Over the last couple of months I've been sending off my poems to publishers and competitions. Only to receive silence in return. Being a writer can be a very disheartening experience. Working away for months, pouring your soul into your poetry only to have it rejected. Last Wednesday was particularly bad. Not only did I find out my poem wasn't good enough to make the short list for a major poetry prize I also discovered that I'd missed the deadline for another competition after spending ages working on my entry.

The cure? (Cos you know there's there's light even when all the stars go out). Spending a day at the Darebin Parklands in Alphington with my girls and a group of friends, making fire. We tried to get the fire going using a fire drill and managed to get an ember. Alas, it went out in our hastily made tinder bundle. Note to self - before starting fire remember to prepare tinder bundle and stick teepee in fire place. 

Airlie, my daughter, eventually got the fire going with a single match (some weeks we have used a lot of matches in our efforts to create and harness the warmth and comfort of fire). I then spent the next couple of hours feeding any dry sticks I could find into the flames. It was so therapeutic and healing to be spending the day outdoors, breathing in wood smoke.

What do you do to comfort yourself after disappointment hits?