My 2009

I have had a lot of 'first times' in 2009. Some good, some bad. All memorable.

Before this year I had never spoken to 'downstairs', I had never been to Kiddy Tesco, I had never slept on so many peoples floors in one week. I had never had a water fight indoors, I had never seen a mask performance, I had never been so drunk I couldn't remember anything the next day, I had never done pub golf, I had never been to Newquay, I had never been on holiday with my friends, I had never dressed up as a tree. I had never been to London for more than a day trip with school, I had never lived in university halls, I had never acted in a film, I had never performed in a full mask performance, I had never been on the news, I had never moved away from home, I had never paid my own bills, I had never had a lead role or a solo, I had never been in a panto, I had never seen a panto! I had never fallen for the lead role, I had never had an offstage romance, I had never been cheated on, I had never been lied about so badly by the person who was "falling in love with me", I had never confronted someone so bravely and calmly, I had never lost all emotions because it all got too much for me, I had never stopped eating for a week because I physically wasn't able to, I had never had my own camera, I had never dressed up as Sporty Spice and danced with inflatable microphones, I had never ordered photos online, I had never done a lot of things.

2009 has been quite different from 2008, yet in many ways it has also been very similar.
I have been hurt beyond measure, and I have found friends who have glued me back together countless times.

The roads I'm walking are still winding in and out of other peoples roads, bringing new people into my life and taking other people away, sometimes its painful when someone leaves, sometimes though, its the right thing.

I have met some amazing people and had some brilliant unforgettable experiences, experiences I know I will never get the chance at again, I have made memories with people I might never see again but I know I will never forget them, as nor will they.

It has been difficult to remember all the amazing things I have done this year as the pain of the last month shadows over it, but I know that that was just a painful bump in my road I had to go over, there was no way to swerve and avoid it, maybe I even needed it to teach me things, to help me become thicker skinned, to make me able to face confrontation.

I have spent too long recently focusing on the negatives. With a new year arriving I think its time I learnt to ignore the pain I still feel and look at it in a positive way - I got hurt, I learnt from it, I became thicker skinned and I had the strength to walk away. I know now more than ever what I am not going to accept from people, I know now how to say what I want.

I hope 2010 won't bring all the pain 2008 and 2009 have, and I think it really is time to focus on me and no one else for a while. I had a brilliant summer and that was down to me. I guess 2010 is only going to be what I make it. So let's hope I make it a goodun!

My 2008

I wrote this one year ago today...

2008. It’s been a bit of an emotional roller coaster.
It started with a boyfriend, a partner, someone I though I was going to spend the rest of my life with. I had plans for the future. A destiny.
But that destiny has changed now, making room for 2009, a magical time. I hope.
It’s amazing how quickly a plan can be changed, how in an instant, without even realising, your whole life can change the course it’s taking.
Destiny is a funny thing.
The roads we walk are constantly winding, merging into other peoples roads, sometimes merging back out as quickly as they merged in, sometimes never leaving. 2008 has taught me this better than any other year.
I’ve made new friends, new enemies, had new hopes and lost old ones. I’ve gained inspiration and lost inspiration, I’ve become focussed and lost focus.
Determination and drive have pushed me the whole way to stick at things I thought I couldn’t and to let me give in when I knew the time was right.
I’ve discovered that some people will hurt you in the most painful of ways without even realising it, others will do it because they think it’s the right thing to do, and you will always find that someone who will pull you through it all; who will stay awake with you and cry with you, who will make you laugh when you feel its impossible, who will stay when everyone else has left, right when you feel the most alone you’ve ever been.
I’ve discovered in 2008 that you’re never alone, even when you feel it more than anything else; there is always someone around the corner waiting to pick you up and make you smile.
A smile can never really be lost, its just trying to find its way back to you.
You can cry a million tears, but in the end, it’s the smiles you remember and the people who make them.
A stranger can walk into your life and straight back out without you even knowing their name but can make the biggest influence on the person you are today without even realising it.
Its moments that make us. Sometimes, they’re so small you never even recognise them, other times they’re huge, destroying and changing everything in its path. Sometimes you don’t even see them coming, but it’s not what they do that makes us, but what we do because of them.
I’ve had my heart broken, and I’ve broken some hearts too. Sometimes you turn into a person you never even knew existed; sometimes you become someone you hate. 2008 has had moments like these but thankfully; I’ve always bounced back.
If it wasn’t for the heartache I wouldn’t be who I am right now. And right now, I like who I am quite a lot.
I’m braver than ever, I have confidence and self believe. I know now that I will make it one day, although I don’t know when; I will be where I want to be. I know this now more than ever before. So for that, I thank the heartache, and the change, and the moments. I thank the winding roads and the people they have bought in and out of my life, I thank the strangers I’ve met along the way and I look forward to the ones I will meet in 2009. It is because of all the pain I’ve been through in 2008 that has made it such a good year and has made me sure that 2009 will be just as great.
So I end this year quite the opposite to how I started it. Single, with no plans for the future, other than what I intend to achieve on my own, by my own right. I still have a lot to learn and a lot of room to grow. I’m not ready to compromise again just yet, because right now, I’m standing on my own two feet, mapping out my own roads alone. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Thinking over the last few weeks.

Some boys are definitley number one A-holes! The guy I was seeing was awful, I knew the other girl before I knew him, he told me all the time that she was just his best friend and when she asked him about me he told her I was a stalker and crazy and that the only reason he spoke to me was cause we were playing the lead roles in the Xmas panto at uni. Her and all the friends I had made stopped talking to me and gave me dirty looks and talked about me behind my back because of all the lies he had told them about me. He got away with it for over a month and a half, there were even nights out where he went out with her and came back home with me, including the night he first told her he loved her.

When we finally found out that he had been lying to us both and that he was seeing both of us we went round to his house together and confronted him. He finally told us the truth and said he expected us both to hate him, I told him not to expect me to hate him cause he wasn't worth my hate.

I still had to act along side him in the panto as we were playing Jasmine and Aladdin and I had to sing to him and dance with him for weeks after all the truth came out, it was so painful but now the show is over and I'm away from him I feel like I'm finally beginning to get over all the shit he did to me.

The other girl has gone back to him despite all the lies he told her about me and all the lies he told me about her. I think she'll regret it one day, and I also think he gave her my Xmas present.

Boys definitley think they can say sorry and get away with things, and some girls are stupid enough to let them. Personally I don't ever want to speak to him again, or anyone else who would treat another person like that. I know some girls aren't exactly angels or saints either but I could never do to someone else what he did to me!

Understanding nothing but the fairy tales and lies

I don't think i know how to love anymore.
I don't think i even believe in it. How can it possibly exist? Surely i would have found it by now if it was real.

Love is for fairy tales. It's what they tell you when you're younger so you have a reason to grow up, a reason to believe.

It's something they tell you to make you believe that you won't always be on your own, but what if being on your own is the only way you're ever going to be happy; the only way you're ever going to believe that you're not going to get hurt again, the only way to protect you?

You didn't just take away my belief but you took away my every reason to believe in the first place.

My way

I guess I'm not as over it, as OK with it, as I thought I was.

I'm being strong and confident because I have to be. I'm being mature and the bigger person because its what I need to do right now. I'm turning up with a smile on my face because I don't want you to see how much you broke me.

For the next week I'm not aloud to be childish or petty because it'll be bought into the performance; I have to wait before I can break down, I have to wait until its OK for me to say all the things that are on my mind, I have to wait until I'm aloud to react to everything that has happened, everything that has been done to me, everything that has been said about me. I have to wait. And that's the hardest thing.

You have no idea how hard it is to turn up everyday, thinking I'm going to see you, only to find out that once again you're not going to be there. It's so difficult to keep building my confidence up, bringing the smile back and growing the thick skin so that I can perform with you without it affecting me. But every time you don't turn up is another day I've spent building myself back up for nothing, and the let down is so painful. I need to see you, to get it over with and you can't even give me that. And then to make things even worse people feel the need to stick their noses in where they aren't wanted. It's my business. Not theirs, so stay out of it. Stop getting involved.

If you don't like the things my friends have said to you take it up with them or me, not anyone else, because it has nothing to do with them and you're involving them for no reason and hurting me even more than you already have in the process.

I know you could say it's none of her business either, that she has no right to say those things to you because this is between you and me but she does. She's speaking for me, she's saying all those things I'm not aloud to yet, and it may be petty and a cheap shot but its what I wish I was able to say, but am not aloud to yet.

You're not going to get beat up, the girls aren't going to hurt you, they just want to make you feel as bad and as little and as small and as pathetic and as worthless and as meaningless as you made me feel. They are the ones who have seen me break down, seen me at my lowest. They are the ones who have stayed up with me all night when I've been crying my eyes out and are the ones who have encouraged me to eat just a piece of toast when I haven't eaten for days because I physically wasn't able to. They are the ones who have sat with me in silence because although I had nothing to say to them I wasn't ready to be on my own yet. They're the ones who have put off essays for an hour while I've cried and repeated the same sentence over and over again, trying to make sense of everything you said and did, trying to find a reason for me ever deserving this.

So they do have the right. They have all the rights. And if you can't handle it well tough, you'll just have to grin and bare it because right now this is how I'm coping.

I mean it when I say you mean nothing to me now, and I mean it when I say you're just a boy I used to know, but that doesn't mean that you didn't once mean something to me, because you did. And it doesn't mean that you were always 'just a boy' because you weren't, for a short time you were special to me, and that's what I'm getting over now.

Please just let me do it, my way.

I think you owe me that.

Do you ever feel like you're a robot?
Like you're on auto pilot and you're just walking through life and not noticing or feeling anything. Your best friend could die and you still wouldn't cry because you actually, physically, completely 100% have nothing else to give.
You're drained, emotionless and for the first time in your life you actually know what it feels like to be empty.
That's how i am.

Its a new kind of empty, its not the same as when you were a teenager and you would lock yourself in your room and cut yourself while writing songs about how much the blood flowed this time, that was something everyone goes through, something personal, something you did to yourself. This is something someone else has done to you.

You don't shine anymore, your light is completely blown out and you have no fire left to light it again.

And the stupid thing is, you don't even hate the person who did this to you because you don't have the ability to. You really have lost everything.

Every emotion you were once capable of feeling is lost, gone and not coming back. Not anytime soon.

You don't even feel broken because to be broken you'd have to feel something. And you don't.

Again.

It's amazing how much can happen in a week. How many peoples lives can change. How many friends can be made and how many friends can be lost, all because of one lie.

Finally the truth has come out. I was right all along. I was right to be jealous. I was right not to trust you. I was right not to give up that one thing that would have made me yours. I was right to speak to the source. I was right to hold back my friends fire until I knew. I was right to end it. I was right.

They always say I read too much into things, that I look for trouble. I take something perfect and try to find all the imperfections in it because I need it to be wrong and bad and tainted. But I only look for these things because I always know that in the end I'm going to be right. And I was. Again.

It's the lies that hurt the most. The lies you've told me about the feelings you've had. The lies you've told me about people who were once my friends and how you've turned me against them. The lies you've told people about me and the new friends I've lost because of it.

You made me open up and you made me give more than I was willing to because you made me believe I could trust you. I told you my stories and my fears and feelings and you reassured me that you would never hurt me, when all along you knew that already you were hurting me, I just hadn't realised yet.

And then you lied. Again and again and again. You made me feel stupid for being jealous when really I was right all along. You made me believe that she was crazy and reading into things when really you were telling her the same all along about me. I gave you the chance to end it so many times and you said you couldn't, that you didn't want to, that you just wanted to be with me. And then you went home to her and used the exact same lines on her. And she believed you too.

I should be breaking. I should be crying and unable to go on. But I don't even have that anymore. I can't feel anything because I don't think my emotions exist anymore. You bought me out of the hole I was in and dropped me into a pit. And you loved me along the way.

Of all the people who have hurt me I never thought you would. I never thought you would turn out to be the person who made me incapable of feeling because honestly, I believed in you.

I meant every single word I said to you.

Every single feeling I felt was real.

Each time I cried, I cried because I meant it.

Now I don't even have that. You mean nothing to me now. You're just a boy I once knew. A boy who broke my heart and added to all the hurt that I already carry round with me. You made me trust you and then you took it all away because of one lie. One lie I didn't even look for. One lie I had no idea about. One lie you could have confessed to weeks ago. One lie you didn't even need to start in the first place.

I hope you're happy now.

I don't know what to write.

Usually I write about my emotions, about whats bugging me, whats on my mind. But tonight there isn't anything to write about, even though there should be.

There should be so much for me to cry over, so much to make me angry to make me need to share my bed with my best friend because I just can't stand to be on my own. It would make sense to be how I was last week, crying in the rain slumped up a bus stop unable to walk anymore. But I'm not.

I've given up, lost my emotions, I've got nothing more to give and I couldn't feel any calmer about the whole thing.

My friends are angry, my friends want me to be angry. But I just don't feel it.

I've done my crying. I've shed my tears. I've been angry and I've been jealous. I've been paranoid and I've been irrational. I've cared and I've cared and I've cared until I've had nothing else to give and have broken down. But now I don't even have that.
And I'm OK with that.

I'm OK with rising above it. I'm OK with knowing that however it turns out, that whoever gets hurt, I haven't done anything wrong. At all. If anything I'm the victim. I don't mind that. Not anymore.

Together they've broken me. Every single one of them. And some have started to put me back together again before deciding to break me again and now I'm done. I'm done being broken. I'm done letting them. I'm done letting my friends glue me back together because they shouldn't have to.

Maybe this break is the best thing to ever happen to me. Maybe this is the break that fixed me. The one that's finally made me realise that the only person who isn't going to hurt me is myself. I'm happy now, if this is how it is, if he chooses her that's fine, if he chooses me that's fine, but if he chooses me I don't know if I even care now. In my mind it ended the moment she said they were together. Whether they are or not now it doesn't matter.

I've said it too many times that they're not gonna break me anymore.. Maybe its about time its true.

Breathe

Hes not going to hurt you
Hes not going to break you
Hes not going to be like all the others
Hes told you a million times you can trust him. Believe him. Breathe.

He might be the one who fixes it all if you give him the chance. So give it to him.

Sleep. Forget about it. Come back to it tomorrow if you must but don't worry about it now.
Its 3am in the morning. Nothing is worth the worry at this time. Breathe.

Remember why you like him.
Remember why you care enough to worry this much.
Remember why it hurt when you thought you'd ruined it.
Remember why you never want to feel like that again.
Remember all the reasons you have to trust him. Believe them. Breathe.

He might be the one who fixes it all if you give him the chance. So give it to him.

Breathe.

Because of you

Because of you I find it hard to trust
Because of you I am affraid
Because of you I can't let anyone in
Because of you I lie awake at night
Because of you I ruin it everytime

You have no idea just how much you broke me. But you did.

I'm a dick. I'm addicted to you.

I didn't think you would be the guy I would drunkenly cry over. I thought that phase had passed, that you were the one who was going to break that cycle. Maybe I was wrong. Hopefully I was wrong about being wrong.

I don't think you're the guy who is going to use me.
I don't think you're the guy I need to create barriers against to protect me from.
I don't think you're the guy I cry about because I don't trust you.

I think you're the guy I cry over because I care.
I think you're the guy I'm affraid to fall for because I know it won't just be a momentory thing.
I think you're the guy who is going to break down my barriers.
I think you're the guy I'm going to finally let in.
I think you're the guy who is going to make me learn to trust again.
I think you're the guy who is going to make give 110% without even knowing.
I think you're the guy who is never going to break my heart without meaning to.
I think you're the guy I am going to love one day.

That is why I drunkenly cry over you.

It is because I care.
It is because I don't want to hurt you.
It is because I don't want you to hurt me.
It is because I am scared to let you in because of every bad thing every other guy has ever done.
It is because I know I am already falling for you and I am scared it is too soon.
It is because I know you are already falling for me and I am scared it is too soon.
It is because you are the guy who has already started to break down my walls I've built and I don't want to put them back up.
It is because I am scared of letting you down, of being too closed off because of the past.

So I send you long messages. And I cry when I get home. Not because you've hurt me, but because you've made me care and I'm scared that I may have hurt you.

I care more than you will know, because it would not 'be cool' to tell you, because I am scared to let you kow just how much you already have me.

I care. And it scares me, because all it has ever led to in the past is pain and me looking like a fool.

You found me
When no one else was looking
How did you know just where I would be
You broke through all of my confusion
I guess that you saw what nobody could see
The good and the bad and the things in between
You found me

All the things I've been through the past few months, they're all over now. And I only have one person to thank. And that's you.

My friends have all been there for me, pulled me up countless times, stopped me doing silly things when I completely lost myself, and then along came you. The lyrics quite literally sum it up perfectly. You found me, when I had given up on Princes and Princess', love stories and happily ever afters you showed me that actually they do exist. Right when I had stopped believing.

It's such a cliche that we met how we did.. Playing the male and female leads in the Christmas panto, and it is so amazing that we don't have to just act the chemistry but actually have it in real life.

There are so many things about you I already adore, me, the girl who a few weeks ago was a closed off cold hearted bitch who had stopped letting anyone new, especially boys, into her life because she had been hurt so many times before, is now adoring things about another person!

You make me smile lots and you make me laugh, I can be 100% myself around you and I know you'll still like me, you make me want to spend all the time in the world with you when we're together and miss you like crazy when you're gone. I want to wake up next to you in a morning and fall asleep with you at night, i want to watch you sleep and look after you when you are drunk. You have this cute little smile you do and your laugh instantly makes me happy. I like the way you smell when you come round and I like how your smell changes while you're here, I like how my room is filled of your smell when you leave and how it gives me something to cuddle up to at night when you're not here. I like the smile you reserve for me only and I like the way you switch eyes when you look at me. I like how I get annoyed at your "I win" so much, but never enough to actually be properly pissed off or annoyed. I like how you wake me up when I'm tired and how in a morning I'm generally in a better mood if you're there. I like how I want to make plans with you for random days out and for your birthday and how you let me make them and don't make me feel silly. I like the way your hands touch my back when we're kissing. I like the way you tease me. I like how you lock your arms around me just right when we go to sleep and I like how you stay calm when I hit you or shout at you for snoring. I like how after one night you bought snoring silence because you knew we'd be spending more than that one night together. I like how I care enough to get jealous of a hoover on your neck and I like how you act when you're a complete drunken fool. I like the way you kiss my forehead and the way you play with my blonde bit of hair. I like the silly things we talk about and I like holding hands with you when we walk places.

I like all these things about you and I still have more I could say.

It makes me smile the things you say to me, like when you compared my eyes to the feeling you got when you first saw Man Utd and how you couldn't look away. It makes me smile how you said you're falling for me, because I don't want to be the only one falling.

I have been lonely for a long time. And I have been hurt many times. I have been broken and I have fixed, and every time I've glued myself back together I've fallen apart again, but I don't find myself breaking this time, and I don't think you're the guy who would do that to me. I think you're the guy I've been waiting for, the one who is finally going to put me back together for good, the one who will make me smile even when I'm feeling down, the one who will come and sit with me when I am ill and laugh at my DVD collection. You're the boy they talk about in fairy tales, and once again I believe in Princes and Princess', in love and happily ever afters. I believe in all that again because of you <3

And you said "This is the first day of my life
I'm glad I didn't die before I met you
But now I don't care I could go anywhere with you
And I'd probably be happy"

Over - 17.10.09

I think I’m ok now. I think all I needed was to see you and ignore you. To know that I had the strength to just move on and walk on by without any kind of acknowledgement. I saw you, once, twice, three times, maybe more, who’s counting, and one of those times you must have seen me too, maybe there were times you saw me and I didn’t see you, point is, you never once came up to me. You never once text me first. You never once invited me round or suggested doing something together.

It has taken me a long long time to realise this, but I did everything. All the running, all the waiting, all the texts, all the crying, all the arguing. All the caring. All the feeling. I did it all, and you let me. You let me chase after you like some puppy with a ball, you let me wait for you until you were ready, even though you never were, you let me do all the starting conversations, all the texts, all the calls, all the random bumpings in to each other, you let me do all the crying about us when in reality there never was an ‘us’, you let me argue with you and get upset, you let me spill all my feelings for you and you never once had the decency to let me know I was wasting my time. Even though you always said you would. You let me care, about me, about you, about us. About what was happening, more importantly about what wasn’t. You let me feel for you and you fed me lies about you feeling for me too but I’ve finally realised now that that’s all it was, lies. You never cared for me the way you said you did. You never wanted to try again. You never wondered what I was doing while you sat at home doing nothing or lazed about work. You never once thought to text me first and it was probably an effort for you to reply when I text you. Never once did you wipe my tears or offer to make them stop. Never once did you tell me the truth and just say ‘It’s not going to happen’. Maybe because you never had the guts, maybe because it never crossed your mind just how much you were affecting me, maybe because you wanted to see how far you could push me before I broke. Maybe because you wanted to watch me fall apart just so you could know that you had the power to break the once strong headed independent girl that didn’t even want your number in the first place.

Maybe you feed off other peoples pain, my pain. Maybe. It doesn’t matter now though, because this time I really do have closure.


You’re not going to break me anymore.

A moment to wake up - 14.10.09

I had a dream about you last night.

At first it was a normal dream, didn’t quite make sense, places looked different but to me I knew exactly where I was. There was a big thing going on at the SU, students everywhere and you were working. I tried to avoid you as much as possible; I even went up to the top floor of the building ‘cause I knew you never worked on that floor. Eventually I was too drunk to care and I came back down to the floor you were working on to look for you. Stumbling around I saw I you and I changed my mind instantly. I turned around and started looking for my friends but it was too late, you had already seen me.

You came over to ask how I was but instead we started shouting at each other. You told me you loved me, that you always had, only, when I tried to tell you I loved you back you told me I was lying. You said the reason we never worked was because I was too afraid to let you love me. I didn’t understand how you could say those words to me; how you could try and tell me I was wrong.

I started to storm off, angry and annoyed but you followed me. I went to say something else but began feeling sick. Too much alcohol. You held back my hair as I threw up over the bridge. You didn’t say anything that night in a romantic way, you were angry. I couldn’t understand it but you were mad at me for how you felt. We argued some more and I drunkenly screamed at you, I broke down a little bit. I tried to run away but you grabbed me by the arm, pulling me into your body. You hugged me, just held me there in your massive arms and you began to talk to me. No more raised voices.

We lay on the ground just like we had so many time before, my head rested on your chest and we talked and I cried but I felt safe. The drama was over once again and we were starting to talk...

But before we could resolve anything I woke up. I tried so hard to get back to sleep, to find that moment again and carry on. For the first time in weeks I felt happy and safe and loved. But none of it was real, it was all a dream. To wake up and know that you don’t love me, that you never have and that everything you said in my dream was all imagery hurt so much. I keep thinking about it, picturing your face when you said those three words that I still long to hear.

I’ll never have a real memory of that, only the one I made up in my sleep. You’ll never hold me safe in your massive arms again, because how can that be my safe place, how can I be safe when I’m with you when you are the one who has hurt me more than anyone else.

Once your arms were my sanctuary. I never felt as safe as I did when I was locked in them, my body against yours, my head resting on your chest, your lips kissing my forehead, but it’s gone now. And no matter how much I dream about it or how real those dreams feel I’m never getting that sanctuary back.

I thought it was supposed to get easier - 10.10.09

I was always under the impression that life got easier as you got older. School’s over, the bullies have all moved on, your body has stopped changing and you’ve finally blossomed into a beautiful young adult. Girl meets boy, you fall in love and everything is sorted.

They lied.

I left school, the bullies, the girls I compared myself to because their bodies developed quicker than mine had gone and I never saw them again and I finally became pretty, just like my mother always told me I would. I found a boy and we fell in love and everything in my life had fallen nicely into place. We dated for 2 years and made plans, he was my future and nothing else mattered to me.

Then it all changed again and suddenly I’m 20 years old, in my first year at uni and living at home because I stayed for the boyfriend who just dumped me. I’m broken and completely lost. I can’t remember how to be by myself and I seem to have lost my personality. My friends, old and new, help put me back together and eventually I begin to feel a small sense of happiness.

Everything is starting to make sense again. I’m getting over the boy who broke my heart; I’m making new friends and starting to find out that I am a lot more attractive that I ever realised. I find new confidence and begin to wear clothes I never would have dared to a few months ago. I’m sleeping on peoples’ floors and accepting that although I will never live the proper fresher’s uni life I can try my hardest to make the best of a bad situation. I’m learning things I never knew before and I’m finding out so much more about myself and eventually I begin to start dating again.

Then it becomes clear to me that I’m destined to play the same scene on repeat over and over again, each time with a different boy, each time the same old story. Boy meets girl, they chat and swap numbers, they go on a date and boy never calls again, girl gets hurt again and again. And again.

Finally I meet a nice guy, someone I’ve been friends with for a few months now. The friendship is already there and he already knows all the good and bad points about me. I don’t have to try and calm down the craziness because he’s already seen it all before and oddly, that’s what he’s attracted to. It seems I’ve found my personality again.

After a month or so of dating I realise that I’m not ready for this. I think he is ready to love me but I’m not ready to be loved again yet. Part of my heart is still broken so I decide I have to end it and in the process I lose one of my best friends. This always happens when you begin dating your best friend.

Months pass with the same scene playing on repeat again. Maybe it’s my fault they never call back.

I start to lose all faith in boys and love and happily ever afters and decide I’m never going to be lucky enough to fall in love again and be loved in return. I carry on making new friends and start talking to someone I worked with years ago and haven’t seen in about 5 years. We start talking most days and build up a routine of drunken phone calls on a regular basis talking about nothing in particular.

Soon he becomes my new best friend and the person I turn to every time another boy screws me over. After a lot of comments from friends I start to form feelings for my new best friend. I can’t lose this one too. Thankfully he starts dating someone and soon enough my feelings for him evaporate and all I feel for him is the love of a best friend.

A new scene starts to play with an old flame I used to work with. I soon find out this is just another repeat of a different scene I played years ago with the same boy.

On a drunken night I start talking to a member of security at the SU bar and although I’m not interested in him at all I give him my number when he asks for it. This could be quite funny. He’s a rugby lad and a second year; everyone knows who this boy is. We start texting and although I’m still not interested in him like that, this boy has a bit of a reputation; I agree to go on a date with him. What a mistake! We meet at the uni and walk to town together under an umbrella he holds over us because he’s so tall. Five hours later and we’re still in the pub talking without awkwardness. This boy has suddenly changed my mind. He walks me to the train station and waits for my train with me, we hug goodbye and stumble over whether to kiss or not and decide on a peck on the cheek. Then we text all the way home.

He takes me out on several more dates and we start seeing each other. He makes an effort with my friends and even cooks breakfast for them all. I can’t believe this is the same boy I wasn’t even interested in a month ago, now look at me! We make plans for the summer and I think I’ve maybe found the boy I’ve been looking for.

It changes again.

It’s now the end of my first year of uni and the beginning of the summer and I’m completely smitten about this rugby boy so many people have warned me about. After spending a lot of time together and making plans he suddenly stops talking to me without warning. 3 months pass. Not a word.

Confused and upset I start to forget about the rugby lad I began to fall for and start talking to someone I went to school with. He sends me flowers asking me on a date and eventually I say yes. He drives from Wales to take me on a date and buys me a present too. This one seems different. Then suddenly I find him too interested and I get scared and begin to back away. I’ve done this a few times before too.

The boy I used to work with makes another brief appearance, still repeating that same old scene that’s been playing since I met him. He’s dating a girl I work with, then they break up, then they get back together, then they break up. This goes on for a while, each time they break up he starts texting me saying he still likes me. Whatever!

A holiday away with friends from uni changes everything when I meet the shiest boy in the club, I don’t think this one is going to mess me about. We text for months after the holiday is over and he plans to visit me when I’m in London over the holiday.

Then he’s back again. The rugby lad. 3 months without a word and suddenly he’s talking to me like nothing ever happened and is asking how my summer has been. I’m over him though so I don’t mention him hurting me and I talk to him as I would anyone else and think nothing of it. Then he texts me on my birthday, I’m surprised he even remembered! It’s not long before we start talking about what happened with us and we have an argument and I tell him I never want to speak to him again. Maybe I’m not as over him as I thought I was.

I soon change my mind and swallow a lot of pride to tell him this. Petrified of what he might say I ask him if we can try again when we get back to uni and to my surprise he says he’d like that.

Everything seems to be getting back on track, a part of course from the boy off holiday that I’m still texting. We’re now talking once a week on the phone and he sends me cute drunken texts telling me all the things he’s too shy to tell me when he’s sober. I still really like him but I also want to try again with the rugby lad. I don’t know what to do.

My London trip arrives and I get a text the morning I leave off the rugby lad telling me to have a wonderful time, again I can’t believe he remembered. My first night we text all evening, playful banter about who owes who a date and what we’re going to do when we get back to uni. This is nice; it feels how it used to.

The day out in London never happens with the shy boy off holiday and we rearrange another visit for when I move to uni. What am I doing?! I’m arranging to see two different boys! I’ve never done anything like this before and I know I’m only going to wind up getting hurt or hurting someone else but I honestly don’t know what to do.

I wait it out and talk to my friends, trying to decide which boy I want to see and the decision is pretty much made without me realising. I was never over the rugby lad. I need to give him a second chance, even if it’s just so I can get hurt again and know that I gave it everything and it just wasn’t meant to be.

Finally after weeks of waiting we’re both back at uni and see each other. It was as though nothing ever happened with us and we gracefully slide back into how we used to be together. I think this second chance was the right thing to do.

How wrong I was.

It’s now a month later and all I’ve done is get hurt by him again. I’ve seen him three more times and he was either working or on a lads night out and was slightly drunk. We’ve argued and we’ve not spoken for days. I’ve cried on my own about it and I’ve cried to my friends about it and eventually I decided he wasn’t worth it. But it’s never that easy.

I’ve deleted his number and I’ve avoided him when I’ve seen him around uni but still I can’t get away from him. I’ve fallen for him and I’ve fallen hard. All my friends have told me I can do better and that he doesn’t deserve me and I know they’re right, but as much as I agree with their words I can’t help but want to give him another chance, because I keep thinking maybe this time it will be different, even though I know it won’t be.

It all boils down to this:

Life is not fair. Don’t believe them when they say it gets easier as you get older because it doesn’t, it just gets more painful. It’s a different kind of pain to when you were at school and you got funny looks while getting changed for P.E. and it’s a different kind of pain to getting your heart broken by your first love because even when you get over that nothing is going to compare to that pain. It’s different with each boy who screws you over, and eventually the pain build and builds until you have nothing else to give. You feel empty, drained, and emotionless. You can’t laugh at the funny things because all you can remember are all the times the boy who you thought was going to change this routine of screw over after screw over actually turns out to be the biggest screw over of all. You’re annoyed at yourself for letting him get to you so many times and you’re annoyed that even though you feel like nothing has any point anymore and you spend all your spare sitting in bed wondering what you did wrong this time that you can’t help but want to text him and give him another chance just in case. You’re annoyed that you’re friends are all completely right when they say you can do better because you wish it wasn’t true and you’re annoyed at yourself for not having the strength to just forget about him.

But mostly you’re annoyed at the person who told you it all gets easier. Because so far it’s not easier at all, it’s just as hard as school was, only worse because this time it’s love that keeps screwing you over.

And that's what they call closure! - 9.10.09

It’s amazing the things that finally make you realise everything you’ve been too blind to see before, and sometimes it’s incredibly ironic. An argument can change everything, make you say things you’ve been holding in for a long time, teach you things you never knew before, it can relieve stress and make you forget everything, and sometimes it’s the bit after the argument that is the biggest eye opener.

Friday night I saw him, completely Paninied and full of life, just like I’d seen him so many times before. At first I tried to ignore him, leave him to his lads’ night out and not pester him, but he spotted me. Arm around my waist he walked up the corridor with me talking complete drunken slurs of affection. “That’s a face I know! How are you chick?”

As the banter continued we agreed he would finally sing and dedicate a song to me on karaoke and as I had been waiting so long to hear it I would be allowed to chose the song. Celine Dion “The Power of Love” came to mind, purely because it would be funny to hear a 6ft 4” Rugby lad singing the high notes. This song did not go down well with him and despite him being a Celine fan he insisted he would never be able to reach the high bits so he screwed up the paper and told me to put his name down for “Suspicious Minds”.

A little later, sober eyes saw him talking to a blonde girl who was equally as drunk as he was, but I held in the crazy and told myself it’s just a friend; he kisses all his friends on the cheek.
More banter. Who owes who a date and who is cooking for who; a debate we never ended in agreement, but it did bring a smile to my face.

More sober eyes seeing things the crazy is just waiting to go, well, crazy about... he’s with the same girl, holding her hand. I tried to remain calm, forcing myself not to get annoyed at it or upset; she was just drunk and needed holding up. Then why were their fingers linked.
Eventually I started talking to a friend who told me he had been trying to get with this blonde girl all night. And that was it, I couldn’t hold it in any longer and I burst into tears. “Don’t cry. I don’t know what to do with crying girls.”

After an hour or two of sober crying, rants to my friends and talks with drunken strangers whose advice was “He’s not worth it. 1, he’s ginger. 2, he’s above average height!” I asked my friend if we could leave.


The texts start:

“I guess rugby lads are all the same” ...number deleted.

Him: “Fine can’t be arsed to argue with you anymore. Got a load of shit to deal with right now and I thought you’d understand”

“You haven’t told me ANYTHING you just ignore me like you always do. I’m fed up of falling for a guy who obviously doesn’t feel the same way. I keep getting hurt by you and I can’t keep doing it. U honestly haven’t got a clue just how much you mean to me.”

Him: “Fine don’t appreciate what the deal is. I mite be kicked out of uni on Monday but fine. Allow yourself a moan”

“How on earth am I supposed to know any of this if u don’t tell me? U tried 2 put the blame on me 4 it fuckin up last time, u can’t do it again. If ud just tell me stuff or at least say uv got stuff goin on an u need some space I’d totally completely understand and be there 4 u however u need me to be but u just don’t tell me anything. I’m not having a moan. U mean way more than 4 this to just be a moan! I’m sorry that I’v got feelings 4 u.”

Him: “K I’m private I’m sorry for that but that’s me x”

“And I get that I do but it doesn’t change the fact that u go hot and cold with me with no explanation at all and leave me feelin shit and confused an then 2nite I see u holdin hands with some girl who you’v apparently been tryin to get with all night. Maybe its silly but that really hurt! I’v walked away from so many guys th last few weeks cause all I could think of was u and how I’d hate it if it was the other way around cause I honestly thought we were gonna give us another go. I guess I was wrong”

Him: “You really think that’s the case? Ok well if that’s your impression of me then there’s no changing it”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean? I don’t know what to think anymore, one min ur the sweetest guy an ppl r tellin me u talk about me when u see them an th next u seem to disappear 4 days. Just please tell me what u want once and for all, I’m tired of trying to figure it out”
Him: “I’d love to tell you but I got more things going on that I don’t want to talk about. Sorry again but as I said that’s just me.”

“Where r u? Can I come see you please? I don’t wanna keep fightin over text x”

Him: “I’m about to get a lift back to mine chick x”

“Is that a yes or a no to me comin round then? U can come here if u like.. I promise I won’t pressure u into talkin bout whatevers goin on with u, I just wanna see u an get this sorted face to face x”

Him: “Well I’m pretty much back at mine now. If you wanna come over then you’re more than welcome x”

So I throw on some warm clothes, extra socks and some boots and begin my 2am walk to his but he calls and makes me get a taxi, he doesn’t want me walking around on my own that time of night. He can be sweet really.

By the time I got to his house I had calmed down and he had sobered up a little and it seemed like a moo point being there but I was just glad we could talk like normal people again. We drank tea, which he picked on me for because of how weak I have mine, and we lay on the sofa snuggled up watching TV together while I waited to find the courage to start talking about us.
When the time finally came around we talked like adults, with no interrupting, no arguing or raised voices and although we disagreed at times we let each other finish before we started to back our corner again. Then finally we were sorted. The issues had been resolved. The girl was just a friend, like I had tried to tell myself all along, my friend was wrong and I was just being paranoid. He tried to explain why his moods with me change from day to day and although I could understand I still found it hard to accept, but then so did he. One thing he said to me really stuck in my mind, “No matter what I do I’m going to hurt you.” I can’t remember if there was a sorry after that or if he was just stating it as matter of fact, but that one sentence stuck firmer than anything else that had been said that night.

Eventually we fell asleep while watching “Dirty Dancing” which was surprisingly his choice, and is also a film he can quote from in an instance. A tad worrying maybe.

In the morning we woke up and he came and lay on the mattress on the floor I had had to move to during the night because of his snoring. With his arms locked around me and his head rested in the back of my neck we drifted in and out of sleep while watching TV. This is how we spent the entire morning, snuggling up watching TV, kisses on the forehead and little play fights. Yet as perfect as it was something still felt wrong.

I left his about 3pm and as soon as I left I felt empty, tired and emotionally drained. Then it dawned on me.

This is never going to work.


If someone asked me how I feel about the last person I kissed I would say that part of me loves him and part of me hates him, but mostly I love him. I’m not in love with him, of course I’m not, but right now he is the most important person in my life. He is the last person I think about before I go to sleep at night and he is the first person I think about when I wake up. He is the person I dream about and he is the person I have nightmares about losing. He is all I think about when I walk around uni and he is the only person I want to see when I go out on an evening. When boys come up to me and start chatting, asking for my name and number and expecting a kiss at the end of the night he is the only person I want to be kissing. But I know now that it can never happen. Maybe I had it for a while, and maybe while it lasted it was a little bit perfect, if only for a day, but I can’t live in the past.

I don’t trust him. Pure and simple. I want to, and maybe I should. But I don’t. I’ve been hurt by him too many times before, whether he’s meant it or not. I can’t keep putting myself through that, handing out second chances hoping that next time it might be different. If I don’t trust him to start with then no matter what he does, he’s right, it’s not going to change my mind.

And for that I am sorry.

I am so lucky to be a part of this! - 22.09.09

Today was my final day working with Vamos Theatre. What a truly amazing experience it has been!

I feel so blessed to have been able to have the summer I’ve had. I’ve worked with a local director on a short film, I’ve been to London for two weeks training with National Youth Theatre, I’ve moved into my first home away from home and I’ve worked with Vamos for a wonderful three weeks!

There are quite literally not enough words to try and describe just how happy and thankful and fortunate I feel to have been able to do the things I have done, not only this summer but the days, weeks, months and years leading up to it!

How lucky must one girl be to be able to have her hobby as her occupation? Okay so I haven’t been paid for any of the things I’ve done this summer, in fact for some things it’s actually cost me to do, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Nothing can even begin to compare to the feeling I get when I walk on stage and begin to perform to a live audience, nothing is as encouraging as the laugher of a child or the gasp from the audience as I lift the top member of a human pyramid and begin walking around stage with them rested on my shoulders. Nothing is as powerful to me as knowing that what I’m performing right now is changing someone’s life. Knowing that I have the ability to give a group of people a voice, even if only for a moment, that is a moment longer than they had before.

To be able to take something from the past and bring it back to life, even for just three performances on one day, is a wonderful gift to give to someone, a gift that you know shall always be treasured forever after. To be able to teach children things from a past whose living links have almost all died now is a thrilling encouragement to continue what I’m doing.

Ever since I was a little girl I’ve been in love with the power of performance. How something so simple can say so many things to so many different people in so many different ways. How one piece of drama can cause so many debates about a single subject. How it can give people who are afraid a voice and the strength they need to carry on, and most importantly, how it gives people the power to believe; believe that anything really is possible.

My biggest influence as I was growing up, as cheesy and big a cliché as it may sound was Disney films. They taught me to laugh and they taught me to cry. They gave me values no person ever had the ability to teach me at that age. I’ve been able to relate to them and learn new things from them as I’ve grown up. They gave me my love for singing and my passion to believe that you are able to achieve anything if you just believe. They’ve helped me stay young when I’ve needed to be a child and they’ve helped me grow up when I’ve needed to take the lead, and no matter how old I get or how many times I watch one I still feel the same magic I felt the very first time I saw it. To me, that is what performing is all about.

Finding the audiences hearts and capturing their minds. To inspire. To believe. To feel. To hate. To laugh. To love. To cry. To agree. To disagree. To see something from someone else’s point of view and to be able to understand when you couldn’t before.

Drama is such a powerful way into so many peoples hearts and minds, and I’m a part of that. I can’t thank everyone who gives me these opportunities enough. They’re changing my life everyday by letting me change others lives.

Thank you x

Treat 'em mean, Keep 'em keen

I wish I could figure him out. It drives me crazy how much he gets into my head without even doing anything! But I guess that's the whole point right?!

Hes hot and hes cold and it is literally driving me mad! I can't think of anything else but him, and he doesn't even realise.

I wonder if he would still do it if he knew how it makes me feel, and I wonder if I should tell him I'm falling for him and then I wonder if he'd really care.

It's annoying how different boys and girls are. I'm not the most high maintenance of people, I'm happy to have my own space and be independent, in fact it's what I love more about my life than anything else, but still, a text every now and then, even if it's just to say hi wouldn't go a miss! That is all I'm asking for. Is that really too much?!

He hasn't text in over 3 days, not a word, and if it wasn't for how it ended last time it wouldn't bother me but I feel like I'm relationship limbo. I'm not taken, but in my heart I'm not single either. Sickening isn't it!! I went out and a group of lads were talking to me all night, and it was clear they wouldn't have said no if I'd have offered it, but I didn't want to. Not even a kiss. Talking was as far as I was happy to let it go and even then all I really wanted to be talking to was him.

He's the first guy I've felt this way about since I had my heart broken a year ago tomorrow and when I'm with him it's like the world stops turning and it's just me and him. I could lie in his arms forever. I feel safe there, and he makes me feel special and pretty and beautiful and interesting and I love everything about us when we're together and every time I see him I can feel myself falling just a little bit deeper. But I won't. I can't let myself fall in love with him, as much as maybe I want to, because I don't feel like he'd ever really understand just how much he already means to me, let alone how much he could if he gave me the chance.

I want to get out of this limbo I seem to constantly be in, but how can I when all he seems to do is disappear. He left for 3 months last time, and I missed him so much, and I was so angry at him but I still let him back in.

Maybe I'm stupid... I honestly think I am. But I also think it could be worth it if he would just stop playing games with me.

I guess the phrase 'Treat 'em mean, Keep 'em keen' exists for a reason. And it's certainly working with me. I just hate how much of a sucker I am.

Thoughtless

I want to write something, but I don't know what. I currently have no thoughts in my head. So lets see how it goes...

Right now I'm sitting in my living room back in Dudley listening to The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song by The Flaming Lips. I love this song.
It reminds me of the wonderful two weeks I spent in London not so long ago. But still that's not a thought I have in my head to talk about.

There are so many things I should be thinking about, so many parts of my life right now I should be processing and sorting. But I'm not. I don't feel the need to think about things I probably really should think about. I don't feel like its time yet to fix all the mistakes I can feel myself making. That time hasn't arrived yet. And this annoys me.

I want to be ready to tell him its not gonna happen. And I want to be able to tell him that I want it to happen. But I'm scared. And I'm not ready. And I need to see him first, before I can tell either of them. I want to feel free to feel whatever I want without fear of getting hurt or looking foolish. I want the power to love like I've never been hurt before. But I have and I'll never have that power. I don't blame anyone for that, but sometimes I wish I did.

It would be so much easier if this summer had gone differently. If we hadn't have messed up, if it hadn't have ended, if we had stuck to the plans we started to make. But we did mess up, and it did end, and the plans changed.

Part of me is glad that it happened this way 'cause its teaching me to trust you again, and its teaching me to relax and not worry and to just believe that you do like me and that it will work. If I relax. So much easier said than done.

And now I'm very aware that I'm ranting. I've finally found a thought in my head that maybe is bothering me more than I realised. But I am scared. I can't deny that. I'm scared to like you. And I'm scared to fall for you. I'm scared of this more than I am of getting hurt by you again. And I wish I could tell you this to your face. But I can't.

I can't tell you. Anything. Not yet.


Wow.. turns out I do have some thoughts after all.

Inspirational

I'm going to London!!!

Not to visit the Queen, no. I'm going for something much MUCH more exciting than that! I'm going to work with National Youth Theatre for two weeks with a selection of talented young people I am yet to meet and I can not bloody wait!!!

My wonderful Dad will be driving me there in around 9 hours time and I really should be sleeping right now but I'm just too darn excited!

This is an amazing opportunity I have been blessed with and I'm planning on living it to the max!!

Over 4000 people audition a year and only a select few get through to go on a two week course in London. Amazingly I am one of those people. The realisation of this has only hit me today as I packed my tiny little red suitcase on wheels.

This summer has been amazing. Truely. I've worked on a short film with a local director, I'm going to London for two weeks then three days later I'm starting work with Vamos Theatre in Worcester until the uni second year starts.

I feel as though I am finally doing something with my life. Something I am truely passionate about, something I can see, something I can feel, something that other people will see me experiencing and smile about because they know that at long last I am living MY dream!

Whats the point in the dream if you're not gonna go chase it?!

Chase it. Chase it and catch it and hold onto it for all its worth. If you don't, if all you ever do is dream without making that dream a reality you're wasting it.

Anything is possible, you just have to believe it!

This summer, this last year and all the events that have led up to it, all the times I cried cause I felt lost, all the times I felt inspired by someone else doing what I want to do, all the times I've seen someone younger than me further ahead because they've driven themselves harder than I've had the guts to, have made me realise this. And I'm not about to let it go without a fight!!

Thinking time

This last year has left me thinking about a lot of things. I've evaluated myself and the decisions I make a lot, and I'm starting to wonder if I like the person I can see myself slowly becoming.

One of my favourite lines from a TV programme is so simple, but so true, and when you listen to the whole quote it becomes even more mind blowing and meaningful. I've been thinking about this line a lot recently -

There are moments in your life that make you and set the course of who
you're going to be. Sometimes they're little, subtle moments. Sometimes
they're big moments you never saw coming.

For me the little moments can be anything as simple as smiling at a stranger or setting out ten minutes later than planned and miss running into a friend at uni, they are the times I've looked at my phone just as the caller hangs up, letting someone jump the queue cause you're not in the biggest of rushes or asking someone if you can jump the queue because you are in a rush.

They're the times I've held back my friends hair while she's been sick rather than letting her get it on her, the times I've let someone have their way to keep the peace, the times I've not said what I really wanted to or sugar coated something so not to upset someone else. These moments seem so innocent at first that you hardly notice them. But what happens when these little peace keepers start to control your life and result in you backing out of what you really want? What happens when the little moments add up to the big ones?

The biggest moment for me was when my boyfriend broke up with me. Although I half expected it I didn't really think it would ever happen. It broke my heart and there was nothing I could do about it. It wasn't my decision and I couldn't do anything to change it. I think what hurt the most was knowing that we both still loved each other, if he could have said 'I don't love you anymore' I would have accepted it, it would have still hurt but I would have known that that was it. But knowing that there were still feelings there on both sides cut me a thousand times deeper than the initial cut of breaking up.

I was a mess. For a long time I was a mess.

I tried to find ways out of the pain by rebelling from the person I'd always known me to be. To me sex had always been a special thing, something you experienced with someone you loved, only when you loved them. It was to be enjoyed but it was to mean something too. Within a matter of days I lost my whole belief system.

I couldn't feel for a long time. Every emotion was the same numb nothingness. Even the times I seemed happy everything was clouded over by pain.

Eventually my friends dragged me out of it. And for that I will be eternally grateful. I was made to look back at decisions I had made in the past and realised how I had made them for the wrong reasons. These could either become regrets I would live with and carry with me everywhere or they would become lessons for me to learn from.

Ten months on I'm still learning to cope with the change. In one e-mail I lost my best friend and my boyfriend. I lost my future and my past, because really what was the point in the past if the future had been erased. Suddenly it all meant nothing.

The pain is gone now and although the love isn't the same anymore, it will always be there, because he was, for a time, 'the one'. I've seen him for the first time since we broke up now and it felt like my best friend had come home and left all the pain of breaking up behind us. When he walked through the door I only saw the friend I lost ten months ago. That was when I knew that I was over him.

I'm broken. But not from him anymore. From decisions I have made instead, or maybe that's just me growing up. And that thought brings me to the end of the quote -

No one asks for their life to change, but it does. It's what you do afterwards that counts. That's when you find out who you are.

I did a lot of stupid things when my life changed, but I decided not to regret any of them, no matter how stupid or irresponsible or hurtful they may have been because regret is wasted time. Instead I decided to learn from them and to try and not make the same mistakes again. Sometimes this idea doesn't work, but its OK because I'm still finding out who I am.

Dreams

Anticipation filled my body as I began to pack my bag, ready to spend my first official night away from home. This was nothing like the excitement of a sleep over or a holiday. This was something that was mine, that I owned. Most importantly, this was brand new.

I boarded the train and read as I waited to get that much closer to my new room, my new home. The journey seemed to pass much faster than usual, partly due to my excitement to arrive in my new home town but also due to my involvement in the book I was reading. It was almost impossible to put it back into my backpack to continue my journey 'home' but this new excitement managed to force my hand.

After meeting friends and checking out Internet deals around town along with a number of other miscellaneous tasks that needed doing, we left for home. The bus journey was over quickly, ending almost right outside my new residence, leaving just a short walk in the blistering sun before carrying my first selection of clothes over the threshold.

The rooms had all been cleaned since I last visited a few weeks ago and the small bungalow had already been lived in by two of my three friends I was sharing with and their boyfriends. It was welcoming to finally enter a place where I knew I no longer needed to ask permission to do the simple things like go to the toilet or make a drink. Finally, after eight months of waiting patiently, I could stop living out of a bag and belong.

I put the few mini boxes of cereal I had brought into my cupboard and my carton of milk into the fridge, then explored around the kitchen, finding the new homes of cutlery, plates and dishtowels and noticed that my idea of moving the microwave to another corner of the kitchen counter had been done. This place really was mine.

The rest of the day passed slowly as I had found time to often do here. So much more seemed to get done and time never seemed to pass at all. Completely different to the constant tiring fast pace of Dudley.

After cooking tea with a join effort and sitting for the first time around the table to eat we decided to watch a film to celebrate my first night here. The others had already celebrated their first night with a Chinese a week earlier, and had had a barbeque the night before in the garden, the remains of which still stood upon a makeshift cooking station, created by a collection of house bricks and a stool sized table under the shelter of a small overhanging tree.

The sofa moulded itself around my body as I sat hugging my legs, my head rested on my knees. The laptop made a noise as it began to read the disk and eventually the light coming from the screen filled the small glass conservatory. This was the first time I had truly felt at home, sitting on my sofa, with my housemates before residing to my bed. This is the thing dreams had been made of for the last eight months, finally my dream had come true and I hoped I never had to wake from it.


It was daunting that night. I slowly climbed into bed, savouring ever second, the same way I had earlier when I entered my new garden for the first time. This was the kind of moment you couldn't let excitement rush you through for fear of forgetting that highly anticipated feeling. This was not a moment I was going to let slip through my fingers, as insignificant as it may seem.

I turned off the light and watched as the heat from the glowing bulb cooled and the room slowly turned to a darker shade of night. The bed sheets were stiff and unfamiliar, never slept in. The tick of the bed side clock was a sweet annoying comfort, reminding me of the noisy silence of my room at home. It soothed me, filling whatever anxiety I had with a small piece of home; even here, so many miles away. Slowly I began to drift to sleep.

My dreamless sleep ended early as the sun broke through the thick pink material of my curtains and woke me hours before my alarm was set to go off. Groggily I looked around. My new room. I'd survived my first night in Worcester.

What a difference a day makes...

I'm stuck.

There are so many thoughts in my head. So many words slurred together, all rushing into a million different paths, all following a similar route, but all so very not the same at all.

Where do I start?!
Where do I even begin to imagine beginning?!
How do I unravel this?

The truth is, I don't think it can be unraveled. Because, maybe there is nothing to unravel.

Maybe I'm just losing myself in this crazy, hectic, spiraling mind of mine.

Maybe.


The same lines keep going round and around in my head.
"Tell me what you're thinking out loud."
If only I could.

"Tell me what you thought about when you were gone and so alone. The worst is over."
But what if its not. What if this, if everything that has happened the past 8 months, is just the beginning. What if the worst never really started and this is it now; slowly consuming me.

Maybe I'm over reacting. Maybe.


I'm not depressed. I no longer feel the need to cry myself to sleep every night. That nightmare ended a long time ago and for that I'm grateful.
I don't spend my days moping around, in fact, I'm actually the happiest I've been in, well, ever I think.
And that's what bothers me.

What if there is never another 'time'. What if I never decide to end this comfort zone I'm in now. What if no one will ever be perfect ever again. That could happen.

I think I'm a little too fussy.

He buys me flowers. I'm freaked.
I see them. I'm smiling beyond belief.

We arrange a date. I'm scared, worried, nervous, not at all interested.
I go. I have an awesome time and don't want it to end.

We arrange a 2nd date, a day out. I'm excited but nervous, this is only our 2nd date!
We spend the day together. I have an awesome time and don't want it to end.

He drives for 2 hours just to pick me up from work. I'm... not fussed.
We watch films and eat cheesecake. I'm suffocated, I need space, I can't cope with the closeness.

How does that make any sense? At all? I know, it doesn't. None of it does.
And its the same story. Again and again and again.

I don't cope with needy.
I don't cope with attention.
I don't cope with whiney.
I don't cope with texting all the time and seeing each other loads.
Yet when I don't get attention, when they're not there, I miss them.
But when they are there and I have attention, I want them to leave me alone.

I guess its always been this way.

Even before.
So I can't blame him. He didn't break me.
I guess I've just always been Royally Emotionally Stunted!

Can't hurt can it?!

Just got home at last from the most tiresome day I've had in a long time!

I started back at work today, the first day there in over a year. A LOT of new faces, but apart from that nothing seems to have changed. It was just like putting on an old pair of shoes - they've already been worn in, they're comfy and they'll never really change.

Then it was off to the park with a friend I haven't seen for around 4 years. Time to enjoy the sun, throw grass at each other and play connect four on a touch phone! Bliss :)

After a meal with family and close friends its off to the girlie's house for some good catch up time and a glass of coke in front of the TV before coming home to finally see these flowers I had delivered yesterday.

...What can I say?

They're beautiful. And no matter how much my girlfriends tell me its a bit OTT and stalkerish I can't help but listen to my guy mates who all think its mega sweet and a totally unexpected thing for a boy to do. Things like this only happens in the movies?!

Then there is the smile that won't go away every time the bright big bunch of flowers catch my eye. They didn't come cheap!

This is the first time anyone has ever brought me flowers like this. And the note is quite sweet. So one date couldn't hurt right? It may be time to reply now. I think I've made him wait long enough :)

"How about Wednesday?" ... "I think Wednesday would be lovely."

A little unusual...

Isn't it amazing how quickly your mood can change. This morning I was depressed about going home and leaving my uni friends behind for three months, and now I'm experiencing a strange mixture of confusion, freaked-out-ness and kinda, smilely-ness!

About two hours ago I recieved a phone call which quite literally changed my whole mood for the rest of the day and right now I'm still working my way through the stages of this shock!

The call was from a local florist at home to say that they had delivered some flowers for me at my work but I wasn't there... I don't have a job. They must have the wrong person. But no. I do have a job. My first shift is tomorrow and already I probably have the name as the girl who recieved flowers on the wrong day! How embarrasing!! haha

The flowers were from a guy, asking me on a date. Great. Something that only happens in films right?

After going through the initial shock and the 'omg i have a stalker' thoughts I have now accepted that in fact this may have actually been a very sweet gesture from a boy who does just want to take me out on a date.

What I can't wrap my head around is WHY?!

And I think thats the thought that bugs me the most. I don't understand how I could possibly be that much of an interest to ANYONE for them to ask me on three dates and then send me flowers at work just to ask me on a date AGAIN because the other three days hes suggested I'm already busy.

So is it sweet or stalkerish?

For now I haven't made up my mind but I am leaning more towards the sweet side at the moment. Time will tell I guess...

Beginning of the end or end of the beginning?

Sitting in my friends bedroom as she packs all her things away to move home and I'm suddenly hit with this strong sense of emptiness. Its been a truly amazing 8 months and I wouldn't change it for the world. I've made some amazing friends and experienced so many things I never thought I would. Some good, some not so good. There have been times I'd rather forget. Times that have shaped me and times that have broken me just a little bit more than I already was.

I haven't been whole in a long time.

And seeing my friends all pack up their belongings and move back to the millions of places around the country where they come from just makes me realise how much these amazing people have glued me back together recently. They are my saviours. These are the people who have fed and watered me, laughed with me when I needed to laugh and cried with me when I needed to cry. They are the people who have talked with me when I needed it and sat in silence when I have nothing else to say. These people are truly amazing and I cannot believe how much I am going to miss them all.

So for the next three months I am going to live without my saviours. Without the people who for the past eight months have glued me back together. But I am going to do my best not to let the glue disappear because I'd very much like to be fixed now, permanently.