I’ve been thinking a lot about making and doing this week, after a conversation I had with a poet friend of mine and Isaac. My poet friend crochets beautifully, I sew and Isaac makes things out of wood. We are all makers.

For me and the poet the issue was also tied up in feeling as if we grew up in the wrong family. Our families are do-ers: they have proper jobs and do proper things and when they want things they buy them in shops. It’s hard to go against that, when you’re brought up to think it’s normal.

It took me a long time to figure out that I was a maker, even though I have always written, even though I love to cook and to bake. Even though when Isaac bought me the sewing machine eight years ago I knew it was the best present I’d ever had, and haberdashery departments have always given me such thrills. I guess I’m sad that I didn’t really get it until the last couple of years, but it doesn’t really matter. Some people go their whole lives without ever finding out and accepting what makes them happy, whether that’s making or doing.

What about you? Do you make or do? Or do you make and do?