Lots of the time I imagine myself as a character in a film. I’m pretty sure this is how I got through high school. The awkward, pale, silent girl was narrating a much more exciting story in her head. But now each morning I wake up and feel like I’m in a bad film. Maybe it’s a B movie, a straight to video (DVD?) release. … Continue reading Waking up in a bad film
Hell is other people. We’ve all thought it, whether crushed by a backpack on a train carriage or hiding from a rowdy stag do in a bar. But now, under the Coronavirus crisis we are told to stay at home. Don’t go out because you might come into contact with other people. Stay distant. And now, other people are needed. We want to talk. We … Continue reading Communities of chaos
I know I’m not alone. The past few weeks have seen us all go from worrying about the daily minutiae – what’s for dinner tonight, have I paid that bill, should I book a holiday – to being overwhelmed and engulfed by the global Coronavirus pandemic. It confirms my belief that there is always a list of worries and we simply prioritise them according to … Continue reading Little and big worries
I’m emerging from an intense TV binge watching a Netflix reality show called Love is Blind. If you haven’t watched it, I highly recommend as a way to escape from the 24 hour news coverage of the Corona virus pandemic. Has any topic so obliterated everything else and taken up residence in our collective psyche? We need all distractions possible. Love is Blind involves men … Continue reading Love is blind in the time of Corona
I’m in Montpellier, making an escape from the UK just a few days after the latest in a long line of cancelled Brexit deadlines. Leaving the EU on Halloween proved to be a dystopian step too far, even for this government. And so we cling on to hope for better politics in 2020. When the daily grind gets too relentless, I find France can be … Continue reading French escape
Decluttering. I’m lazy so I tend not to get rid of stuff until I absolutely have to, until I run out of space or I feel so emotionally unbalanced that tidying seems like a good idea. To be fair, I don’t have a lot of storage space (because London). My wardrobe had reached the point where I’d just stuff clothes in at random, meaning everything … Continue reading Sparking joy with square brackets
Kathy Burke’s documentary All Woman explores different perspectives on being a woman today. The episode on motherhood got me thinking about selfishness. Kathy talked about why she didn’t want to have children, saying “as a kid, we didn’t have much money. If I have a kid, all my money’s got to go on a kid. F— that, I want to spend my money on myself.” … Continue reading A selfish or a free woman
I signed up for the F45 challenge, in a bid to put fitness on my agenda. Self-improvement is where its at these days. We always have to be working towards goals. F45 combines a number of trends: pursuing a fit and lean body, in a bootcamp, under time pressure. I feel tired just thinking about it. The marketing for F45 is visual. People are a ‘before’ … Continue reading On self-improvement
Does anyone else remember seeing the school nurse? It was a feature of school days, where as children we’d be checked over for medical issues of the day and headlice (pretty sure this is still an issue for kids?) When the ‘nit nurse’ wasn’t combing through my hair whilst I prayed nothing was living it in, she was checking my height and weight. As a … Continue reading Doctor vs. Google
Last weekend I sat outside a cafe eating avocado on toast (sorry not sorry). It was cold but sunny, and I was basking in the glow of surviving an exercise workout with only minimal back pain. I was relaxed… …until a scene of urban aggression played out on the narrow pavement next to me. A man was pushing a pram with a baby, whilst a … Continue reading Angry encounters
