I'm building foundations, I'm going to rip this person, this crap that I've become to shreds, and start again from the very beginning, do it all again.
You don't get a second chance at life, so you need to make this one count. And so far, it hasn't.
And in the new version of myself, I'm going to wreck some fucking havoc on my sisters. Let this be a caution to them: its on.
There's a theory I heard that every 7 years, your body is totally different, all new cells etc, as if you have changed bodies completely. I am two years into my body Mk4, and it's shit, so screw biology, I'll sort this out myself. I want to disappear, go off the grid, and come back like a raging bull.
My first term, my first half of my Masters teaching period is now over. I have more assignments to do over the break, so I am not exactly 'running free', and as soon as we get back in January, it's full steam ahead until September. And that date looks like a tiny dot on the horizon right now.
For my module of Science Fiction in Film and Television, I had to do a presentation on Jericho, the post-apocalyptic TV show which started in 2006, only lasted a season and a quarter (CBS, or whoever it was, allowed them to finish off the story in 7 episodes). All things considered, it's a good show. The narrative is a bit mental, jumping from extreme terror plots to minor love stories, and at times it feels a bit like a soap, other times like a mild version of The Walking Dead, but all-in-all I enjoyed it and would recommend it to anyone interested in seeing how a TV show post-9/11 can capture the fear and isolation Americans felt about the stability of their own country and government. The actual plot of the apocalypse is very clever and intricate, and the characters in the town are all likeable, even if the dialogue is a bit questionable, and they gave the lead role to the guy who played Billy, mad boyfriend/murderer alongside Shaggy in Scream 1. (His name is Skeet Ulrich, he's a fucking weird looking guy, once-upon-a-time he looked a bit like Johnny Depp, but it would be hard to say that of him now).
I've also got into 2 Broke Girls recently. I don't really know why. It's likeable, it's comfortable, and unlike The Big Bang Theory and How I Met Your Mother, it doesn't have this generic formula of how to be funny which it MUST abide by. Like, its not hilarious, but every now and then something will be funny because its totally unexpected, random or just sharp, and it does make you laugh. Speaking of HIMYM and BBT, you can feel in their writing the critics saying 'its not funny anymore'. You can feel them stretching out their characters, trying to milk them dry, exploiting Sheldon and Barney for what were once hilarious characters, which are now very predictable.
I haven't had much time to watch films, apart from Breaking Bad Part 2, which I have to say, is a bit weak, and a bit ridiculous, and really didn't do anything, it was mainly people standing around chatting, and the CGI of the werewolves looked somehow worse in this film, and yet I highly enjoyed the five minute fake-carnage which occurs just before the end. I even thought for half a second that we might see Edward die, and I was SO excited for that possibility, but alas, we did not, and the fake-clip reveals itself to be a flash-forward in Alice/Aro's mind of a possible future in which many people die, so Aro turns around and goes home and they all live happily ever after, the end. I've always disliked this ending; reading the books, which in fairness are not anywhere near as dire as the films, allowed this shoddy ending to resonate even more strongly. But I realised the other day why I hate it so much. We were talking in class about Genre, and what genre is / does. It's main impact is the audience's per-conceived notion of genre ie. if a film has Will Smith and guns in, you know its a hollywood action blockbuster, if there's no guns, its Hitch (or some other rom-com deal). So from the trailers and adverts you know what to expect when you sit down in the cinema, and you know the generic traits of that genre ie. western's have a good guy, a bad guy, a show down and a lot of horses and dust. Romance has a lot of love, tragedy has a bit of death, probably also love, comedy has anything but will hopefully make you laugh, fantasy has this, horror has that, so on and so forth. A film about vampires and werewolves and a human girl stuck in a love triangle with one of each of these gives the impression that there will be a fight. You think at least the two guys will fight over the girl. The vampires will fight the werewolves. The wolves might break into two pacts and fight each other. The vampires might have some really old leaders that live in italy called the Volturi whose sole purpose is to maintain the vampire's secrecy and they keep order in a brutal and bloody way, and when a human becomes a vampire with a little half-vampire baby and a werewolf falls in love with that baby, and the Volturi decide they need to step in and interfere, YOU EXPECT A FIGHT. All these things happen, and yet they never, ever so much as scratch each other. Fucking waste of muscle and teeth.
Also, I'm waiting to here from a certain writing organisation, and I'm getting really impatient. I keep telling myself to not think about it, but every time I remember how long it's been I think to myself 'no news is good news' and then I get hopeful. I don't want to be hopeful, because it's horrible having all of that hope shatter around you in one non-descript letter opening, so I'm very on-edge every time mum brings in the post. One day.... one day I will hear... if it's bad news, I won't post it though. I'll try not to even think about it, if I can.
Also also, I'm not feeling festive yet. Its scaring me, because I normally get ahead of myself completely, but I can't get into the mood yet. Maybe its because I have an essay to do still, maybe its because I haven't done any shopping whatsoever... or maybe I'm finally not a little kid that gets giddy at Christmas anymore.
I want to change so many things about my life right now, but I can't do them all at once, as it's far too much to change all at once, so I need to figure out which to do first, and its really hard to prioritise these things.
The first thing is my work load. I have two essays due in soon - one in 9 days, one in 14 days. And I have done so little of both of them, and I need to get on that. Like, pronto.
The second thing is exercise, and my lack-there-of. I haven't done any in so long. I never go to the gym at uni because most days I start too early to have the time, and by the time I've finished my day, I just want to go home. I also have to park really far away, in the opposite direction to the sportspark, so... yeah, I don't go. And equally, I always think 'I'll go for a run today' but I'm never home when it's light. Running in the dark seems like a bad idea / I just don't want to do that. So I bought myself a stepper and a crunch thing and some (light) dumbells, but.... they don't do much. Like, its not a work out. I need a running machine. Or a gym membership (but don't have the money for either). But I need to lose weight because I'm gaining weight like a bitch and my jeans are getting far too tight. And I can't afford to buy new jeans!
The third problem, you may have guessed, is money. I can't afford anything, and yet I keep having to buy things. Today, tuition for this month came out of my account. All my banks are now empty / fully overdrawn. The only money I have left in the world (not counting my credit card, as I don't believe they count as money anyway), is the £40 I got paid today, the £85 my mother owes me, the £30 chamaale owes from AGES ago and the £90 Milli owes me but probably won't be able to pay me for a while. After some quick maths I can tell you that the total (if I were to have it all) is £245. I have to buy Christmas presents, go on holiday to the netherlands, and afford January's tuition of £625... which lets face it, I'm not going to be able to do. Should I send another email to my sister trying to explain just how much I'm not 'coping'? Should I ask my mother if she can lend me the £1250 we agreed she'd pay me in May, early, and risk not being able to pay May and June's tuition? Should I get another job, work even harder, spend more time cleaning, and then realise that I've failed both my essays trying to get the money to pay for this master's degree that I'm failing?
Fucksickles.
Lastly, (and bottom of the priorities), I realised recently how much I miss being in a relationship. This is the longest time I've ever been single for (ignoring from age 0 to 15), and... well, I'm fine, its not like I'm some Bridget Jones case, but I've realised that I really enjoy being in relationships, and therefore don't have the time of day for anyone who wants any less than that. Not that there is anyone. Just... you know... I've given myself principles.
Hilariously, this blog is of course procrastination from doing essay work. Maybe I should 'suspend' my facebook account until I've finished the essays. Hmm...
Maybe I should dose myself up on redbull? Or maybe I should go to bed now, hit the books hard tomorrow? OH life is so difficult sometimes. If only I had a man like this singing to me:
People always have that notion of 'summer is the best time for going to the pub', as if pub's cease to exist in the other seasons / just can't accommodate for any weather apart from sunshine. This may be a fair assumption if all the pubs you know are 'city pubs', ie during the summer put tables and chairs out on pavements / on roof terraces and go bananas. Country pubs, or even town pubs, have a whole different set-up. Town pubs generally have beer gardens, and during the summer, it's like a fight for seats. I have, many times, been known to sit on people's laps because there were no more chairs. Of course, you have to know the person / be smaller than the person you are sitting on. Otherwise things get awkward.
In the winter, however, all the local pubs round here have this different feeling. Like, instead of smelling cider and fruity things, you smell mulled wine and pints of heavy ales and stouts. And the kitchens (they all have kitchens) are cooking vegetables, and pies, and lots of meat, instead of baguettes and burgers in the summer (which either don't smell or stink) - the whole pub is taken over by this mouth-watering smell of onions and beef, pastry, steamed vegetables and crispy potatoes. You didn't even think you were hungry and suddenly you're salivating, impatient for a nice roast meal. Such a great way to get bums on seats.
Of course, Christmas changes pubs, but not in the tacky way it changes city pubs. They'll put up some holly, or get a small (real) tree, or whatever, which will add to the smell. They might but up some decor, but not much. And most of the pubs have no music, or that that they do have is so quiet you don't notice it, so you don't have Slade, Wet Wet Wet and Wham! shoved down your ear holes every second of the day.
Last night, for the first time in over a month, I went to the pub, and I had some shandies, (not too many), and we walked through Bungay in the freezing cold to the kebaby, where Ben and Luke got some foul looking food, and we walked to Ben's, sat in the warm kitchen, on the new sofas, Luke and I had a weird drink (concoction of Morgan's Spiced and Caribbean Juice) and all night we just chatted, laughed, tried to recount all 150 original pokemon (aided by three other drunk guys who got into massive arguments about whether or not Onyx evolves), failed / gave up at 80 and tried to google them, but to do so I had to stand just outside the pub doors, because signal is just that bad; all in all it was such a chilled, lovely evening. It was pub-in-winter, which is actually the most warming thing. Being out in the freezing cold and huddling by a bar, in the warm, near a blazing fire, with all the other town drunks laughing merrily around you, is such a warming sensation.
I'm really fancying a pub roast now, but its a Saturday, so will just have to wait 'til tomorrow.
So, for those of you cynics who think every pub is like a Weatherspoons, and every winter is for staying indoors - I urge you to go out and embrace the Winter Pub. Its a fail-safe way of getting you in the mood for the festive season!
My alarm went off at 7.30 this morning. I hit snooze, and as per usual, after 5 minutes, was too tired to do anything, so smacked my phone, which tends to turn off the alarm. Not great. So I then slept for another half an hour. Not only did this make me late leaving the house for my weekly clean in Acle (luckily bad traffic meant I had a valid excuse, my over-sleeping was not brought into question), but this also allowed for 30 minutes of mental half-awake, I've-turned-my-lights-on style dreams.
The setting was this big old village-hall looking room, except I think it was supposed to be the drama studio at my high school (which is odd, as I don't dream about high school ever anymore). And whatever was happening there was quite relaxed, but I think my notion of school slipped into my dream, because we were all sitting on the floor, with cushions and shit, staring up at the stage. I found Al, Nathan, Macina, Will, Coates, Matt and, sitting nearby, Adam, all in a group. We all sat together chatting. Nathan was explaining who we were about to see to me - it was an Italian opera singer famous for being directly related to the mafia; Macina of course made comment. People asked why certain people were missing - I explained Maria's in Italy, and Macina explained that Martin and Paul were in Aberdeen, filming. As you do. So, this guy comes out, fat and in a suit, and starts singing. Adam starts to applaud really loudly, and we all shift further away from him, annoyed. Around the edge of the room was a big black curtain, I think they're useful for the sound quality, or something, and there's about two feet gap between them and the wall. As we shuffle, Matt becomes lost in curtain. As the others laugh at the situation, I try and help him out, and as I do so I notice that at the back of the room, hidden from sight by the curtain, and only therefore visible by me, is an Observer (creepy people in Fringe, completely bald, suit and hat, briefcase and no eyebrows, from the future, able to read minds, very fucking scary and can apparate suddenly and move through time and space effortlessly, rending human weapons useless). When I see him I panic, and hastily act like I didn't see him, and try block my thoughts, in case he's looking. I then realise something else: a lot of the people in the room are quite important. Some very intelligent professors, some financial types, lots of suits and lots of power. I realise how stupid it is that a bunch of post-grad idiots may be caught in a terrorist attack, and I think 'fuck, we need to get out', but obviously I can't tell anyone. So I take out my phone, and try typing a message. I write the message really slowly, in between each word I think up a bunch of other words, telling a weird story, so that my thoughts can't be infiltrated. My message includes a warning about being mind-read. I pass it to Matt, and Nathan reads it over his shoulder. They both stare at me, terrified but blank. As the message gets passed along, Al is the only one to speak up, offering 'I really need a piss, can we go find the toilets?' but Nathan points to the toilets door - it's next to where the Observer is hidden. My phone is passed back to me, and Al points to Adam - he wants to warn him too. I shrug and pass him back my phone, but Adam reads it and basically swears at us all, so we decide to leave him to die.
I can see a stage door up and to the left of where we are sat; I nod Matt towards it; he does lots of hand gestures I don't understand. I try explain this to him, and he passes me his iPhone, earplugs and all, and mimics music in ears. I realise what he's doing - keeping the observer's out. Everyone follows suit, but it means that we now have to communicate through sign language. Al, Will and Macina stay in the room, trying to 'act casual', whilst Matt, Nathan, Coates and I explore the stage doors. We find two path ways, so me and Nathan take the right, and the other two take the left. As we walk, I realise how quiet it is outside my earphones - the stage doors must be soundproof. I turn the music down, and as we turn a corner we hear voices, and I recognise one immediately - that of Peter Bishop / Pacey Whitter / Joshua Jackson. And of course, being my dream, I don't understand which one he is. So he explains that he's Joshua, but in Peter's world ie. the Fringe world is real, but the Observers are after him, so it's best to call him Pacey, so they don't know who we're referring to. He tells us that there are no ways out back here, so he comes with us to find the rest of the guys. We find coates and matt, but the boys have disappeared from the hall, so we start to panic a bit. 'Pacey' tries to keep us calm, and hands us each a observer-tech gun, that can kill them. I ask where he got them from, he won't tell me, so I ask where Olivia and Walter are, and he looks sheepish. He explains that the observers, through their manipulation of time, have once again deleted peter's existence from their universe, but he has once again survived, despite being in the wrong timeline. He therefore is on his own, but really thankful for meeting me, because no one else believes him. Suddenly loads of people in the hall are scattering and we can't see the observers, so Nathan opens the door a fraction and takes out his earplugs - a high, deafening tone is screeching through everyone's minds. We see the opera singer has collapsed, and some italian looking thugs are around him, controlling the noises being made. Matt understands, and tells us all - the Mafia are on our side. Obviously the observers, in wanting to control everything, have pissed off the mafia, and they're fighting back, with the same idea matt had but much more controlled / effective. So we approach the Mafia, and in following them back to the dressing room, find Macina, Al and Will, who had all figured out what we just had. Suddenly all the lights go out and we're trapped, the music has all been switched off and the dressing room can't hear the high-pitch tone. 'shit', Pacey mumbles, 'everyone grab hold of everyone else, we need to know we're all still here.' We all shuffle around in the dark, saying names and checking people are all still present. Yes, we're fine. I'm in between Nathan and Pacey, and Nathan's making stupid comments about how he has sweaty palms, and he's really sorry. I feel Pacey's grip tighten, something's wrong. Suddenly we're all yanked; like a rope attached to your insides is stretched, and we're moving through time and space, and we're in a really bright, cold room, all concrete and ugly and plain, huge windows showing the disgusting New York of 2037. As we land, everyone is split up; dozens of observers have descended upon us and are trying to seperate our limbs, any touching, and I notice one observer is on the floor in pain, he's the one that just lifted us out and he's taken the hit for such a move. In the light I see how many - us 8 plus another 10 or so mafia members. People scramble to safety and shit starts getting real: the Mafia guys have gone into war-mode, and with their own tech they're blasting the room apart trying to shoot the observers, who are apparating around the room like bouncy balls. I'm still holding on to both nathan and pacey, but an observer is getting dangerously close to me as he avoids the mafia gunshots, and pacey yanks me towards him, leaving nathan exposed. An observer lands above him, and he's reading him, we can all feel he is, and I panic that my thoughts haven't been hidden at all, and suddenly Will jumps out from behind Nathan and shoots the observer square in the chest. I wonder how Will got the gun and see Coates' body at the back of the room. Something hits me; a wave of realisation, shit, coates is dead. Shit, I might die. Shit. I look back to Pacey and he's loading a gun, and he's putting it in my hands, and putting grenades in my pockets and I feel terrified. But behind him, I see Al, Macina, Matt, and a couple Mafia guys in combat mode. And they're all fighting like its a war, and the block of rubble that Al is hiding behind gets blown apart, and he turns, exposed, and three observers creep in on him, so he opens fire on them and falls in a blaze of glory, killing two and wounding the third, who then tries to apparate away but Matt grabs his arm and puts a gun to his head; as he does so, sirens trigger, and I see maybe 10 more observers crowding in on him, not wanting him to get to their safety point, and I see his earplugs in, he's blocking their thoughts, because this is a plan, this is a set-up, and he's the bait. Macina, Will and Nathan have been pushed to the back of the room by the mafia, who open a grenade-looking device and throw it to Matt, who catches it, and smiles at his surrounding foe, and a gas leaks out: 80%nitrogen, 20%oxygen, its our pure air that they can't breathe. I try move toward the smog, try to figure out if Matt will survive, I can't figure out if the gas is actually poisonous to us, because if it isn't, why did the mafia move the other boys away? But as I ponder this, pacey moves us out of the room and we're running. The whole of central park has been concreted over and it's vast, and it looks like a concrete desert, never ending, as far as the eye can see, the direction in which we're headed has two tower blocks at the end but nothing else, making it an open landscape, and we're both very easy targets. He's trying to teach me to run whilst crouching, and I can't focus because my music is too loud, and he's not got music, and I'm worried about his thoughts. But then I hear his thoughts: like a radio in my brain, he's telling me it's fine, he's mastered their control of thoughts, he's hacked into their system and he can do it all himself. I'm amazed at this, and ask how, as Etta died before she could teach him. 'in this universe, where I don't exist, there is no etta, but there is a lincoln, and he didn't die'. Lincoln; of course, he would never have moved to the alternate universe. Pacey's thoughts linger in my mind as we run, and then I think about moving faster - time-jumping, 'leaping', spiderman, superman, all the ways in which one can cross distances faster. And then, we're flying, we're in the air, and we're being attacked by the observers. Full on flying/fighting sequence, I'm pretty terrified and don't know how it is that I'm flying, so refuse to let go of Pacey's hand, and then I look over to the two tower blocks we were running towards and I see the Boys all lined up on the ground, half of them firing at the observers, the other half manning a giant machine which appears to be the reason why we're flying. And I duck as a shot comes straight past me, and I feel Pacey ducking and dodging too, and I find in my pocket one of those banger things that create a huge amount of smoke, magicians use them, and I remember I found it earlier that day, and steal an observers hat, throw the banger as hard as I can on top of the hard surface of the hat, and as the smoke clouds around them, I let go of Pacey's hand and I drop, and I fall quite quickly, and my ankle hurts, and I hit the ground and start running toward the boys, and they've done something to the machine so it's flashing, it looks like a bomb; like they've created an anti-gravity ball, shelled it, and now they're going to blow it up, and I don't know where Pacey is but I can't afford to look back because I'm directly beneath it so I keep running and as I run I see that who I'm following is Macina, Nathan and some Mafia guys, and I stumble slightly, and I fall and scrape my hands but roll and push myself up and keep running, and I think I'm bleeding now but I can't stop running, the huge ball in the sky has a shadow which I'm still inside, and the the edge of the shadow is not too far away now, so I push myself harder, I keep running, I run past the big machine, and it has five seconds left on the clock, and I keep running and I'm counting in my head, and I hear another voice counting in my head, but it's not Pacey, and I'm confused, and I'm listening, and I realise it's Lincoln, and he's urging me on, just a couple more meters, come on, 3, 2, almost there, 1... I turn around, knowing that if this is my last moment I may as well see it, and I see Pacey is being half-carried by Matt and Will, and they're wearing gas masks and they throw him out of the shadow and he comes tumbling towards me, and the sky explodes in a huge inferno, and as the fire rains down from the now dying bubble, and the smoke is creeping out of the gaps, and the suited bodies start falling from the sky like flies, Matt and Will stand over us, bloody and sweaty and triumphant, and pacey is in a heap next to me, he's missing an arm, he's badly bleeding, and Will, through his gas mask, says "and the skinny guys win again", beaming. Pacey laughs, but in my head I hear Lincoln; he's telling us to keep moving, one observer stayed alive long enough to alert the rest of our position. We scramble together, we walk towards the tower blocks, and... I wake up.
I have two types of anger; a really loud, ugly kind, and a very cold, cruel, quiet kind. Not many things bring out the latter, but I've felt a lot of it recently. Too much, almost.
I don't want to go into the details about it; they're long and boring. To sum up, my sister has a shit lot of money just hanging around, but basically refuses to help me with my tuition at all because she thinks that I'm not struggling enough yet. As if there is some kind of chart to go by.
Equally, my father told me seven months ago, when I moved home, that I wasn't allowed a boy here, ever. I asked many questions, of course, like 'what if I had a boyfriend?' - 'no, when you have a boyfriend, you can wait until you live together. That's what your mother and I had to do; that's what all of you lot have to do too. The same rules apply to everyone'.
This obviously was a bit harsh, considering that once upon a time I actually frequently had boys here and they didn't ever have 'chats' with me when I was 18, so why start now, when I'm actually more mature/sensible/respectful of their home. But whatever, their rules, I don't want to piss them off. So I didn't.
This weekend, my brother brings his girlfriend over from Holland to meet the parents, and to join in at my brother's best friend's girlfriend's surprise party, thrown at our house. This was all well and good, it was fun, drinks were had, I got to know my brother's girlfriend, she's a really nice person and we bonded over the backstreet boys. Then, when the party was over, and everyone went to bed, where did they both go? Into my brother's room, of course. OH WAIT, what's that dad? We're all treated the same, have to abide by the same rules, etc etc? Bullshit. I don't care if he's the prodigal son or the fucking messiah, he's clearly never been given the 'chat' before in his life and I hate that he gets to breeze past all the shit that I have to deal with in this house.
So right now, I have a lot of silent rage about my siblings, and my parents, and the whole circle of crap I find myself in.
So now I'm thinking I probably can't afford to go see Muse. And I'm also thinking, I can't afford our family trip to the Netherlands at Christmas. But obviously, I have to go, so it will just involve everyone else paying for me again, and I hate that too, because there is this silent attitude of how I'm the youngest, I don't have a highly-paid job, and I still live at home. Brilliant. At least this year I don't have to listen to my siblings telling me how much I need to change my life... because I already went and did that. Look where that got me. Once again, thanks a bunch guys.
I feel very different at the moment. Very weird. Like I don't quite remember who I'm supposed to be. And it's weird to think 'is this the new me?' when new defines something fresh, something clean and sparkly and untouched. I'm definitely not new. But is this me, being old? Becoming the older version of myself? Words are getting caught in my brain today, like flies on sticky paper.
I keep feeling like I'm about to cry. I'll think of something tiny, one miniscule detail, and a huge emotion will hit me, like when a lorry drives past and you get the after-gust of air. Its horrible, I don't feel safe thinking about anything today.
I hate this county. I've been trying to surpress it, ignore it, hell I've even been saying 'No laura, positive thoughts only', but it won't go away. This place is swallowing me up. I've barely got back and I already feel lost and fucking depressed. The post-holiday come down.
I just keep thinking about one of my new favourite songs, Broken Crown, from Mumford's new album Babel. The last line just goes "And in this twilight our choices seal our fate". I think my fate is pretty sealed for the next year or so, and I hate it, because even though I feel so crap right now, I'd make the same choices all over again. I just have to grit my teeth and soldier on.
Sorry about the whine. Hopefully the next one will be happier.
This week, this month so far, has been excellent. So much happiness, so many freaking awesome moments that I will remember and cherish for as long as my memory lasts. I don't know where to begin in describing these amazing few days.
Manchester
A blur of driving, laughing, and dancing. Was amazing to see the boys again, had some good chats about bugger all (isn't that all we ever do?), ate some good food, drank some drink and danced into the small hours in a very alternative indie/old school club, many sweaty mancs around us, singing our hearts out to the classics by Oasis, Arctic Monkeys, Mumford and Sons (heck yes) and various others. My feet just couldn't stop moving, I loved every second of it. Southampton
I wasn't totally prepared for the state of the home I was entering. Coates' crap was just littered everywhere, the incarnation of the relationship he ended, just thrown into the living room whilst his ex girlfriend piles things neatly into her own room. Very bizarre. And luckily, I had other places to be.
I went to Starbucks and met with the two faces who haunted my dreams for a year or so: Sophie and Matt. And it felt so strange to be sat there, the three of us, trying to calculate all the things that have and have not changed since we three sat down together like that. It was quite incredible, in my head, at least, as nothing was really mentioned, which I was quite grateful for. Its hard to tell people you haven't seen in over a year how hard it is to go from university to home, and realise you've left behind every single amazing friend you made at uni, in one form or another, and that in the moment you realise that, you also realise how much you regret the ways things ended between a lost friend. I went to late lunch with Sophie, in Bella, as per usual, and it felt very normal. And I tried to explain a few things to her, not sure how that really went, but at least I finally gave her her present. It was strange, because it felt like I had a billion and one things to tell her and I just didn't know how to get them all out. And it was so spooky - I later explained to Maria, who was equally spooked - how my dream had happened just before Sophie's world get really shit. Sometimes, I swear, my dreams are fucking psychic.
So then, things got interesting. Went and got Coates, went to Soul Cellar for a couple drinks, then got in to the Guildhall and heard the last song of the supporting act, whoever that was, and had a couple more drinks. Chatted a lot about life, and how Coates REALLY needs to sort his out. Like, I can't write some of the shit that was mentioned, but Oh My God. That boy really has dug a massive hole for himself. And so, drink in hand, we stood in the crowd and watched one of our favourite people come out and perform a half hour slot before Twin Atlantic came out. It was very good, as ever, he ended with Riverbanks, as always, and I felt that thing I feel sometimes, where I don't feel anyone else in the room, or anything else going on, I just feel music. Its a pretty trippy feeling, but I loved it. I felt so connected with it all that night. Southampton was giving me this amazing night, all these amazing memories, and I felt so at peace with the city, despite this odd sense of not belonging, and of nostalgia.
Then, we went to Rhino. We skipped half of Twin Atlantic's set, they were alright, his voice got really grating and the crowd were slightly too young for my liking (yet mainly male, which was weird). So we went to Rhino. And we drank more, and chatted more, and the chat became drunken chat, and I'm not entirely sure of half the things that were chatted about. And then the house DJ came out and played every single pop/punk/rock/alternative band that were around in the late 90s, and we danced like the floor was on fire. Blink, Jimmy Eat World, Sum41, all those types of bands, all those tunes that make you think of American Pie, and the first Scream, and staying up later than you'd ever stayed up, for no reason at all, just because you were young and wanted to be wild. That music makes me so incredibly happy, it was the perfect start to the night. And so, after a couple hours of dancing, (by this point I was drinking water), the DJ booth changed hands, and the boys that took over were Charlie Simpson, Nick Walpole and the rest of the band, and the music was amazingly loud, and we were dancing in front of the speaker, right up in front of the DJ booth, and it was an hour or so of pure joy. Chop Suey was amazingly hilarious, I've never screamed so much, and Coates had many fist-bumps with the guys in the booth, and he was like a giddy little child, and it was pretty amazing. I had a few revelations about the girls who are old enough to go to clubs but also like Charlie Simpson - they're all dressed like sluts and don't know who Rage or System are. I felt quite unique that night. But those girls aside, it was an incredible night.
Torquay
Where to even start. It felt like being at home, Maria's room was decorated with all the things she had in the last three houses, so it felt so comfortable. The smell on incense, the bean bags, I literally wanted to curl up and never leave. She cooked paella, we cooked breakfast together, we drove and we laughed and we chatted about life, and it was so good to be in a space of relaxation with my best friend, and just suppress all my worries and problems. The first night, we found army boys. The second day, I met her grandparents, and had some an amazing talk with 'yaya'. That night we went exploring on the cliffs in the rain, I found a place Maria didn't know existed. The Saturday, my last day, we went everywhere. We had cream teas for breakfast, the sky was beautiful and clear, we drove down to the beach and walked along the rocks, we found a waterfall, we drove around, found Labrador Bay, had a nice steep climb, saw some amazing views, drove back and found Thatcher's Rock and had a climb on the rocks, had a sit and a chat, took in the beauty and splendor of Torbay, and then we drove to Teignmouth, got a bit lost, had a walk around, finally got some grub, and drove to Stansted, seeing an array of firework displays along the way. It was incredible, it was stunning and serene, and I'm so looking forward to going over to the West Country in the summer time. And my heart feels slightly lost, knowing how far away Maria now is, but having had the amazing week that I have, I can at least feel glad that I got to see her, and that I got to have such an extraordinary few days, enjoying the things that England has to offer, and catching up with many old friends.
This has been the best holiday I've ever had without leaving the country. I feel like the happiness I've felt will keep my heart warm in the cold weeks to come. I hope everyone else that I spent this time with has enjoyed it too; next stop, London for New Year's!
This year I'm celebrating November like never before. So much goodness, so much happiness in one month.
Bring on the lights; the dancing and the music; the laughter and the happiness; bring my magical world to me, and in it I will conquer all hate and fear, all neglect and distrust. In my world, light reigns, and in creating light, we create hope, and give every face something to smile about.
Fearlessness: it's a practice I have preached but never actually put into practice until right now. Pure fearlessness. Just going to do things, no thinking, no looking back, no wondering what if, just do it, because I have too little time to not.
Sounds like I'm dying, right? Well, I'm not... at least, that I know of. But we all are, and will one day cease to exist, and in that moment I want to know that I did all I possibly could and more to make the most of this life and live it and be present, be aware, enjoy it and just smile.
There's so much I want to do, and not enough time to do it in. I want to dive right in.
If we don't, we'll always ask 'what if''. People's biggest regrets are the things that they didn't do.
I don't want to wait for life.
What I want, I want right now. No one ever thinks 'ooh, I really want a cup of tea... in two hours'. Or 'I really want to help the environment... when I have my own house'. If you want it, you do it.
Tomorrow it begins. Tomorrow I sit through my first screening. Tomorrow I have a seminar and a lecture. Tomorrow, I dive into the deep pool of being a Masters student, terrifying and beautiful as it is.
I want this day to last forever, and I want tomorrow to be over and done with already. I am so aware of my own failings and fumblings and I keep making an arse out of myself around people I know, I don't know how I'm going to manage it with people I don't know.
On a good note, have thoroughly enjoyed having Maria with me this week, and I hope that I can visit her in Oxford sometime in the next month, and if / when she's in Italy, I am definitely on a plane to see her. I'd really love for all my friends to move to different exciting cities and countries for a few months, just so I can come visit. That alright?
Also, this country freaks me out sometimes. Norwich at 9am on a sunday is so quiet, so still, and so very empty. It really caught me by surprise. I never see Norwich like that anymore, and it took me back to school days, and I realised that tomorrow will be just like school days combined with uni days. With a car. And no friends. Sigh.
It's fine, these are just nerves talking. 'This too shall pass'.
I refer back to my blog last year, called 'I really fucked it up this time, didn't I my dear'. I want to amend something that it has taken almost exactly two years for me to figure out, remember, or at least, just have a clear enough head to realise.
I miss him. He was so much of my life, so much of me, and he was my best friend. And the hole is still there, from where he just disappeared.
A few moments were so perfect, and so beautiful, and I want to remember them. I want, when someone mentions his name, or when I'm driving near his house, to remember those amazing moments.
Sitting on the common, we'd been for a long walk, chatting away as usual, and we sat on the bench up by the duck pond, and the sun was setting over Southampton in front of us, and he asked me to be his girlfriend. I was so happy, and we walked down to the Cowherds and had a nice meal and I was so in love with him that day.
I used to pick him up from the top of his road: his house is down a dead-end street, so he'd walk up to the crossroads, and I'd come from the opposite direction, so when I came over the hill I could see him standing there, hair quaffed, nice jeans and shoes on, bag packed with spare pants and little else, and a smile on his face. We would spend so much time together in my car.
Dropping him off, I never wanted him to leave. We'd be there for hours talking, kissing, holding hands, wishing that the night could be ours together.
We were lying in my bed at uni, the window wide open, heads on the windowsill, looking up at the stars. We were under the duvet, cuddling, and he sang to me. He's the only person who ever sang to me.
He was on my doorstep holding a rose. And he had purposefully been on a mission through Southampton to find me a rose, because he knew I'd never been given flowers before. I took pictures of it so it will never wilt.
I can understand why he doesn't want to see me, or acknowledge my existence. I just miss him. I want to know whats happening in his life, what his little sister is called, what he's doing post-university, and there's just this hole.
I never got over him; I never had the time. I just forgot to think about him.
The really strange thing is that I used to believe he was the one. No matter how much we went through, I still believed that we'd be together again, we'd make it through, and we'd get married one day, have children and a dog and a nice house in the Home counties and the whole dream that we constantly spoke about felt so real, so attainable, and I don't know where that emotion went. I wonder whether part of my psychology has turned that assured future into a longing for a companion good enough to marry. Like, I've now set that in my sights. And maybe, in an even weirder, deeper way, thats why I had to leave Brighton and break up with Martin: because I could never see us getting married. Maybe, as much as I know I have broken too many people's hearts in the past, maybe I also broke myself.
Maybe I'm looking into this too much.
Needless to say, I hope that I'm not broken. And I also hope that somewhere in his anger, Whall can remember that good times too.
Today I feel invincible. Tomorrow is so close, and I am so excited about starting this new chapter in the story of me, my life, and slowly writing the rest of the book at the same time. I get the feeling that this chapter is an important one. And its one year: one tiny year that will fly by and I don't want it to, I want to grab it and keep a hold of it and just enjoy every single second of it.
So today I can't be harmed in any way; no words can cut me down, no bruises will shine, no monsters will make me scream; I am confident in myself for one thing only and it makes me feel like I'm glowing. I can do this. I can be this person, and achieve exactly what I want to, and come hell or high water I will be my best this year.
Certain things fit into place in my head today.
The word 'perfect' should never have been invented, for there is no such thing as 'perfection'; only our own view, our own belief of what perfection is. And with that we can be perfect, but whilst the word has 7 billion definitions, we can only be perfect to ourselves. Trying to be more than that is a fruitless task.
And dreams are like emotions within us; no matter who else dreams the way that you dream, or who else knows what you dream, it does not mean it is not your dream. Your dream is your own to have, to hold on to, to long for and to become. It is more than lust or love, more than a friendship, more than a glimmer of hope, more than a desire: it is inside you, growing, and the more you acknowledge it, the more that you want and hope and pray for it, the stronger it becomes. You just have to know that. Trust in yourself, and in who are you, and in what you can do. We are all amazing, and we can achieve whatever we want to; you just have to find your grasp of dreams and never let go. Have faith. Know that you can be the best; perfect to yourself, and you can achieve your dreams, and more. Its all about knowledge.
It was this week, possibly this date, can't remember exactly, that I started working for Molly Maid.
So I have been working as a cleaner for a whole year now.
Jesus Christ.
Also, I have a weird thing I like doing - when a friend sends me a message on facebook, I scroll right to the top of the messages, and read the whole way down. This is extremely funny with people like Sam, as our conversations are always hilarious, and then months / a year or so can pass with nothing, then they start up again like no time passed. And I just did it with Maria, and it's hilarious that most of them are just little things, like us discussing going to the gym, or laughing about adam or tim, or her sending me things to print off. But it makes me so sad that its all gone now. Living in our flats was so much fun, and I think I forgot to appreciate all the privileges, all the independent happy moments and all the purely simple things like cooking with a friend, having someone to come home to, and that amazing feeling of friends becoming family. I miss them. My old family. I miss the people I would speak to every day. And I hope they know how much I will cherish those memories.
Lastly, I'm home with my Dad all week, as Mum's on holiday. I'm cleaning up constantly, the builders (basically live here now) drink more tea than we have mugs for, and its freezing. Autumn is settling in the home, and with it comes a chill only my heart feels: the loneliness of winter, particularly Christmas, when mirrored with last year.
As a good friend once told me to remember, through thick and thin, "this too shall pass".
You know how certain habits go with certain things? Like people who smoke always want one after a pint, or people who do exercise want healthy food after a work out, etc etc. Last night a brand new season of Glee started in America, so I watched it this morning, and it feels like I should be getting ready to go to a lecture, or go to the library. Glee is University for me - even last year when in Brighton, I'd watch it and feel a little rush of inspiration or something, so I would try to do something vaguely creative - and right now my fingertips are buzzing, wanting to do some writing. I want to drive up to the UEA right now, find a quiet spot in the library and read about film theory. I don't want to go to Ellingham Hall to clean for three hours, and later today go over to the Durrants auction and help my Mum. I want to be at the UEA already, I've got ten days to wait and I just can't, I'm brimming with excitement and eagerness.
Also, brand new episode of Glee made me cry twice. It is BACK! Now just for some New Girl, Big Bang Theory, How I Met Your Mother... and I'm sorted until Christmas!
I was just going to call this Angel, but when I finally finish watching it (will be starting next week), I'm going to undoubtedly write a post about all five series of Angel.
It occurred to me today that some people are more contagious than others, in the sense that certain things have you gripped. If someone has you gripped on conversation, it would be very hard to not talk to them if they were near by, or not call them, or text them. If someone had you gripped whenever you looked at them, it'd be hard to ever look anywhere else. And if someone had once let you feel something, they got beneath your skin and you want that feeling back, your desire to get that again would overcome most other desires.
Well, he does all three, and its driving me a bit insane. And I can hear myself, feel myself going a bit crazy, but I don't know what on earth can stop it, apart from attaining him. But even then I'd still be consumed. Like a drug addiction; there's no win. And I find myself trying to distract myself - I've just spent the evening perusing youtube for all Josh Hartnett interviews (one of the five, and not overly youtubed him before). But now I'm just seeing similarities between them. And there aren't many, but my mind can still find them.
I know how little time there is until the MA starts, but it doesn't stop my impatience. And I know that if I can just get through the next eleven days, things will start to get better, look brighter, be easier. But then I see him, and he tells me he wants to join me when I go out in Norwich with people I meet. And he tells me he hopes my best friend comes home for Christmas, so we can spend New Year's Eve together. And he knows what's in my head; well, he knows I like him, and I'm sure after my drunken antics of last friday he knows how I think he has the face of an angel, and... yet he sits there, gathered together and all, and tells me these things that make those voices in my head tell me it's mutual. But he just sits there. And as much as I don't want to literally throw myself at him, I don't know what else to do. Am I too far in the friend zone? Was he only interested in sex when he didn't know me? Or is he waiting for something - and if so, what? Is it to do with the way that he thinks he needs to be his idea of perfection, and if he's not there yet, it's wrong, or something? Does he not see just how fricking perfect he already is?? GOD DAMMIT.
My head won't shut up. I sit myself in my study (pink sofa bed and all) and watch Buffy all day. I get up in the morning to go to work, really fucking tired because I haven't slept properly because I'm having a hundred and one vivid as fuck dreams. And a lot of them involve bizarre scenarios in which I look a fool. Last night he was dying; I think a car had hit him, and I run over to him but his sister pushes me away, (the sister I have not met... not that I can remember meeting the other one) and tells me to get lost; I obviously look annoyed, so she asks me, "who the hell are you anyway?".
I wonder if he's found this blog. I wonder if he knows more than he lets on, because occasionally he's far too on the ball, he remembers conversations I don't even remember having, and more specifically, the details I've told him. Like, little moments I've mentioned before, and he remembers them, like talking about Arthur the other day, I was like 'God, I haven't seen Arthur in fucking ages! Must be five years or so..." and he says, "the night on the trampoline under the stars?". I couldn't even bring up my last memory of him that quickly, but he could. But then I get paranoid sometimes. My stupid fucking brain.
I wonder if he's just 'playing foolies' with me. Just leading me on, some ridiculous elongated joke. I wonder if he did it as a bet or a dare, and he just hasn't been able to get rid of me. I wonder, in the darkest moments, if before that weekend when we first hooked up, he'd heard from Whall; a scheme was devised where Whall would tell him certain things to and not to do, so that they could break my heart, just like I broke Whall's heart. I wonder if they will ever talk to each other, and if they do, would I come up? Would he be ashamed to mention it? Or would he be evasive to avoid the awkwardness? So many shitty thoughts whizzing around my brain right now.
I once made a simile that my mind is like a tumble dryer, with a certain amount of things in, slowly getting dryed. Right now, he's the only thing in the dryer, but it's going at full speed because it's bogged down with more water than you'd think possible.
I feel a bit like I'm under a spell. And that four letter word is scaring me at the moment. This isn't; it can't be...
Hello world, this bright, shining rock that spins casually on its orbit, slowly revolving around a great mass of heat and energy, living a very co-dependent life with this burning gaseous monster, knowing that its life and existence depends upon it, but it will be the thing to ultimately end its life too. To need something that you know will kill you, end you, and be remorseless as you fail to exist away from its cruel clutches.
What even is true independence? The sun is a selfish, emotionless life-giver, and yet we all owe it our everything. And the Earth is patient and kind, it gives and gives and frankly takes little away, if you compare how many are born and live each day to how many stop living each day. This planet is over-stuffed with its generosity to feed us, house us and care for us. I believe that if there is a something up there, like a God, or whatever, it cannot choose between who to look after and who not to. It cannot pick a race or ethnicity, a place, a gender, a sexuality, an age, an ambition, or amount of ambition, a hope or chance in the future - it cannot decide who does and does not live, it simply gives everything to everyone, and the times it takes away are sporadic, unpredictable, yet we can learn from. We can learn which areas of this planet are most likely to suffer from drought, wild fires, mass spread of diseases, from natural disasters like earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, tsunamis and avalanches, and if we are fortunate enough to live in one of the lucky areas of the world that is very safe from these things, do we praise the rain every day for helping our crops to grow? Do we dance in the sunlight, rejoice in the process of photosynthesis, or thank the greater beings for our plentiful harvests? Do we look out to our flat and undisturbed countryside and thank our parents for living in this beautiful and harmless environment? Do we look upon horses, the biggest animals found wild in this country, if any wild ones are even left, and respect their power and grace, knowing that the much bigger monsters that roam the northern territories, the deadlier creatures with poisons and bites and stings that can kill, are miles and miles from us as we sleep safe and sound in our beds each night? Do we relish in the vast and incredible history our country has to offer, countless battles and wars lost and won, Kings and Queens dating back farther than our minds can even conceive, a relic which we touch and cannot imagine who else has touched it, used it, and been left in the history books, perfectly preserved through our glorious national pride and our heavily set importance of remembering what has passed, and remembering those who sacrificed, battled, loved and died for this country; within each village and each town and each city throughout this country is a place of worship, a great church or cathedral, built beautifully and thoughtfully so that all the praising of our bounty and good fortune could be done in the most elegant and respected of buildings, and each of these landmarks is surrounded by a reflection, a memory, and a plaque to those who lived, breathed, and once made some mark in this world, and their names are etched upon a stone, and they will be forever part of this country for they are buried in our soil and we have remembered them, and even those with no names or bodies, we make great memorials for, and we spend a day each year thinking of those who have fallen, unknown, slipping through the cracks in the history books into a place we cannot imagine, yet we try to put our minds there, and we try to become one entity of thought, a whole country praying that those people know they are still thanked each year, for fighting the good fight and giving us what we have today.
If those people knew how our country would be today, I don't know if they'd have fought as hard.
And the true question I pose is this: why do we do the things that we do? To what purpose, to what achievement, when we all know that we cannot live forever, what is it we want to leave here? What immortality do we wish to create for ourselves? Because each day I wake up and I work, and I earn money, and I long to spend it immediately on traveling, seeing my friends, seeing the world and taking in the beauty that I feel I cannot see whilst I'm stuck here, yet that money I earn is for my education for the next year, but what is that even for? I will still want to travel and see my friends, but I will just have to wait longer to do so. And will my education benefit me immediately, or will I have to wait a few more years until I reap the rewards? And what the hell is it I hope to reap from it anyway?
Right now, I am at a loss. I can make money doing jobs that I hope I don't have to do forever, and I feel so distant from everything around me, and I have this horrible sensation that I am becoming too attached to one of my only friends in Norfolk, but I think it might actually be a self-destructive attachment because I don't believe he wants to be that person to me, so inevitably I will get hurt, but my heart would rather be in pain than numb and not feeling anything at all. I want to go see Maria; I want to look at life positively, and I want to enjoy every moment I live, but my body slumps and shrugs, and instead of doing exercise I watch Buffy, and instead of writing a short story I write a long and whiny blog post. I need a change. September 24th is my hope right now. September 24th is the start of the new me, and there'll be no looking back.
Last night my mother's side of the family, plus lots of friends and people who my parents have known for years but barely see because they don't live in Broome, all piled into our home to celebrate my aunt's 60th birthday. It was a very nice evening, nothing bad happened, lots of drinking, dancing and laughing, eating and a bit more drinking happened, and all in all, was a good night. And in the middle of the dance floor, whilst my awesome playlist of all things 60s (the era my mum and aunt grew up in and love) blasted out some serious tunes, I realised just how amazing my family is. It's hard to describe what I really mean, but I will give it my best shot.
So my Mum's family is a strange but interesting thing. My Mum (Jenny) is the middle child of seven: Carol, Wayland, Bridget, Jenny, Gilly, Lulu and Joey. Now, Carol and Wayland had a different father, and are both a bit older than the others, so didn't live in the house that the others grew up in, so are slightly estranged. Carol's family all live in Ely-area, which is a couple hours drive away: she has three children, I think, some of whom also have kids, I don't know any of them, except Tracey, my cousin, who lives in Hampshire, and I think she has a brother called Darren, and one of them on that side is married to Kevin, who is blind, and if you ever saw the episode of Top Gear when a blind guy drives around the track, that's him. Carol passed away a few years ago, so the only member of that family we ever see now is Tracey, despite her living much further away than everyone else. And I love that she makes the effort - there is something in her that knows how important and amazing family is, and she makes the effort to be there for the important things, and in return she's getting to know the family that her mother was always so accidentally detached from.
Wayland is married to Margie, and they have two daughters, Paula and Jacqui, who each have a daughter. I know Jacqui's daughter is called Tia, but I can't remember Paula's daughter. They all live in Kirby Cane, a village two miles, if that, from our house, but we seldom see them. They tend to be there for the important events, but I think they make the effort for family-related things, and wouldn't class themselves as 'friends' with the rest of the family, or at least, no where near as much as the rest. Its sad, because Wayland's age gap isn't his own fault, but you can definitely feel the difference in relationships with his brother and sisters.
Bridget has three children and an ex-husband, Neil, who is their father, but a bit of a skeeze. Matt, the eldest, just turned 40, has a wife Denise and two kids, Jacob and Eloise, 15 and 12, I think. Then Nicky (36 or 37), who has three kids with two ex-boyfriends, both of whom are pretty terrible parents, but Beth (16) and Noah and Isaac (2, twins) are good kids. Beth is a bit spoilt, but having younger siblings seems to have helped their family a lot. And Becky (34 or 35), the youngest, has a husband James and two BEAUTIFUL daughters, Evie and Maisie, who I think are 6 and 4, but thats a total guess, and I don't know which one is which, but they are both so pretty, and I'm sure as they get older I'll be able to tell them apart.
Mum obviously is married to my dad with four kids - Helen (28) James (26) Charlie (25) and me, 22.
Gilly (male, real name Gilbert) is married to Lisa, the best aunt in the world, and has three boys, Luke (23) Jack (22) and Mike (19). They have the perfect family, in my eyes, because despite constantly not having enough money, they are all so close, and their girlfriends practically live with them, and all their friends are friends, and their parents are the perfect mixture of fun and cool, yet organised, level-headed and good parents. Lisa was telling me yesterday that once Luke goes to university, she doesn't know who she'll go with to see Twin Atlantic and Billy Talent and the UEA. COOLEST AUNT EVER.
Anyway... Lulu, (or Lesley) is married to Crazy-Australian-Uncle Craig. He's a bit wild in his graying hair and his ridiculous mustache, and people constantly, after parties, will ask me "who was the crazy Australian guy?"
Joey, the youngest, has no family, and lives in Beccles, and works in Morrisons petrol station, and I don't know much about her life, really.
Now, Bridget, Mum and Lulu are like the three sisters everyone dreams of having when they think of being sisters. They go on holidays together, they sit and discuss the hilarious things they got up to as kids, and they generally are very close. You can tell that Lulu is younger than them, because she's got her own wild-streak that they don't have - she had a best friend Linda when she was young, instead of a sister, so grew up in a slightly different world to Mum and Bridget, but still they are all amazing when on a dance floor together, wearing stupid hats, singing Daydream Believer.
And last night, on the dance floor, I had to take a moment to appreciate what was around me. Bridget, Mum, Lulu and Joey, Lisa and Denise, Nicky and Becky, Nicky's hilarious friend Donna, Eloise, Evie and Maisie, Tracey, Craig taking pictures, and me in the middle, so glad that I was standing there. Being home can sometimes be oppressive and like a heavy weight, but last night made up for it a bit. My sisters wished they could have been there, and I'm really glad that I was there. Having a family that strong, that happy and smiley and glad to see each other and wishing love and luck to everyone is a really amazing feeling to be part of, and it reminds me of how much I hope that I have kids, quite a few kids, and my siblings all have kids at a similar age, and they can grow up together with this knowledge of this huge family support system that just goes on and on, back and back, this huge spiders-web of family and friends and people you didn't even know you were related to, that whilst growing up you don't even realise is such an amazing thing, but one day you can pause and just smile, surrounded by love, and think 'God I love my family; I wouldn't change them for the world.'
I'm watching everything apart from the three dvds that I've been meaning to watch for over a month.
I'm thinking about things to write, I'm feeling more positive about writing, I just need to get some done.
I'm in this bubble at the moment, where I go to work, I come home, I go to another work, I come home, and in the evening I have dvds, books, music and sometimes a friend or two to keep myself entertained with.
My life revolves purely around myself. I have become the independent, self-assured person who I wanted to be. But something still isn't right.
Is it because I know I'm waiting for things still? I'm waiting for the MA to start, I'm waiting for life to actually catch up with me half the time.
I'm waiting for my Mum to pay me. She owes me a LOT of money right now, and keeps putting off paying me. Its really annoying. I really want to put my money into my bank account and see my overdraft shrivel up in fear of my huge amounts of money. But no, my overdraft continues to point and laugh at my empty wallet, because my own mother needs to use my money, so has to wait until she's got more cash flow to pay me back. It could take a while.
I'm turning my laptop into more of a desktop. I'm putting every piece of music possible on it, I'm leaving it in my study (from now on, the only entertaining thing that happens in my bedroom is reading. How dull.) I'm doing this because I'm making space and neccesity in my life for a new laptop. A small, powerful, genius little thing I can take to uni with me. I can watch things at night and it won't overheat and die. I can go to a cafe or a library and just whip it out, like a book, and boom, its easy and fun and helps me work more. This thing, classy as it is, is too old, too dusty, too slow and just way too heavy. I have to catch the bus from the park and ride into uni, so the laptop really needs to be transportable. Just gotta find what type of laptop I want to get!
I'm a bit bored of being adult and boring. I want to stay up all night with the boy that dominates my thoughts. I want to drink lots and walk home and sleep for ages and then miraculously not be hungover. I want to eat Chinese food. God, I want to eat wheat and carbs and shitty shitty take out food. But no. I have to be sensible, think about my job, and my parents, and my body, and my old and retarded fucking bowels.
But even when I'm living a boring life I still can't wake up in the morning.
"I wanna stand with you on a mountain, I wanna bathe with you in the sea, I wanna lay like this forever, until the sky falls down on me"
I am not Buddhist, nor particularly religious, but seeing this reminds me of my friends, my loved ones, and the amazing things they have taught me, about how to stay strong, love life and just follow my heart and listen to my soul.
Like looking down from the stairway to heaven. The clouds in this picture make me think of The Voyage of the Dawn Treador, when Reepicheep gets in his little boat and sails over to Aslan country to die. Its a beautiful image, and he is so full of respect, dignity, and believes that he is headed some place good. Narnia tries to teach us not to be scared of death, but to embrace the eventualities and live a life worth living.
Caves. Mumford and Sons comes to mind, "come out of your cave walking on your hands, and see the world hanging upside down". I love the dark, mysteriousness of caves and their underground, hidden views and secretive nature. Reminds you how beautiful this earth is, and how the natural phenomenon can be so grand, so massive, so stunning, that nothing humans can ever do can compete with the power of nature.
Peace and tranquility. Finding your 'inner calm'. Taking a walk around your village and finding some beautiful flowers hidden beneath some nettles and thistles. The hardest thing to decide it what to do with those flowers. Do you pick them, put them in a vase, so you enjoy their beauty until they wilt, or walk away, but leave the area clearer, so more and more people can see the beauty that you have seen, time and time again.
I'd love to go to India during Divali. I'd love to feel part of a moment like this. Light is one of the most powerful things we have on this earth, and we embrace it's potential and beauty every day without even noticing. I'd love to celebrate light.
I've lost my sense of self, of belonging, of passion and ambition. I have ambitions, and I remember what they are, but my mind does not react to motivation or success. Somehow I have drifted from one plane of existence into another, and here, looking back, I'm stuck on the wrong side. Oddly reflective of the story line in Fringe at the moment (beginning of series 3), I definitely feel like I'm in a parallel universe, and I cannot put my finger on what it is, but something is missing.
Strangely though, I feel like connections are constantly being made with my younger self, when I was in High School, and now. I'm not sure if its something I'm doing, or actually something about the juxtaposition of my life, but its quite noticeable. I can only push myself to be better than the person I was back then. She was pretty crap at most things.
Maybe I need to get out of this house. My mind needs a spring clean, something new and exciting, some air, some experience, some inspiration.
For now, I spend my free time watching Fringe, True Blood and re-watching How I Met Your Mother. Its all pretty simple, if you let it become simple, but I know deep down I don't want simplicity; I'm capable of much more than this, yet this is what I have become.
I wish this post was more positive. I wish I had something more positive to think about. God, this place is just sucking my soul away.
There is an emptiness inside me that I cannot put my finger on.
I feel the lack of contact with him. Like, I notice my phone never goes off anymore. I notice when I have some stupid little thought, a funny moment happens, or I just want someone to chat to, and he's not there. I think there is always a certain amount of granted being taken by most friendships, but totally accidentally. I think a lot of people just get used to their relationships, and what they can or can't expect from certain people. Like, I know that if I want to leave the house right now and go see someone, my best bet is Ben. Jasmine is always busy/unavailable, and Henry takes a good three hours to just reply, let alone make a plan with. And I think in that respect, I always knew I could rely on him to just be there, and now he's not. There's this weird emptiness that has no real emotion or loss attached to it, because as yet it's just a lingering feeling. Like when someone you kind-of-know dies, and it takes a few months for it to really hit you. That sounds horrific as a metaphor, but there is a numbness that reminds me of that feeling of confused mourning. A funeral typically happens about a week after passing, but when it hasn't hit you yet, a funeral feels so cold and misplaced.
I think my empty feelings may also relate to my constantly thinning group of friends.
Ever since I got back and Sam left (in the same day), I have told myself that I don't have many friends in Norfolk. They all keep leaving me. This is, I guess, quite true, but it's also the wrong approach. I found myself giving advice recently, and I was giving advice that I had previously heard from Maria: the idea of asking the Universe for the wrong thing. If you say 'the weather looks shit today', it will be, where as if you say 'I hope today is sunny', you will find the weather to be better, and the next step, the one I'm not quite doing, but trying to, is to look at the sky and say 'hey look, I think the clouds are thinning already'. Regardless of what the weather does, it's your attitude towards it that makes a difference. The whole 'instead of waiting for the rain to pass, you've got to learn to dance in the rain' saying (that I just said quite wrong, but you get the gist). I was giving this advice to Henry, as he has a very negative view of his life at the moment, and as I was saying it, I heard myself, and realised I've got to take the advice too. Stop saying 'all my friends are leaving me', because that will in turn drive away current / future friends. I've got to be thankful for who is here, and keep in contact with the lucky few in amazing parts of the world, and just accept that change is a constant, and I am a constant, so I must embrace friends as they come and go, our worlds touch and pass, even if briefly, for even in the briefest of encounters, magic can happen.
And so, I am excited for the coming change. I hope that some things are not permanently changed, and a common ground can be found for my recently lost friendship. His parting words of 'it was nice knowing you' resonated in my mind with an air of closure and finality. I hope this was my misreading a strange situation. If not, it was equally nice knowing him, and I hope he knows that. I stand by my 'dirt off your shoulders' blog, and hope that this is just a quiet period.
I have this thing I do when I meet people: I unconsciously suss them out. I figure out how confident they are, how calm, how content, how together they appear, and wherever I see a crack, I poke around to see what might be back there, like some bitch who broke their heart, or some controlling siblings, or a messy divorce which their mother ran from. I see these things, and I figure out a persons reasons and I come to a controlled judgement of how good-hearted and likeable this person is, and therefore, whether I want to know them. Usually, I just sort of have a 'they seem nice' attitude and never think about it again. Sometimes, people make me want to dig deeper. A handful of people in my life have done that, and the further I dug, the more heart-breaking, the more twisted their life seemed, and the more I respected and loved them for it.
Well today, I'm turning my own tables. I want to dig into my own psyche, because I have some problems that I need to address. I considered going to counseling about it, but I think I'll write it on here first. If I need more help, obviously I'll look further, but today, I take the first step. I need to admit it.
I have an addiction, and I need to get clean.
When I was 12 I got the first kick. I had this seriously long first proper kiss. It was awkward as hell, and weird to think back to, considering our friendship since, but either way, the addiction began. It didn't resurface until I was 15, and experienced the first drunk kiss I didn't mean to do. But I couldn't help it. Those could have been almost anyone's lips, because I was never going to pull away. Not that night, that drunk, and that devastated by being laughed at by the guy I fancied. Hook, line, sinker.
I was 15 when Thompson happened, then Smithy. And Shane then started, but never got anywhere, he bottled out, and broke my heart with a text. Then I went from guy to guy in a weird succession: first Drew, then Ross, then Gatenby, then Barnaby, then Jack, then Barnaby again, with a bit of Rowan in there, then Ed, then briefly Arthur, then Shane, with Michael thrown in there, then nothing for a while, a bit of Ingham, a bit of Ed again, then nothing for a while. And I didn't have a particularly reflective moment, I felt so angry after everything with Ed that I was alright being single, so when the good guy came along, it worked, and I was swept away. So Ben began. Then half-ended, and Mark happened, and Spence happened, then we properly ended, and after Mark, Matt happened, and after I threw that in the fire, Ben happened again. All the way through until Rich happened, and then it carried on, and then it was over in a blaze of fury, and Martin happened. And then I came home, and Henry happened, and Ify happened, and now I'm the most single I've ever felt in my life. Not because of loneliness, or being alone, or anything like that. More because I've been in love, and lost them all. And the problem is, I know that I should just be single and have a tolerance, a will power, and an appearance of not needing a man to make me happy, but I have this addiction. I'm addicted to affection.
This addiction boils down to very early-set psychological problems, I'll get into them later. But needless to say, the affection I require is not just physical. I couldn't be a whore, a fuck-buddy or a S&M junkie, because I get attached to things, and feelings always get involved. And those feelings are the things that I actually long for, but the only way I know of achieving them, or finding them in the first place, is through physical affection. This isn't me trying to say 'therefore I'm a cheating whore because I have problems', but I do believe that there is a connection between when it is I've cheated on guys, directly linked with when our relationship has floundered, and affection has been lacking.
A few weeks ago I slept with a guy I don't know or particularly like. Yet I felt better in the morning. Its like this drug, and I hate it. I hate that I can't fix myself, I need to rely on another person to relieve me of my crave. Its not like I walk down the street thinking 'I need to fuck something', I'm not like a dog on heat or anything, but there is something in my hormones, in my psyche even, that finds a way of taking over so it can gets its fix. And it's ruined entire relationships, my whole emotional support ripped out from under me, because my hormones don't understand the need to have patience and will power, they just smell testosterone and go for it.
Horribly, I don't think my crave will ever be fulfilled, because the root of my problem is the place I need to be looking for the answers. I need to get affection from those who didn't give it to me in the first place. But I don't have that, and I don't have three siblings that I could call best friends, so at the end of the day, sex may be the only place I can go to cure the itch.
When I was a kid my parents worked a lot. My dad was always busy, and my mum was too busy to look after her fourth child as well as the other three, so she had a nanny for a little while. When I was about 5 or 6, I can remember being bored at home, because Charlie wouldn't play with me. She had already grown up too fast, because she was at the girls school; playmobil was just not cool enough for her. I spent most of my summers at the Howarth's house in Alburgh. Simon and Sue were my second-parents, and me, Alex, Ben and Louise would find stuff to do all day. I had so much fun, got so much done, had something different to do with each of them, and I was entertained. They're still my second family now, and I sometimes just go there because this house feels so cold and empty. They make that feeling go away, temporarily.
When I started at the high school, I hoped things would change. Mum used to forget to pick me up from primary school, and sometimes some one else would come, sometimes I'd have to wait because she was late finishing work, and sometimes she just forgot completely, got home and thought 'shit I forgot Laura'. I never cried or anything, I'd just stand there and wait. One time, I could have walked home with Jack and his mum, as they live up the road from us, but I didn't, because I knew that if she couldn't pick me up yet, there certainly wasn't anyone at home to let me in.
So I started high school, and I got the bus every day with all three siblings. They had their bus crew, and they didn't want me in it. Helen would tell me to sit further away from them, she'd give me her walkman so I didn't eavesdrop, or she'd introduce me to the other girl my age on the bus and say 'go sit with Charlotte, she likes Buffy the Vampire Slayer too, you can be friends!'. I mean, we were / still are friends, but still... I was very much rejected by them every day on the bus.
Helen only shared one year in high school with me. If I saw her walking around, I'd go and say hi, follow her where she was going and stuff, and she'd just shun me off, because she was far too busy, and didn't care that I wasn't fitting in to this big new school that she was so comfortable in. Helen's friends were always nice to me, and that made me feel a tiny bit better. Charlie's friends were not, but they were all 14, and in that rude stage of puberty. It was in the next few years that they would accept my constant presence. Phil was always good, she'd involve me in conversations on the bus, tell me all her weird stories, and Charlie didn't seem to mind. But Charlie wouldn't discuss her own things in front of me. She'd wait until I was engrossed in my mini-disc player to talk seriously. Luckily, I had about 14 mini-discs of my favourite albums, the only ones coming to mind are Avril Lavigne, Eminem, and Savage Garden.
Then Fame Academy happened. Charlie and I had something in common again. We'd watch it for hours, we had loads of home-recorded videos of footage, live shows, interviews when they'd come out of the house, and the official fame academy video, and we'd watch them all the time. Emma was in the house at the time, and she'd laugh at us a lot, but we didn't care. Sinead and Ainslie, and their friendship, helped me get close to Charlie, which led to many other great things. We went to the live show at Birmingham NEC with Charlie's two best friends (very cool), and when I was 16 I visited her in Edinburgh and we went to see Ainslie at a little gig.
High school was quickly over run by dramatic moments with friends from about age 13, but I'd still come home to Emma, Dad and Mum discussing work, which I was not yet very much to do with, and James discussing his latest hobby (BMXing, fishing, Warhammer, there were so many...), and Charlie doing homework, calling friends, writing out all her texts. She used to ask me to clean her room for her, then tell her a story, and she'd always fall asleep. But I still did it every time she asked. I wanted to, because it was quality time with my sister, and I was not going to pass that up just because I had my own shitty homework to do. Evidently, I probably should have found time to do that. Oh well.
I was never very close to James. For a few years, when the garage was in its prime, he'd sit at his computer, and I'd sit at mine, next to each other, and we'd play games from about 8.30 until 12, sometimes 1am, depending how many times Mum came in and told us to get to bed. We'd discuss very little, he'd show me parts of his game that were cool, I'd carry on playing either one of his old games (in a hope we could bond and chat about it, no doubt - but they were all really cool games) or just on msn and shit like that for hours. Emma sometimes would be there, drinking and chatting, music would be on. Charlie sometimes joined the three of us.
During the weekends and holidays, we'd often have a full house. Katie might stay round, Phil had popped over for dinner, Martie was coming for lunch, Helen was home and Julia and Sophie were both hanging out with her in the kitchen. James even had his friends, and Corbett and Ruan would be in the garage, playing computer games, being given beers jovially by Dad.
Then they all left. Emma's circus picked up a bit, she'd come home for less time, and dad would be more angry with her. James went to the RAF in the January of 05, Charlie went on her gap year in the September of 05, and I was at home with mum and dad, very alone, and they were still working all the time, forgetting to pick up their child, too busy for school plays and things. I was 15. That's when my above list of boys begins.
I've never told my siblings about what happened between myself and Thompson. Mainly because I don't think they'd care. But its now been seven years, and its still this worry in the back of my mind - why did I let him? I've never been able to answer it, but it's because of something I'm scared of admitting. Its hard to talk to girls your age about how sex makes you feel when your 15, because people either laugh, cringe, have no way of relating at all, or have had 'so much' already that they just HAVE to tell you ALL their stories first. And yours never seems to come out. The thing with Thompson is, I liked him, before it happened. I even liked him the first few days after it happened. I liked the feeling of him liking me. And I didn't enjoy what happened in a sexual sense, but I was being given attention by this guy that I liked, and I could put up with weird settings for doing weird things because I had that warmth of affection.
I don't need a guy to make me happy. And if all I needed was pleasure from sex, I'd own a dildo. But I don't, because its also about intimacy and emotional connections. One of my old blogs was about how sex with someone you're not in a relationship with is not as good. Being in love with someone, making love, and having this warmth take over your body, is the closest thing to being cured that I've ever been. Having one-night-stands does very little good, and considering the varying people who have been involved, they usually do more damage than good, anyway.
Right now, I have a handful of friends in this county. Filling my daily quota of affection takes a whole day of being with friends, and I get no work done. So when I work five days in a week, get little sleep, feel like a zombie most days and just think 'do it for the money' most of the day, my quota is very low. I get cheap thrills from farmers telling me they like my hair, or the tea I made was 'just perfect'. It's not even real affection, but I've noticed how much happier I am when someone drops a little compliment like that. I used to either ignore them or just laugh them off / dismiss my tea as being 'bog standard'.
I don't know if Norfolk is going to break me. Being in this house is easier now than it was from when I was 15 til 18, but that was for three years. This is just over one. And I'm determined to leave before it reaches two years. Even if just for a month of traveling or something. I don't want Norfolk to break me, but I know how broken I already am. And the people that broke me are the people I live with, work with, see every day and rely upon for food and housing. And I don't know if I can convince my head that I am loved by my family. I think it's been too long, too shoved down my throat, too many times have I walked away from an argument brimming with tears. How do I turn all of that over?
I want to be happy again. I want to fall in love and feel like my life has reason, because I have a person to live it with. I don't want to feel like this empty shell any more.
When I was a kid I couldn't stop myself from lying. It was like oxygen to me, and I only truly stopped when another girl came into my life who lied bigger and worse than I could ever imagine. She sobered my addiction, and I have otherwise been so much better ever since, but I'm never entirely sure why. It was the same time that I started writing poetry. Writing is my outlet for emotions. Writing, especially fictional, fantasy things, cures my need to lie, as I am lying, just in the most acceptable form.
I wonder if that girl ever realised why she lied. I think she was very unhappy with her own life, and wanted more, and made up a boyfriend, and when she wanted attention, but didn't know entirely how to get it without seeming rude and self-involved, she made up a story about being pregnant. She made up so much stuff that had absolutely no credibility to it. And one day, I decided to call her bluff. I made up my own story, and I did it damn well. And she believed every word of it. And I made all these loop holes for myself. I told her she was the only one I'd told, so no one else knew, and I couldn't deal with other people asking me about it, so can we keep it between us? And if you want to talk to someone about it, I understand, just don't use my name, or talk to someone who I don't know, so it doesn't come back to me. And she lapped it all up, and she was heartbroken for me and genuinely fell into this massive ironic trap I'd set out for her. And I loved it, it was a brilliant moment for me, and I felt like I'd achieved something so real that day.
Of course, two years later, the rumour about my virginity leaked through our friendship group, and she heard something, I don't know what, but something probably close to the truth. And she believed it, and it cemented what I had previously lied to her about anyway. We weren't very close after that, so I never explained to her that it was a lie. I never corrected her. So to this day, she still thinks I was sexually abused when I was twelve by my Dad's late-best-friend.
I want to be in love again. I miss it. I miss having someone to give all my energy to. A someone to let my mind drift off to, a someone to think about as I fall asleep, a someone to just cuddle and steal warmth from.
I also miss my best friends. I believe things happen for reasons, and I believe everything happens when it's supposed to, whether we like it or not. But me coming home was swiftly followed by Sam moving to Kuala Lumpur, Milli moving to Burgess Hill, Maria moving to Torquay and Chamaale's off to Sri Lanka tomorrow. The world is telling me to meet new people, or something, but it sucks not having them here. I miss laughing with my friends.
I miss drinking green tea, eating biscuits and watching something in our living room.
I miss having someone to go to the pub with, any night, because she's a trooper, even if she's got shit to do the next day she'd still be there, buying me shots.
I miss having someone in the car with me, sleeping in Helen's room, struggling through a day of work on the van with me, keeping me awake as we drive through the morning.
I miss being able to sit in the red room and waste hours doing nothing, just chatting shit and watching disney films.
I miss my ladies. I've still got George, who I will cling to with all my might. And on friday night, typical trip to the Dragon, Jasmine summed up both our lives in one sentence. "You know what sucks? You're basically my best friend now." Of course, this wasn't a mean thing to say. I work with her, she's my fake-brother's girlfriend and we hang out, drink together and meet up a lot anyway. But it means we're all each other has, and that's the part that sucks.
I can't wait for the 24th of September. I'm slightly terrified, as I always am when meeting new people, and having to force myself to seem normal around them. But equally, I'm so excited. I just want to dive right in. Put my life back into perspective, get some good things into my head, get some people in my life and just roll. In the last two days I have watched 11 episodes of 'My So-Called Life', each of which is 47 minutes long. That's 517minutes of my life that I had nothing better to do with in the last two days.
I feel stuck in between worlds. I can feel the three movements in my life: school, university, and now, slipping away from each other. School was not far off when I was at university. My closest school friends were still reachable, holidays would be jammed with seeing as many old friends as possible, including those who did not actually go to my school, but fall into that category nonetheless. And even after we left university, many meetings have been had between groups or just pairs of us. But right now, in the third state, they are slipping. People's lives are that much more busy. My friends are all becoming people with places to live and be and can't run away with me for a weekend. And it sucks, because I'm not there yet, but I'm happy for everyone with their lives and jobs and stuff. Acknowledging change is the first form of acceptance. I'm good with change most of the time. I feel it, like waves, or bursts of energy into the atmosphere, and it carries so much with it. When change is in the air, many things go with it. And even though good things can be lost, it's refreshing and you know that inevitably, good things will come, you just have to have patience and hope.
In my brain today, I feel a few things stuck. Like, usually, my brain is a tumble dryer, with a whole load of soggy clothes riddled with unanswered questions and confusion, and they all churn over and over slowly but surely. Today however, my washing is smaller. The load I had is mainly dry, so I have taken them out, but three or four things remain, damp and cold, not yet good enough to remove. And I can't quite get a grasp on them.
One is pictures. I made a collage of university pictures, so I now have three on my walls, as well as three photos, and the two pictures Maria made me next to my bed. However, the photo frame I got for my birthday sits on the floor in my study. I pretend it's there because I don't know where to put it, but it's more that I'm not entirely used to seeing it yet. Like the wound is too fresh. But, the collage I made, I put one photo in it that I hadn't been able to look at for almost two years. And I don't even remember ordering it online - I must have done it after we broke up, but I don't know why. And its now nestled between a photo of a watermelon, a photo of me, Maria and Nadia in first year, one of Sophie and I looking drunk and one of Paul Martin looking like he's giving someone head. And I'm comfortable with it there. I do wonder what my Mum thinks when she comes into my room and sees pictures of the three years I had, some how obtaining a first, all the photos suggesting I didn't, though. Oddly, I might add, one photo does make me smile, although I can't understand why: a 'winning' shot of Blue Waffle, all sweaty and shiny post-match, and the three of us look pretty happy (obviously, because we beat The Cunts), but that photo I can smile at. Despite it being a bit awkward.
Another damp item is friendships. I feel like some of the relationships I have right now are under pressure of becoming more. But, in a strange sense. And I hate the idea that if they don't become more, the friendship will flounder, possibly sink, proving it to be a false friendship in the first place. Equally, I wonder if I'm guilty of the exact same thing. I wonder if the guy I spend some of my time with, I'm only with for the hope that someday soon he'll turn around and just admit to the secret desire to be my boyfriend. And I only wonder this because I realised recently that I'm always disappointed by our time spent together, but not because I ever expect anything different, I obviously just want something else on top of it all. But annoyingly, I think he just needs a friend. He's the most confusing person I've ever met, and I don't know if he tries it on or not, but I'm starting to see through some of his cracks, and the guy underneath is fucked. Basket-case is a little too strong - more like he's in serious need of some counseling. But apparently, I like broken guys. My 'type', as this is my only way of linking all the guys I've liked in the past - is that of someone in need of help, be it emotional, mental, or anything. When I can see that a guy needs someone to mend their heart, I melt a bit. Shane, Ben, Matt and Martin all fall into that category, but for very different reasons. Equally, Mark, Ed and Henry all fall into the slightly more dangerous, 'they probably need to see a shrink' sort of category. Unsurprisingly, those relationships didn't go too well.
My last item in the washing machine is my 'future', my 'what am I doing on this planet' question that I just can't answer. And doing an MA just means I can postpone answering for another year. But I am trying to think things through laterally, and give each option (the other day, landscape gardening became an option, because I did such a darn good job at sweeping) thorough thought. My two main contenders are quite different from each other. My writing career, which may be aided by my MA, or may not, therefore could take another year and then some (two years, four years, who knows) just to get through the door, but I won't be earning much, so living would be expensive and hard and I don't know where I'd go or who I'd know and it may even involve leaving the country (YAY) but is a very undefinable future which is based a lot on luck and hard work, persistence and most importantly, who you know. The other option is to stay in Norfolk (boo) and earn lots of money living either very or relatively cheaply at home or in Norwich, which is a pretty cheap place to live, working as my parent's prodigy to eventually let them retire. This would give me time to write too, although not much, but it would be such a huge responsibility to take on, and I'd then be rooted here. I've been here three months and I need to leave already. But the money is a very big advantage. I'd love to have more money. I wouldn't have time to do anything with it, but it would still be great.
Ah, the muddle that is my head. I wish I could just get out for a few days. I keep getting little chances and backing out because of money or some lame excuse, like 'well, I really should spend some time updating my iTunes'. I need out soon though. Very tempted to go see Maria now she's in Torquay. Or go see Milli for a bit in Brighton, see how Gilly's doing too. That'd be funny. Or just run away to some sunny beach for a week. But no one I know has the money or time to do that. It's very upsetting.
I'm watching Fringe again, and I've just started watching My So-Called Life. It's excellently nineties. I'm hoping this will encourage some dreams about Jared Leto. It may have some horrific fringe-science in it, but his face is worth it, frankly.
