Wanting to, but difficult.
I've really been wanting to sit down and write a good journal entry for a long time, but it doesn't come easy. I guess these days it doesn't help that I live in a complete hellhole and therefore there is little that allows for peaceful reflection.
However, having popped on the headphones, dimmed the lights and curled a blanket loosely around my lower back... I feel very much back in the habit.
I miss my more thoughtful days - I don't partake in enough quality self-indulgence anymore, and I've noticed the effects. Any indulgence these days consists of boozing, snacking and sleeping - all of which is turning out to be more self-abuse and I don't feel I've retained any of my sweetness and innocence. I've tried too hard to be a typical university student, but honestly, I don't want to be one. I'm dating one at the moment, and gradually his whole attitude has begun to repulse me. He has a kind heart, and I hate to have these new feelings towards him, but I know he just isn't the man for me. He could never understand my wanting to write like this; my wanting to reflect, to have quiet and emotional moments that feel so satisfying when you wake the next day.
That is now. Shall we start at the beginning?
My first year of university seems so long ago now, but it was a good enough one. I got along with everyone, although I never really made any lasting connections with my housemates. I never got myself a boyfriend - I got my hopes up several times, but other than that relationships were short and shallow.
I made some decent friends through the combination of one course mate and one of the people I'd travelled to Africa with. They are a bohemian kinda gang. We prefer to play silly quizzes, get together around a guitar and some lyrics and "restyle" some old classic indie tracks. We dance like we're kids and we laugh a whole lot. At the same time, the whole bunch are older than your average student of this time, and this gives them a long-term perspective of life, which keeps us from being complete morons.
I had a couple of difficult times in the first year, but nothing incredibly debilitating. And I came out of it fairly well, heading for a first class degree.
Greece was a wonderful trip and I learned more about myself again, but left me with no overdraft facility to tide me through the next academic term.
My second year can be split into two halves.
The first I wasted away, but I was generally happy. I moved into a new house with the above group of friends, had few commitments, took on a flexible bar job, lost my beer-weight from first year, learned poker and broadened my friendship group to include more people who suit me well.
I scraped through the post-xmas exams with scores ranging from 58% lowest to 72% highest, giving me a stable 2:1 degree forecast.
But then I got overconfident about my abilities and took on everything.
This was all amongst a heavier semester already with a variety of group research projects and pieces to complete. But generally I was happy if not a little stretched for personal time.
And I got fat.
I ate poorly, had no time left to attend my exercise classes or be able to spare 50 mins to get to Uni in the mornings.
And by this time one of the guys I had met before xmas was becomming a prominent part in my life and at the end of January we decided to call it a relationship.
It all started off well.
And I've enjoyed everything I've been a part of. It's been wonderful to contribute to so many different things and to meet like-minded people.
Things have become more strained now that a lot of my extra-curriculur work has ended - surprisingly.
I have more time to sit down and evaluate things, and I feel I have been to busy to attend to my general attitude. To remain polite, to feed old friendships and to like myself.
Mark irritates me the more I see him.
And I don't feel close to my housemates anymore.
Starting to feel a bit of a lonely outcast again. No-one else seems to enjoy the small things that I do. They laugh at me when I make my own birthday cards, when I paint and sew things, when I can sit still and listen to jazz alone in my room.
They make fun of people and can be quite mean - and whilst they insist it's all in jest and they know we can all take it, I don't think they realise that I can't. They don't realise quite how sensitive a soul I am.
I can't stand to hear anybody being picked on. Even if it is only someone on the television. I have tried to join in, but I don't feel comfortable about it.
I am also heartbroken over somebody still. It has been a long time, but I still think about them and wonder what it would be like if it had worked out. If only they could see me now! But I stay distant, because I don't want to be hurt anymore.
I'm starting to dream about alternative guys. A man who has his own life and his own agenda - one that I respect and admire. One with whom I can sit next to, reading a book and not feel obligated to speak or attend to him. One who does not grab at me and lech over me, but just tentatively touches me now and then.
And mostly one who talks to me about matters of the heart, not just how wasted they got last night and had I seen the pictures of him and the lads with lewd diagrams scrawled over their beer-spattered bellies.
That's what I desperately want. Someone who, when I speak, they understand and can respond intelligibly.
I thought I was making great strides relationship wise - I'd finally picked a man who was my age, unattached and close enough to see more than once a month.
I forgot to consider whether our personalities were compatible.
He's lovely. He's just not my guy.
However, having popped on the headphones, dimmed the lights and curled a blanket loosely around my lower back... I feel very much back in the habit.
I miss my more thoughtful days - I don't partake in enough quality self-indulgence anymore, and I've noticed the effects. Any indulgence these days consists of boozing, snacking and sleeping - all of which is turning out to be more self-abuse and I don't feel I've retained any of my sweetness and innocence. I've tried too hard to be a typical university student, but honestly, I don't want to be one. I'm dating one at the moment, and gradually his whole attitude has begun to repulse me. He has a kind heart, and I hate to have these new feelings towards him, but I know he just isn't the man for me. He could never understand my wanting to write like this; my wanting to reflect, to have quiet and emotional moments that feel so satisfying when you wake the next day.
That is now. Shall we start at the beginning?
My first year of university seems so long ago now, but it was a good enough one. I got along with everyone, although I never really made any lasting connections with my housemates. I never got myself a boyfriend - I got my hopes up several times, but other than that relationships were short and shallow.
I made some decent friends through the combination of one course mate and one of the people I'd travelled to Africa with. They are a bohemian kinda gang. We prefer to play silly quizzes, get together around a guitar and some lyrics and "restyle" some old classic indie tracks. We dance like we're kids and we laugh a whole lot. At the same time, the whole bunch are older than your average student of this time, and this gives them a long-term perspective of life, which keeps us from being complete morons.
I had a couple of difficult times in the first year, but nothing incredibly debilitating. And I came out of it fairly well, heading for a first class degree.
Greece was a wonderful trip and I learned more about myself again, but left me with no overdraft facility to tide me through the next academic term.
My second year can be split into two halves.
The first I wasted away, but I was generally happy. I moved into a new house with the above group of friends, had few commitments, took on a flexible bar job, lost my beer-weight from first year, learned poker and broadened my friendship group to include more people who suit me well.
I scraped through the post-xmas exams with scores ranging from 58% lowest to 72% highest, giving me a stable 2:1 degree forecast.
But then I got overconfident about my abilities and took on everything.
- Training sessions from the BBC for podcast writing and production.
- Twice weekly 2 hourly sessions of training for helpline work for 6 weeks.
- Set designer for a stage production of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
- Local woodland regeneration outings
- Volunteer fundraiser for the Manchester New Children's Hospital Appeal
- I'm on my faculty's committee involving improving the course for future students and offering peer coordinated seminars for struggling students
- Homeless outreach programme volunteer
This was all amongst a heavier semester already with a variety of group research projects and pieces to complete. But generally I was happy if not a little stretched for personal time.
And I got fat.
I ate poorly, had no time left to attend my exercise classes or be able to spare 50 mins to get to Uni in the mornings.
And by this time one of the guys I had met before xmas was becomming a prominent part in my life and at the end of January we decided to call it a relationship.
It all started off well.
And I've enjoyed everything I've been a part of. It's been wonderful to contribute to so many different things and to meet like-minded people.
Things have become more strained now that a lot of my extra-curriculur work has ended - surprisingly.
I have more time to sit down and evaluate things, and I feel I have been to busy to attend to my general attitude. To remain polite, to feed old friendships and to like myself.
Mark irritates me the more I see him.
And I don't feel close to my housemates anymore.
Starting to feel a bit of a lonely outcast again. No-one else seems to enjoy the small things that I do. They laugh at me when I make my own birthday cards, when I paint and sew things, when I can sit still and listen to jazz alone in my room.
They make fun of people and can be quite mean - and whilst they insist it's all in jest and they know we can all take it, I don't think they realise that I can't. They don't realise quite how sensitive a soul I am.
I can't stand to hear anybody being picked on. Even if it is only someone on the television. I have tried to join in, but I don't feel comfortable about it.
I am also heartbroken over somebody still. It has been a long time, but I still think about them and wonder what it would be like if it had worked out. If only they could see me now! But I stay distant, because I don't want to be hurt anymore.
I'm starting to dream about alternative guys. A man who has his own life and his own agenda - one that I respect and admire. One with whom I can sit next to, reading a book and not feel obligated to speak or attend to him. One who does not grab at me and lech over me, but just tentatively touches me now and then.
And mostly one who talks to me about matters of the heart, not just how wasted they got last night and had I seen the pictures of him and the lads with lewd diagrams scrawled over their beer-spattered bellies.
That's what I desperately want. Someone who, when I speak, they understand and can respond intelligibly.
I thought I was making great strides relationship wise - I'd finally picked a man who was my age, unattached and close enough to see more than once a month.
I forgot to consider whether our personalities were compatible.
He's lovely. He's just not my guy.