50p sweet money on a Saturday did not come for free. Our dog Aslan (After the lion not the band!), needed looking after. It still amazes me now, his ratio of meals to number of poos per day he could manage and I would say this to him: ‘How do I have three meals a day and one poo, and you have one meal a day resulting in three poos?’ He would just wag his tail and leave me shovelling, willing me to hurry up and get his dinner. I would ask the same question to my Dad and the only answer I got was another question ‘Do you want your 50p sweets?’ It is amazing how much dog poo you can scoop up when you are motivated by the images in your head of Golf Balls, Cola Bottles, Wham bars, Bikers and Meanies.
When I was 12 or 13 there was a farmer in our church who began to talk out loud about needing some help on the farm. He’d do this in front of all the adults, so that one of them would go ‘Maybe Stephen you’d like to…’ and as I knew there was no football involved with farming, I’d just run off with my football. Eventually they stopped with the hints and I was made to go and work on the farm in the summer. When everyone else in the neighbourhood was spending their busy summers doing… nothing, I had to go and shovel sheep shit.
Day One:
‘Open that gate Stephen‘
Stephen goes to open gate, gate falls on top of Stephen, farmer jumps out of the tractor to lift said gate off Stephen, he struggles as gate is very heavy. Stephen has a massive hole on the top his wrist from which blood pours.
‘Ok you’re going to have to be careful with everything on a farm you’ll have to just treat everything as dangerous.’
That’s right folks careful of the gates. I still have the scar.
Day Two:
He is hearding the sheep through a gate. There are hundreds of them with their bulging eyes, big tongues and they are so loud with their ‘BLLLEEEEEEAAAAAH!’ I am afraid of them. They are all coming towards the yard, over the threshold and he shouts:
‘Close the gate!’
But I am scared, they are running passed me and they’re going to knock me over. I try to close the gate, the sheep panic and BLLLLLEEEEEAAAAAHHHH louder, before turning around and running back out into the field. The farmer is fuming. I am shaking.
‘If I say close the gate, close the gate!’
What is it with me and gates?
Day Three:
With my record so far with the gates, I don’t see why anybody would hand me a power hose. Not only does he give me a power hose, he hands it to me and says: ‘I’ll leave you alone to do this and I’ll be back in a while’ - are you nuts?
Thankfully neither I nor any sheep or gates were harmed in the power hosing of the giant shed. I am however scolded for being lazy as there is some sheep shit under some cavity blocks that I couldn’t lift and I have managed to power hose lime paint off the walls to carve out the lettering: ‘MULLAN’. The farmer’s father tells me there is a time and a place for that sort of thing. I still don’t exactly know when that would be.
Day Four:
The sheep shearer has arrived, I thought this was going to be a lot better that it actually turns out to be.
To be continued…
Love😂
Lobe this, high Comedic Value even your CV knows how to keep things light😂 must be in the genes🩷