Writing at Midnight

By [Your Name]

There’s a place I go when the world becomes too loud.
When the engine’s revving, the kettle’s boiling, the kids are crying, and everyday life feels like it might just swallow me whole.

That place is my bedroom.

It’s not grand. Just a quiet corner, a soft lamp, a newly gifted laptop from my son, and LibreOffice humming on the screen. It’s enough. More than enough. Because here, for the first time in a long time, I feel like I belong to myself.

I sit. I wait. And then, without fail, inspiration waltzes in, usually at some ungodly hour, as if it’s had a key this whole time.

I wake from dreams with sentences falling over each other like unruly children. I convince myself I’ve just dreamt up the next big Hollywood script. Or maybe something cheeky for Ulrika Jonsson’s column. Who knows? I can dream now.
Because I finally have the time.

People sometimes ask, “Why now? Why didn’t you write thirty years ago?”
The answer is simple. Life.

Back then, there was always someone to feed. Someone to fix. Someone to fetch. Someone to worry about.
Writing wasn’t erased. It was postponed. Shelved under a label that read “One day.”

But even in those long, loud years, it was always there, flickering softly in the background.

I remember being a girl, scribbling stories on the backs of my dad’s worksheets. I remember the stack of Enid Blyton books gifted by the kind neighbour across the road. I passed only one subject in school—English—and it still makes me smile.

Since then, I’ve earned a CACHE Level 3 as a Teaching Assistant. A BTEC. Dozens of certificates in epilepsy care, medication training, and manual handling. I’ve worked. I’ve raised children. I’ve kept going, even when I had no idea where the road was heading.

I never wanted to be a high-flyer. The stress would have eaten me alive.
I just wanted a life I could manage without disappearing inside it.

And honestly, the best job I ever had was being a mum.
Also the most exhausting.

In my twenties, I wore a lot of masks. Call centres. Banks. Environments full of noise and forced cheer. I could talk to anyone. “Chatterbox,” they called me. But I never truly felt at home in crowds.

As the years passed, I grew quieter. Less class clown, more anchor. The kind of mother who checks the door at 2 a.m. to see if her 18-year-old son has come home. Who wonders if her 21-year-old will ever leave his bedroom. Who silently worries if her daughter is okay juggling two young children. My second eldest is married now, living in Manchester. I don’t see them as much as I’d like, but I think about them all every day. More than I probably should.

Actually, every day.

I wonder if they’re happy. I wonder if they forgive me for the chaos of their childhood. I wonder if I’ve done enough, or if I loved them the right way.
People say, “You do your best until you know better.”
That was certainly true for me.

Age has taught me to hold on to what matters and let go of what doesn’t.
Including people who no longer deserve space in my life.

Now, in the hush of midnight, I write. Not for fame. Not for approval.
But for the little girl who used to scribble stories on scrap paper.
And for the woman she became—tired, tested, but still full of words.

Writing at Midnight