Hello Goodbye

Before I left the UK, I sent an old friend an email. I no longer had their number, they'd moved out of the address I had, and I couldn't reach them on social media. I wasn't even sure they used this account any more, but I reached out anyway - across the dark void of both space and time - to let them know I was leaving. To let them know I wouldn't be back. To say some sort of goodbye, although goodbyes were said long ago. I didn't expect a reply, and the darkness didn't answer with one. But somewhere, somehow, I knew they had received my message. 

They say when you meet the 'one' for you, you know. I think that's true with many decisions in our lives - some little, some monumental; that courses set into action will irreversibly change your life forever. Sometimes, these are happy moments, like knowing you're with the right person; sometimes they are tinged with guilt and sadness, like closing a door on a chapter you will not revisit again. These are 'sliding door' moments - that if something, however big or small, had or had not happened, your life would be very different. 

Although I know, just know, that leaving the UK was the right decision, the knowledge is not an easy burden. I left behind a life that was filled with people and memories, with events and stages that have shaped me as a person and made me who I am, in exchange for one that, although familiar, is entirely new. I grew up here. I remember so many little details. Yet I have been entirely absent for 12 years. I have missed all my friends from those years grow up. I missed their trials and tribulations, their first kisses, their boyfriends, their parents' divorces - and although when I see them again it's like we were never apart, it's wholly surreal. Like I was in a coma and woke up 2 months ago. I have no idea of Australian politics (don't ask me who the last Prime Minister was), or any big news stories. I have a very bad sense of geography (I thought Canberra was North of Sydney until I looked on a map). I say 'football' instead of 'soccer', and 'rugby' instead of 'football', which although sounds quaint in my conditioned English accent, is fundamentally wrong here. I didn't know what 'Goon' was (cheap wine in a bag, what everyone got drunk on as teenagers), or 'schoolies' (Australia's equivalent to Spring Break), and I still cringe whenever anyone calls flip-flops 'thongs'. But despite me feeling like I might as well have lived on the moon for a decade, I know I'm happy. Like, deep down, fundamentally happy. Yet I feel more guilt for being happy than when I wasn't in the UK. Why?

A weekly Skype date with my parents is scheduled every Sunday. Technology has made the world so small that I still sit with them at home through a window spanning thousands of miles, talking to them like I would in person. Since I've been away, my mother has mourned my absence by unpacking my childhood belongings, which haven't seen the light of day for more than a decade. She's put teddy bears on my bed, carefully unpacked books into a new bookshelf, and slowly turned my room into her own kind of shrine. Although this behaviour is not new - when I left for university she turned my pinboard into an organised photographic chronology of my life, and hung portraits of me on the wall - it still makes me feel guilty. I feel my happiness has come at a cost - to them - and it pains me. Although technology makes it so easy for us to communicate, the distance can still be felt, and the distance is great. I don't know how to say I'm not coming back. At least not for good, and not for a long while. We avoid the subject of permanence every time we talk. And while I think we both know the truth, uttering it would break a spell that we have all weaved; that I will return, that I belong there, with them.

It's strange to realise how a life that seemed so all-encompassing, so saturated with people and memories, can so easy be forgotten. Events that haunted me for years have all but evaporated in the space of a few months. Yet I still think back to that rainy night I left the UK, when the weather echoed my emotions, and the email I sent to my old friend. The email that detailed my leaving date, and time, and asked for one last goodbye. It never came. They never came. And although I am several thousand miles away, and living an entirely different life, I am still waiting for it. Perhaps one day it will come, and through a window of a screen I will say a hello that will really mean goodbye. 

Inception

To all who might assume, from the title of this post, that I have returned to critiquing films, a word of warning: this is not my interpretation of one of Leonardo DiCaprio’s finest hours. This isn’t to say this will never happen, it’s just to say this isn’t it - yet. I have just returned from an amazing week in Paris with my friend (let’s call her Julia, for artistic purposes), who is quite remarkable for many reasons - not least for her amazing ability to inception anyone she chooses. In this particular case, the person that she chose to flex her mind-altering muscles on, was me. Let me paint a picture for you…

Julia is not wholly remarkable for her amazing ability to plant ideas into people’s heads. Oh no. In my case, she is also unique in the aspect that she is a friend, who also happens to be my ex’s sister (for more information on this topic, read my previous post, Don’t Worry, Baby). To all intensive purposes, we had a marvelous trip. Despite Paris being, on average, a scorching 32 degrees (that’s in Celsius, for all you American lovers of Fahrenheit), we managed to see, and enjoy, a plethora of cultural activities. But I won’t bore you with a myriad of Instagram-doctored photos of Paris and its attractions, instead I’d rather talk about our last night. There I was, winding down after a week of sightseeing and cultural exploits of the French capital, quietly packing my bag in the private confines of our beautiful hotel off the Champs Elysees (how’s this picture working for you?), making general small-talk about what we’ve got to look forward to after this trip has ended, when she interrupts me to say: “You’re so sad.” I stop packing and slowly turn to her. “What do you mean, like, ‘gay’ sad?” (Not one of my most mature interpretations, I admit.) “No,” she continued, “you’re just so unhappy - and the saddest thing is, you don’t even realise it.” Well, that last part was certainly true. As far as I was concerned, I am pretty happy - I mean, I haven’t got much to get down about at the moment: I’ve recently graduated with a not-too-shabby 2.1, I’ve landed a dream job in fashion marketing, I’m living in a lovely house, in a new city, and have money to shop, see friends, and travel with. Why would I be sad? “It pains me to see you so depressed about your ex-boyfriends,” she finished with. Well hold on there, Sally. I don’t remember mentioning anything about my ex-boyfriends. In fact, apart from the passing thought, I really don’t dwell on them much at all. Until now.

What I hadn’t realized was, with one, carefully placed comment, I had been totally inceptioned. I began to doubt whether I really was happy. Was I just pretending to be happy because I didn’t think I had anything to be sad about? Did I not have any time to be sad anymore because of the job? Was I so out of touch with myself that I project an exterior of sadness and depression that I was not even aware of? In other words, was what she was saying right? Shortly after our subsequent conversation, in which I talked - for the first time in months - about my disappointment in my inability to sustain friendship with my exes, we went to sleep. But this was only the beginning of her carefully planted seed. On the Eurostar home, I didn’t reminisce on our time in Paris. I reminisced about my old relationships, on where it went wrong after they ended, on where they went wrong before they ended - poisonous, black musings that plunged me right back to a mindset that I hadn’t wished to revisit ever again. Like a bad dream that I couldn’t wake myself from, I let every memory of failure, regret, and remorse wash over me, accompanied by the most depressing songs in my iTunes library. I started doubting whether I was truly over my relationships, whether I should have stuck them out, not ended them when I did, whether things would have gotten better. 

A year ago, I wrote a journal. Well, I call it a journal, but what it really was was therapy. I had come out of a relationship that had obliterated me to the core. I was working, so had no time to talk to anyone about it, so instead I worked through my thoughts by putting them down on paper (sound familiar?). I was sad then. In fact, sad would probably be an understatement. But am I still sad? No. There are memories, people, places, that bring up feelings of sadness. But if I let every one of those affect me, I’d be a nervous wreck. I think that goes for everyone. I have a scar on my wrist. I got it at boarding school when some girls pressed the heated metal on a lighter against my skin. People ask me about it, and I tell them that it hurt, but it used to be redder and now it’s faded. I think that’s like relationships. Time heals scars, but scars are still scars. People will ask you how you got them, and you will tell them the story. It doesn’t diminish their healing process, or the pain you felt when you got them. Julia’s inception was like pointing to the scar on my wrist and telling me “it’s bleeding”. All I had to do was look down to see it was fine. 

Love,
Belle x

Don't Worry, Baby.

There comes a time in every girls’ life that we are faced with the - often daunting - realization that we are turning into our mothers. In my case, this has been a slow, terrifying process. Don’t get me wrong, I love my mum. She’s the best. But she - like most mothers - is a worrier. And recently I’ve realized, so am I.

The last two nights, I’ve dreamt about my ex-boyfriends. Not in any kind of sexual, or enjoyable, way, they’ve just featured - as supporting actors, if you will - in improbable, illusionary situations. Mentioning this on the way to work, one of the girls suggested I look up the ‘meaning’ of this in a Dream Dictionary. Well, with only so much entertainment derived from the ‘commuting hour’ of Radio 1, I thought “what the heck”. Here is what it said: 

To dream about your ex-boyfriend/girlfriend or ex-husband/wife, that you and your ex are kissing/fighting or that you and your ex got back together again suggests that something or someone in your current life is bringing out similar feelings you felt during that relationship with your ex. The dream may be a way of alerting you to similar behavioral patterns in your current relationship. What you learn from that previous relationship may need to be applied to the present one so that you do not repeat the same mistakes…

Well that’s all very well and good, except I’m not in a current relationship, and I’m pretty sure the only guy I’m interested in at the moment isn’t stirring up any feelings of nostalgia, remorse or regret. But being a worrier, I worried. Are there similarities there - subconscious or otherwise? Am I doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past? The more I mused, the more reasons I thought up as to why these apparitions made an appearance in the first place. As some of you might know, I’ve recently moved to Bristol to start a job in fashion marketing. A job I landed with the help of one of my ex’s sisters. The same sister who, until recently, I was living with. My other ex’s sister gave me an internship last summer at a creative agency in London, which was crucial in gaining the experience necessary to even apply. Was this the reason I’d been dreaming about them? Was the relationship I have with their siblings “bringing out the similar feelings” I felt during my relationship with them? I’ll be honest, it’s definitely something I worry about. Because, let’s face it, it’s not particularly normal - let alone healthy - to shack up with your ex’s sister and pretend you’re not going to be reminded of them from time to time (or every day). My best friend has a pretty strong opinion on the matter. She simply can’t get her head around why I would put myself in a situation that made it impossible to forget and move on from my exes. And, if I hand’t had any experience in remaining friends with exes’ families, I’d think it was pretty fucking weird, too. Do I worry that I won’t escape my past relationships? Yep, all the time. Do I worry what people think when I tell them that I lived with my ex’s sibling? Or that I’ll never meet anyone new without them being slightly freaked out with the situation? Affirmative. But that is the reality of my life - I now talk to my exes’ families more than I talk to them (which is, at the moment, not at all). Does this make it awkward? Yes. But I don’t pretend like they haven’t made a conscious decision to be friends with me. I never expected - nor forced - them to have any degree of contact after my relationship ended with their brothers. It just turned out that way. 

So what is it like to be so close to families who’s brothers have broken your heart? Hard. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel anything when they talk about them. I worry if I made the right decisions, if I made mistakes I can never reverse, if things could have been different. They are questions I will never know an answer for, yet cannot stop thinking about. Every day I spend in their company resuscitates the pain I felt the first day being parted from them. Yet, in a way, I have the best of both worlds. My biggest worry when we were in a relationship was not what would happen to us after we broke up, but what would happen to my relationship with their family. Because, when you break up with a boyfriend/girlfriend, the general rule is that you also break up with their parents, siblings, and friends. Yet it hasn't happened to me. And I’m pretty sure it’s not because I’m too fabulous to let go of. Looking objectively at my life, I’d say I have it pretty good. My dream job, a respectable 2.1 degree, the prospect of travel, new friendships, and relationships, that come from living in a different city. Yet I dedicate my spare time to worrying about the minuscule aspects of my life I’m not happy with. I’m not happy I no longer have any contact with two people who played such a huge part in shaping who I am today. I’m not happy I still feel remorse, regret, and sadness over how my relationship with them ended. I worry that I will never find a real connection to anyone ever again, that I had my chance and let it slip away. I worry that I’ll have a great job, a life filled with worldly experience, a beautiful home, and no one to share it with. 

Some of you might roll your eyes, tell me to buck the fuck up, that I’m only 22 for Christ’s sake. And I’d totally agree with you. But I am my mother in one aspect: I am a worrier, trying to be a warrior. 

Love,
Belle x

Flat 4, Manchester.

When I was six, I broke my arm really badly. I was playing on the monkey bars at school, slipped, and fell on my straightened arm, making the bones overlap. Gruesome, I know. I had to have a cast put on it for 3 months. The cast was blue, and people at school wrote messages in marker pens of 'get well soon's and cartoon faces. I wore it like a trophy; like a symbol of the good and the bad. Finally, the day came for it to be removed. Most kids who break a limb count down to this day - the day when they're 'back to normal'. Not me, I cried and screamed. I didn't want my cast to be removed, because, psychologically, it was like cutting off a part of myself. Bit of a random story, I hear you say. Bear with, there is a point.

Today I officially moved out of my flat in Manchester. My parents had kindly driven all the way up from Surrey to cart my things back home, and by God did I give them a hard time. I didn't want them touching my stuff. I got annoyed at them asking whether or not they needed to take X or Y. They cleaned the entire kitchen and I only just managed to spit a thank you at them. Why was I being such a bitch? Because my flat had become like my cast: it had become such a part of me, that losing it was physically painful. Like the scribbles of classmates on my cast, my flat played host to countless friends, family, and loves. Some of the happiest, and the saddest, times of my life had occurred within its walls. I learned the news of my grandmother's passing sitting on the sofa, of the engagement of one of my best friends in bed at 3 in the morning. When I was poor, I ate packet noodles in the kitchen. When I had money, I had friends over for huge suppers and parties. I laughed, and I cried, in every room - and I remember every time with equal clarity. I filled the walls with memories - literally, with photos and paintings, and metaphorically, with everything that happened to me whilst I was there. Admittedly, sometimes these memories got too much. When I broke up with my boyfriend, I removed every photo from the walls that reminded me of him - with not much success, as the memories of the times he was there still haunted the place. When I was alone, I filled the space with music, with words, and when neither helped, with the sound of typing - I started this blog sitting on my bed. So I guess the question is, what happens when you move on? I think the answer is in there: you move on. 

When my cast was taken off, the doctor asked me if I wanted to keep it. Strangely enough, although the ordeal had been so dramatic, I said no. I think I didn't want to be reminded of something that I'd lost. I wanted to move on. Perhaps I knew that there would be other broken bones, other ways of keeping memories of friendships and good wishes alive - I didn't have to keep a physical representation of them with me forever. The point is, I can't be a Van Wilder. I couldn't live in that flat forever, just as I couldn't keep repeating the final year of university because I'm scared of what comes next. There will be other flats, other houses, other homes, that I will fill with new memories, new people. However scary it is, there will always be a next chapter. Even death, as my grandmother used to say, is the start of something new. 

Today I arrived back at home. Downstairs are 8 bags of clothes, books, and DVDs that are going to fill someone else's home. I just finished putting together a collage of photos and pictures - none of which feature times in my old flat. Because we can't live in the past forever. Sometimes we just have to take a deep breath, bite the bullet, and have faith that more good times are gonna come. 


Love,
Belle x



R.I.P Flat 4. Here are your best bits.

With Friends Like These...

As a student, I am forever finding new ways to distract myself from doing any work. Stumbleupon, YouTube, Facebook, you name it, I'm probably on it, wasting time. One of the best ways I've found of using up the hours in what would have otherwise been a productive day, is to watch an entire series. Which is what I did a couple of weeks ago (before I went into a full-blown panic upon discovering all my deadlines were in the same week). I got hooked on Season Two of New Girl. 

For those who are over the age of 30, or have made a conscientious decision to boycott TV (why?!), New Girl is, essentially, the 2010's equivalent of Friends: a group of twenty-somethings living together, and the problems - and laughs - that this creates. As I said, I went through the entire second series (that's eighteen episodes) in a day or two last month. But even after a few weeks respite, something that one of the characters said has stuck with me, and I've found myself asking myself this question:

"If you met your friends today, would you still be friends with them?"

I'm an only child. So is my Dad. And my cousins on my mum's side all live in on the other side of the world. Consequently, our family unit is about as small as it could be. Over the years, I've built up a group of friends who have pretty much substituted as siblings for me. They're the ones who I phone if I've got a problem, want a gossip, or swap clothes with. Recently, I've pretty much burnt bridges with half of them. A couple were exes, and I got let down by them - I wanted to be friends, but they, or their girlfriends, had other ideas, which I can understand. That's ok. Time's a healer. Others I've realised that their relationship with me might not be the same as mine with them; they don't call to hang out, gossip, or chat. At first, I put it down to most of them being third years at university - not all of us can be History of Art students with a 5 hour weekly timetable! This is where Facebook's a killer: when your friends don't ask you out, and you see the photos of them getting drunk and going out, you automatically ask yourself - "why wasn't I invited? Is there something wrong with me? Have I done something bad?" It reminded me of a line in a movie that was on TV recently, He's Just Not That Into You. In it, Drew Barrymore's character reminisces about 'the good old days', when people only had one landline, and one answering machine - which either had a message on it, or it didn't. Nowadays, with Facebook, Twitter, Email, Cellphone, and a hundred other mediums of communication, we're rejected on a host of different medias every day - and it's exhausting. So, I guess another question is: what do you do if your friends 'just aren't that into you'? 

Well, you could try reaching out to them. But, as I've learned, to be rebuffed and then see photographic evidence of a night out you weren't invited to, is pretty much self-confidence suicide. You could try and make yourself less dependable on your friends, but come on, who wants to be a Norman no-mates, alone every Friday night while all the Facebook statuses roll in about pre-drinks, club nights, and hook-ups? Not me, no thank you. You might think about taking yourself off Facebook, and just saving yourself the hassle and some humility - but then that's just another way of cutting yourself off from civilisation, and one further step to becoming the hermit cat lady who dresses in bin bags. Maybe you need to take a step back, and ask yourself the tough question: are these people really your friends?

Friendship, for me, a lot of the time is about habit. You were friends at school, when you were all shoved together and forced to chose people you got along with to make your time more bearable. Or in university halls, and ditto. They're the people that, when you meet up for a drink, you can say "remember when..." and they do. They know who you were, who you are now, and all the bits in-between, and that's nice. But sometimes, friendship with those people is habitual. People change. They fall in love, they make new friends, they're influenced by existential circumstances you have no power or control over, or can even relate to. Ironically, those I would call my 'best friends' are often people that I didn't have any contact with for years. Even though I haven't been kept up to date on every minuscule happening in their lives, we still never shut up when we finally have a chat. They're like a bookmark in your life: you pick up where you left off. If we continue with this metaphor, other friends are like the wind: they come and fuck up where you were, and you can't remember what happened. 

Over the last few weeks, I've discarded quite a few 'windy' friends. A lot, I think, has to do with the fact that I'm planning on moving back to Australia; that I'm off to start a new life, on the other side of the world, and don't need to take any extra baggage with me (in a metaphorical sense. I'll probably have loads of extra baggage.). I guess I've felt like I have nothing to lose by being honest. I've told a few that I'm disappointed with them (that old 'Mum word'), that I've been hurt by them, or I've simply not said anything, and come to terms with the fact that it might not be the end of the world. 

To make sure I wasn't going insane with the 'immense pressure' of my final year, I asked a mate if she had ever felt the same. She replied that she has, and does, regularly. It's the wound that is inflicted when you put yourself out there for someone, and they don't reciprocate in the same way, if at all. I suppose sometimes, you have to think of your friends a bit like a boyfriend: if they're not there for you when you need them, if they let you down and make you feel belittled and self-doubting, then there's no point in letting them continue to make you feel like that. Sacrifice in any relationship is good; self-martyrdom is not. Remember, the only person who will be there 'til the very end is you - you might as well make it a pleasant journey. 


What are your thoughts?

Love,
Belle x

Commitment.

Here's something I wrote a few weeks back but had forgotten all about...give it a read and tell me if you agree or disagree!


Back in secondary school, one of the texts we had to study for English was Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice. The first line of this book is pretty famous. It - ironically - dictates:

"It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune must be in want of a wife."

It just so happens that 2013 marks the 200th anniversary of the publication of P&P, and it seems no irony has been lost in these two centuries: men simply don't want to commit.

Now, before I get hate-mail from a barrage of single men desperate to find a lucky lady, let me explain myself. I have a theory, that if you are a man over the age of 18, you have a fear of commitment. Humour me by casting your mind back to ye olde age of innocence, when things were simple, and you and your teenage boyfriend/girlfriend planned out your wedding and picked baby names together, and you thought everything would last forever... But it didn't though, did it. Now, while you ladies have moved on and had subsequent relationships with other people, my theory is that your teenage boyfriend still bears scars from your breakup - scars that can result an inability to commit fully to another person, because they don't ever want to go through the hurt, disappointment, and/or rejection that they went through the first time round. I can hear the sound of masculine indignation right about now, but bear with me and hear me out. 

I have a friend, who, by his own admission, "cannot commit to a sandwich" - and, in my experience, he's not alone. After splitting with my boyfriend of 3 years at 20, I have had precisely three relationships worth noting - two of which have ended because the guy was scared of committing. Now, perhaps these have just been easy excuses to get out of a situation that was slowly killing them (HA.), but IF we take them for their word (and trust me, it took them quite a while to admit this was the reason), then we're left with the question: If guys are scared of committing, why do they get into a relationship? Well, ladies and gents, I have a theory for this too. I have another friend who, like myself, is currently in his final year at university. In the past three years, his choice of post-university career path has changed from spy, to lawyer, to pilot, and I now believe he is currently planning on going into banking. He likes to determine his future on what sounds cool at parties. Now, I'm the first to admit that I don't know what precisely what I'm going to do after university, but my point is that I believe guys have a similar attitude when it comes to relationships: they like the sound of 'having a girlfriend' - just not necessarily the practicality.  

Now before you palm me off as some kind of psycho who pictures herself waltzing down the aisle with every guy she meets, I don't believe 'commitment' in a relationship necessarily equals marriage. For me, it simply means putting some sort of effort into being there for another person. The truth is, girls love again and again, without fear or hesitation. I don't believe the same can be said about men - at least between the ages of 18 and 30. You only need to look at the countless relationships that are sustained through the legwork of one half: the women. Granted, the initial 'chase' does come, more often than not, from the guys, but after that, they tend to start treading water rather than swim - and it's left to their girlfriends to pull the relationship along. One argument is that it's just not natural for men to commit to another human being at this age, or even, at all. After all, the male species is not designed to be tied down to one partner - it's all about 'mass-production'; sowing your wild oats as far and wide as possible. If that's the case, how come there are so many (seemingly) happy marriages? Or marriage at all? We've all heard the - proven - theory that men mature mentally slower than women. If so, maybe that explains why the 'trauma' of their first failed relationship affects them so deeply. Perhaps guys just take longer to get over disappointment than women. That's not any knock on your masculinity, male readers, it's just scientific theory. 

Curious to know if anyone thinks the same, or if I'm just a bitter old witch, I asked a couple of friends:

"Do you think guys, on the whole, are scared of commitment?"

"I think they are at first. But if they really care about a girl they forget about their fears. At the end of the day, men are designed to protect and help women."

"I think that it really does depend on the individual. Different people want different things at different stages in their lives. On the whole though, if we're looking at the 18-24 Thomas Cook Holidays target age group, I'd say a majority of them don't like commitment. Not scared of it per se, but worry in the back of their mind that while they're young and more or less free they might not have seen all there is to see, and good old FOMO (of a sort) kicks in. It's not all cynicism though - perhaps some guys might not be thinking a whole leap into the future, so when the topic comes up or their significant other starts hinting at things beyond his current scope of interest, he might feel like he isn't reciprocating those feelings. Not wanting to feel like that's unfair and wanting to avoid a disagreement or say something daft he backs off. "


"A lot of guys our age don't want commitment but I'd say so are just as many girls -  as a rough law of averages. In short, to adhere to the line 'On the whole', guys, are just as 'scared' of commitment as girls are,  I wouldn't say one particular gender are less likely to commit than another. But I would say is that, yes - and this has been the case since (liberal/non marital)relationships began in society/civilisation - young men have been scared of commitment - perhaps famously more than young women. Yet I think both sexes probably equally 'scared' of commitment. Women are now able to express their desires to sample to the same extent men have done for over two millennia."

"I think they give in to temptation too easily if it comes their way. Some are good guys, they're loyal to their other halves but even if they do cheat doesn't mean they are scared of committment, it just means they don't have much self control. Our generation is more liberal than it used to be, along with the fact there's no presure in getting married so young anymore. Therefore guys to take advantage of that and it has become 'cool' to sleep around. It doesn't however mean they are scared of committment, it just means they are able to put it off a few years longer than our parents may have."

Obviously there are exceptions to the rule. I know couples that have had previous serious relationships and are still wholeheartedly committed to one another - but there is a large proportion of men who just aren't ready...yet. I guess the only thing to do is to play the guys at their own game: go out, be young, and have a good time. Prince Charming will come a-knockin' when he's good and ready.

Love,
Belle x

Commitment.

F.O.B.A.

In yesterday's Tune Tape I included the new Strokes song One Way Trigger. It's a great new single, totally in-tune with their older material, and it got me in the mood to listen to their first album, This Is It - in my opinion easily one of the greatest albums of the last 15 years. When I first listened to it as a teenager, the song Last Night struck a real chord for me as a young girl starting out on the then-inexperienced road of relationships and sexual encounters. Listening to it at 22, though, I have found a new appreciation for the lesser-known hit Alone, Together - not just because recently, that's how I've been feeling. The song, with its typically Strokes-esque strong guitar riffs, masks some really great lyrics, that listening this time around really hit home hard. Allow me to copy and paste...

No choice now, it's too late

Let him go, he gave up

I gave up

Lisa says, "Take time for me"

Dropping him down to his knees

Ah, chest down...

Take me away

See I've got to explain

Things, they have changed

In such a permanent way

Life seems unreal

Can we go back to your place?

Oh, "you drink to much"

Makes me drink just the same

People tried. Felt so right

Giving themselves good advice

Looking down sometimes felt nice...

He knows it's justified to kill to survive

He then in dollars makes more dead than alive

Let's suck more blood, let's run three hours a day

The world is over but I don't care

'Cause

I am with you

Now I've got to explain

Things, they have changed

In such a permanent way

Life seems unreal

Can we go back to your place?

"You drink to much"

Makes me drink just the same

The first time, it happened too fast

The second time, I thought it would last

We all like it a little different...

We've all heard of the acronym FOMO, and presumably know what it stands for. For those who have been living under a rock, or are over the age of 40, it stands for Fear Of Missing Out, and generally describes those types of people who's motto is 'Go Hard or Go Home'. Perhaps fortunately, I have never been a sufferer of this sort of phobia, but I have recently realised that I harbour a different, more serious fear. I suffer from FOBA, and it is the Fear Of Being Alone. 

A couple of weeks ago, my relationship ended. There was no tears or mess, we just both realised it wasn't working and decided to go our separate ways (I wish I could say all my breakups were as straightforward, but that would be lying). Unfortunately, no matter how uncomplicated, clean, or tear-free a breakup may be, there comes that moment when you think - I am truly alone. For some people, this comes as fucking great news. With their new-found 'alone-ness' they might take up a new hobby, sleep with an entire football team, or go on holiday with the lads/gals (delete as appropriate). For me, it's about as welcome a thought as an envelope full of dog shit. My FOBA reached its dramatic climax last week, when, half-way through The Notebook (I really am a break-up cliché), I realised that I have no 'Noah'. In fact, I might never have a 'Noah', or anyone willing to renovate a dilapidated property for me. And this terrified me. In between drunken sobs, I managed to dial my friend's number. After listening patiently to my wails, which were along the self-pitying lines of: "everybody I care about leaves, and everybody who cares about me I push away", he calmly, but forcefully, gave me his diagnosis. "You," he said, "have pretty much constantly been in a relationship since you were 14. What does that say about you?" I decided now was not the time to reply with "I'm in high demand (L.O.L)", and so plumped for a non-committing "dunno" instead. He sighed, obviously unappreciative of my ignorance to the situation, and told me: "B, you have a fear of being alone."

At first, I was indignant at this remark. I felt like he was palming all my relationships off as some kind of self-delusion; that they held no more significance other than a cover-up of a problem I didn't want to admit I had. But, thinking it over for a few days, I realised that what he said was true. I do have a fear of being alone, and it's not exactly a new thing. That's not to say that I didn't value all those relationships for what they really were: learning curves and memory lanes - some better than others, but all equally important and life-enriching in their own special ways. But it's true: I do hate to be single. I like knowing that I have someone there who is 'liable' to pick up the phone. Who texts you to ask about your day. Who wants to spend time with you, who thinks you're special, and likes to be close to you. It's also true that I feel more 'complete' when I'm in a relationship - that a previously empty space has been filled. But my conversation with my friend made me realise that this 'completeness' is only ever temporary - that the 'space' that I was filling with a boyfriend, never really goes away. Like the Strokes's song title, I now realise that it is possible to feel alone, when you are together. 

So what am I going to do about it? Well, I realise, like any other fear, that the best way to get over it is not to avoid it: it is to face it. To meet it head on, and to conquer it. I know this much: it's not going to be easy, or enjoyable, but, let's be honest, FOBA is not fair on anyone - be that yourself, or the poor guy who you choose as a temporary distraction. 

Ironically, I realise that FOBA is not unique to me; I am not alone in my fear of being alone. It's actually a pretty common anxiety, and usually - as in my case - goes unnoticed for a long time. But ask yourself; what is the bigger fear? The fear of being alone, or the fear of being incomplete within yourself? Relationships shouldn't be a mask you wear - they should be about a mutual love, respect, and understanding between two people, and within two people. Finding someone who 'completes you' is so wonderful because you didn't know you needed completing; it comes as a surprise. If you go out looking for someone to fill some sort of hole (in every sense of the word), you will never find them - for completeness comes from within yourself and radiates out of you. I hope, in time, I can radiate completeness too.


Do you suffer from F.O.B.A.?

Love,
Belle x

School Daze

Here's something I've been writing for a job application, but I thought I might just put it on here as something for y'all to read and think about...

A friend said to me the other day, “you’re going to look back in 20 years and think of your school days as the best days of your life”. This sentence struck terror in my heart. Am I alone in hoping that every year will be better than their school years? Am I the only person who would prefer to never see anyone they went to school with again? Was my negative experience of school all that unusual? I decided to ask around. 

My experience of school was at an all-girls boarding school, set in 100 acres, and surrounded by absolutely nothing. It’s a well-known school, one that has seen Kate Middleton, Clare Balding and Lady Gabriella Windsor come and go, and has produced two members of the reality TV show Made in Chelsea. I had moved to the UK from Australia, to take up a music scholarship that had been offered to me, and prior to arriving, I had hopes that attending a boarding school would be an experience akin to that of Hogwarts, or Mallory Towers. And I’m sure, to most of my year, it was - it’s just that my experience was very different. Coming from Australia to an all-girls boarding school can lend you a certain caché - if you fit the stereotype of blonde, lithe and tanned, and came shooting out of the womb ready to master every sport. Unfortunately, this was not me. I was awkward-looking, to put it lightly: long red-brown hair, pale, freckles and sticky-out ears, with low self-confidence and bad posture (to try and conceal the fact that I already had tits, age 11, how embarrassing). I also knew no-one, and everybody seemed to already know each other. It was a club that I was not a member of, a party that I wasn’t invited to. I will not bore you with the details of bad episodes at the hands of other girls - I will only say it did happen, and it made my life very hard and very lonely. I arrived an intelligent girl, ahead in all her studies, and quickly became the class joker - sacrificing my academic performance for a performance I hoped would gain me some friends. Popularity, both in and outside of school, ruled my life, and I spent years ‘perfecting’ myself for others’ approval. I left school with one good friend, and with a burning desire to never return, and to distance myself entirely. I was also tired. Tired of the cruelty that comes from girls who spend 24 hours in each other’s company with nothing else to do but form social hierarchies. I was tired of trying to be someone else for someone else, and the never-ending pressure that puts on oneself. I was ready for a change, and university offered me a clean slate to do so. I had escaped from the spider’s web that is the public school network, and, for the first time ever, decided to just be myself. Ironically, I now find it easier to make friends than I did at school, because I’m not bothered about whether they think that reply to their question was ‘weird’, if my outfit is too over-thought or contrived, or whether my ears stick out too much with my hair tied up. 

This isn’t to say that I look down upon, or pity, those who can reminisce about their school days as their ‘golden years’. I wish I had such fond memories as many of you do. But ask yourselves this: if your ‘best days’ were those spent in an institution as an awkward teen, where do you go from there? How can you put the most into your life, here and now, if you believe that it’s never going to improve on what it was at 18? For me, my many failings and unhappiness at school have spurred me on to seek success through happiness for my future; to focus not on what I haven’t had, but focus on what I could have. My very own pursuit of happiness, if you will. But don’t just listen to me. Here are some of your thoughts on the subject.

“Would you say your school days were the best days of your life?” 

Edmund, 21: I was indifferent towards my time at school. I didn’t have a bad experience, but I prefer my life since school. I’d probably say the best days of my life were on my Gap Year - no responsibilities, and the ability to do whatever I wanted.

Rosie, 21: YES! not the classes but 6th form was the best time ever. Turning 18, big parties and with everyone. You see everyone you're closest to every single day and you don’t miss them! I loved school.

Harry, 21: I had a great time at school, it was awesome fun - but I’ve had a better time at uni so far. Why would I resign myself to the belief that was as good as its going to get - I’m not even a third of the way through my life!

James, 20: The first six years were tough, but I look back proudly at where I've come from - living with your friends for 7 years was a good experience and prepared me well for the future. Some of the best and worst days of my life no doubt.

Hannah, 21: Yes, but only the last two years.

Louis, 17: School is food on your plate, money in your bank account, clothes on your back, a nice warm bed just for you, and a house full of love. The only thing you have to worry about is whether or not your doing well at school, or petty arguments that you have with your friends/enemies. Even if you fall out with someone, nothing really matters, as soon those will all be in the past. The things which will later tear you apart, such as job interviews, extra work, and true love crisis' are long in the future. All you have to worry about is yourself, and even though that might seem selfish, it’s really a huge relief. Childhood and your school days are a dream come true.

Claire, 20: I'd say that upper sixth, along with my experiences at university, would be what id call the best years of my life so far. the years before are just full of awkward  trying-to-fit-in moments and bratty young teenage girls!

My Friend's Mum (age withheld, obv): Are you serious!! I am very nostalgic about school days but they are nothing like what your generation will have as even a remotely similar experience...

Iona, 21: It’s like marmite...I love it because I met some interesting people, and learnt the occasional interesting thing, and I never had to pay bills, or check the oil in my car. Everything seemed more exciting with rules you could break without a spell behind bars. However, kids are mean, and money was available from a tap only my parents could turn on. All in all you could say that they were, although, there is no time but the present, and when school was my present I couldn't wait to leave. So on that note, no - school days were not the best days of my life, I'm still looking for them.

Then and Now - what a difference 10 years makes.

What was your experience of school? 

Love,

Belle x