the beginning of the end

Thoughts on third year. 

Who can believe it, eh? How quickly this has all disappeared.

Six months ago, I got on the train home, in state of quasi-evacuation, and then the weeks and months passed, and now we are here, in mid-September. I've even got a back to school playlist to mark the occasion. 

I feel distinctly mixed about it all. I can't contain my excitement at being back in my libraries and immersed in it all; at living with my best friends, working in cafes, running in the parks, just being away from home. Michaelmas' paper is sick, Autumn in Oxford is beautiful and my yellow bike is going to look iconic zipping around the streets. I cannot wait.

But I almost can't accept it's going to happen. Maybe it won't, who knows in this post-certainty world. But regardless, the prospect of it is idyllic.

And then, there's the apprehension. The hoped idyll that simply won't be fulfilled, because corona and necessary rules mean what feel like the best parts can't happen. Can't go to formals, can't have balls, can't even have face-to-face tutorials. Oh, and I can't cook for myself. Too often I think 'what's the point', and toy at the threads of rustication, suspension, a year out. I just can't shake this profound nostalgia of what was, and I know it won't be like that anymore. And it's like March's grief all over again. So that hurts, in a privileged sort of way.

And then, of course, there's the inevitable anxiety. Anxiety at exams and pressure. And at the end. That cruel creature that caused so much pain in 2017. But it sort of doesn't hurt as much this time. It feels as though there is a little more hope and prospect and opportunity once this is done, and maybe even some excitement (Berlin, please?!). But I also struggle to process that it will end. At the speed with which these three beautiful years have melted and slipped and are suddenly almost concluding. And then who am I? What does my identity consist of? Do I have to get a job? Can I not just read books forever?

And I just can't imagine my world not consisting of these people of whom I am in awe, who are so ridiculously intelligent and caring and driven it is hard to believe they are really real. I want them to be my world forever and to just stop time so I can drink up the hours with them. Really, I'd like to hold on to this eternally, and never let go.

So, for third year, I am feeling both hope and dread. So sad and so hopeful at the same time.

I know it will be hard and too many early mornings and late nights will be spent in the library (I've already had the necessary pre-warning) and in so many ways it will be different, and some of that I won't know until it happens. I refuse to let myself be consumed by the grief I did last time, and instead want to try so, so hard to breathe it in. Enjoy my window looking onto the quad, and the sandstone streets, and the coffees, and the cold mornings, and the laughs and the pubs, and even the hungover working. 

And I'll fuckin' stop with the photobooth pics when I really should be reading. 

Good vibes for back to school, y'all (and hoping beyond hope that a second lockdown isn't on its way!) <3

(pics are from insta: here, here and here)

the reads and the to-reads #2

I seem to have books everywhere: a permanent pile downstairs as remnants of days working, a tower next to my bed of 'to-reads', a shelf above my bed of my favourites, and a collection of history books to feign intellect. Despite not needing another for at least a year, I can't! stop! buying! them!

I've read a wonderful array of things this summer: it's been quite an inspiring few months, literature-wise and I have definitely explored things I wouldn't have otherwise. 

Here are some recs!

The Parisian Affair and Other Stories, Guy de Maupassant 

I have only read half of these, but as they are short stories I feel it is more justified to take a break halfway through. This is a collection of over thirty short-stories, with some just a couple of pages long. They are set in different areas and worlds of France, in the late nineteenth century. They are debauche and scandalous, and some are profanely ridiculous, but they are madly entertaining. Some of the comments he makes about women are so blatant they just make me laugh – how terrifying men used to find us. 

'Really strange, complex...unfathomable creatures, women', 'one of those treacherous looks that so often appear in women's eyes', you get the gist!

I'd highly recommend for a dip-in-and-dip-out book, with some astutely of-the-time comments and some crude humour, alongside a beautiful translation. 'A Parisian Affair', 'Monsieur Jocaste', 'Two Friends' and 'Regret' are some favourites. 

Rainbow Milk

As a debut, this novel was, for me, groundbreaking. I know some people found it a little too explicit, and perhaps buying too overtly into gay stereotypes, but I found it's representation and commentary madly eye opening. It's an intertwining of stories of the Windrush generation, alongside the life of a gay, black Jehovah Witness. The two narratives seem entirely unrelated, until the very end, but it concludes in almost perfect harmony. I found it visceral and raw and very harrowing, but also warm and loving. It made me think a lot about the intersectionality of identity, and as a book that breaks all the conventions, I thought it was just wonderful. 

It's not about the Burqa 

Another recommended reading of the reading group I mentioned in this post. My perception of this book was a little tainted by a conversation I'd had with a friend who said it was rather repetitive and superficial. I can see what she means by this, but for a white-woman entry into the feminism of Muslim women and the intersection between Islam and feminist theory, I thought it was excellent. It's main premise is to reclaim the voice of Muslim women on their identities as feminists, and explain what it means to them, through a collection of essays. The difference it highlights between religion and culture is, I believe, a pretty essential thing to understand, and perhaps offers a starting point for white women questioning the relationship between Islam and feminism. I do agree it is perhaps a little surface-level and repeats its fundamental point, but that I believe is not a bad thing, and maybe White Feminists will finally begin to listen. 

Reading Lolita in Tehran 

This was a slow and long read for me, but enjoyable and eye opening nonetheless. A memoir by Azar Nafisi, it explores life under the Iranian Revolution, as a woman, an academic and a reader. It taught me a lot about Iran that I didn't know, and shocked me at so many points. I adored her analysis of the different texts read in the subversive book group, and I often got lost in the novel itself, rather than her description. Whilst it did seem to take me far longer than most other books to get through, it was worth it as some of her lyricism is just beautiful, and the theme so important. 

So there are a few, perhaps more unusual, suggestions. I've also read The Family Upstairs (a little predictable but very quick paced), Exciting Times, and Women Don't Owe You Pretty – all of them good, but maybe ones you've heard of before. 

In terms of to-reads, I've got a considerable pile to work my way through before October. They include a Virginia Woolf 'Flush', a retelling of a Greek myth ('Thousand Ships', the David Nicholls I've been pining after ('Sweet Sorrow') and one set in the Qing dynasty to ease me back into history. 

What have you all been reading recently?

back to normal but not really normal

I was in the co-op buying snacks for a blissful afternoon on the beach, when my dearest friend asked me 'what would you think if you saw yourself now, six months ago?'.  I question this a lot. How normal signs of 'keep your distance' or wearing a mask or queuing outside a shop have become. How quickly we've adapted. 

I am in the penultimate hour of a very long coach journey, something that seems to have become a seminal feature of my summers. Unfortunately, this one is not preceding a flight to somewhere hot, but instead to a twenty first, with friends I haven't seen since March. 

I've spent this journey working, napping, reading, and eating a soggy pitta that just did not satisfy my evening hunger. I also got lost in the depths of my blog, circa. March, reading the intricacies of lockdown life. I can't stop thinking about how terrifying and horrible it was, and have had numerous conversations about a quasi-trauma I experience when thinking back to it all. My experience wasn't bad, and of course was not unusual, but the anxiety and the claustrophobia feels almost more intense and almost more unbearable in hindsight. 

It's resulted in a lot of reflection, about life now, life five months ago and life a year ago. And I suppose, in response to Evie's musing, my life feels more similar to how it manifested in 2019 than it did in May. Likely, in the midst of a pandemic, that is not a good thing. But, it also feels somewhat safe and reassuring and relieving to have got lost in this semblance of normal. To have forgotten what it was like to be stuck inside, not able to even see my friends for a walk. 

In so many of my posts I wrote about how I longed for a pub and a walk and to see a face other than my mum's, and now I have all these things and have absorbed them until I am exhausted with over-stimulation, I've almost forgotten we couldn't have them.

It's such a strange and liminal space and world, right now. It's all so normal and also so abnormal. That sitting on this coach with a mask, and relentless hand sanitising is assumed as a rite of travel. That life goes on despite two trillion pounds public debt. That the infection rate rises, and still we eat out to help out and travel further and meet up more. But also that my life is busy, that I go outside, and have plans and that so many of the things I said I missed, I can finally evoke in some form or another. 

I suppose I want to write this to remember, that on a dark day in April, when I thought I had throat cancer but really was just reacting to the stress, I would have never have dreamed I'd be on this coach to see my friends, or that Libby would be coming to stay, or that I'd be able to drink cider on the beach and go out for meals and work in a cafe. 

But also how quickly I slip back into taking these things as a given, and for granted, and not recognising how profoundly blissful it is to have them back.

being outside

Much about the last 5 months has been dark, empty and endless. But there has been light and opportunity and time that wouldn't have other wise come about. 

One pleasure I have indulged more than ever is the beauty of being outside, in the warm sun, on the beach, on a hill or just sitting in the cloudy grey in a park. I've discovered a new found adoration for simply being outside, in nature, in the fresh air. When you're time outside is so severely curtailed and when all other possibilities are no longer viable, there is something so freeing about being able to simply walk on a field or read in the garden. 

At every opportunity, I have held my breath and jumped into the depths of a cold and probably somewhat dirty river and swum until I could no longer feel my legs. I've swam in the Exeter canal, in the north sea at sunset, in Port Meadow, and in a valley after a breakfast cooked on a fire. 

I've enjoyed having skin smelling of wood smoke and clothes marked with mud and grass stains, or disappearing on my bike to walk amongst white flowers in an abandoned field. Sandy meals and drinks consumed in a park, as though we were replicating the summers of our teenage years. I've even found odd pleasure in the necessity of hedge weeing that arose out of lockdown. Its all been magically freeing and fresh.

 

And now, as summer rolls into the languorous days of August, I am finding beauty in picking blackberries to cook and eat with mountains of granola, and in picking the veg my dad has tirelessly tended to. Last night, I made an entire meal from harvested foods and it was hugely satisfying and nourishing, despite doing nothing to contribute to the growing of any of it. 

So, although our opportunities and experiences have been clipped and summer did not consist of the baked mediterranean paths and sparkling seas we may have dreamed of, the focus has been adjusted. Just the green spaces around me have a new found worth and beauty, and its been a delight to embrace them come rain or shine. 

longing for art

I am longing to see some art. I don't think I realised, prior to corona, just how much I love galleries, and how peaceful I find room after room of sometimes beautiful, but mostly mediocre paintings. Embarrassingly, I used to rubbish history of art as 'pointless' and vacuous, and now not only do I find myself doing a dissertation on early Islamic art but also frequently dream of sitting in a tutorial in the Ashmolean discussing paintings. I guess I've realised its a lot more than just pretty pictures, and has immense cultural and historic value. 

Recently, I've felt a real affinity with some of my favourites, and can't stop thinking about their spot hidden away waiting just for me to stop and stare. This Constable, of clouds, in a backroom in the Ashmolean which I can never direct myself to, but which I always seem to fall upon. Monet's Antibes in the Courtald, magically warm and rich in soft pinks and turquoises. I think you can find good art anywhere, these just happen to be a few whose delicacy play in my mind. 

Over lockdown, I found a lot of good art online, much of which was shared by my friend Sophie. It felt such an escape to still be able to explore new works and see some of my favourites, even when I was locked inside. 

Some highlights include (above):

Pierre-Auguste Renoir 'Buste de Femme Nue', Claude Monet 'Marine', Edvard Munch 'Standing Nude', Konen Uehara 'Hatō zu', Lucian Freud 'Man's Head (Self Portrait I)', Paul Cézanne 'Les Grandes Baigneuses'

I suppose there is some sort of theme: blues and greens, soft female forms, a lot of sea. And that Lucian Freud. I cannot stop thinking about that self-portrait. 

I also listened to Simon Schama's 'The Great Gallery Tours' which, if you can reconcile yourself to the posh stuffiness that often (in my opinion unnecessarily (because so much good art is free)) comes with art critics, is so lovely. He virtually visits 4 of his favourite galleries (I've only listened to the Courtald one) and describes three of the paintings. It feels just like you're in the gallery with him, and I would very much recommend for a gentle half hour relax. And as soon as I can, I am making a trip to the National solely for this Artemisia exhibition. After sending magazine cut outs to my best friend during lockdown, we've decided we need to go and see it as soon as it opens. 

Much of this is formal, 'traditional' art, But really, art can mean anything. For all its flaws, and all the times I have frantically deleted the app from my homescreen, Instagram is the perfect place to share and diversify creative works. Having just scrolled through my saved, I realised so much of it is art and brings creativity and colour and inspiration virtually. 

Some accounts I'd recommend following are:

@amber_sidegallery (a gorgeous independent photography gallery in Newcastle – Forever Amber's most iconic series was of poverty in the city, but since they have done so much; one of pictures across Syria during the conflict was just breath taking – I can't wait to take myself on a date here soon)

@vangoghmuseum

@museelouvre

@charlotte.ager

@ashmoleanmuseum

@robertoferri_official (a modern baroque-esque artist; obsessed)

@metmusuem

Ars gratia artis – mutatis mutandis (on fb, such a beautiful and diverse selection and it has really exposed me to some gorgeous new stuff!)

And finally, this. Which I think about almost on a daily basis. God, what i'd do for an americano, a croissant, some art and a nap. 

What have you been missing most? And any arty recs please send 'em my way xo

a whole lotta love

A little drunk, and a little lost in the sadness that comes with the end of a fuckin' brilliant few weeks that felt they would never end. 

Originally intended to be a week in Devon with my family, I ended up seeing almost all my best friends in some of my favourite, and new delightful, places. 

I feel sad and teary but so deeply happy and blessed. In a delirious exhaustion on the train from London (?) to Newcastle, I sent a message to a friend saying:

'I just had such a nice realisation that I have the kindest and best people in my life, and what have I done to deserve such goodness'. 

Sometimes I wonder if everyone is as blessed to have as good friends. And I mean really fucking good. The kind that let you cry drunk on the phone whilst they are on holiday with their girlfriend. The kind that swim in a canal with you even though it is raining, or read with you, or laugh so deeply you can't breathe from the stomach pain. The kind who I don't feel I ever have enough time with, who I think of a million things to say in too little time. The kind that, god, just make you feel so full and alive and yourself, and that you just want to hug when you are walking in silence because the love you feel is too much. 

As you can tell, I am delirious from both a lack of sleep and a blur of chaotic beauty, and drunk from too much sangria and good times. I also have 'sure on this shining night' playing because for some reason being in York minster made me need to listen to choral music. See what I mean? Friends that let you be yourself. 

I am adamant this is the best summer ever. I think because of the unexpected beauty of it all. How amazing it feels to be in the presence of my friends and drink their warmth, after months of Zoom. And the freedom, to float around the country and stay in random rooms in empty tenuously known student flats, pretending I don't have a whole dissertation to write and a whole paper to research. Oh, Oxford. 

Delightful highlights include: seeing my best friends for the first time in months and drinking wine, swimming at Exmouth in the sun, eating scones at the top of a hill, reading in bed with a coffee in hand, planning an expected trip to Oxford and the hilarity (and I mean hilarity) that came with it, swimming in Port Meadow, traipsing around bookshops with my bffs, eating tapas with Libby and pretending to replicate the Spanish trip we never got to book. I think I may have been on twenty trains, spent hundreds of pounds and used more hand sanitiser than I thought possible, but man my heart is full. 

And now, we focus. On work, on eating, on myself. I'm scared these can't go hand in hand, that Oxford is just not compatible with a healthy mindset (no matter how deeply I love it) and that some form of recovery, whatever that transpires to mean, may be too hard or too scary. But here we are, it's going to happen because I want to continue loving and thriving and breathing the intense happiness these beautiful people impart. 

(wow, that was a lot - the sangria hit me harder than I thought)

love xo (and listen to sure on this shining night before you sleep <3)

twenty one

This train journey, my third in as many weeks, was supposed to be spent researching early Islamic art in Transjordan, but instead here we are writing. The avoidance I am practicing in relation to my dissertation sure needs to be addressed soon, especially after, on the 16th June, my supervisor said we should 'speak in a month' to 'assess progress'. Of course, progress is limited, but really I've just been trying to soak up as much sleep and laughter and permissible adventure as possible and make up for some of the privileges we have been denied as of late. So I think maybe, in corona times, that is a reasonable excuse. 

Twenty-one feels big and 'adult', neither of which are characteristics I attribute to myself. I'd really like to stay twenty forever, but I think I perhaps say that every year. 

Either way, it materialised into a magical day of sea swimming and cardamom buns and a haircut (that I now dislike) and phone calls and a lot of Prosecco and laughter with some old friends. I felt very happy and very loved and very lucky, feelings that haven't really been in abundance in the last few months. I got some beautiful gifts, notably a yellow 90s racing bike, a paloma wool shirt, and some velcro vejas which I bestowed upon myself, and whilst in some ways it was not the twenty-first I imagined, it was beautiful. 

There are some big things I want to learn at this seminal (?) age and, as I currently have a lot of time to think and reflect and some long convoluted journeys abundant in empty time, I thought I would document them, perhaps for some accountability. 

Break my jealousy streak. Florence Given taught me that my feelings towards others are simply a projection of my insecurities. And jealousy is a big one. I want to learn to share people and to not get angry when they spend time with other people. Trust your friendship and trust their agency.

And I suppose along the same vein, have faith in your relationships. I'd like to eliminate the excessive time spent with dear friends worrying whether they like me, and instead focussing on the time spent with them. 

Learn intuition – with food, with rest, with direction. Probably seek some help for the former.

Have confidence in my worth and don't depend upon external validation to realise this.

Speak up rather than shy away.

Be more critical in my approach. Don't accept as gospel everything I read, even if it is by someone I admire, and have the confidence to challenge it. 

Don't fuckin' freak out about the future or the intense and unwelcome reminder of other people's plans. I think third year is going to be perhaps a little grim for this, as the gossip about next steps and internships and grad jobs amongst inherently driven and ambitious people takes over. Breathe, ignore. 

Challenge my guilt complex, and learn to be. 

Finish my degree (yikes) but don't waste time thinking about the end. 

Thus, a few key things I want to learn. I suppose really all I want is a little more freedom and a little less control, but I think lessons from this pandemic will perhaps aid such a development. Twenty one will in some ways be a big year, but I don't really like to think about it too much. I just want to finish my degree, and not much else. I have plans for after but am a mighty firm believer in taking it slow. So I am envisaging another year out to live a little without 2 essays a week, before embarking on a masters in a subject which probably sounds vacuous, but for which I have fallen deeply in love. But let's not get ahead of ourselves, I need to finish my preliminary degree first. 

I hope you're all well and safe and wearing your masks! I've got an exciting week or two of celebrations and friends I haven't seen in a while and days in Devon, so I feel lucky and more normal than I have in months. 

vicarious summer

Living vicariously through the delicate faded hues of these photos to emulate some form of the summer I dreamed of. 

Evocative of the serenity empty days propose but never totally fulfil, the morning sun I want to lie in with a cup of black coffee, the sea I want to swim in and the salty skin drying in the heat, open windows onto shouts of street vendors and that smell of warm petrol air that only exists in mediterranean cities. 

Each day I create a fantasy that revolves around these improbable hopes, in a time before corona when the world felt deceptively ordered. I've got lost looking at Eurostar tickets and making calendars marking all the movements of my friends in some attempt to create plans that I know should really be left alone. It's a perplexing dichotomy, between shattering statistics and graphs and death tolls, slurs of 'R' related jargon and calls for economic foundations to soften the already pernicious blow, and mindless, reckless drunkness in beer gardens and crowded rooms, a discourse moving on as though it is already tired of this ceaseless pandemic. Somehow, I feel 'all men are liars' really epitomises the world right now. 

In all honesty, I vacillate between the two. I know the seriousness, feel blindsided, condemn the slow response and too-rapid relaxation. But I am also bored, dream of the summer I selfishly convinced myself I 'deserved', as if my privilege could somehow ward off the virus. I've grieved for a life I left behind, which was so good I perhaps know it wasn't real and couldn't last, and sometimes convince myself that tomorrow I will awake and this will have been an apocalyptic, cold-sweated dream forged to remind me to live a little harder. But, echoing something I think Alain de Botton said, why did I think we could avoid this? That we had overcome nature, and could never succumb to its innate powers. 

Instead, this is the world and the times we are living in. Adapting to the lessons it is teaching us and hopefully listening to the calls for human softness on the natural kingdom. I don't think an existence in this hopeful summer is wrong or futile. It gives me promise for the future, makes me evaluate the things of importance, perhaps create a bucket list for post-corona days. 

I'll try and recreate the warmth and serenity of these pictures, somehow. In my morning coffee under my duvet, in walks in the damp drizzle that still feel somehow releasing, in smaller adventures that appease the hunger for newness. I've rearranged my room, stuck anything remotely orange or peach up on my walls and have taken to sleeping exclusively with the window open. I've found some excitement in bought coffees, the hour of cereal eating and book reading that I savour each morning, and the excessive number of silver rings I have collected.

Trying not to think of what the summer of my twenties should look like, you know?

(sources of pics: all found here)