My last blog post of 2013

2013. 
Twenty thirteen.

I could spend some time reflecting on the year that is in it's dying moments, but I won't. Too much has happened. And it's New Years Eve tomorrow. And New Years is all about new starts, new beginnings, looking into the future, not behind us into the past.

I've been umming and ahhing about my 2014 New Years resolutions. As you know, resolutions mean a lot to me. I worry bout making them attainable, but want them to reflect who I want to become and achievements I want to accomplish. 

So. New Year's Resolutions for 2014:

1. Visit Uluru using an Aboriginal tour company
2. Be officially employed in Australian TV/media (i.e. get paid!)
3. Write something creative that isn't a blog. This doesn't have to be a full novel, but could be a poem, short story or a film script.
4. Choose next tattoo design (and maybe get it done...)
5. Improve my health by exercising and healthy eating so that by the year's conclusion I am able to:
     - Run 5k
     - Do 30 push ups
     - Do 100 sit ups
     - Touch the floor in Yoga poses (specifically Triangle)
6. Read the following list of books:
    - Better than Fiction (collection of short stories, already started on iPhone)
    - Heart of Darkness (on iPhone)
    - Villette  (on iPhone)
    - On the Origin of the Species  (on iPhone)
    - Around the World in Eighty Days  (on iPhone)
    - White Men'll Never Do It (already started, paperback)
    - Bewitched & Bedevilled  (on iPhone)
7. Start learning French? (Rosetta Stone e-learning for 12 months costs $273. Still deciding on this one...)
8. Climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge
9. Skydive.


Last two, and number 4 is easy....

What are your New Years resolutions?

Oh, and Happy New Year!!

There's More To Life Than Rush

It's December. It's nearly the end of 2013. I cannot believe this year has gone already. A year ago I was just getting back from what was up until now the trip of a lifetime. And actually, Trek is still the trip of a lifetime. It was the trip of a lifetime for an Emma that doesn't exist anymore. I came back irrevocably changed.

I've been trying to write New Years resolutions for 2014, but it's surprisingly hard. I don't know where I'm going to be, or what I'm going to be doing. How do I know what's achievable or not? I like my NY's resolutions to be achievable, usually not too broad, which means I never put "lose weight" or "build self esteem" any more, because those are too broad; improvements that have any number of ways to achieve them. And it only makes you feel worse if you don't achieve them.

Before I get onto what I think my 2014 resolutions will be, I'm going to review my 2013 resolutions.

Resolutions 2013

1. Watch 500 out of 1001
2. Read list of books (10)
3. Complete Before 24 list
4. Learn to knit
5. Ride the Bluebell Railway
6. Make a roast dinner
7. Save £1000 for Australia

I was unsuccessful in two of these: numbers 3 and 6. Although I still have a few weeks to complete number 6, I'm not really in a position to make a roast dinner for myself or anyone else, so I'm ruling it uncompleted. And I failed at completing my Before 24 List, which if you don't remember what that was about, you should read this old blog. 

And so to the others that I have been successful at. Whilst I may not be the best knitter in the world, I understand the basic principle of it, even if I still can't cast on. I easily saved £1000 for Australia, and I rode the Bluebell Railway for my birthday.

Self/unemployment at the beginning of the year meant I rocketed through my list of books to read, though that list did include the Fifty Shades trilogy. And I have now watched over 500 of my 1001 films to see before I die, and it'll likely stay at that number until I return from Australia.

So what am I going to do for 2014? Usually I'd have a films to see resolution, but I don't have Lovefilm any more, or even a disc drive in my laptop. I could have a books to read list to complete, but books are cumbersome for a backpacker, and there's only so many free books I've got downloaded on my phone.

Should I make some Australia-centric resolutions? I could make it a resolution to see Uluru, but I could also make it a resolution to see Fraser Island, the Whitsundays, to do a skydive over Mission Beach. And that's only Queensland... What about a resolution to climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge, or do something equally iconic in Victoria, or Tasmania, Western Australia or the Northern Territory (none of which I know anything about). Maybe I should have a resolution that requires me to visit the Neighbours set. I don't like vague resolutions, so I can't just have a resolution that says "travel".

And what about the main reason I came over to Oz - work? I had planned to make it a resolution to work in Aus TV...but I've been doing that the past two weeks. Granted, not being paid for it, so perhaps that should be written into the resolution.

Last year I had a resolution to save money for this year abroad. Should I again have a resolution to save money - but this time for my return home? This really depends on me getting work of any kind.

Maybe I am overthinking this. Okay I am definitely overthinking this, but I like to plan. I like to be organised and make lists and goals, and often lists about goals or goals that involve lists.

I see resolutions as a way to become the person you want to be. But there's only so much control I have over the person I'm going to be by the end of 2014.

Maybe I should try to have a resolution not to get burnt again. Let's see how long that one lasts.

Crikey this heat is hot.

I have been in Australia for exactly 16 days. I've been away 22 days now but I am only 16 days into a 365 day visa, and it feels like I'm running out of time.

Tonight I'm seeing the Brisbane Christmas tree lights being turned on. They're solar powered, because if you didn't know, Queensland is the Sunshine State of Australia. So here I am, sweating my bits off in 30 degree heat, celebrating the approach of Christmas.

Talk about head screw.

16 days, feels more like 60. Feels like so much longer. 2 weeks ago I jungle surfed through a rainforest. A rainforest!! I've snorkelled the Barrier Reef. I've held a koala. I've taken a train ride that lasted a day and a half. I've been burnt three times, and I've peeled too. Parts of me are still milky white. I've partied, got drunk, thrown up. I've made new friends. I've tried octopus, and lobster. I've been scared the day lights out of when a massive (not poisonous) spider crawled out from under a TV unit whilst watching a creepy tv show.  And I've had work experience at an Aussie production company, and there's more to come.

And I've been here only 16 days.

And in the next 16? More work, as well as a short road trip to the beach and to Australia Zoo.
And then maybe a train ride to the Gold Coast.

I came here to find work. Unlike other backpackers, I wasn't coming to see Australia, to experience the beaches or the outback. These last 6 weeks of 2013 were for holiday, and then 2014 I would work as much as I could. Now I realise there needs to be time for both. I've been here 16 days, and I want to see more. I want to see it all.

And I only have 349 days left to do it in.

A Rant About Misogyny because I saw a Flo Rida video last night)

In a nightclub at my hostel last night, I noticed this video on the screens. And all I could see was ass. Ass, booty, the junk in this girls trunk.

What really shocked me was not that there were beautiful scantily-clad woman dancing in an RnB song. It was the complete disassociation of these butts from the women that own them. In the first three seconds, we see a reflection of a bottom in Flo Rida's shades. You can just about see that this bottom is attached to body. But then Flo Rida is standing astride a long line of oversized arses. Seriously. They are just everywhere.

At 20 seconds, the creepiest thing I think I have seen on a screen in a long time appears.

I'm not sure I should show you, but in the interest of research.this blog. I print screened it for you.

Why, in 2013, are female bodies still the main fucking attraction? (Damn I try hard not to swear on this blog but I'm a little bit angry right now).

These women, where are their faces? At 0:30 we get a fleeting glance of two women sitting n the front of Flo Rida's speedboat. It's so quick, and they are not even doing anything. Just sitting there, looking pretty. 

Oh wait, more faces! at 0:46, there's are two women whose faces we see as they...sit...there...looking pretty... (as mermaids?! Do mermaids even have asses???)

OOH! At 0:49 we get a face, as she does an awesome hair flick towards the camera. And then at 0:58 we see her face as she returns from bending over. 

My favourite bit (wait, can you tell that was sarcasm? It's hard to know sometimes when you're reading something so just to let you know, that was sarcasm) is at 1:01 Flo Rida is holding a booty-cone. Oh yes, this girl's booty is positioned like some fine piece of ice cream that Flo's just gonna get his tongue around. But wait! The booty-cone girl is holding a booty-cone of another girl, who is also holding a booty-cone and oh my I'm a bit dizzy.

(Also, it's just after this bit I started asking myself "what do crocodiles have to do with ass?" And I'm still not sure.)

Mermaid girls are back for a second's glance at 1:30. 

And at 1:46, did Pitbull just call women "monkeys"? Or just women's asses? Or just the asses of women of colour (this latter possibility is sort of nullified by the fact that Flo Rida just "can't believe it" that a white woman has a booty, and thus giving us the whole [terrible] premise for the song.) Maybe I misunderstood him. Maybe he just wanted to get a Michael Jackson reference in there. 

Wait! 5 seconds later I think I have made the connection! The chorus is "bubbleyumbum" or something like that. And Jacko's monkey was called Bubbles right? So it was just the reference he was going for then. Right?

I seriously hope so.

2:04. More creepy mirror images. At 2:12 you get a tiny glance a the girl with purple hair's face. It's so quick I thought it was Jessie J pre-head shave for a moment.

2:40 - :44. Mirror. Images. 

And then yeah. Last minute is just the same as everything before. Asses, booty, junk in their trunk. And you barely see the women attached to them.

Now, you could argue artistic whatsit. You could even use that age old argument that the women in the video have made a choice to be in the video. And you could say some women might enjoy Pitbull and Flo Rida drumming on their asses like fucking bongo drums.

But actually it's the bongo drumming hand gestures that really seal the deal for me. "Look at that ass! I want to drum it. Like a bongo drum. Like an actual fucking object. Because this isn't a woman, a human being with feelings, thoughts, ambitions, brains or brawn. It's a wonderland created to help me improve my drumming skills."

And the misogyny and sexism in popular culture doesn't just stay in popular culture. For a start, it's created by those that continue perpetuating misogynistic and sexist views. And it doesn't stay isolated, but not matter how much you say popular culture doesn't affect you, it does. Like the excellent "She Didn't Buy It" strips for Page 3, you don't have to buy into something to be affected by it. The people on the bus in Stirling didn't buy into the misogynistic lads culture of the hockey team. But they were on the same bus and had to be subjected to their pathetic chants. You don't have to like the song Blurred Lines, or you can see it as harmless fun, but juxtapose the lyrics against rapist's actual words, and maybe you'll think a little differently. 

Blurred Lines, and whatever this Flo Rida song is called, are just two in what seems like a bazillion gillion songs in mainstream music that makes objectifying women, telling women what they want, dominating women, etc etc, totally normal. Totally normal. 

But I am more than a piece of ass, or a great rack. But this is just so freaking normal now. The hostel I'm staying in, at the nightclub attached, had a pole dancing competition last night. Ladies only, of course. On Ladies Night, after the topless champagne waiters had packed away. And at the end, all the women lined up for 60 seconds more dancing and the MC kept saying stuff like "get naked, get dirty, get your lesbian on". 

And I'm not going judge the girls on the stage for what they did, as long as they didn't feel pressured into it and they enjoyed themselves, but what the MC was saying was pressure, and it was just typical misogyny - women, get your bits out for our enjoyment. And I felt guilty that I was watching it all. A passive bystander. But what could I have done, jumped on stage and tried to pull the plug? Am I going to stand by when there is jelly wrestling, wet t-shirt contests, and Gladiator fights where the female contestants are nicknamed "Love Black Cock"?

I'm not going to watch, or participate. But that doesn't mean I won't be affected.

And my room mate just came back from a bar where one guy harassed her, trying to get her to have a drink (she's not drinking tonight as she's diving tomorrow) and when she refused him politely he grabbed her arm. 

I am raging. And it's exhausting. Which is why this rant is probably incoherent and rambling. 

You don't expect old men to touch you up

But, Erm. Why not? We live in a culture where women are objects, meat for the taking.

And why not from an old man? Because old people are so much more polite than the 'yout' of today? Perhaps but they lived in a time where women were still striking out and beginning to live beyond the home. 


It's hard to guesstimate how old this old man actually was. Old enough that he was shuffling along (though I do that in the morning with a hangover). Old enough that he was wrinkled and had baggy skin. Old enough that he was sensibly dressed for the cold weather. 


The more I think about it, the more righteous my fury becomes. I am practically apoplectic as I replay the events in my head. I am walking down the slope of the Lidl car park towards the station. After having to wait for a car to reverse out of its spot in order to leave, I continued walking, and there was an elderly man walking towards me. Nothing out of the ordinary, looking slightly like Victor Meldrew as he shuffled along, adorned in long black coat, black beanie hat and red scarf.
And since he was shuffling and wasn't going to change his path of direction to make sure we could pass each other, I moved over slightly. 

And that's when I saw what was coming. His left arm moved out from his side, at perhaps a 30 degree angle. I thought maybe he was going to stop me and ask me a question so I instinctively slowed down just a touch. 

Ha, just a touch, what an apt turn of phrase. Because as we passed that's what he did. He touched me. The 30 degree angle became a 45 degree angle and as we passed it touched my jeans just left of the zipper and dragged his hand along the top of my thigh. And I kept walking, but said out loud (not very loudly) "what the..?"
I turned to look over my shoulder at him and I could see him still shuffling along, arm down again, but he turned his head slightly back towards me too. Only briefly. 


I was in shock. An old man, shuffling past me in the car park of Lidl, just touched me up. And I know I didn't imagine it because my left thigh is incredibly sensitive since I got my tattoo, and not just directly on my tattoo but all around it. 


And I kept walking. I was in so much shock. Now, shock has given way to downright anger and disgust. I was not shocked when my friends got touched up in a bar last night. We take that kind of sexual harassment for granted in bars and clubs. 


BUT THIS WAS THE LIDL CAR PARK. I walk through there every day for work. That's how I get to the station. And he was an OLD MAN. Not some drunk sleazy banker guy that we (shouldn't have to but unfortunately do) expect to try and grab us. 

But next time it happens - to me, my sister, my friend, any other woman - I will not be shocked. And he will see my righteous fury. It doesn't matter how old you are, you do not have the right to touch me without my permission. 

   

I'm running out of clock and that ain't a shock.

I'm 6 days away from leaving. I'm 6 days away from leaving an island of family, friends, memories, for an island of family, friends, and memories yet to be made. 

I'm sitting on a train carriage and the man across from me is clutching an oversized bottle of Stella Artois. I like Stella, but the smell reminds me of an ex, and his bedsit, and nights in front of the PS2 playing Lego Star Wars. 
And it reminds me that I think I lost one of my PS2 controllers to him. Just like I lost my DVD (or was it VHS, I was 16...) of the Nighmare Before Christmas to another ex. 

And it's trails of memories like that which I savour, and considering my terrible memory, feel precious to me. Granted, it's not pleasant remembering either of those ex's, but remembering the memories themselves is nice. It's comforting.

Someone commented to me recently that they didn't think I was the sentimental type. But I can be. That's why I have several memory boxes of collected items. That's why I have walls covered in postcards and pictures. But you can recognise the pleasure in remembering times gone past without being nostalgic for them, or wishing that in fact the past was the present.

I'm about to leave the country for anything up to a year, and at times I might be lonely, or homesick, and the memories of all the people I've left behind will battle for space in my mind. Some will come equipped with megaphones, others colourful banners; anything to get my attention.

But when I'm not feeling that way, or maybe despite feeling that way, I'll be in a new country, on a new adventure, making new memories. And that is so exciting. We document our lives so much these days - Facebook updates, 140-characters or less tweets, Instagramming our dinner. Even blogging. There's the criticism that we're so busy posting about our lives that we're not actually living them. 

But how can we resist having an instant memory recall?! How can we resist being able to find out how exactly we reacted to England qualifying for the World Cup or the major storm of 2013. Or our comments on the opening and closing ceremonies of the Olympics, or even as far back as Michael Jackson's death? It's like reading back old diaries and reminding yourself of all the ancient petty squabbles you had with your sister or the time your parents tried to ground you for doing something or other.
I can look back on my Facebook and the multitude of hair colours and clothes I've had in the last 8 years. I can see with a click of the mouse the people I've been sharing my life with up until now. I can see again all the places I've been: America, Belfast, Bologna, Brighton, York. London. Beautiful, miserable, sprawling and crowded London. I barely know London. I want to know it so much better. I still have time. But for now I can make do with getting to know Cairns, Brisbane, Sydney...

I'm going to miss you. All of you. Ok not all of you. In fact, I'm looking forward to putting some memories, some people, behind me. Hey! Hey you! Yes you, the one that acted like a jerkoff to me. I'm looking forward to leaving you behind. The Other Side of the Sea behind. Don't get me wrong, I'll still think about you, because you got under my skin and you're like a scab that I can't resist picking... But when I'm in a country where I'll be in a bikini because it'll be SO DAMN HOT, I won't want to pick that scab.

I'm not stupid in thinking that by going to the other side of the world, I'm leaving all my troubles behind. How many films have we seen when people run away from their troubles or think they've escaped them only to have them catch up with them? I'm taking my issues with me because they are to do with me. But people run away for a new scene, a new culture, a new perspective. So your issues? They might not matter so much an ocean away. 

So when I'm the other side of the sea, missing some of you, and being finally free of the presence of others, you just need to know I'm ok. But you'll know that, cos I'll have posted it on Facebook. You know, that photo of me on the beach in my bikini, in December ;) 

No Freedom Til We're Equal

Yesterday my phone died when I was coming back from Central London. I had no music. I had to listen to the world. I had no choice.

And on the train home I was across the aisle from a young mum and her son. Her phone rang and she proceeded to tell her father that she had no money. Only £60 in the bank. And the Bright House money was going out on Friday and two of her son's friends were having birthdays this weekend and it was her son's birthday this week and she still needed to get everything for him but how was she going to pay for it all?

What I'm about to say is not a boast, I am not trying to lord anything over anyone. But I have never had to worry about money. Not really. I live with my dad, and I don't pay rent. When I tried to pay rent to my dad, he told me to set up a savings account and pay my "rent" into there every month. So I was paying my rent to myself. I think my dad just wanted me to save more money so I'd be out of the house quicker. At university my student loan never covered my accommodation, because my family had been assessed and it was concluded they could help me out financially. Which they had to. I still worked, but because I wanted to, not because I had to.

I'm not getting out of this house anytime soon, not least because I'm going to Australia for a year and by the time I come back my savings will probably be decimated.

So to hear this woman's fears about paying for things, to hear that she might genuinely struggle to give her son the birthday he wanted, it made me feel uncomfortable.

And that's my understanding of having privilege. When someone elses experience is not equal to yours, and it makes you uncomfortable. It should make you uncomfortable, because only then can you understand it, accept it, and if you can, make steps to correct it. Some shy away from that uncomfortable feeling, and make excuses for it.
I can't change that I was born into a family that is not rich, but is not poor.

I also can't change the fact that I am white. It is frequently noted that the mainstream feminism, the "third wave" is not very diverse. Feminism as a movement has more often than not focused on the experiences and disadvantages that white women suffer. And that is not because the movement is being racist. But because the experiences and disadvantages suffered by white women are not always strictly the same as those suffered by women of colour, and the women propelled forward to lead the movement are frequently white.
That is also privilege.

So now I have recognised that I am privileged in being not-poor and white, what can I do about it?

I can read. I can listen. I can take in what other people's experiences are. I can't change my skin colour or roots but I can learn about other people's roots. I can learn about their lives as experienced because of their skin colour. I have to continue to challenge my own preconceptions - and I do have them, I'm not denying that - of race, sex, age, ability, class, and in challenging my own I can learn to challenge others too. I don't want to be blind to the differences between myself and others. We need to deconstruct the stereotypes, and tear them down piece by piece. Stereotypes of Northerners, Southerners. Stereotypes of old and young. Stereotypes of nationality, or religion. Stereotypes of race. Stereotypes of gender.

Human rights for everybody. I want to be uncomfortable, if it means I become a better person.

The Times They Are a-Changin'

Changes can happen overnight, instantaneously or gradually. But we all change, all the time, and when we comment that someone hasn't changed, we're wrong. That person will have changed, perhaps not in a ground-shifting life-altering way that irrevocably changes who they are, but they will have changed in little ways, by small degrees.

I have changed so much in the last 12 months. Trek is the obvious catalyst to a new perspective of my life. Before Trek, I would never have planned a year abroad in Australia. I cried when I went away on Trek, when my mum and nan came to wave me off. I'm tearful thinking about it now. And that was only for a month.

A year is very different to a month. (No shit, Sherlock)
A year alone is very, very different to a month with a best friend and a random group of people you have to spend everyday with.

34 days left to go, and I'm scared. So scared. I'm terrified because I'm going into the unknown. Fearful of the things I'll find, or won't find. Scared that what I'm leaving won't still be here when I come back. I think the stupid craziness my brain has been dealing me the last week or so is down to me desperately feeling the need to make more roots here.

But the fear isn't stopping me from going. My excitement, my expectations, my desperation to explore, the bubbles of curiosity are carrying me ever closer.

A lot can change in a year. I've changed a lot in a year. I'm not expecting to come back in a year, or however long I go for, and everything be as it was when I departed.

I think that's one of biggest evolutions you can go through. Understanding that things change, and that it's okay. Accepting it, and embracing your own changes.

Evolving Forwards, Not Stuck Behind.

Those Walls I Built, Part 2

Boxes. Lots of boxes. Different sizes. Different weights.

That's how I'd like my mind to be. That's how I would like to compartmentalise the bad memories and the good memories and the grey memories. I could keep the bad memories in a dark corner, hidden from view, gathering dust.

In the same dark corner in which a flame burns. A flame that refuses to be extinguished. A flame that threatens to give life to paranoia, give light to jealousy. It burns bright for self-loathing and held to closely it smokes out my self-esteem.

I am still to work out how exactly I am meant to deal with rejection, and let go of crushes. I feel like every time it happens I haven't learned anything from the last time. Or the time before that, or the time before that. 

So I am a bit fed up of feeling so crap over this one thing. I feel like I'm only focusing on it because I'm bricking it about Australia. But I've got shit to do. So whilst I would love to feel the feelings and work on sorting myself out, I think the best thing to do is keep having the small brief cries, and compartmentalise. Like I said, shit to do man. Shit. To. Do.

40 Days and 40 Nights

[Trigger warning] self-harm 

Tomorrow, my countdown to Australia hits 40 days.
40 days.

Erm, how did that happen? I do not feel like I will be stepping on a plane in 40 days and heading off to the other side of the world.

I mean, that's only a month and a half. No, it's less! It's less than a month and a half! Unless that month is February. But that month is not February! 

I don't even feel remotely ready. So many things to do, so little time. When I keep getting days of nausea, and my head is bad or good or great or worse depending on the day, I wonder if I'm going to be ready. If I'm going to be okay. 

My biggest fear is that I won't cope. Won't cope being away from family, from friends, trying to get work, adjusting to customs, and the heat. And I haven't in the past been well known for my coping skills. 

In fact, I have a history of engaging in destructive behaviour as a way of coping. Selfish behaviour that I would say I will never fully exorcise from who I am today, or who I will become. 

Because the way I used to "cope" was with self-harm.

The reason I'm mulling over this in particular today is because I caught a glance at my arm. And the scars there are minimal, despite everything I inflicted on them. But the light caught them, and for a second my mind froze, and I thought to myself "ah yes, that's how I'll cope if things get bad."

No. No no no. 

I recognise that I will never get over that part of me. Not just because of the scars that remind me daily of my selfishness. But because a tiny part of me remembers the feeling of ecstasy with every cut. The bitter happiness. The feeling that I was taking control, of something, anything, at times when I felt nothing was ok. 

The cuts were my anger, directed at myself because I wanted to direct it at others and had been chastised for doing so. I still have anger management issues. I smashed a wall with my fist in Tombstone, Arizona, in an act I am so ashamed of I practically blank that night out from my memory. I was angry that I couldn't cope, that my brain wasn't processing shit properly. 

I am ashamed of my behaviour that night, and I am ashamed of all the times I harmed myself. Let me go back to the word I used above - it is selfish. And this selfishness is good and bad. It is bad because a self-harmer does not consider what effect their actions have on other people. Not until afterwards. When you are in such desperate need to hurt yourself, to numb the pain, to just cope, you are only thinking about yourself. And that is the good part. I am not advocating self-harm in anyway. I am simply saying that by taking your feelings into account, and trying to find an outlet for them, that is a good kind of selfish. But these actions you take have consequences, sometimes fatal, and always life-altering. 

It's okay to need to cope. And I can cope for the next 40 days. And the 40 days after that. And the next. I don't need that way of coping anymore. 

In my darkest times, it's comforting, like a reassuring hug. But I'm staying in the light. I'm "clean", and I'm staying that way. 

Those Walls I Built

It's very easy, when you're overwhelmed by emotion, or when you're feeling something you'd rather you didn't feel, to try and block it out. 

I'm good at steeling my heart against things, against people in particular. Acting cold towards someone is a defence mechanism, that I'm sure they can see through. But it makes me feel as though I'm dealing with it. As if it can't hurt me. I think that eventually it works its magic, and in the end I can deal with it because I've walled it up for so long. In fact, I'm undoubtedly processing those feelings and emotions constantly, and that's what gets me through it.

Whilst I am sort of fed up of feeling things for people and then having to stop myself from feeling those feelings, I guess that is life, and emotion is so important. It's vital to being empathetic to other people, to making friends; it's essential for falling in love.

The walls I try to build around my heart don't stop me crying at RSPCA adverts or the degeneration of an elderly man's - my elderly man's - mind. It didn't stop me crying when I moved house, or when my sister left, or when my mum moved away.

And sometimes it's easier said than done. Even when clothes I like the look of don't look good on me at all (I'm looking at you, blue sequin Lipsy dress) I don't automatically think "oh well it doesn't suit my body shape or my skin tone." I think "I'm fat, why are these arms even here, why doesn't it look on me like it did on the (tall, leggy, well-photographed and well-photoshopped) model?!" Sometimes reason is lost in emotion, and not even the best walls can stop you feeling crappy. 

And then, sometimes, aside from dealing with unrequited desires and not coping with rejection, the walls, and the emotion, are necessary. This morning walking to walk, I had a sense of futility and gloom. And it was confirmed when I got in and I felt overwhelmed, scared, and very alone.
But I took a moment to deal with those feelings. I felt the fear, the terror. And then I walled it up and got on with things.

But with every paper cut, with every phone call made and with the re-tying of my makeshift hairband, I was dealing with the feelings.  Those emotions, and my ability to deal with then, make me who I am. 

I just wish I was able to cope with all emotions, all the time. 
I suppose that's what the rest of my life is for.

You call it "nothing", a word to cover ignorance.

Ignorance would be bliss if it were ignorance we could be blame.


I am not very worldly. I have travelled, but never really immersed myself in another country's culture. Excluding Trek last November, I have never spent longer than 2 weeks in one country at a time. I've been to France a lot, but I barely speak the language and generally go with the prejudice that they hate vegetarians.

I don't speak any foreign language to an acceptable standard of fluency. And until recently I had never realised how little I sought out in knowledge about foreign countries, their cultures, and their history.

A couple of weeks ago I met Brian Avery, a US activist who spends a lot of time campaigning around the Israel/Palestine conflict. (His blog is here)

Before I met him, I quickly Wikipedia'd the conflict as it is one of those things I knew existed, but not why or for how long. I accepted it as part of our world, I had never questioned it before. I knew the names of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip and I've heard of Hamas as the baddies and that was it. The sum of my knowledge about what I now understand to be a complex war dating back 70 years.

I'm not going to pretend that an hour with Brian made me an expert. In fact, it made me even more confused.

I want to blame my own ignorance for not challenging my own thoughts on this. But it's a laziness to not discover more. It is a laziness that media outlets depend upon- that we will swallow their wisdom of the day on any given topic.
It's also a (terrible) way of trying to protect myself: I get so upset over the bad things in the world, I get so wound up about the killing and the hate (see this blog about my inability to cope with it). So if I seek out more knowledge of the awful things, surely I am just going to make myself more upset? There's nothing I can do about other countries problems, is there?
My ignorance would tell me there isn't. But knowledge is edging its way in. Knowledge that as an individual I can make a difference. If I understand more, then that already changes things a bit.

Australia is not a third world country (as my GP pointed out when I asked if I could get a years supply of the contraceptive pill). But that doesn't mean people don't need help. I will need to work in order to live. But I can surely find time to volunteer. It's my year, I can do what I want with it.

I have the opportunity to live in a country and get to know the people, the culture, the good and the bad. I'm not brave enough to go somewhere like Rwanda where my sister is, not yet. But I think this is a step in the right direction. A step away from ignorance.


*A big thank you to Danny Eve, whose random Doctor Who quoting on Twitter gave me the title for this blog!

Share A Coke With Friends, they said. What If You Have No Friends, I said.

Last night, I paid £9 to stand like an awkward loner for half an hour and flee the depths of Stockwell in tears. 

I am not a social butterfly. I am not good at making friends, or keeping friends. I'm not good with communication. I'm just terrible at talking to strangers and being in crowds. 

This is something I have known about myself from a young age. I remember my first Brownie session- my sister ran around getting involved in the games, as I clung to my mum crying. 

I left Brownies because I had no friends there.

I consistently see articles saying how you will live longer and alleviate depression if you have friends. So one can only assume that if you are best left to your own company then it shall be a quick descent down the depression spiral for you.

Movies and TV shows made me think I'd grow up with a huge gang of mates. Hey Arnold, Arthur, even the Rugrats. I do have friends, I love the friends I do have, but it's not what I was led to believe I would have. I suppose this is true for the portrayal of most aspects of life in TV and film. 

It's not that I'm terrible at talking to people. I talk to people for a living. But it's not the same thing. Phoning someone and being the Spanish Inquisition about their lives is a damn sight easier than walking into a room of people, none of whom you have ever seen or spoken to before and striking up conversation with the first person you happen across.

I stood there last night, clutching my drink and smiling at people, but rooted to the spot in terror. I could think of tons of things to say, a bunch of opening gambits, but my feet wouldn't carry to me to people, or my mouth just wouldn't open. 

On the tube on the way there, I got chatting to a guy. Well, actually, he started chatting me up. But I was capable of talking back. It's not like I can't talk at all. I just can't do it if I'm the first one. And I can't do it when I'm so worried that they will think I'm the desperate loner that, let's face it, I am. 

This inability to talk to strangers is worrying. Not just because in life you are often measured by your ability to talk to people and how many friends you have, but, more immediately, because I'm leaving to go to a country where I know about 3 people, and I won't be with them all the time. Will I make friends in hostels? Or am I facing a year of almost solitude?



Share a Coke with friends, they said. What if you have no friends to share it with, I said. Well then, they said, you can have all the Coca Cola goodness to yourself, as part of a healthy, active lifestyle.

Can I just ask, legit question here, who the hell shares a 500ml bottle anyway?! Doesn't anyone intending to share their coke get a 1.5 or 2litre bottle?! Or maybe it's that actually no one does share a 500ml bottle so you'll have to get to get more than one and...ah, I see what they did there. Well done, Coca Cola. Well played.

Edit: I walked past the Share a Coke truck at Westfield and people were coming away with tiny bottles! Not even a 330ml can's worth! That's a normal glass size, who the hell shares a normal glass?! 

Thoughts That Occupy A Mind Left To Silence

Cancer

Trees

Badgers

Travelling 

Things to do

Social plans

Food

Global warming

Spring/summer/autumn/winter clear outs

More things to do

Changes

Ice cream 

Chocolate

Jeans

Jewellery 

Eating disorders 

Psychiatry

Depression 

Illness

Getting old 

Memory loss

Things left to do...?

Holidays 

Adventures

Time and space

Life, past and present 

Immigrants

Emigration 

Jobs

Career paths

Perspective 

Cats, missing, alone, leaving, dead

Jealousy 

Rivalry

Bitterness

My choices 

His choices

Her choices

No choices 

The consequences

This train terminates here.

I might be a grown-up but I'm still growing up

I can be quite an excitable person. Although I do not get excited about Christmas or birthdays, I get squealy over new film or TV releases, epic wins such as same-sex marriage, and kittens. (If you don't get squealy over kittens, I suggest you have your heart examined, although the same might be said of my lack of googliness over babies.)

I'm vaguely aware that my behaviour is not always very... grown up. I have the advantage (?) of being short and I think (without any scientific evidence to back me up whatsoever) that short people are allowed to be less grown up for longer. My evidence for this is that my sister is tall and she has always been quite grown up. Usually she looks after me, even though I am the elder sister.

Growing up is not just about making it through education or work, and taking on "grown up" responsibilities like a mortgage or kids. It's about negotiating your way through friendships and relationships and just life in general, and not necessarily coming out unscathed. It's about learning how to handle successes, defeats and experiences.

For me, growing up is watching your childhood home be packed into boxes and seeing my mother prepare for a new life in another county, and not feeling bitter or abandoned but feeling proud and content to say goodbye. I never liked that house anyway; it was haunted. (I kid, I kid...)

For me, growing up is working out who to make an effort with, and when to recognise that you have drifted apart from someone that at one point would have been your everything, and to let it go. Growing up is recognising the loss, and being okay with it.

As someone still growing up, I'm still figuring out whose opinion should matter to me. Once upon a time I would have cared what everyone thought. And when you made a mistake, you thought everyone was looking, and judging you. But I suppose life is a bit like being a learner driver. When you stall in your car, you might think that everybody is staring and laughing and pointing and you feel mortified. But everybody has stalled before, both in life and in their car*. It's easy to falter in new situations, or even familiar ones. You can stall at the bottom or the top of a hill. What's important is that you get going again. Forget the people you think are paying attention to your mistake. They are probably too wrapped up in trying not to stall themselves.

I learn every day more about who I am, and who in my life I care about and whose opinions matter to me. I can respect your opinion, and yet not let it affect me. And I am still working out my opinions.

Although... if your opinion is that women shouldn't be in power/flying planes/doing anything except getting their tits out, cleaning the kitchen and making you a sammich, then I will declare your opinion stupid and I do not have to listen to it.

Come back when you've got something far less sexist to say.


*this metaphor really only works for those who can drive. But the idea of stalling - essentially a false start, being unable to get the right balance of power and clutch - is applicable to everyone.

Also, here is my breaded cat, running with the sandwich/cat theme. 

Nom nom nom.

   

Late Night Walks

*Trigger warning: rape*



I just walked home from my old house to my new one.

And I walked the long way home. I walked down a residential road that dips, and is therefore longer and much more effort to use, instead of walking through the isolated alleyway that would have got me home a few minutes earlier.

I use that alleyway all the time. And I have used it when it has been dark. But for some reason, at 11pm on a balmy Friday night, I didn't think it would be safe to use.

That shiz is effed yo.

And it's not even a feminist problem, that I have been conditioned to be frightened or wary of dark alleyways in case someone leaps out and rapes me. Despite the fact that 80% of rapes are committed by someone you know, that still doesn't stop the government, police and media capitalising on the 20% and warning women off walking down dark alleyways late at night. Especially if they've been drinking. Or they are wearing any items of clothing that don't cover all their flesh.
Urgh.

But actually, there are similar tactics used to warn against or protect you from other supposedly "spontaneous" crimes. The idea that if you take out your mobile phone on the street, you're walking around with a valuable in your hand that a criminal can see and you are automatically making yourself more of a target.

To me, this. Shiz. Is. Effed.

Why are we not teaching people NOT TO MUG PEOPLE? NOT TO COMMIT CRIME?
It makes no sense to me. Yes there will probably always be crime, there are some people in the world apparently more pre-disposed to becoming criminals but surely we should take a preventative approach with the wannabe or potential criminals, and not the potential victims?

Annoyingly, when a women walks down an alleyway late at night and gets raped or sexually assaulted, there will be people that say "She should have known better". That doesn't happen when a man is raped.
It doesn't happen when a person is mugged. Or burgled.

I am NOT, I repeat NOT, comparing being raped with getting mugged. They are not comparable in my opinion, and I am not trying to trivialise these crimes. Both can and do result in trauma for the victim.
But they are both crimes. And we need to stop scaring people about being victims of crime, and start teaching people not to commit crimes.

I dream of a world where I can walk down an alleyway and not hold my keys in my hand "just in case".
But I also dream of a world without gender-based toys.
I dream of a world where growing your armpit hair is not disgusting (BECAUSE IT'S NOT DISGUSTING. JANINE I LOVE YOU BUT IT'S NOT "GROSS" IT IS COMPLETELY NATURAL. NO ONE TELLS MEN THEIR ARMPIT HAIR IS GROSS!! STOP POLICING MY HAIR PEOPLE. SOMETIMES I SHAVE, SOMETIMES I DON'T IT IS NOT YOUR GODDAMN BUSINESS WHAT I DO WITH MY BODY HAIR ARRRRRRRGHHHHH).

I dream of a world where men and women and trans-people are equal and treat each other with the love and respect they deserve. I dream of a world where all races and ethnicities are equal and treat each other with the love and respect they deserve. I dream of a world with EQUAL GODDAMN PAY.

A person can make bad choices and do bad things. That does not mean their race, their religion, their gender does bad things.

Come on people. Wake the fuck up and let's start changing the world for the better.

If you need me, I'm going to be eating Nutella out of the jar and measuring my armpit hair.

Carpe Diem! (Or recognising opportunities)

I like planning. I'm not usually one for spur of the moment plans. I like to know what I'm doing and when because it is less stress for me and therefore for my head. It means I can plan getting enough sleep and fitting in exercise (if I can). 

I've begun to wonder if life could be looked at as simply a series of opportunities. If my life up until now can be pinpointed down to opportunities. If my future hinges on opportunities, and if I seize them. 

Sometimes opportunities arise out of something planned, like going to a networking event and getting a job through someone you meet there. Often an opportunity comes that needs a bit of planning to see it through. But I feel opportunities in themselves have spontaneous, unplanned energy about them. Because you don't know what the outcome of them will be. 

I'm seeing opportunities in everything. I pick up the download codes in Starbucks and as a result I've had the opportunity to discuss an absolutely beautiful and fantastic piece of music. Getting in contact with yet another alternative therapist is an opportunity to continue exploring my headache and ways to a possible cure. 

Being asked to extend my contract by several months. Being invited onto a radio show by a random person on Twitter: an opportunity that I should never have hesitated over!

Australia has become more than a year working abroad.  It's an opportunity to experience a different culture. It's the chance to see if I can sink or swim on my own. It's the possibility of making new friends. Of trying new things, seeing new places.  

And it's also an opportunity to get as far away from the shit that's gone on in the last year or so.  

The divorce, moving, my sister's illness, my dad's drinking, my mum's moving. Saying goodbye to the house that was my home for my entire adolescence and which I hated when I first moved into but grew to love. 

And him.

I loathe sounding melodramatic over men. They are not the be all and end all, and I am not a broken-hearted damsel.  

But having seen him last weekend, I'm surprised I didn't feel the pain of the break up a lot more. True, my legs were jelly when I got there, I could barely look at him most of the day, and every time he looked at his phone I wondered if it was her. But when I left I didn't feel the need to be complicit in the pleasantries. When I said I wouldn't see you again, I wasn't smiling because I was joking. I was smiling because I know now I don't need to see you again.
Maybe one day we'll be friends, he said. I just need time, I said.  

I could look at Saturday as a missed opportunity. I could have said all the things I’ve wanted to say to him for months. All the times I've dreaded walking through London Bridge station in case I spot him - on his own or not- even when I'm walking through the station an hour before he would even get up.  

I have to admit that 4 months after we went out separate ways, I still think about him every day. Wonder what he's doing, how he's feeling, who he's seeing... I wonder if he ever misses me like I miss him.

Oh my, for someone who loathes to melodramatic about men, I've devoted several paragraphs to one. 

We were never going to last. I mean, he's so old! Just kidding.  We saw an opportunity to get to know each other. At least we gave it a go for a bit, and had fun while we did.  

The night before I last saw him in April, I applied for my visa for Australia. All I could think was that I wanted to get out of here.

But now it's more than just an escape. It's an opportunity to forget the person I am, and be the person I want to be.  Perhaps I am placing too much on this. It might have become my new holy grail.  

In the mean time, I hope I continue to see opportunities, and seize them.  Next time I see that guy at work who I think is fit, I will say hi. It may come out all mangled as my mouth dries up and my brain switches into standby when I see him, but that's often the beauty of opportunities: you never know what will come from them. 

I've passed up so many in my life. No more. You're gonna hear me roar. (Sorry, just had to get that in there ;D)