19 months and 26 days.

London has been my home for the last 19 months and 26 days; it has been the backdrop to the majority of my greatest days and nights and the setting for a handful of my biggest falls. It's the city that still amazes me on a daily basis and also the city that drives me the craziest I've ever been.



When friends ask me "why London?", it's so hard to describe why this city means everything to me. I didn't move here to see my name written in lights, because all I want  is to see my name printed below a published piece of my own writing, whether that be in a newspaper or on a restaurant menu:

London is a greasy kebab shop. 

It's the song shared between the birds and the drunks walking home at 6am.

It's a waiter, calling me ma'am one minute and then asking to 'borrow' a cigarette the next.

London is a used copy of the Metro, sat alone on an empty tube.

It's a packet of metallic green 'Extra' chewing gum.

It's a bar of Terry's Chocolate Orange, eaten in secret as you wait for friends at the train station.

London is somebody following you home at night.

London is "ten Marlboro lights...and a lighter, please"

It's a used condom in the middle of the road.

It's a window left open during the night, wide enough for passersby to hear a couple's moans of pleasure.

London is listening to that couple.

It's two grams of cocaine just to get you through the night.

London is a sleeping tablet, and a dry mouth.

London is a can of Jack Daniels and Coke bought from the newsagents.

It's drinking a shandy on a cool summer's evening.

London is eating calamari overlooking the Thames.

It's G-A-Y on a Friday night/Saturday morning.

It's "it's not you, it's me".

A conversation remembered forever.

Roasted chestnuts served along South Bank.

A homeless man sitting outside Starbucks.

Fingerless gloves and short skirts.

Two for £10 burgers at your local 'gastro-pub'.

London is playing Arctic Monkey's album on the bus at 8:43am.

It's a fishfinger sandwich with ketchup and plastic cheese.

Buses that come every ten minutes.

London is an excellent transport system (we're supposed to say that).

It's falling in love with how somebody sounds at 5am.

London is foreplay on the dancefloor of a tacky nightclub.

It's Oxford Street Marks and Spencers for tea and cake on a Saturday afternoon.

It's arguing over religion with people you've just met.

London is vodka Red Bulls just as the night is coming to a close.

An attic flat in Brixton with four strangers.

It's the greatest love story ever told.

It's the loneliest story ever told.

London is working through your lunch break.

Sainsburys 'help yourself' salads.

It's introducing food into the bedroom to spice up your sex life.

It's bowling with strangers and your best friends rolled into one.

Vietnamese food with your manager.

London is tweeting when you're waiting for your train at night.

It's K cider to start the night off.

London is exactly like Christmas Day; you wake up and everything is amazing.

You eat six mince pies in a row, all of the Malteasers and the Galaxy Caramels from a tub of 'Celebrations' (because they're the best ones) and then start working your way through a selection box before you feel sick. 

It's opening your presents, full of excitement, before realising if you didn't drink so much, you could have bought it for yourself, saving your parents a little bit of money. 

It's being grateful and feeling guilty all at the same time. 

It's hiding the annoyance on your face when you realise somebody is always going to try and top your Christmas presents.

London is going to bed at the end of the day, feeling sick from too much food and too much joy. 

London is waking up on Boxing Day, realising you have to take the rubbish out.

Nirvana

Nirvana
nɪəˈvɑːnə/noun1.
(in Buddhism) a transcendent state in which there is neither suffering, desire, nor sense of self, and the subject is released from the effects of karma and the cycle of death and rebirth. It represents the final goal of Buddhism.

synonyms:

paradise, heaven, Eden, the promised land.

Americano.

I like that
      I now drink coffee because of
  you.

Black, and sugar please...two.
                                       Most mornings begin with addiction
   as I watch my veins turn into
the selected method of transport, as the caffeine
            mixes with my blood. A paper cut
       would only show Nescafe and nicotine.

"I need a hero"...well, actually you don't...

Five days ago, I went to see Russell Brand's stand-up show 'The Messiah Complex. I'm a huge fan of his work and the way in which he vocalises himself does nothing but make my brain hurt and my heart beat faster.

After he spent 'quality time' with the audience at the beginning of the show, Brand then spent two hours dissecting just why people think it's so important to have a hero. He compared himself to Malcolm X, Che Guevara, Gandhi and Jesus Christ in an attempt to convince people that really, we're not that different to those we place upon pedestals.

Sure, comparing yourself to the Son of God is a bit much but it got me thinking...

I know that I, personally, am incredibly guilty of placing those I admire upon a higher platform; I cannot even fathom why I do this because I only have myself to blame when these people show me they’re nothing more than simple human beings after all. None of my ‘heroes’ can cure life threatening diseases or stop famine in third world countries but yet, there they are, perched just higher than reaching distance, reminding me that I could be so much more. More hard-working, compassionate, loving, dedicated, relaxed, fearful, interesting…whatever I could be more of, they are.

I can’t tell you the exact moment my head decides it’s a good idea to place a singular person at this height, and I can only guess as to why I allow myself to make this decision. As I said before, I’m the only one who gets hurt when a person fails to reach my ridiculous expectations.
Just like Brand mentioned in his show, he, too, is guilty of marking somebody with the ‘hero’ status. Sure, he admitted to idolising four VERY famous, brilliant men but it’s not just ‘celebrities’ we’re capable of going starry-eyed over.

Back in April this year, I could officially say I had met every single one of my heroes. What started out as a joke – motivation, if you like – between me and a friend had actually become a bit of a checklist:
- Get e-mail address of particular ‘hero’ (usually a writer)
- Send/receive e-mails with them
- Arrange drinks/meeting

- Spend a whole day prior to meeting them, throwing up with nerves and convincing myself I wasn’t enough of a good writer to be in their presence.

This process happened five different times. Each time, I left the meeting in an intense state; I had just spent the evening with somebody I’ve idolised since I’ve been old enough to make my own decisions. I’m 20. I officially have nobody else I want to meet…except John Lennon but that’s impossible. It’s a complete understatement to say that the intense state mentioned above is nothing but overwhelming.

The next day, I’d be in a daze. People would try to talk to me and all I could say was “they think I’m a good writer. Like…a really good writer. They said I have so much potential and they’re excited to see my journey progress”. God, it was like I was possessed with this horrible, self-obsessed demon that stopped me from caring about anything other than what these people thought about me. I wish somebody had slapped me. But at the same time, that feeling of hearing a hero of yours praise you…it’s incomparable, it’s amazing and it’s addictive.

At the beginning of this process, I decided that all I could really do was get better. After all, that’s what my heroes were doing. They weren’t slowing down just because somebody praised their work and if anything, I just wanted to be like them. I wanted to be that good that somebody might even consider eventually looking up to me.

Suddenly, my heroes began to turn into my friends; they became the first person I’d call when in need, the most regular name flashing up on my phone, the person my Facebook would automatically assume was with me whenever I ‘checked-in’anywhere. It got to the point where I was living out their dream, side tracking my own, just to be a little bit like them.

I had the best time. I was living a life I had never, ever planned and enjoying every single minute of it. I was phoning my Mum to tell her I had spent the night partying with her favourite chart topper or Hollywood’s most famous leading man, coming into work after two hours sleep, wearing the same clothes as the night before, leaving the house at 6pm and finding myself on a different side of London at 6am. It was magical and compelling and I was living a 19 year old’s dream.

I had conversation topics to suit any situation, I had experiences under my belt that other people couldn’t even begin to get their head around and things that had once seemed impossible were now my reality. And what was even better about this, was that I had my heroes on speed dial/e-mail/next to me throughout this whole adventure.

On those rare nights when I found myself in my own bed at 11pm, I would spend hours obsessing over how amazing it was to have these people in my life; five very different people, all teaching me very different things. The experiences I had with them separately all created this huge bubble of ridiculousness in my head, a bubble that I soon discovered was about to burst.

This was the part of Russell Brand’s show whereby he compared himself to his heroes. He had built the audience, and himself, up to this point where we all genuinely believed life could not get any better. He had somebody to aspire to be like; he was constantly getting better now that he had something/somebody to aim towards…and then came the biggest flaw: the realisation that really, these people are no different to us already.

They are human. They need food and water and sleep to function. They have parents and maybe brothers and sisters. They have their own dreams. They have to go to the supermarket to buy cleaning products, toilet paper and things like butter. They go to the toilet. They suffer from hangovers and comedowns.
Every single person on this Earth has flaws. Perfection is impossible – unless you’re Channing Tatum, of course…

I soon realised that I had completely put my own journey on hold because it was too time-consuming. I wanted to spend every single possible moment, savouring in the taste of what the life of somebody I admired was like. But, was I any closer to becoming an award-winning journalist? Did I have anything, other than the dark circles under my eyes, to show my Mum I was one step closer to fulfilling my dreams?
If the answers to both of those were no, was I at l least any closer to convincing a really rich man to marry me? At least his wealth would distract my parents from my journey that they watched start and were now being forced to view as it came to a startling halt whilst I filled up on expensive alcohol?

Whilst some of the audience recoiled in shock as Russell Brand ended the show with a comparison on how he, just a simple (yet ridiculously sexy) man from Essex, was like Jesus Christ, I sat in awe as he encapsulated my outlook on heroes over the last few months with a few simple sentences.

Of course, I still place people on a pedestal. There are some I will always hold with high regards. I refuse to delete certain messages/e-mails/photos purely because they remind me of a particular person, or a memory associated with them. But I’ve given up on expecting these people to make me better. That responsibility falls on my own shoulders.

I’m learning to utilise what my ‘heroes’ teach me for the long term, the bigger picture. But I’m also learning how to edit what they’re teaching me so that these lessons completely mould around my own journey.

They may praise my writing skills, provide me with a ‘Free Entry’ pass to everything exciting and keep me distracted from my thoughts but I know now that what’s more important is my ability to turn my own dreams into reality. And I also need to focus on finding myself that rich man…

Archived.

E-mails saved in a folder re-named as 'Archived', with subject lines, detailing

the amount of times I kissed you, how many minutes we spent together and
memorable dates.
Dates only you remember, which is strange because I remember everything,
including the amount our last adventure together cost you.

I kept receipts and cinema tickets and birthday cards and mixed CDs you had made me.
But I couldn't keep the videos I recorded of you laughing,
because the thought of somebody else being the reason for that laugh
only makes my heart heavy.

You kissed me like a friend, the last time I kissed you,
but it was hard on my mouth so I knew you meant it.
I wanted us to be closer, yet you grew distant.
The phone calls stopped.

I can't help but wonder if the other girl,
the girl you could take home to your parents because she shared the
same beliefs as you, gets to hear your laugh.

But two weeks ago, your name flashed onto my phone screen, and you told me you heard a song and it reminded you 
of me.

9 to 5, part one.

Nobody really aspires to be working an average 9 to 5 job at the age of 20; most of my 20 year old friends barely make it out of bed before early afternoon and the thought of missing the lunchtime special at Whetherspoons fills them with a dread I don't even want to get my head around. In fact, regardless of age, does anybody really aspire to be working a 9 to 5? Dolly Parton may have convinced everybody that she understands what it's like to have to down two large espressos before 10am, just to function, but I'm pretty sure she's able to pick and choose her own working hours...she is Dolly Parton, after all.

Never, in my entire life, have I ever been seduced by the idea of working from 9am to 5pm. From the age of seven, I wanted to be a writer and in my head, that meant writing at 3am because it's the only time to find some peace and spending a lot of time networking with other writers, complaining about writer's block and lack of inspiration - two things which automatically mean a holiday needs to be booked ASAP. I had visions of myself sat at a desk, working from home on my state of the art laptop, writing 500 words every hour, stopping for spontaneous (but often) coffee, cake and cigarette breaks and finishing work whenever the nearest pub began Happy Hour. Now I'm older and a little bit more realistic, I cannot begin to tell you what a shock to the system it was to discover I didn't get to re-enact all of the above the minute I had a few A-Levels under my belt.

Instead, a lifetime of hard work is mapped out. If I want Happy Hour drinks, I have to earn the money to buy them. A state of the art laptop? Well, they don't grow on trees...
So I've taken up an office job, whereby I start at 9am and finish at 5:30pm. I'm usually late and if I'm not late, I'm sometimes hungover, tired or moody. The latter is a firm favourite of mine.
I'd be lying if I said I didn't struggle with the same routine everyday but luckily, my day to day to-do list varies.

The job is based at a debt collection agency; when I first started, I was an admin assistant who spent most of the day looking at the clock, urging the hands to move faster. Nine months later, I switched roles (I guess I was promoted really) and now I'm a complete Sales and Marketing tosser. I use phrases like "I hope you're well?" in e-mails, arrange client visits and make connections via LinkedIn. Friday afternoons and Monday mornings are dedicated to running reports and creating a Pivot Table in Excel excites me more than it should.
The company itself has a lot of potential to be something amazing. It's innovative, forward thinking and is in the process of finally catching up with the 21st century. Thank God.
I get on ridiculously well with my Manager (she's actually more of an annoying older sister than a pushy boss) and after a busy day at work, it's quite normal to find us sat outside a pub in Clapham, finally tasting those Happy Hour drinks I've been banging on about.
I work with my brother, which is a challenge in itself but entertaining nevertheless. Plus, it means I'm always guaranteed a lunch buddy.
In actual fact, the idea of working a 9 to 5 would be too much to bear if I was working anywhere other then the company I work for now.

One of the benefits of my job is that I get to visit clients across the country. I escape London every once in a while, braving Euston Station at 9am and travel to places like Havant, Coventry, Wolverhampton...it's not glamorous, but it beats staring at the same four walls five days a week.
So, today, I found myself in the office of a warehouse, dressed like an estate agent and sat next to my Manager. We had just finished a four hour long drive to Stoke after a horrendous 5am wake-up call and life could not have been anymore surreal unless a flying pig flew past.
"Who wants to be sat in a warehouse that distributes collectible plates featuring the Royal Family's faces? Oh, and at Christmas, they include Santa hats on the plates..." 
And the answer to that question is: nobody. Nobody really wants to be sat in this specific office, discussing how the placement of a Christmas hat would effect the Queen's hair on a plate that's going to take pride of place on somebody's wall unit.

But it got me thinking: 13 years ago, when I first decided I wanted to write for a living, I would never have imagined that spending time in a plate distributing warehouse would ever have factored into the hard graft I've got to put in. Not only just spending time in said warehouse, but some of the activities that take place at work either...I'm pretty sure I didn't sign up for "awful atmosphere, bitchy comments" when I made a pledge to create a career out of my words but still...they're entertaining stories when swapped over a few drinks in a beer garden.

My office consists of a range of people: University graduates, working Mums, angry young adults and hard-working career heads.
I sit with my manager, slap bang in the middle of an open plan office; we're between the Call Centre and Client Services, so eavesdropping means conversation topics vary. One day, it could be about cruise ships dedicated to amateur tango dancers, and the next, it could be about politics and the voting system.
There's a variety of characters who accompany these stories, starting with the right-wing-Daily-Mail-reading 67 year old who works in Client Services, the outrageously-gay-but-in-the-closet guy who works in Correspondence and ending with the over-protective-of-stationary Finance Ledger.

I'm not sure if it's because we favour Prosecco over £6 wine (no complaints though but when you've got a choice...) or because we separate work from our home life, but nobody really talks to my Manager and I. Oh, hold your sympathy, surprisingly the silence is actually a good thing. It keeps us out of drama and allows us to laugh at the ridiculous situations that unfold from the sidelines.
For example, when one member of Correspondence fell out with the outrageously-gay-but-in-the-closet guy who also works in Correspondence, this suddenly meant the team had to take sides. Cigarette breaks were staggered, teas and coffees were made separately and there was an awkward atmosphere hanging over the section like somebody had seen somebody else naked.
It provided a fair bit of entertainment on boring Tuesday afternoons and it was always a mystery as to who would be speaking to who every morning.

Bitching like that occurs frequently and it is really the people, not the situations, that bring the entertainment factor to the table. One woman is obsessed with the new coffee machine we've just had installed in our kitchen and it's become a bit of a running joke how mad she gets when it runs out of beans. Another woman drinks so much of a lunchtime, it's become a bit of a competition to guess how much sense she'll make when she stumbles back into the office. One guy pulls so many sickies, we're actually shocked when he turns up in the morning.
Although I understand the importance of caffeine when working such straight hours, I'm also starting to understand how important it is to fill everyday with as much laughter as possible. I wouldn't be privy to such ridiculous situations, conversations and people if I was sat at home with only my laptop to keep me company.

Sure, I'd have plenty of videos of funny cats on YouTube to watch but I don't think that interests me as much as knowing how my Manager's step class went, whether a specific Call Centre Agent pulled during his beloved Foxtrot lessons and what every single member of the Client Services team had for dinner.
I don't care how sad that makes me, I can't help but thank John Lennon's spirit that all of what I wished for mentioned above doesn't come so easily because if it had, I wouldn't have met some of the funniest people I know. So as much as I want to write for a living, right now I'm quite grateful that I'm gaining experience in a field I didn't even know existed up until 18 months ago. Even if it does mean I have to sit in a warehouse that distributes collectible plates sometimes...

"If you can't say something nice...don't say nothing at all" - Thumper (Bambi)

As a kid, I was never allowed to watch Bambi; my parents knew that it would lead to days of hysteria, endless sleepless nights and a hundred and one questions. I've still never watched it, purely out of fear that these things will happen, this time without the safety of my parents bed and a nightlight to help send me back to sleep.
But, despite never seeing the film, Bambi has actually taught me one of the most important lessons I've ever learnt: "if you can't say something nice, don't say nothing at all".

As a rule of thumb, if I have only negative comments to make, I try not to turn them into utterances. Sure, every so often, I slip up and I say something I end up regretting for the next 24 hours but usually, you'll only find nice words coming from my lips. I LOVE sarcasm but would never use it to purposely make somebody feel bad. I just find it easier to compliment people then to insult them, regardless of whether I mean it or not.
Unfortunately, some people tend to favour the insults rather than the compliments and I'm struggling to get my head around this.

Whether they do it to be purposely nasty or because they've placed themselves in an uncomfortable situation, people who say things venomously really do get my back up.
It's bullying, it's in most obvious form, and although some comments are meant with jest, I honestly do believe that it's easier, and a bloody lot nicer, to just keep your mouth closed.

A lot of the time, people don't even think before they make a comment; I'm one of those annoying people without a filter between my brain and mouth but even I know hurtful comments do nothing but cause upset. When I dyed my hair orange, the amount of abuse I got in the street was ridiculous. But it came from strangers, from people who didn't, and shouldn't, care about the after effect of their words. They get to go home, watch Jeremy Kyle, and forget about how their comments made me feel and good for them. The only reason they're going to address their comment is if they're evaluating how to become a nicer person - I'm the least of their worries. But when supposed friends make nasty comments, that's what gets me.

They should know how rude it is to pass comment on something such as weight, sexuality, career choice, what you had for dinner. But again, I'm shocked to see that very few people think about the consequences before they open their mouth - even when they know the person they're talking too.
At a wedding yesterday, I felt reasonably good about myself. I haven't had an excuse to dress up, wear heels and apply my eyeliner until it reached my hairline for a really long time; it felt good putting effort into how I looked and as strangers started complimenting me, I began to get a buzz. And then the comments came.
Again, regardless of whether the comments are made in jest, I think people really need to address how their words effect others. Somebody made a comment about my hair reminding them of Ariel, from The Little Mermaid. "I think you look more like the Sea Witch in that film" came a response. Cool.
At first, little jokes like this used to make me laugh but the situation in how it was said, did nothing but get my back up.
Then came the comments about weight. I've suffered with my weight since I was 13 and I'm now in a position to say I'm comfortable with how I look; okay, so I have an issue with my arms and I really hate my thighs and hips but FINALLY, the thought of somebody seeing me naked in the light doesn't make me feel as sick as it used too. But none of this matters because all it takes is one comment from one person to knock me back into that place again. Oh, and there it was "I might become bulimic for an hour, see how much food I can fit in." - sure, a sweeping statement to many, but for me, that was like a dagger through my stretch-marked stomach.

The entire day, not one single nice comment came from this person's mouth. When speaking to me, most words were laced with malice and spite, all for no particular reason. I hadn't been nasty to them or uttered a single word aimed to insult them.
It's just amazing how one person's negative actions/words can totally ruin the precedent of a day. Weddings are supposed to be a celebration of love, documented with beautiful photographs and with amazing memories. Instead, I'm flicking through Facebook photos scrutinising my make-up and wondering whether or not I share any resemblance to Ursula, the Sea Witch.

Although rather selfishly I've focused on myself throughout this, it seems that the negativity has spread worldwide.

Recently, Twitter has been like a playground for cyber abuse with strangers sending other people threats, of rape and murder, when all they should be doing is enjoying their lunch break. When did a social media platform become so negative? I signed up four years ago to keep up to date with my friends - two years ago, something clicked and I realised I could be using it to showcase my blog and to connect with people in positions that would help me. I've met many of my heroes, and some of my best friends, through Twitter and have never even thought to bombard somebody with horrible Tweets or to abuse somebody simply because they're in the public eye. This sort of behavior is so foreign to me, that I'm still genuinely shocked when I see it happening.
Caitlin Moran wrote an explanation on the reasoning behind the #twittersilence she arranged; an organised Twitter silence to alert the higher powers of Twitter that if something wasn't done to step up how abuse, and abusers, is treated then Tweeters would just find a new platform. Shockingly, this led to even more abuse from those who thought the #twittersilence was giving into the bullies. A simple act of solidarity didn't even need to be explained but the sheer naivety, and nastiness, of some people means that we're now living in a world where even positive actions are having to be explained.
Why can we not just be NICE?

There's really need for all of this negativity; why do we purposely try to make people feel like shit? Why do we even think our words matter enough for us to speak them?

Social media, although this cannot be blamed entirely, has given every single person out there a voice, and whilst that's brilliant in some aspects, people seem to think that suddenly, it's okay to use this voice to cause trouble. I see it everywhere: YouTube video comments, blog posts, Twitter, Facebook...there's so many platforms for people to shout from. It's a horrible world we live in when you're scared of Tweeting something, just in case a stranger seems to think it's okay to pass a negative comment.

I can only share my opinions but I am going to make it my mission to say at least one lovely thing per day. In fact, make that five. Whether it be a nice comment on a Facebook photo, an e-mail fan-girling to my writing hero or a Tweet, spreading love towards somebody having a bad day, I'm going to make certain that my social media platforms are radiating nothing but positivity, love and kindness. In fact, when I eventually have kids, I'm only to deter them from getting Twitter accounts (or whichever 'cool' social media platform they're using) and force them to watch Bambi instead.
I think we can all learn a lot from Thumper's words...