“Life changes fast. Life changes in the instant. You sit down to dinner and life as you know it ends.”

Flicking back through the last eight weeks of photographs is like taking a trip in a time machine. I will never forget how scared I felt the first day I moved in; how nauseated at the thought of leaving and in that moment if we had turned the car around I would never have gone. I listened to so much Beyoncé on that journey. “I’m not afraid,” I told myself over and over again. “I’m not afraid of anything.” I replied to good luck texts from my friends with shaky hands and refused to cry or think about home.

It took one look at my university bedroom and the equally, secretly, terrified faces of my new flatmates and everything was fine. Someone brought cake, the rest of us fetched our alcohol, music playing, and suddenly we’re laughing, we’re happy, we’re all going to be okay. Someone else went to Reading festival in the summer, someone else worked at Leeds. We talk about Arctic Monkeys, A-levels, who hasn’t lost their virginity somewhere in the blur of the last few years of teenagehood, play never-have-I-ever - all lying of course - and spell out our names as we save each others numbers. We wander out, elated, to explore our new world of libraries and bars, concrete steps, a campus of new experiences awaiting us in the morning but we can’t wait for that, we want it now. Snapchat, “have you seen this TV show…” falling over, spilling ciders, walking home. I climb in through a window in our building, fall up the stairs, smiling. Hangovers follow, medicated by mugs of tea. Milk and one sugar, are we becoming friends? (Yes.)

Two months have flown by; a blur of drinking and dancing and attempts at cooking, movies and arguments and laughing, never quite getting enough sleep or enough coffee. It’s not quite a home, this funny flat with the bedroom doors that stick and the mouldy showers and the fridge that’s too cold and the freezer that’s permanently melting. It’s not a family, this weird group of people, thrown together and suddenly alone, supposedly independent. Some of us only share in birthday meals and chip in for washing-up liquid; some of us drink tea at 2am together and watch TV in each other’s rooms, advising and teasing on everything on the colour of shirts, to who’s turn to clean, to who had who in their room being noisy last night. And that’s okay, everything’s always okay, or it will be in the morning or one day, far in the future, when I’ve got a drink in my hand and a funny story to tell. It’s always okay.

House hunting, walks to Aldi, figuring out the laundrette, homesickness, fresher's flu, far too many tins of soup and spaghetti hoops consumed. Visits from family, trips home, adventure, stress, panic and laughter. Essays written, seminars endured, lectures napped through. Coffee drunk, tweets written, instagrams posted. Whiskey, vodka, Jager, Malibu, vomit and alcohol poisoning. Too many pizzas to count. Halloween, Bonfire Night, passing by in a blur. Suddenly it's nearly Christmas and I feel as if I've lived here forever.

University is somehow everything and nothing like I imagined; exactly as I knew it would be and also in another universe. Even when life feels terrifyingly new and upside down and fragile and I remember how far away I am from home, its so good, this learning how to be a person stuff. This tumble-driers and microwaves, budget, student, train tickets, "adult" stuff. Cigarette smoke on cold November evenings, sparkles in the sky, the smells of winter, soft sweaters and hugs, more music than my ears know what to do with. Fairy lights, to-do lists, poster sales, endless, endless books. Sometimes I get sad of course and when I do I listen to music and read messages in my yearbook and miss my family - who half the time are somehow capable of infuriating me from miles across the country - and my friends - because a million messages and texts and Skype sessions are just never the same as being in the same room and laughing so hard you need to pee with people who've known you forever.

It’s as if one day I woke up and someone handed me my brand new life. An adventure, just like I always wanted.

Procrastination....

It's a truth (pretty much) universally acknowledged that the only time I ever want to sit down and write on this blog is when I should be revising/writing an essay/insert activity that I'm supposed to do to pass exams, leave sixth form and be allowed to live an adult existence. (Yes, that was a Jane Austen quote... sorry.)

 

It feels so strange that in just a few weeks I'll be 18 - and legally allowed to do basically anything - but still live in exactly the same way, going to lessons, arguing with my family, being stressed about UCAS. Life isn't going to change dramatically in any way at all, which doesn't help to explain why I'm dragging my heels so much right now.

 

Learning things - for some reason - feels entirely pointless. This is an incredibly bad time for this to happen. In September, I and everyone else currently aged 17/18 and wrestling with the annoyingness of the UCAS track and admissions offices, will supposedly be heading off to university. Towns all over the country will be filled up with new students, cars full of families dropping them off and driving away waving goodbye, anxious parents, brand new friends, duvet covers, posters on the walls of new rooms.

 

Nights out in cities seen with fresh eyes because the high street isn't the same one you've been wandering up and down since you were 14. Cooking meals and doing laundry feeling exciting for some bizarre reason - because you're doing it all by yourself. Lectures, independence, student loans, new experiences and homesickness (even if you won't admit it...) On one hand I wish it could all start next week, but on the other I am honestly, really, completely freaked out.

I should probably also stop dealing with the anticipation of this by refusing to be motivated to work. You can tell its a real bad mood when inspirational quotes aren't helping...

xox

Friday Nights & Sunday Dinners

Doing things regularly. It's the perfect plot device, ensuring drama on a weekly basis and making sure there's always something to talk about. From the Gilmore Girls (MY MOST FAVOURITE THING EVER), having "Friday night dinners" at their grandparents' house every week - honestly barely an episode of that show goes by without one - to Olivia Pope's Sunday catch-ups with her dad (not all that much more scary than a meal with Emily Gilmore if you ask me...) many shows rely on the regularity and familiarity of ritual, of entrenched expectations to allow the pace to continue.

But in real life? Not so much. Apart from religious, borderline obsessive watching of my favourite TV shows, there is very little I'm capable of doing routinely. I marvel at Youtubers who are able to promise they "post new videos every Wednesday," or, god knows how, even daily. I can't stomach the idea of a nine-to-five job, a boring career, the thought of commitment to a life lived in one place. As cute as Tom and Giovanna Fletcher's lives are, from the wedding speech and now the pumpkin baby announcement video, the idea following the pattern of job, marriage, family, etc. etc. literally makes me feel ill. I can't really picture how I want my life to look in the future, especially as I barely even have a handle on what I'm supposed to be doing next week.

Sometimes its all I can do to remember to eat meals at the "normal" time of day. Is there anything really wrong with eating cereal for dinner or ice cream for breakfast? - not on my planet. I don't know whether its that I get bored easily or just that my daily life is really uninteresting, but when days go by, each one incredibly similar to the last, I start feeling trapped. And then I feel the need to go and do something crazy, like get something else pierced, run off to Reading Festival with a weeks notice, quit my job or get seriously behind with my school work only to panic, sit up until two am doing an essay and get to my 8.30 am history lesson just to realise I answered the wrong question.

I don't handle boredom well and I do admit to having a very low threshold for enduring things I don't want to do. An allergy, an intolerance, or just a severe distaste. I'll sit there, roll my eyes, force myself to get through another Thursday that will be exactly the same as the one before, and exactly the same as the one in another seven days time. My worst nightmare is predictability and the only thing I like less than knowing I'm going to be living right where I am now for the next year, sleeping in the same bed I've had since I was a child, is that I still don't know where I'm moving to. All I want to do right now is escape off round the world, without any idea when I'll be back.

Many of my friends are experiencing this same feeling as I am - probably they're capable of handling it slightly better than I am. To be honest, I think its perfectly common around age 17 to 18 to suddenly realise your whole life is ahead of you and the pressure to know what to do with it can feel completely overwhelming. Its like staring out into uncharted water, or off the edge of a cliff into a massive abyss ominously labelled: Your Future. "What happens now?" we all think. Since when do we make the decisions, decide the course of our own lives. I didn't sign up for this - no one asked me if I wanted to be born and now there's potentially eighty more years of this bulls*** that I have to plan out? (You can see why I feel other people are dealing with this collective emotional crisis a bit more maturely...)

So once I'm done with my ironically timed toddler-style tantrum about the fact I exist, I had better get on and start making some choices. Smart, useful ones that might actually get me somewhere. Not something I'm famous for being great at, but its probably time to start giving it a go. To do some preparation for the entrance exam I have to take, to sit down and deal with the mountains of work I need to do, to stop helplessly refreshing the UCAS track page in the hope it will tell me what to do with my life. If you feel yourself getting into this state (no judgement here, if you've made it this far you can tell that I am clearly losing the plot anyway...) I have one piece of advice for you. Watch Danisnotonfire's videos on this topic, and have a cup of tea. If this doesn't make you feel even slightly better you are probably in need of professional help that I am in no way qualified to give.

Hugs. We'll all get through this eventually xoxo

“Things change. And friends leave. Life doesn't stop for anybody.”

Today has been a weird kind of day. I dragged myself out of bed, after pressing snooze a few times, went downstairs and ate what I usually eat for breakfast, swallowed my iron supplement tablet with a mug of green tea and got dressed. I found some clean jeans and chose the rest of my outfit from the mess of clothes, make up, books and magazines on the floor of my (not-usually-quite-this) messy bedroom. Messed around with my hair, put some make up on my face, plugged my headphones in, grabbed my bag and left the house. So far, so normal.

 

 

This is where it changes. I walked into school - early for once in my life - and waited around for my appointment. My appointment to send off my UCAS form. My university application, personal statement, results, predicted grades and reference are currently being sent off to the five places I have applied to. It's all done, it's all finally finished and I can have my life back. It may sound a bit dramatic and it probably is, but I have always been someone who doesn't deal very well with even the idea of change. And this change is a big one. This time next year (hopefully/fingers crossed) I will be finally moved out and living at one of my five choices.... and no, I'm not going to tell you what they are! It's safe to say I would be extremely happy getting into any one of them but for various reasons my application had to be sent off early so, along with everyone else from my sixth form in this position, October 15th has been a big deadline hanging over my head. And now, with under 12 hours to go, it's all done and I can stop worrying. I can go back to spending too much time watching the Gilmore Girls, never quite enough doing notes and essays and coursework and dance around my bedroom or go for a run without feeling guilty that I'm not redrafting my application for the millionth time.

 

 

It's amazing to think about how much has changed in the last couple of years. Everything from my favourite books and music, to the people I'm closest with (except for an amazing few who have stayed the same) and the things that interest me most are completely different. It's really hard not to feel like a different person when so little about my life actually feels recognizable to me. When I was fourteen - aside from the fact I was still convinced I could become a ballet dancer, don't laugh too much - I thought I knew exactly what I wanted to do with my life. When I was fifteen I thought having a full fringe and short hair was a good idea and when I was sixteen getting my nose pierced was the scariest thing I had ever done. Luckily that one did turn out to be a good decision, and I hope as I finish up being seventeen the good decisions are starting to outweigh the bad ones.

 

 

My friendships have changed beyond recognition, I no longer spend hours of my life perfecting barre exercises or learning solos and fixing new ribbons onto ballet shoes. I talk far more than I used to, and while my family are unsurprised as they complain that I never shut up at home, teachers in sixth form and people I had never bothered trying to get to know are surprised that I have "come out of my shell." I think change is a good thing now. I get bored if I haven't moved my furniture around in a while, constantly need new posters for my walls and feel that live isn't really worth living if I haven't got something new to look forward to just around the corner.

 

 

There are so many plans I have, so many things I want to do before this year ends. I need a new job for starters, I need to save up some money and finish learning to drive. I really really need a new phone. I need to go to Washington DC in February for my Year 13 Politics trip. I need to see Taylor Swift when the Red Tour comes to London (thank you God, for amazing people who buy me tickets for things!) I need to have a lovely Christmas with my family, the last proper one before there are only two people living in our house all the time. I need to make sure I don't worry about them too much but at the same time, set up Skype on my laptop and come home to visit every now and then. I need to go travelling next summer, I NEED to go to Reading Festival again, I need to find my wristband from this year and put it on my pin board, I need to get a new camera and take so many pictures of all the things and people I want to remember. I need my hair to grow some more, I need a lovely prom and a happy ending to being "in school." I don't particularly want to be eighteen and have to start being an "adult," but it's going to happen anyway and I might as well try and love it.

 

 

I used to say I hated where I had grown up, that it was boring, that I wished I had lived somewhere else but I think I actually might be starting to realise how much I'll miss it. I think my resistance to any kind of change comes from the insecurity I have from being moved around the world so much when I was little and being afraid to put down roots and have to leave again. I don't remember it, of course, I was one and two when we moved from England to Hong Kong and back again and three when we moved to where we live now. But I remember the anxiety I had throughout my childhood of people disappearing, of moving away and never coming back. One of my close friends in primary school moved to Italy, another to the other end of the country. Others I have lost touch with since then, Year Nine friendships break up and people move on, things change and there is nothing I can do about it. I remember waving goodbye to my dad so many times from windows and airports and trains - jobs with constant travel are really good for building abandonment issues into your children.  I remember how much easier that made it to say goodbye to him permanently and how much I hated it, and tried to miss him more, on purpose. I remember all of these things and how they have made me into myself.

 

 

I hate looking through my old pictures because I hate how I used to look. I hate hate hate myself with short hair and I have still not quite gotten over it yet. I'm working on it, they were not happy years for me and maybe that was reflected too poignantly in those photos. But there are one lot I found: pictures from my trip to Italy this last summer. I spent nearly three weeks with my mum and little sister and the in photos from this holiday we look the happiest I've ever seen us. I don't know why this is, a combination of sunshine and exploring in a beautiful place? The amazing food, the friendly people, the feeling of being so far away from anything about home? Whatever it is, I intend to capture that feeling and spend as much as possible of the rest of my life being exactly that happy.