Thirty Things

Some landmark, previously obscured by hazy expectation, is drawing near. So for lots of reasons that seem different than the cliches (but probably aren't) I want to mark this moment - because now is as good a time as any to start the rest of my life.

The Full and Complete List

One
Visit one city I have never been to before

Two
Be by the sea. A lot
(once so far)

Three
Take three friends out to lunch

Four
Join a group I'm passionate about

Five
Walk five miles of country road

Six
Make six beautiful things

Seven
Go seven days completely unplugged and off the grid (in your own house)

Eight
Compliment eight strangers

Nine
Hold a baby

Ten
Do ten cartwheels

Eleven
Read eleven books I've always been curious about

Twelve
Send postcards to twelve people

Thirteen
Grow a wildflower garden

Fourteen
Eat off of pretty things as often as possible (buying cheap mismatched china to make this happen is allowed)

Fifteen
Write a really good short story

Sixteen
Barbecue and picnic sixteen times this summer
(5 down...)

Seventeen
Paint the house a color you love

Eighteen
Bite the bullet, and do that super secret project you are embarrassed to admit

Nineteen
Build a bonfire

Twenty
Learn to make twenty new recipes
(three down, addendum: Beer Butt Chicken was a spectacular start)

Twenty One
Learn to sail

Twenty Two
Play on a swing set and remember how awesome it is

Twenty Three
Sing in public, just once, and see how it goes

Twenty Four
Create twenty four sweets and send them to someone you love

Twenty Five
Wave at twenty five people riding by on the bus

Twenty Six
Get rid of twenty six articles of clothing

Twenty Seven
Go on a road trip

Twenty Eight
Go twenty eight days without sugar or bread of any sort

Twenty Nine
Learn twenty nine words in another language

Thirty
Have a midnight Carpe Diem, just for you

I do have news, life is in the fast lane these days, but I am about to make a paella so I don't have time to write it all down.

In the meantime, I give you my back of the cupboard world class BBQ marinade . The perfect change of pace now summer's hit it's peak.

Thirty on my mind

For about a year, the prospect of 30 has drifted in and out of my consciousness.

Some landmark, previously obscured by hazy expectation, is drawing near.

I mostly don't mind at all - or rather I don't mind in the way that seems expected. The way it works on tv.

I am not worried about aging (I like my gray hairs). I am not sorry my 20s are ending. I am not terrified of the commitments and seriousness of life ahead. I am not racing a clock, bodily or metaphorical.

I do mind that I am slow to seize the new me. That my vision for the future (it is truly beautiful) is taking shape and I want to grab it right now -- not wait for money or sense or reason. I do mind that regret and resentment still hold me back sometimes, but I am working on that.

So, for lots of reasons that seem different than the cliches (but probably aren't), I want to mark this moment.

I want now to be a time I can look back on and remember. To see the change. To know the bravery and hope that filled my life in this turning point.

Serendipitous then, that I got an email alert from Joy the Baker today. It is fab. I love her (mostly because she reminds me of my sister).

Lovely Joy is also in the thirty-something transition. And she made a list : 30 Things Before 30 Years.

It's a lovely list (and reassuring she hasn't quite got it done yet and it's become a 30 Things in 30 Years list)

So I thought it was time I came up with my own.

I'm not sure I need to stick to the numbers, I don't need a gimmick here. And I'm not entirely sure it'll be things that need to happen in the next six months - but now is as good a time as any to start the rest of my life.





One
Visit one city I have never been to before

Two
Live by the sea

Three
Take three friends out to lunch

Four
Join a group I'm passionate about

Five
Walk five miles of country road

Six
Make six beautiful things

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten
Do ten cartwheels

Eleven
Read eleven books I've always been curious about

Twelve
Send postcards to twelve people

Thirteen
Grow a wildflower garden

Fourteen
Eat off of pretty things as often as possible (buying cheap mismatched china to make this happen is allowed)

Fifteen

Sixteen
Barbecue and picnic sixteen times this summer

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty
Learn to make twenty new recipes

Twenty One
Learn to sail

Twenty Two

Twenty Three

Twenty Four
Create 24 sweets and send them to someone you love

Twenty Five
Wave at 25 people riding by on the bus

Twenty Six
Get rid of twenty six articles of clothing

Twenty Seven

Twenty Eight

Twenty Nine
Learn twenty nine words in another language.

Thirty



Hm. Am running the risk of putting in impulsive nothings to fill the list just for the sake of it. Will sleep on it a bit I think and add to it as and when.

Any suggestions people?

I have finally sorted out my LinkedIn. and after a morning staring blindly at tick boxes my eyes are swimming.

I so don't miss having a desk job.

I may or may not have made a giant skillet cookie today.

I may or may not have done any measuring whatsoever, resulting in a giant lump of goo.

I may or may not have undercooked it so it stayed that way.

I may or may not have eaten the entire thing while contemplating nothing and reading trash.


but if I had, it would have been worth it.

So, that story I was writing?

It's going to be published in this book.

Hideous, but awesome.

today I told Liam my deepest, darkest secret. the one that haunts me almost everyday.

and everything feels different now.

My friends are turning 30.

And having babies.

My feelings on these points can waiver. But they are ever present. Like a storm brewing on the horizon. An awesome, amazing, thundering storm which shivers the spine and brews cackling, ecstatic howls in my throat.

I'm having such a funny time of it.

Drifting, fluffy, hazy times. Oddly discontented and vivdly stressful dreams.

And yet it's no longer an annoyance. A hinderance to my days.

It feels like a call to arms. It's time I got on with things. I feel suffocated, trapped. At odds with myself. Why don't I bloddy well get on with doing the things I want to be doing? There is no point in waiting.

So, bit by bit my life comes together at last.

I spent yesterday writing an article. about science. it was terrifying. and just right.

Right now I'm trying to figure out how to upload ebooks for a job. The problem is, I want them to be free, so the licensed aggregators who take a cut to get you in iBooks and Kindles really aren't going to work. suggestions welcome.

open road

When I am stressed, I dream of endless airports and crowded tube stops and stressful dead empty spaces. In many ways, quite literally, they are my worst nightmare.


And lately, more than ever, I need open road. Clean, fresh air. Empty sky and plenty of roam to roar and run.

Which I guess is why I've been hankering for a car.

We don't have one, and to be honest, in this town it's unnecessary expense and hassle - much as I'd like to pop to the country for a Sunday drive every now and again.

But now the urge is almost impossible to ignore. It keeps me up at night. I need to get out, I need to get out, I need to get out...

So, to pass the time I've been daydreaming about the car I will someday have. The one that will take me out into wild expanses and help me feel free.

Most days I am up for a bit of Grace Kelly glamour and antiquated sophistication and am almost settled on what is quite possibly the world's cutest car, the Nissan Figaro, which incidentally should only ever come in that retro hospital green with a white soft top. In case you were wondering.

Though, in my searching, I must admit there are many times I'd be seduced by the bad-boy-made-good charms of this humdinger, the Fiat Spider .

So much love. So little cash.

Someday little beans, someday I will wear a headscarf and drive you til your wheels bleed.

also, remind me to tell you about the time I made bread with cornmeal and apple cider to go with the best curried lentil soup you will ever eat.

It was one of my finest kitchen moments of all time. hands down.

the mother of invention

sometimes I get these cravings. To hear a certain song, to lay in the grass. Usually they are about food, but I'm trying to make it sound like they are normal, healthy urges.

Well, tonight I needed sweet. And not candy or fruit, but baked good. Gooey, squishy, melty goodness. And it needed chocolate.

But my cupboards are bare. Like seriously. The fridge has half a head of broccoli and about a thousand condiments and an old cheese my uncle brought over from Ireland (don't ask). It is sketchtown.

So, I needed all my kitchen skill to work this magic. And boy, have my years of experimenting paid off. At last, I have a useful talent!

I literally took a skillet, lobbed in the dregs of a jar of peanut butter to melt on low, mixed in the crumbly ends of the brown sugar and waited for it to melt too.

Then added a dash of milk (trying to save enough for tomorrow's cereal) and the last squeeze of vanilla, plus a couple of fistfuls of flour, a big shake of baking soda and a pinch of salt.

Mixed it together on the stovetop until it was like wet cookie dough, then put it in the oven for 10 minutes to crisp.

Tasted the fork I'd used for stirring (the kitchen utensils are all dirty, so sue me) and realised it wasn't sweet enough, just tasted like dough - so while it baked, I made impromptu icing.

Scrapped the remaining butter wads of the paper wrapper, melted it in the microwave, added some cocoa powder, the last of the milk (guess tomorrow is stale toast now) and some icing sugar which has been lurking in the back of the cupboard since my mother bought it Chrismas 2009

... and voila! Creamy peanutbutter blondie with chocolate drizzle sauce, to be eaten hot, straight from the pan. honestly, I'd offer you some but it's gone already. Just too perfect.

I am a god of small things. well, the sorts of things that come with utensils anyway. I'm still working on the rest.

today

Life is very flexible lately. Having no schedule means I often feel listless, but it also means I'm slowing running out of random distractions and getting on with changing my life.

Of course, the important thing I always avoid noticing too forcefully, is that in relaxing my routine and seizing my new interests, my everyday is becoming my new life quite organically. Honestly, it couldn't be better.



Having thought about this a bit, I'm going to record today, so I can remember this freedom isn't at the expense of effectiveness.

7am alarm goes off. snooze.

8am rouse to chat with Liam over breakfast before he leaves, then watch the mist
gathering out the window

8:40am roll out of bed, make a pot of tea and sit in the bay window overlooking the garden and write in my journal

9:20am stretch. eventually stop even trying to contain the cat-like noises my body seems set on emitting

10am dither over breakfast. decide to make (read: make-up) honeyed soda bread.

10:15 pop it in the oven, and tidy the hurricane of a front hall while it bakes. this mostly consists of sorting out the bookcases and filing away the piles of receipts and mail. it feels very Mary Poppinsish. bonus: find some old cards and letters and re-read them, feeling all fuzzy inside

10:50 - butter the toasty warm bread and feast

11:00 spelunk in the dvd bookcases and start sorting out those we still havent watched (MadMen, Persepolis), those that should come when we move (Persuasion, Edward Scissorhands) and those I'm probably done with (Signs, Team America). make a mental note to talk to Liam about his opinions on the subject.

11:30 personal emails and dither on twitter

12:15 finally take a shower and get dressed

13:00 chat to Liam on his lunch break briefly while concoct lunch. Today, thai sweet chili noodles and edmame.

13:30 proceed with an afternoon of weird tv (The Beauty of Diagrams & When the Moors Ruled Europe so far) and work (research, emails, proofing some work I've commissioned)

And now, the haar has rolled off, the sun is shining and I think it's time for a long walk, possibly a cuppa and then the commencement of the holiday weekend!

delayed

I thought working from home would leave me all this time. I was wrong.

I will write soon, and there is much to tell, but it is just too sunny to stay inside and our wifi doesn't reach the garden. so it'll have to wait. you poor poor people.

culinary creativity

So I am not one to brag, but I am getting seriously good at this cooking thing. Well, on occasion.


I still have my fair share of mishaps and mangled recipes - say the first time I tried to bake a potato. in the microwave. without forking holes in it. or the curdled alfredo. or any number of honest mistakes.

but now it's ten years on (really, I didn't cook anything but ramen noodles and the occasional frozen dinner until my sopohmore year of college, and even then it mostly pasta bake and toast piles until I moved to Eden-burgh).

Now, at last, I feel confident in the kitchen. I know my spice rack. I can feel combinations in my throat and nose before anything hits the pan, and I've had some corking successes. Turns out, once you've got the basics in you brain, and the more I let myself invent and ad lib, the better things are turning out.

So first: my weekend decadence: Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies.

I won't put it in the Gastronomic hall of fame, as I didn't really do anything more than find something outstanding - but I certainly count good research and experimentation as a skill.

So Joy the Baker posted Alton Brown's best batch ages ago. While I didn't bother to melt the butter, using bread flour was inspired (but non-essential) and Joy's great cookie debate got me thinking about cookie chemistry - namely, why didn't I beat and fluff my dough in a mixer they way I would cake batter for light, fluffy perfection?

Also, her pointer on chilling the dough first was very clever. I always do for cut-outs so it's roll- able, but for drop cookies, the chilling helps them stay in shape and stand tall in that first blast of oven heat.

So anyway, essentially, I took this recipe - creamed soften butter with sugar to start, followed the directions (and used a mixer) until the flour - which eventually got too stiff for my shitty $10 bought-it-on-amazon handheld and most importantly, WAY undercooked them.

The best bit though, was adding 1/4c Hershey's cocoa powder, an extra dash of milk to cover the extra dry, and added peanut butter chips instead of chocolate.

My they were heavenly. Seriously. Like amazing.

Especially if you only bake them for ten minutes, and then bring the hot tray to sit in front of the tv (on an ovenmit) so they can finish baking gently, stay gooey and be the perfect mix of mushy melty love while you watch crappy documentaries about China.

-----------

I won't go into such a narrative about my lunch today, but it was stellar. Turning that weird midday "oh what shall I eat" cupboard rummage into something majestic yet simple. Perfect for one.

I will put it here for your delectation.

the touchscreen terror

So I have been struggling with the touchpad for a long time.

Whatever the iVention or increasingly, every other bandwagon-hopping technofirm's market-share-grabber, I just cannot abide touch screens.

Having been relatively tech savvy in my day I have been dismayed at this. Have I finally become a crochety old person? Have the youngun's passed me by with this new fangled development? Am I too old to learn? Is early adopter no longer in my vocabulary? It keeps me up nights.

I kept trying them, thinking maybe it was just teething issues. Thinking, hoping maybe you just had to grow into it.

But last week I cracked it. Well, Colin did really, but he had no idea his nonchalant observation would open the can of worms it did.

You see, as I tried to type on his iPad (with easel!), I was explaining that it was just untenable. Every single keystroke was wrong.

And then, in his nerdtastic way he said "oh, you touch type"

Which isn't really news, rare though it may be. I went to Catholic School. I had typing tests every week. There was a cloth over my hands when at the computer, and a nun behind me with a ready ruler, so I had to type without looking.

(Okay, the nun bit is a lie, but the cloth hand-fold isn't)

And back in 1989, that was a pretty big thing. That I'd grown up at a keyboard. That I knew what all the keys did. I was pretty proud of my fast little fingers (and certainly thankful of their speed when I had to transcribe interviews in college).

But now, oh now, it has let me down.

Now I am a dinosaur. No one can touch type these days (I can just hear the rachety granny voice now...). It's not a skill anyone cares about.

Most people still laze about with one index finger plucking away, no matter how many years they spend in front of the screen.

And the world of technology has cottoned on. Because people who look where their fingers are going don't care where the keys are. How far apart they are. How tall they are. If the size is changed a bit. If the rows are squashed to fit the netbook screen size. If there is no tactile difference to distinguish between the letters.

But my fingers, they learned a shape. They learned a ratio of movement. One that is consistent and useful, only so long as keyboards are a standard size.

And now, all these squishy, moving type boxes mean where I say H is could be a J or a G or even (gasp) an N.

No wonder I hate these fancy pants screens. They make me seem stupid for being the only person in the world who bothered to do it right in the first place. And now, they reward the lazy fuckers who never bothered. (it's official. I am old.)

But that's capitalism for you. Damn Apple.

I am working on a short story.

The first in over a decade.

Now it comes close to finishing, I am terrified. my heart is racing.

Someone tell me it's okay. Remind me it's about the story, not the rejection I feel is inevitable.

food III

my week of eating continues...


Sunday continued
(I caved and had another cupcake that night)

Monday
huge bowl of granola (plain)
apple cinnamon tea

wild garlic leaf*

turkey sandwich: 3 slices of turkey, a bit of marg and henderson's organic sesame loaf
honey roasted cashews (handful)

apple cinnamon tea
a slice of that bread, with nutella on

2 stuffed peppers

two more slices of nutella bread (I couldn't resist)

Tuesday
chicken nuggets (5)
camomile tea

a handful of granola
smoothie

1 c whole wheat penne
1/2 courgette (zucchini)
1/2 bell pepper
roasted with a bit of mozzerella

couscous bake

3 chocolate chip pancakes (for Shrove Tuesday)

Wednesday
2 scrambled eggs, slice of granary toast
peppermint tea

last stuffed pepper
griddle quesadilla

2 tacos (hard shell, soya mince, cheddar, old el paso sauce)
green beas
sweet corn

the last lonely lump of granola

Thursday

honey & walnut bread
smoothie


I'll stop here (though I am planning on lentil and bacon soup tonight, possibly with cornbread). That's pretty much a week. and I could say oh I was on my period. Or I have been really depressed about work.

But the fact of the matter is I eat sweets every day. I do. It's a hell of a habit.

I suppose I don't have caffeine or fast food - so all in all, it could be a much worse vice. And possibly I could find better ways of getting my protein in the morning than chicken nuggets, but they are convenient and require no work, so for now I suppose I'm willing to live with the fact that I eat ready made meat products every couple of days.

So there you go. How completely unremarkable, but still I enjoyed it.




*ps - eating a wild garlic leaf may sound crazy, but was very tasty. I was so surprised there was a hillside full of it this early in the year (and beneath Roslin Castle on my hike no less), I picked a juicy one and nibbled it as I walked the banks of the River Esk. I know. It sounds pretend. But it was a beautiful day - and fresh, sharp treats foraged by my own wildman skills made it extra good.

food II

deary me, have fallen off the bandwagon already.

Food Week, the next installment:

Saturday
homemade granola (should definitely give you that recipe, my god do I love it)
smoothie (this time boysenberry!)

panko breaded chicken breast with basil salad con sundried tomato relish
elderflower fizz (aka apple juice, tonic and elderflower cordial. sounds snazzy.
sadly, it tasted like canned peach juice)
(also a bite of Liam's tiger prawn linguine)
in case you can't tell, Liam took me out to lunch

peppermint tea

veg stew

Sunday
chicken nuggets (5)
smoothie

picnic lunch
3 herby oatcakes
4 poppy seed crackers
lump of parmesan
3 sun dried tomatoes
granola (handful)
juice box (apple)

2 pork & bramley apple sausages (in buns)
peas
sweet corn

day at the beach today. fucking freezing, but still very sweet of him to take my bloated pms'y self to the shore for a breather from town and a picnic.

food

we all know I love food. a lot. in many, many different ways.

so it's no surprise houseguests bring on a bout of change and something a little special. but it was shocking how much crap jennie and I ate last week. more sugar than i imagine either of us have had in years. and goodness did I feel it.

so, now it's time to clear out, clean up and get back on schedule.

it's funny, but until I started eating The Old Way (late night pizza, munching on ready made treats, tons of sugar) I didn't realise quite how far I'd drifted from it.

So, as an experiment, I am going to write down everything I eat for the next week. I have no idea if it'll be The Old Way, or what I suppose is The New Way, but based on the feedback our guts were giving (which was audible) I think I'll know it when I eat it.


Wednesday
chicken nuggets (5)
apple cinnamon tea

wild rice with broccoli, tomatoes, peas & bells peppers
juice box (apple)

smoothie (blackberry & cherry)

cornbread roll with lots of honey (homemade)

gnocchi with sage butter
green beans (steamed)

chocolate cupcake (half, no icing)



Thursday
cornbread roll w a tiny bit of honey
smoothie
rosebud & camomile tea

chocolate cupcake (the other half)

juice box (apple)
herby oatcakes (5)

(only now it's written down do I see what an odd list this is going to become...)


broccoli, pepper, tofu & edamame stir fry with egg noodles

a slice of raspberry victoria sponge

Friday
chicken nuggets (5)
smoothie

camomile tea

half a pink grapefruit with a bit of sugar
corn bread roll

savoury cashew & pumpkin seed mix (handful)
juice box (apple)

1 bite of the aforementioned cake.

the chick pea curry I invented tonight
with a garlic & coriander naan

I bought myself flowers for my birthday.

Big, fluffy yellow and orange mums and daisies.

I can see them peeking out of the living room window when I'm walking home.

They make me so happy.

a lance for hire

So going freelance seems easy - and the work is, but all the other stuff is quite a truckload of crapola.

If I am my own company, I am the marketer, designer, accountant, bookkeeper - and perhaps most importantly, tax payer. Things normal offices have staff for. Things that take up a lot of time and effort sorting out (until I make enough to justify getting fancy accountancy webernet stuffs, an exhorbitant expense for where I am at right now).

So all of a sudden I am spending my evenings formatting invoices and logging my hours and creating spreadsheets for my expenses.

I need a filing system. And a paper bag. stat.

promises

Remember how last year we had to go get ourselves a pseudo-marriage-visa?

It was kind of a big thing.

While we will get married (and we discuss it at length, now it may be one of our only narrow windows to get him into the States), it's not yet. We can't afford it for a start.

BUT, the promise we did make still matters. a lot. (even if we refer to it as pre-engaged. though, I am no Egg. And he is no George Michael)

We wondered how to mark this moment. To trace the days where we still were committed, even if it wasn't quite the same thing.

And we decided to get each other rings as our Christmas present. Not wedding bands or even an engagement ring, but something that fit us. That worked for right now.

Today we got them. It's not flashy, or fancy. But we saw them in a jewelers, two in the window, side by side - and magically, just the right fit for our two fingers. Like it was meant to be. Serendipity.

They aren't awesome enough to say all the things I mean (though I tried among the snowdrops and the clanging churchbells and sunshine this morning when I slipped it on his finger), but they look a bit like this.

And I couldn't be happier.

I have decided to have drinks, to mark my leaving of this life.

And all of a sudden I've invited almost 200 people in this city.

I guess being marginally famous means I know a lot of folk.

I even have a snazzy website to keep track of rsvp's and generally stalk my guests with pie charts and status updates and everything.

Also I am quite proud of my silly little invite. See what I did there?

Have a look here

Self Employed

There are many hard and weird things about jumping ship.

The sorrow I expected, the freedom seemed promising.

But now, when days stretch before me with everything and nothing to do, it's a little daunting, and on occasion more than a little upsetting.

Going freelance means flexible.

It means I am in charge.

It means I only take work I want.

(except when in a fit of panic, I say yes to anything because I am terrified of the gas bill - which happens more than I'd like to admit)

It also means no rules. I set my own deadlines. I'm the only one checking up on me. When it's work I'm none too keen on, it's like having a toddler in my brain.

Plus, the whole reason I left work was to have time. to stop. to think. to do NOTHING. to have filled my weeks with laundry, dusting, email, facebook, and piles of work means I'm doing exactly the opposite.

I'm avoiding my life, because honestly, I don't know what I'm going to find. I know it's time to clear the rubble. Harvest the good and bin the rest.

But I don't know what goes in which pile.

Not being sure of what I'm about to lose is making it a scarier proposition than I expected.

I finish work today.

Which means right now I am clearing out my office.

And I keep finding email exchanges like this:


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Blackwell - Edinburgh
Sent: 06 August 2007 08:34
To: Sara
Subject: Dime


I got a dime in my change this morning. I think I will keep it.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Sara
Sent: 06 August 2007 10:08
To: Blackwell - Edinburgh RBS
Subject: RE: Dime


Oh the buds of cotton. Brings a tear to my eye. Besides, it's worth 5p, it looks like 5p. Who's really going to care?

S


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Blackwell - Edinburgh RBS
Sent: 06 August 2007 10:13
To: Sara
Subject: RE: Dime


It's cute. Who's that guy on the back?

Also, not your problemo but I tried to RSVP for the Opening Party and the email got returned to me cos the address doesn't work
Maybe you should try it out before passing it on to someone cos it might just be me being silly...

So, after the weekend, do you now have 3 moms?




--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Sara
Sent: 06 August 2007 10:18
To: Blackwell - Edinburgh RBS
Subject: RE: Dime


It's Eisenhower I think but I don't remember.

The email should work now, it was just down for a bit. Party should be quite the gig. 500 people last year apparently. And a roving band. Last night was at the fringe do behind Cargo. Pissing it down, but the drag queens didn't mind. I met the Hollywood designer the tiny designer in the Incredibles was made after. She had her Oscar in her arms but wouldn't let anyone touch it.

And yes, we had brunch in bodacious and then wandered to the bethany shop where they bought us a bookcase as a housewarming present (to go with the harvey nics champagne!). I think I have been accepted. It's official. I was invited to their civil cermony, that makes me family right?

S



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Blackwell - Edinburgh RBS
Sent: 06 August 2007 13:13
To: Sara
Subject: RE: Dime

I hope you are recording your life in some way.

change.

Big is a relative term.

After all, a really big grape is what, the size of a golf ball?

But today my life is big like the size of the Death Star.

While my successor has settled in well, and taken to the job like a fish to water (mostly. which is more than I could have expected. my type A judgementalness can only be so accommodating).

I finish on Friday. And as I tried to explain to my pseudo-therapist, I'm not just leaving a job or an office. I am letting what I thought was my dream life die.

I am giving up on more than the desk, but the whole industry. I will never see 90% of these people (and there are thousands of them) again. I am turning my back on much of what I have built with every ounce of my being for the last five years, and that is an intense thing.

I wish I could viking funeral boat the whole place to give me a sense of scale, but that would be highly illegal. But farewell toast and a box of paltry desk detrious to cart home really isn't going to do this transition justice.


Also, leaving this work means leaving employment. What I need is time and space to sort out new directions and new plans.

I'm clocking off.

And it's terrifying.

I had no idea I had such a profound and abiding fear of poverty until the prospect of living without a paycheck arrived.

I am suddenly so small and so scared and fly off the handle about all sorts of random rubbish because deep down I am afraid I can't support myself. That I am starting on a slippery slope to destitution, ruin and depression I'll never recover from.

I don't believe it. Most of the time. But it is lurking my sadly child-like brain. waiting to haunt my days.


So, for better or worse, my throes of panic have brought about change.

On a positive bent, I asked the world for what I did want: flexible, artistic, full-filling PART TIME work to pay the bills while we save up to move. In media especially, as I think that's where I am headed.

On a negative one, I panicked at having freetime to face my fears and was cajoled by my overly analytical and deeply manipulative brain to find rash acts under which to bury my undying terror of poverty and loneliness.

Either way, I've now got more work than I know what to do with.

I'm a specialist consultant of freelance retainer with the BBC.
I'm doing some event management at the Science Festival.
I'm project managing a Book Festival thing on contract.


and Monday I have a meeting about running a specialised PR campaign around a new book hitting the market this spring.


Ask and ye shall receive, even when it's a mixed blessing.


Please don't let me ruin this. I worked so hard to let go. To give myself time and space and this spring to sort my life out. Don't let me railroad it with projects until I can't see straight.

Don't let me waste this chance for change.

Today I cleared out my desk. Every scrap of me is now removed (we had to take a taxi home), and tomorrow She starts.

I tried not to get teary eyed and weird, but to be honest. It's a lot more than a desk.

I'm giving up the reigns, and I've never been much of a passenger at the best of times.

I hope I am up to this. This letting go. This starting over.

It may well be amazing, but it also happens to be fucking terrifying.