This week has been the best week of 2012, I think. I kind of ruined my own birthday. And the whole of January. But I feel positive and happy and relaxed this week. And that is much better.
This week has been mega busy at work and Alison is super stressed with exams. Despite that, we have still had time for the most snuggles ever, pick and mix and grey’s anatomy in bed, a sporadic Starbucks date in Manchester, a rather hilarious and satiating meal at the Trafford Centre with Alison’s sister and tomorrow I’m going out in Liverpool with some school friends.
The only person that can make you truly happy is you. The other people can just make you even happier.
I love you Alison.
25th October 2011.
This is the thing. (The under-punctuated and unstructured thing…hold in there.)
I’m fucking good at writing. Like, I’m really good at writing. Words are my thing. They’re not the thing, but they’re my thing. Listen to me talk irl and you probably wouldn’t believe me; I’m that girl, y’know, the one who says ‘lol’ without any hint of irony and smothers words in thick, viscous glottal stops? I do not sound like someone who could use the word viscous in a sentence, is what I’m trying to say.
And just, it really gets me so irate when I see bloggers - those beautiful creatures with the sole purpose in life of putting pictures to words and having a merry fucking time doing so - writing badly. Like really badly. Like, legit, claw at your own arm because reading that paragraph of typos and grammar fails is making your flesh bubble, badly. Here’s another thing, but not the thing. I’m a fucking snob, man. If you write badly, I will judge you. I’m a high school teacher (which is nearly the thing, I mean we’re getting closer, we’re definitely to around a Kat Dennings on a scale of Jodie Marsh - Eva Green) and I attempt to teach science. (Nope, not English, I’m as confused as you are.) I attempt to teach science and I’m more concerned with the mistaken interchangeability of your/you’re than I am with the definition of mitosis when marking books. I’ve been told it’s not conducive to learning but I argue that it is conducive to a more well-rounded society and I can be very persuasive. So how is it that some people are perpetuating these spelling misconceptions all over the world wide web, and getting paid to do so, while I sit here ‘marking books,’ aka writing a blog post and occasionally adding a faint green ‘x’ to a page?
I will tell you how. I will tell you how and, in doing so, I will tell you the thing.
*drum roll*
How this has happened, is that I have always taken the easy option. I mean I’ve done some incredible and note-worthy things and I’m sure somebody somewhere would kill for this career path. But it’s not me. It’s so. very. NOT ME but it is impressive and it is easy and it is what people would want for me. I want to be a Fashion Blogger. I want to be a bloody good (see also: articulate and verbose) Fahion Blogger. I want my life to consist solely of reading about clothes, writing about clothes and purchasing clothes. Rinse, repeat. Is this an easy career? No. Is it a viable career? For very few. Am I wasting my time doing something dull and soul-destroying because doing what I would love to do is risky and I’m scared of failing? Well, yes, and the truth stings like a fucking bitch.
I want to be brave. I want to be proactive. I want to carpe diem that shit and wake up smiling and looking forward to the day, not with a weight in the pit of my stomach, listening to the quiet ‘tick, tock’ of my impending implosion. I want all of these things but I am comfortable. And sometimes (/oftentimes) comfort wins out. And I wish I didn’t let it.
Straight As, a top 10 University education, a really bloody competitive and world-renowned graduate scheme. And I’m not satisfied. Satisfaction would be talking for two pages about my love for the Jeffrey Campbell Cat Tapestry Litas before going on a vintage trawl and documenting my finds, all to the tune of my John Cougar Mellencamp vinyl on repeat. Satisfaction is not marking. I am not satisfied.
I want to be brave. & that is the thing.
"I like tattoos and floral dresses. I want to move to Brooklyn and live in an apartment where my kitchen is my living room is my bedroom. I want to write. I want to spend all of my money on Iced Lattes and perfume and never have children or responsibilities. I want the kind of life where you can just up and leave, just like that. I hate bananas and Creme Eggs and those days where you can’t get out of bed because everything seems so damaged. I also kind of love those days. I would like to feel infinite. I would like to spend all of my time in heels but I don’t think I was cut out for the Sex and The City lifestyle. I like Jenny Owen Youngs and Tegan and Sara and live music and dancing and when my face goes numb. I think non-sequitors make me look broody and intense and I was once on Playdays."
— This is my Myspace bio. I know, Myspace. I know exactly where I was when I wrote it, I know exactly what I was doing and what I was reading and what I was feeling. Words are funny. Memories are funny. This was inspired by The Perks of Being a Wallflower, degree resentment, break ups and the sun. I wrote it on the roof of the extension of my third year student house. Not much has changed, really. I hate bananas and Creme Eggs, I still love Brooklyn and I definitely was on Playdays. I am less selfish now though. And in love. & I do want responsibilities and I do want children and I want a life with little Alison in it. Love is funny. Words are funny.
x
I miss University today. Not so much the education side, but the freedom; the ability to do whatever the fuck I wanted. I have a deadline tomorrow. Typical University protocol would be: wake up at 11am, make breakfast whilst being shamed by the boys for not taking my degree seriously enough, watch some daytime television, get a really long bath, stream all of my American shows while painting my nails, wander back down to the kitchen to make something to eat via the microwave/any method that ensures food in my belly within 10 minutes, watch Hollyoaks with Rachel and Susie (who had always both had super productive days), return to my bedroom to browse Tumblr and snack. This would take me to about 8/9pm, by which time I would start to feel a little apprehensive, I mean it’s 9pm the day before and I haven’t revised/written anything, you know? So for a few hours I’d sit with a word document/book open, idly studying and day dreaming until about 1am. By this time, everyone would have gone to bed, each one popping their head in my room to wish me luck/cluck at me in disdain (gender dependent) and I’d make my way back downstairs to the living room. I’d put on Skins or The L Word or some 80s movies and start the hardcore work. Drink a lot of coffee/orange juice. Pop pro-plus like it was going out of style. Open the windows. I’d sit and type until about 5am before driving to campus at sunrise to print off whatever it was that was so important I could leave it until 12 hours before to begin. The computer rooms would always have one student in, always international, and I’d get a vending machine barely-latte for £1, a Yorkie for 60p and put in the finishing touches. Print. Staple. Bed. (Until 10.30am to hand in).
My point is, here I am in my room trying to get shit done and it’s unbearably warm and my bed is too comfortable and there is no good juice and. This isn’t MY house. I can’t go and sit in the living room until 5am because ‘keep the noise down your brother is up early’ or ‘don’t turn the TV over I’m watching a documentary about overweight [insert random demographic].’ If I stay up until 5am on a work night my Mother will see fit to chastise me tomorrow morning but if I’m old enough to pay rent to my own parents then I’m old enough to make my own bedtime, no? I feel so suffocated. I feel like I’ll never achieve my potential in this house because whilst there is someone nagging at me to try my best, I will always feel too pressured to do so. I don’t want to answer to anyone anymore, I’m 22. This isn’t life. I’m not living my life so much as I’m living in accordance with someone else’s. This was not the plan.
I should have studied Medicine.
x
