April 2019

It's not cold! I'm okay! It's actually still cold! I'm not okay! Okay it's not cold again! Maybe I'm okay! Maybe I'll never be okay again!

That's basically my brain at the moment (but I'll be okay) (probably)

Nothing is real. Or maybe everything is real. It's hard to tell at this point.

Me and my senior designer James presented our proposed rebrand for the company we've both worked for for 8 and 10 years respectively. We care deeply and passiontely about the company, the brand, and getting this right, and had put many hours over many weeks into coming up with something good

And everyone hated it

(It wasn't actually my boobs you guys this is just a visual metaphor for LAYING MY (DESIGN) SOUL OUT IN FRONT OF PEOPLE AND HAVING IT REJECTED

I mean maybe this is a bit melodramatic BUT

Also still hard at work sorting and trying to get up and running with the letterpress collection at my lovely local co-working space the Egg Factory. Weeks of frustration continue, as the Adana press still kept printing everything fuzzily and unevenly, but WHY

Just continuing to fully lean into the bad feels, like an over-emotional teenager. Still can't draw myself. Although actually this was an attempt to paint myself, so I'm more willing to forgive its shoddiness.

Took myself and Charlie away for the weekend, which, let me tell you, was a big adventure for the both of us. Charlie used to be very scared of trains, and still is quite scared of trains, but it's a fear I want him to get over, as I love trains (and can't drive), and want to be able to take him places with me. He's dealt better and better with short journeys and Justin once took him on a steam train (!!), so I decided he was ready to try and go visit one of my oldest friends Sarah, who lives on Anglesey (where I grew up). She's also Charlie's former owner, so arguably his BFF too. It's three trains away — 35 minutes into Manchester, a walk across the city from Victoria to Picadilly, 2.5 hours to Llandudno Junction, and then another 20 minutes to Bangor. Charlie was mostly very brave although also has no boundaries around strangers personal space (luckily everybody was extremely receptive to his advances and he made lots of friends). He's also incredibly particular about where he poos, which meant I spent the whole journey super paranoid that he really needed to go, and at every stop walked him round and round grassy areas, but none of them were grassy ENOUGH, so he refused to go (even though I'm pretty sure he needed to).

But anyway, we made it there intact and with no major mishaps, and I was VERY PROUD.

We went to Penmon beach, which is one of my favourite places on Anglesey — a beautiful pebbly beach with amazing rockpooling and a lovely cafe. Sarah has a 2 year old daughter which I still find incredibly disconcerting (because on some level we're both still the same twelve-year-old girls we were when we met), and toddlers are HARD WORK, but we managed to cajole/drag/carry her all the way, and appeased her with delicious raspberry sorbet and Welsh folk songs. Charlie drank lots of salt water by accident because he kept forgetting he was at the beach.

These are really bad, but I spent ages on them so I feel like I want to share... We went to Church Island in Menai Bridge, which was another one of my childhood/teenage haunts. The gravestones there are fascinating (in a way that I never really appreciated when I was younger), so I tried painting a few of them using my lovely gouache paints.

Me and Charlie travelled back again that day and the journey home was also very smooth, which makes me feel like maybe we can manage more future travels. Would you welcome me and an enthusiastic border collie for a mini break at your place? Let me know. I want mini-breaks.

FINALLY got the Adana working! Well actually no. I gave up on that Adana and dusted off/reassembled one of the others there and it worked pretty smoothly from the get-go. I am DELIGHTED. (The text is just some random stuff taken from the 'notes' app on my iphone, I assume everyone's notes folder is filled with similar half-remembered nonsense?)

Wrestling with the sense that I'm just drifting directionlessly and am unable to quite get a grasp on what comes next. Some days it's okay though, like a pool toy idly floating in cerulean blue on a sunny day

Justin and Dav very kindly invited me and Davey on one of their exciting roadtrips. Unfortunately me, Justin and Davey ALL get car sick (and Dav drives) so it was kind of stressful (no one actually vommed)... But anyway, we went to Haworth and Bolton Abbey and it was all very scenic and they are very lovely people, but also it was ludicrously cold and I wore totally the wrong coat and spent the whole day shivering.

HELLO WHEN DOES THIS STOP

YOU KNOW JUST LYING AWAKE AT 5AM PANICKING ABOUT WHAT TO DO WITH THE REST OF MY LIFE

Alex uses Tarot as a tool to work through some of their difficult feelings. Sometimes I wonder if I should too...

(Probably not but I very much enjoyed painting this)

Got another tattoo. It looks a bit like this but infinitely better, and I am delighted with it. Two magpies, for joy. Legs are much more painful than arms but still absolutely dealable with, I do find the whole process strangely soothing.

Hannah came to visit, and lo, it was good

Me and her went into Manchester, as she is in the process of visiting lots of good Northern cities for the first time. We ate good things and had delicious milkshakes, and it was so gloriously HOT, which was entirely disconcerting having been just the previous weekend freezing my socks off in Bolton Abbey

Went to see Milo and Elucid at the Deaf Institute and it was maybe one of the best shows I've been to (This year? Ever?)

It was also FINALLY THE END OF LENT. I got trains down to Brighton, eating all my favourite things en route.

Taking some time away from the immediacy of still being around Alex on a day to day basis (although not for much longer, as they have found a new place to live in Hebden Bridge now, and move out in a week or so)... Still figuring myself out, still figuring our relationship's past and future out, still figuring a lot of things out. When does this stop? It's been nearly three months. And even more time before the breakup wrestling with my confusion and upset internally. I want it to be over. I want to be carefree and hopeful. I'm working towards it with all my might.

When I'm in Brighton (Hove actually), I often stay with my friend James. He was away this time but still kindly let me crash at his place. It occured to me that I'd never seen the view from the top of his apartment block (he's only on the second floor), so I climbed up to the top and stood and watched the lights of the offshore windfarm blink in unison on the dark horizon for a bit. It was very soothing. Brighton still has my heart. (I'm not going back tho 🙃)

Meanwhile, me and the other James in my life (my senior designer) continue to wrestle with this painful project. AM I EVEN A REAL DESIGNER OR HAVE I JUST BEEN PRETENDING ALL THESE YEARS

And then a day in London visiting freelance clients, and a rare respite from my current default mode of INTENSE SELF DOUBT, so that was nice.

Anyway, back in Hebden Bridge, and, as much mentioned, I'm sick of feeling this way. Sick of feeling laden down by self-doubt and self-loathing, feeling paralysed about my future and like a huge chunk of my past hasn't been quite what I thought it was. Therapy feels weirdly indulgant. Practically, it's expensive. Personally... Do I REALLY need it? Am I just going through perfectly natural post-breakup feelings that will actually subside all by themselves? Maybe. But the fact of that matter is that I maybe don't have time to get better on my own. It's been three months already. I need help in understanding a lot of the thought processes I'm going through so that I can make rational and informed choices about my future, un-swayed by my current intense neuroses and paranoias. Weirdly almost all the friends I've spoken to about this specific thing are either currently seeing a therapist or have done in the past, and pretty much everyone recognised it as a positive and useful experience. Maybe we're all in crisis. Maybe that's okay.

This is also more than likely the only time I'm ever going to be able to afford it, due to my current privilged position of very low rent and reasonably okay income (pls keep commissioning me freelance clients, thank you)

It potentially jeopradises my ability to afford another much anticipated trip to the US late this year/early next, but you know what, would I even be able to enjoy that trip if I'm feeling as fragile as I am now? NOPE.

So anyway.

(Ummed and ahhed about whether to even share this, but I dunno. I'm not going to write about all of it obviously, but I think it's good to admit when we're struggling, and I also want you all to know that I know I'm struggling and am taking active steps to get through this and come out the other side in a better place. I'm sorry for anyone I've moped or moaned or ranted or gloomed at in the past few months, you're all wonderful and I love you.)

Anyway, some days I cry for like an hour straight while talking about all my failings/feelings and other days the sun's out and I walk and I feel okay, and I see some weird nature and it makes me feel a bit sick but it's INTERESTING and life is interesting, and there's new things to learn every day, so much more world out there to see, and I am so excited and ready to figure out what's next.

(This is a genetic defect called 'fasciation', and I've gone from only having read about it/seen pictures of it to seeing like three examples in the last week... Is there something wrong with the Dandelions in this valley?!)