You Gotta Do What You Gotta Do To Get Your Degree, Boo.

Today I graduated from University with my (first) degree. I wore orange to match my hood, and ankle boots that were just high enough to reach my goal of wearing heels to my graduation. I woke up early, straightened my hair, contoured my face, shaved my legs, and then donned the good ol’ traditional cap and gown. I wore my cap backwards for a good few hours, and my hood kept slipping off my non-existent little shoulders, but it is nice to feel like I have something to show for the three years of all-nighters I just pulled. I had my 10 seconds of fame on stage, my head was tapped by the vice-dean, I forgot to smile for my photograph, and at the end of the day I have a foiled certificate, a detailed copy of my academic record (yikes!), and a generic key-chain with the words “UP ALUMNI” stamped across it in what I’m pretty sure is Arial pt 12 font. Arial is the font I have to type all my essays in, so why they’d choose such a triggering layout is beyond me.

Apparently it was supposed to feel strange. The ceremony was about 6 months after my final exam, so it makes sense that it would be a reminder for some people of the compatriots, and the campus they have left behind. I decided to take my degree further by completing my Honours year. So for me graduation was less of a reminder of the blessed student life I used to have (because my life is STILL #blessed) and more of a nice day off from tutoring and studying, with the added bonus of having my immediate family focus all their attention on me. 

The one thing graduation did for me though, is it made me reflect on how much growth I’ve experienced throughout my undergrad years.

If we look at the first blog post I wrote in my first month 1st year , I spend an awful lot of time discussing all the “strange” things that had happened to me in that month. These included:

• Singing Afrikaans karaoke (Don’t test me on Loslappie now: I KNOW THESE LYRICS)
• Meeting sneaky racists (Everyone in Pretoria is either a full blown racist, or totally against racism…there is no such thing as a “Sneaky Racist” in Pretoria)
• Being offered weed (Wow girl…you were LIVING)
• Being offered an electric toothbrush (First year Harriet was clearly sheltered and unaware of what all-nighters can do to a person. I am the one offering electric toothbrushes now. IT’S ME.)

I was 18, stupid, and completely mind-fucked by all the freedom I suddenly possessed. I thought drinking booze straight from the bottle was cool, that kissing strangers in sticky clubs was exciting (thank you Hook-up Gods for keeping all the venereal diseases away from me), and that I would never find another man like my high school boyfriend of two months (I still haven’t, and thank God).

At the end of that silly, silly blog post I sign off with a little “I have a tertiary education to attempt.” And wow, was that education attempted.

Despite the failed module towards the end of 2nd year, the 3 distinctions I managed to scrape up on the way, the countless calls home to my mother, panicking over the fact that I may have chosen the wrong thing to study, and the many, many, many all-nighters…the real education came in the form of life experiences.

I wish I could go back in time and meet January 2014 Harriet. I wish I could sit her on my lap, rock her back and forth, stroke her hair and tell her, “Holy shit kid, you’re just getting started. There’s a whole universe of people and experiences and happiness out there to take hold of. You’re going to come out of this new place, with its scary one-way streets, and its horrific neighbours, and its dingy bar bathrooms, and you are going to be glowing.”

I wish that I could pull her out the window of her ex-boyfriend’s commune. I wish that I could grab her by the hand and lead her to a different room in a different house, one with friendlier demons. I wish I could tell her not to fall in love with boys who can’t stand to live any closer than a twelve days walk away, and to stay away from Gin and Tonic and to love every wonderful, awkward part of herself. I want to tell her to keep her secrets to herself, because you never know whose tongues have been dipped in razor blades.

But if I told her all that, she would still think that Pretoria is the weirdest place in the world. And she would still think drinking out of a bottle is classy. And she would still cry whenever things get a little uncomfortable.

So I’m glad I got my undergrad. I’m glad I had so many strange nights, in this wonderful, fucked up city. I’m glad I met the people I ended up meeting, and I cut off the people I ended up cutting off, because today when I graduated, so did 1st year Harriet. And she’s so freaking proud of how she turned out.

My mother got me a graduation gift in the form of a bracelet. Along the outside, stamped in a font that is definitely not Arial pt 12, are the words “Don’t Panic”. Which just so happens to be my favourite quote from my favourite author, but it also sums up the first three years of my student life incredibly well.

Don’t panic. Don’t you dare panic. No doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. You are going to fucking glow.

You gotta do what you gotta do to get your degree, Boo.

Happy New Year Ya Filthy Animals.

So I survived 2016…we all survived 2016 (unless you are some weird ghost/corpse/zombie who has somehow obtained my URL, or you are from an alternate universe where silly things like time has no meaning, in which case: Welcome!) 

Welcome to 2017, people. All that has happened is the calendar has reset itself in a supposedly significant way, the 6 is now a 7 and the 12 is now a 1 and we can all continue living the debaucherous and immoral lives we’ve been cultivating this entire time. Go humanity!

I am pleased, however, that I have managed to survive yet another routine trip around the sun, especially since this year I started driving, which has significantly increased my sense of mortality. 

My sense of morality however is still, I admit, a little shoddy. 

I spent the last few seconds of 2016 outside in the cold, walking along the streets of the Spanish town Moraira, listening to the people inside scream “Happy New Year” at each other. It was nice to feel like I was watching everybody else get on with their new year whilst mine stood still for a bit. Then I had to watch a very loud and disorganised fireworks display because NYE is full of cliches.

My first few moments of 2017 were spent in a club I have actively avoided for about a year and a half, because the last excursion ended in me puking my guts out over the side of a Catamaran into the Mediterranean Sea (holiday life is soooo hard). This time I was smart enough not to puke, and therefore I spent the night dancing awkwardly with people who were a lot more inebriated than I was. Happy New Year. 

I got a taxi home before everyone else did (because I’m old and need time for my wrinkles to reset before the sun comes up), snuck back into my dad’s house and sat on his kitchen counter eating ham by myself. We’re off to a good start if my first meal of the year was ham. 

At this point I had enough clarity of mind to consider my resolutions, or “very relaxed guidelines for the year ahead” as I like to call them, because then I feel less ashamed if I don’t achieve them. 

My guidelines for last year were as follows: 

1. Stop getting drunk on my own emotions and sending psycho messages to unsuspecting victims. 

I like to think I achieved this. I no longer send messages, I just write blogposts of subversive intent, and maybe I subtweet a little. In terms of embarrassing texts, 2016 blessed me with a few incoherent voice notes to my friends and one failed attempt at a sort of booty call in July, although I don’t think he got what I was talking about because I just kept sending weird winky faces. (Note to self: try the eggplant emoji next time). 

This success may be due to the fact that I now have a Whatsapp group with 2 other emotional individuals, so all my angst has been channelled into them (sorry gals). 

2. Actually read all my English setworks. 

I am proud to say that I read 70% of the subscribed reading material this year. I no longer skim through study guides, I actually lugged around the tombs prescribed by the English department and became that nerd who did her homework at music festivals. 

3. Write more. 

I need to stop thinking I have the diligence or the time to churn out a blog post every week. It’s just not going to happen. 

4. Actually save my money because I need a car. 

I’m really freaking proud of myself for doing this. To be fair, the fact that I turned 21 and I have a really nice and generous grandmother paid off. But at least 26% of my car came from me carrying hot plates of food to fancy rich people and heavy beer steins to sloppy drunk people. A lot of carrying for a lot of people went into paying for 26% of my car, and his name is Slartibartfast because that’s what he sounds like when he starts up, plus Douggy A is my ultimate home boy. 

5. Get my license so I can drive the car I’m sacrificing so much disposable income for. 
3 failed tests, 2 driving instructors, 50 hours of lessons, thousands of rands, so many panic attacks and almost a year later, I finally have that stupid piece of paper that confirms that I can, in fact, drive by myself. 

Now I really hate driving. 

6. Focus on nothing but myself because I get a little distracted and forget to look out for number 1.

I’ve done a lot of weird shit this year. I jumped about 50 metres into an old mine that was filled with water, played pool volleyball with my friends in my underpants, declared war on the neighbourhood watch because they’re self-righteous dicks who do nothing, told someone I really cared about to buzz off, hosted some really good parties, passed out in a flower bed, climbed a few campus buildings, high fived a pope, and kissed a lot of people on the forehead. 

And I did all of it, pretty much, for myself. 

Which brings us to this year. The big one-seven. Here are my very relaxed guidelines for 2017:

1. Stay away from Dangerous White Men (DWMs)

Source: Disney

My best friend Su has figured out that pretty much all the angst in my life stems from my weird interest in Dangerous White Men. The ones who are clearly up to no good and will probably tear down your land in search of gold (it’s just a reference to Pocahontas, but take it as a euphemism if you will). 

2. Get better at driving. 

It’s self-explainatory.

3. Learn to walk in heels before my graduation. 

Despite my freakish height, I really want to be one of those girls with nice calves in nice heels in her nice graduation get up. I want to look fancy and tower over everyone when I take my cliched cap and gown photographs in front of a fountain. 

4. Figure out what I want to do with the rest of my life. 

Like I said “relaxed guidelines”.

5. Probably go to the gym more. 

At least I can now drive myself 600 metres to gym instead of walking all that way. 

I should probably also do more things like stop procrastinating, eat less junk food and drink less gin and tonic. But I’ll take the year as it comes. 

I hope everyone reading this has a good year. I hope you fill it with mistakes and hugs and the people you love. I hope you dance a little in parking lots and that you learn to love yourselves a little more every time you do something shameful. May you call people out if they’re being ableist, sexist, racist, ageist, bigoted or insensitive. 

Just be decent, flawed, majestic human beings. 

I love you all, 

Stay interesting. 

The Pretoria Chronicles: The craziest freaking tale you will ever read. Ever.

Source: weheartit.com

I haven’t posted in about 2 weeks, basically because adversity is the best fuel for writing and I’ve been floating in my own solace for a while (thanks Angelo for the solid observation). It’s been 2 weeks of lectures and reading and driving lessons and maybe the occasional glint of personified hope sending me voice notes, but other than that nothing particularly inspiring or noteworthy wormed its way into my otherwise predictable routine. I wrote a rather mundane post about how nice it is to walk in the rain, and then I forgot my umbrella during a deluge which changed my mind about the matter entirely. I’d basically been drifting through life at a rather sleepy pace until Friday night happened.

Before I carry on with this post I would like for my Mom to either shut down her computer now and continue as if nothing has happened, or to treat the following story as a work of fiction. The same goes for any future employers or husbands.

Right.

Friday night.

Friday night I went on a pub crawl with my ultimate homie, let’s call her D. D is pretty much ride or die- one of my housemates actually pointed out that every story I tell starts with “So D and I…”. I guess this one is no different.

So D and I went to this pub crawl with a bunch of other girls, some of which are so lovely and poised they look airbrushed. These girls probably don’t trip over things or graze their knees climbing down trees, they’re actually pretty mythical, and they’re really really nice. The plan for the night was as follows: meet up at a local bar, move on to 3 of the university’s clubhouses, try not to graze your knees on the way, Harriet.

I think I’ll have to put a time stamp on the various locations and events to keep the story comprehensive. It’s kind of a mush.

18:00: D got to my commune. We had 1 and a half drinks each to get us going. All was good, we looked hot, I had a long debate with myself over whether to take an umbrella in case it rained.

Pros: my hair won’t poof, remember how much I complained the last time I forgot it

Cons: I am almost sure to lose it somewhere

The prospect of smudgy mascara and dreadfully spiraled baby hairs was too scary to risk.

18:45: A brief walk, sheltered from the rain (HA!) to said local bar, we’ll call this “Bar A”.

18:50: Arrived at Bar A, got complimented on my hair (thanks, I grew it myself), had one shot of Strawberry Lips (Nesquik for adults), took a few selfies (millenials, amiright?) before running for cover and cars and Bar B.

19:10: Bar B. Hello, Bar B. What a delight you were! There were glasses of wine for R10 and quite an alarming number of animal heads on the walls, hopefully haunting the taxidermist who put them in that position.

Not much came from Bar B, except the Solo Cup of dry red that warmed my heart and probably caused my quick deterioration over the sobriety line into “tipsy”.

19:45: Bar C. Bar C introduced itself in the form of R3 shots, Beer pong and a tipsy me trying my hardest to worm my way onto a beer pong team.

The conversation went like this:

Me: “Hello,hi. Can we be on your team?”

Rude male: “Um, sorry, no, we’re kind of winning and we’re about to play another game.”

Me: “Oh my gosh, do you mean you don’t want to play beer pong with 3 super attractive females?”

RM: “No”

Me: ” What the hell dude? I mean collectively we are a solid 8.” (D says it was at this point she didn’t want to know me, to be fair- I didn’t want to know myself after such a display of word vomit.)

21:00: Away from the accursed Bar C and onto the magical land that was Bar D.

Bar D was packed, shots were just as cheap as Bars B and C and I locked eyes across the counter with a certain tall mystery man from my lectures.

A brief note on mystery man: I call him Dark Chocolate, not to his face. Simply because one day he arrived in a tight grey t-shirt and I was bored and almost died. It’s also really fun to make puns about his cacao beans (MOM, THIS IS TOTALLY FICTIONAL).

Dark Chocolate poured his way into my immediate vicinity, flexed his muscles and asked me why he’s never seen me out before. Then Dark Chocolate bought me drinks. A lot of drinks. I was close to getting some of that velvety Aztec goodness when 22:00 closing time hit and he told me to meet him at Bar E.

22:00: D and I had lost our lift in the process of fooling around at Bar D. So we walked from D to E, somehow I still had my umbrella. I don’t remember much of this bit, except that it was a really short walk for such a far destination, maybe it felt short because I’ve forgotten most of it, I’ll have to consort with D.

22:30: Made it to Bar E. At which point I started feeling like I was on a train I couldn’t get off of. Ran for the balcony to get fresh air, D in pursuit, I became vaguely aware of some attractive male trying to talk to one of us. I had a moment when I considered using my charm on this man, but then figured it was better for D to handle it- I was not on my A-game, in fact we’re looking at more of the later letters of the alphabet. I was on my P-Game.

*Disclaimer: I am a smart girl. I look both ways before crossing the street, I eat vegetables sometimes and I never, ever pull stunts like this- until I do.*

22:45: I hugged the toilet briefly to no avail, D ordered an Uber somehow and got me water (my request- she was smart enough to know water = disaster).

22:55: Made the Uber pull over so I could properly chunder onto the side of the road. D made some comment about how much was coming out.

23:00: McDonalds. D got out to order for me, I wretched out of the car and had a quick nap. Apparently at this point one of the nice mythical girls saw me in such a position and asked if I was alright- damn it.

23:15: Home, a few chunder scares in the car. D found out her phone was missing once we got out of the Uber. Shit.

23:30: Chaos. Freaking chaos.

D ran through commune screaming for someone to help her phone her phone (I had no airtime). I lay down in the flower bed/ also the place my house mate extinguishes his cigarettes and was perfectly happy to stay there until morning. People thought someone was dying due to D’s hysterics, they weren’t entirely wrong. I saw the white light people, I knew my time had come and I was going to meet my demise in a glorified ashtray. Time to repent.

23:45: McDonalds had D’s phone. I don’t know how, I didn’t really care (sorry D).

I got placed on the couch for the night by my house mate in first year, who I also subsequently used to go to aftercare with. I have now officially lost the respect I used to conduct at my living establishment- I am no longer a wise mature student, but a train-wreck.

03:00: The inebriated animal woke from her slumber in search of food, found D in her bed and a double cheese burger on the floor, score.

The next day: Tried not to die.

So there you have it. The most intense night of my life, and the night I realised that the allure of R5 shots and a certain slab of 90% pure attractiveness isn’t worth the fuss.

I’m still alive by the way.

 

Confessions of an apparently ancient extrovert.

I’ve always enjoyed going out. I think simply because I like finding new stories to tell and I am in love with the feeling of crawling into bed: smokey-haired and smeary-faced. I like feeling overjoyed that I made it back to my continental pillows and soap-scented sheets alive.

Last night was one of those nights. I went out with my fresh-faced and over-zealous first year housemates- whose wonder at everything I now deem to be novelties allow me to perceive my dingy university city a little brighter.

I love my first years dearly. I love how they wanted me to go out with them and how eagerly they expressed their delight at whatever outfit I’d thrown on for the occasion. I love how excited they get about karaoke nights and grubby bars. I don’t however, love some of their friends.

Queue the arrival of one particular irked freshman with angrily drawn on eyebrows and heavily contoured cheeks. She took one hooded look at my beloved, dilapidated watering hole, considered the fact that most of the people there were around my age (ages 20-22) and declared “well, maybe I’d come here if I were 30, but I want to go somewhere else.”

Her ageist comment made me giggle, especially when she needed the help of someone as geriatric as me to point her in the direction of “somewhere else”.

“Somewhere else” ended up being just as disappointing to Eyebrows as the previous place, so she graced us with her departure and I was able to fully enjoy my existence once again.

I ended up at my favourite grime-pit of a bar- the kind that condones table dancing and head-banging- and was accosted with yet another round of fresh and eager 18 year olds. One of them asked if I wanted to sokkie with him (in a seedy bar that plays only alternative music…okay, little boy) and then leaned in for the grand finale of whispering in my ear the smooth line of “so, do you want to make out?”. I laughed too hard and sputtered out a “no!” (poor chap, I’m sorry) before rescuing my friend from the clutches of a very hormonal, enamoured youth who was lying about his age spectacularly.

“I’m actually in my first year of my second degree”
“Oh really, what year were you born?”
“1994”
“Forgive me, my maths- how old are you then?”
“23”
Flashing his braces, looking very pleased with himself. I’m sure his second degree doesn’t have anything to do with numbers.

I got home around 1. Flopped down onto my fluffy, wonderful, clean bed and felt immediately homesick for the people who weren’t around for any of this, the people I’d much rather have stayed in my pyjamas with.

I like going out because people are silly and their antics and their eyebrows and their terrible pick up lines are the best material. Going out also helps me remember what I have, and how desperately happy I am to have it.

Another year, another 366 days worth of poor decisions.

I wrote a post like this last year, when 2015 was still but an infant. I was sitting at my aunt and uncle’s toasty kitchen table, trying to be all dramatic about the hardships of 2014. It was great, I enjoyed it far better than a sloppy kiss in a crowd of strangers, and who wouldn’t? I’d rather reflect on all the first world problems the universe has thrust upon me for the past 365 days than actually BE a first world problem by jumping on the generic bandwagon. The public will see none of Tequila Harriet tonight and that is my New Years gift to all of you.

Last year, like the boring human being I am, I wrote myself resolutions that were destined to be broken by January 2nd. You can read them here , or you can peruse this very condensed recap:

2014 Harriet’s New Years Resolutions for 2015, a recap:

1. To have fewer hangovers and less junk food. This one was broken at by week one of University. I even closed down a bar on a Monday AFTER walking 2 blocks just for a large Double Whopper meal. I’m clearly a disgrace.
2. Blog more. We did okay in 2015. I wrote 21 new posts, which is just under 2 a month. I also rediscovered my obsession with Twitter, which is a badly punctuated, less pretentious form of blogging, I guess.
3. Learn the guitar. LO-Fucking-L. I learnt the D chord (insert stupid “she wants the D” joke here) and then I gave up and subsequently forgot the D chord. I was not the douchey guitar guy at parties, I was clearly, according to resolution 1, the girl slurping Stroh Rum off counters on a Monday and washing it down with double cheeseburgers and extra large fries, classy.
4. Stay single until July. I had a pact with my dear friend Richard that we would remain solitary and soul-searching until July. I am still relatively solitary and soul-searching. Around April I discovered the joys of sweatpants, Chinese food and series and decided to dedicate all my pent-up love energy towards pigging out in my underpants. I am clearly very good at being single. This is a skill I’ve decided to list on my CV.
5. Learn how to say ‘no’. I’m so proud of this. I actually discovered the joys of telling people when I don’t want to do something, and surprisingly, no one disappeared from my life just because I told them so. “No” is my new favourite word next to “Tom-foolery’.
6. Learn how to be angry. Meek 2014 Harriet was WAY too chilled. She didn’t get why anger was sometimes required and she was often too scared to actually tell people when she was. This year I told several sexists off, chastised a few line-cutters and kicked my house mate out of my room when he said something offensive. Anger is good and necessary sometimes. I like the notion that I am capable of such an emotion.
7. Be happy. Despite what my relatively piney and depressing blog posts may convey, I am so happy. In the midst of all the human waste and misery, all the spilled tequila shots and the tears and the lying on my bedroom floor listening to The Cranberries- I came out content.

5/7 is a pretty decent score.

I don’t think I’ll be able to beat a 71% pass rate. That’s a solid B, I’m proud of my B.

I haven’t reflected much on what I want for this year, maybe to stop talking about myself so much and to cut down on the selfie taking (note to self: staring constantly at your own selfies is concerning and probably an indication that you’re a shameless narcissist, Harriet.)

Right so my resolutions/goals/meaningless attempts to self-improve (please improve!) are:

1. Stop getting drunk on my own emotions and sending psycho messages to unsuspecting victims. As my mom likes to remind me “you’re not crazy- stop acting crazy.” Turns out not everyone wants to hear about how my heart feels like it’s going to fall out of my chest, it gets tedious and receiving multiple texts about my feelings probably makes people scared of me.
2. Actually read all my English setworks. I must not rely solely on Sparknotes, I must not rely solely on Sparknotes, I must not rely solely on Sparknotes.
3. Write more. Ugh. Every year.
4. Actually save my money. You do not NEED that back-scratcher Harriet, nor do you NEED 15 different black eyeliners. You NEED a car.
5. Get my license so I can drive the car I’m sacrificing so much disposable income for. 21 years old and unable to make it to 3rd gear is not a good look.
6. Focus on nothing but myself. I get a little distracted, I forget what matters, I perceive other people in my life as being more important than myself. I am the hero of my own story, I can’t keep on tearing myself apart for people who are only looking out for themselves. Sometimes you gotta be your own little hero and save your own little soul.

That being said I hope everyone has a good year and you learn to kiss the people you love more often on the forehead.

Forehead kisses are the way of the future.

Bottled tourism.

I am ecstatic because for about a minute I got to breathe in Germany. I’m not picky about where I go or what I do when I go there, but I’ve decided that if I don’t have enough time to fully experience a country, I at least want to say that I had it in my lungs.

Countries smell differently. They’re kind of like people that way, which, if you ask me, is pretty cool. South Africa smells like dust and sun; it’s wild and backwards and a little bit too eclectic to fully describe; Spain smells like salt and, if colours had smells, the colour blue. Germany though…Germany is fresh and earthy and green…in all my life I have never wanted to inhale anything as much as I’ve wanted to inhale Germany.

I want to bottle Germany.

Lost in Transit…and then found.

Johannesburg: Sitting in OR Tambo International Airport by myself and I’m terrified. I have a 10 hour flight to Frankfurt ahead of me plus a connection to Valencia. I’m on my way to see my dad and the last time I did this I was 12 years old with a broken arm, a sibling on either side of me and an air hostess escort leading the way. Now I’m 20, with only my rainbow shoelaces, wooden tiki pendant and this push further into adulthood to keep me going. I’m scared of losing my passport, I’m scared of getting lost in-transit and when I hugged my mom goodbye, I swear I almost didn’t let go. 20 years old, cooking my own meals, buying my own toothpaste and doing my own laundry, and I don’t want to let go of my mommy?

That’s the strange thing about growing up; you’re so keen for it to happen, yet the minute you’re on the cusp of adultish oblivion you suddenly feel so desperately homesick.

The nicest thing about this is there was this cute little french man whom I kept passing in the queue. He had the kind of soft blue eyes that constantly look wet and a moustache that made his face look permanently whimsical. If this were a fairy tale, I am certain he would have appeared before me with a baguette and announced himself as my fairy french-man. He was just that sweet-looking.

So, here I am, boarding gate A09 to independence, about to prove my ability to navigate international airports sans a fairy french-man.

The words of Walt Whitman are on repeat in my head:

“I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world.”

I am traveller, hear me yawp.

Frankfurt: I survived. 10 hours later and I’ve come to realise that things come in threes. I watched 3 movies, read 3 chapters of “A Passage To India”, got 3 hours sleep and am currently sitting in a German restaurant on Cappuccino number 3. My mother would be proud of my growing caffeine addiction.

If anyone reading this is ever worried about grabbing connection flights, trust me on this: if you know how to read and how to move in a forward motion, it is easy. I didn’t know this when I stepped off the plane, I found out my gate number to Valencia and could hear my feet tapping along to the rhythm of the phrase I was trying so desperately to commit to memory: “Ay-twenty-two, Ay-twenty-two, Ay-twenty-two.” A22 has been added to my list of lifelines next to my passports and boarding pass.

I’m also desperate to commit to memory the way Germany looked peeking over the wing from my plane window. I’ve never seen so much green and so many trees. It’s almost like the forests sucked in the little pockets of civilisation and then the universe declared it to be art.

One day I am going to live in a log cabin in the middle of a forest in Germany. I will become a tree connoisseur and then probably go crazy from the lack of human contact.

For now I’ll have to stick with collecting German Airport cappuccinos. I am about to vibrate into two people.

Despite this, I managed to dunk my earphones into cappuccino number 3. This is either from confusing exhaustion, or because I’m a born spaz who regularly pulls stunts like this because I just can’t function like a human-being.

I may be an over-tired spaz, but I’m still yawping!

Running away…or at least fantasising about it.

“I’m running away” I announce to my mother who’s kneeling down on the bathroom floor washing my little brother’s hair. I had been given a time out and was marinating in the injustice of it all when I marched up to her, drew myself to my full 6 year-old height and told her of my intention to leave and never come back.

“Perfect,” she says, “which suitcase would like me to pack for you?”

Sheer terror and I haven’t felt the urge to leave since then.

Yet recently, I’ve been feeling this incredibly strong pull to be anywhere but here and, perhaps, anyone but me.

This year hasn’t exactly gone the way I planned. In fact, if I could go back in time and talk to the me who existed in the beginning of this year, the one standing on the doorstep of independence,  I’d say “don’t get your hopes up kid, in fact, it’s better if you don’t even ring the doorbell.”

But how do you tell the hopeful, fresh out of high school little girl that she’s about the walk into a house of abuse and intense loneliness? That she’s going to lose so many friends and that just when she thinks she’s found where she’s meant to be and the people she’s meant to spend time with she’s going to have to leave them too? This girl has just had her heart broken, she’s just gone through hell to get to a point where she truly believes that everything will be better only to be told that nothing gets better, nothing gets fixed, nothing feels okay.

Nothing feels okay.

18 years old, standing in a crowd of people who feel and think less than me, with my heart and pride smashed like a beer bottle on the floor, only to have it taped back up and thrown against a wall, just so it can be stood on almost a year later. Lying under a tree, surrounded by people who think and feel less, cradling my shredded soul with what I have left. I wish someone had told beer bottle girl to watch out for the liars and the name-callers, the crazies and the manipulators, the friends who make her feel worthless and the boys who refuse to make eye contact even when she’s a kiss away. She could have been told that if she carries on believing too much in people she would eventually find herself alone with only a tree to cling to in the world, trees don’t hurt like people do.

Tree girl got on a bus yesterday. Unfortunately the furthest it would take her was Monte Casino and back but the thought of catching the next flight out of her circumstances and away from her problems was the most hopeful she felt in a while. But how do you tell the girl who’s about to step onto a plane away from all her problems that she’s about to go somewhere that’s exactly the same as the house she got away from? How do you tell the girl with the crooked soul, the crippled heart and the constantly blind optimism that wherever she goes she’s going to get hurt?

You can’t. She has to figure it out for herself.

“Which suitcase would you like me to pack for you?”

I don’t care. Just stop this feeling.

I wrote this a few hours ago. I was mad at my cousin for cancelling our plans for the umpteenth time and feeling deeply melodramatic about the entire 1AM tree debacle. My mom came in to ask about dinner, read my post over my shoulder, saw my puffy eyes and just held me. She stroked my hair, called me sweetheart and held me like I was, in fact, 6 years old and had just been called “ugly” on the playground.

Apparently when I actually got into the adult world I was under the impression that it was something I’d have to face by myself. I’m too independent and hard-headed for my own good. Sometimes I don’t realise how hard I’ve been fighting to keep my head above water until someone finally comes along and tosses a life jacket and I’m able to crumple and cry tears of relief.

She took me to Bubble tea, spoke to me about everything else but the fantasy of me disappearing into great oblivion and I suddenly felt okay.

Being okay- being happy-  isn’t being kissed when you want to be kissed or having a perfect year with no disappointing people in it. Being happy is tea while it’s raining, having one’s hair stroked and, despite everything that’s happened in the past year, being able to make jokes and find things to laugh about.

Happiness is what you make of it, the girl under the tree has no clue how she’s going to feel about that moment next year, but hopefully she won’t still be damaged.

Plus she’s still got people to keep her at home.

I Want To Be Alive

I don’t want to start living like an adult as soon as I stop studying. I don’t want to get a steady job or find the person to spend my life with right away. I think people care about that too much, mediocre stability. I want to travel, I want to feel poor, I want to live in youth hostels and suitcases. I want to see the world, and be a spectator for a little while longer before I’m forced to be an active participant.

That’s where all the unhappiness of the world stems from, I think. People doing what they’re meant to be doing and not dancing through life trying to find what they want to be doing.

I want to be alive. I want to be different.

Stop Seeing Through Tunnels.

I can’t help but feel like there should be something more to my life. I don’t want to spend the next four years working my butt off for a piece of paper that informs the world that I am of value, only to get stuck behind the desk of a company that adds no sustainable value to the world anyway.

To be honest, if I could make a living out of volunteer work I would put down my degree and help humanity immediately. Unfortunately economics aren’t very forgiving if you do such a thing.

Since high school I’ve been involved in community outreach. I spent every Wednesday in shacks that were meant to be pre-schools teaching children cognitive skills they were meant to have developed already, I went on a mission trip to Mozambique to do the exact same thing but with children who lived in reed huts and whose parents decided drinking while pregnant would be a good idea.

I never really thought anything I did would change someone’s life. I gave myself up for service because it felt good to help. This all changed in Mozambique when I met two of the most precious little boys on this planet.

The first one smelled almost as dirty as he looked. He obviously hadn’t been clean in weeks and I was told the children often only have 2 sets of clothes. I can’t remember how we became friends or why I took such a shining to him but every day I went to the village he would run up to me and hold onto me until I left and every day his grandmother would sit against the side of the reed school house, drink cheap booze and glare at our fun. She probably hated me, I didn’t care. I decided to teach the little one about music, at least the good stuff like Aerosmith, so I sat him down in the dust and belted out “Don’t Want to Miss A Thing” to this squirming sponge for learning. I wanted him to atleast learn to keep music in his life and not to let his grandmother get him down. I don’t know if I succeeded, I just know that we both cried when I left.

The second one had the Measles and no one would play with him or touch him for fear of infection. He was isolated, snotty, tired and in the sun the whole day. The other volunteers couldn’t hold him, they hadn’t had the vaccine, I’d been vaccinated so I held him, that little untouchable kid, until he fell asleep.

I stopped community service in my last year of highschool. I figured studying, being a prefect and playing volleyball was more important than helping little kids. Since then I’ve had no passion in my life, no source of joy, I have my studies and my writing. The writing part comes with difficulty, there’s nothing to write about, I’m tired of 1st world people with 1st world problems like being “victimised” or not knowing whether to do the ALS Ice Bucket challenge in a bath tub or outside; I’m tired of Tweets and stressing about getting 11 likes on an Instagram post, I hate relationship issues and reading dumb Thought Catalog articles on “11 signs he’s a cheater.”  I don’t like dealing with stupid ceremonies like SRC elections that will only benefit people who are already studying towards a future, who already have more opportunities than my two little boys could ever dream of.

“Vote for me and I’ll make sure the clubhouses stay open longer and the booze will be cheaper.”

“Vote for me and we’ll create more jobs in the Humanities department.”

“Vote for me so I can have something that looks good on my resume.”

Is it so hard to have goals outside of our own little bubbles? Why can’t we stop talking about the theme for the next party and start talking about the refugee crisis in Syria? I don’t want to hear about Solange hitting Jay-Z in an elevator or how funny that “21” Vine is.

It feels like the state of humanity is getting worse because our brains are getting smaller, we’ve started seeing everything in tunnel vision and only think about wifi passwords and becoming “YouTube Famous.” We’ve become empty people living shallow lives only helping ourselves.

I feel like we as a generation of capable, open-minded, thinking people can find more ways to help people beyond taking no-make up selfies and pouring a bucket of ice water over our heads.

The only thing I want to do with my life is help people and then write about it along the way.

So I think I’m going to do just that.