The Break Up.

So I watched ‘The Break Up’ last night and felt totally cheated. I cannot believe they don’t get back together at the end! That’s not a Rom Com, that’s a Rom Con! I didn’t sit and watch an hour and a half of actually quite an engaging film to see a mutual agreement at the end not to be together. I wanted rain, maybe even a bit of snow. I wanted an exhausting sex scene or a fireworks display where they declare their love for one another. But, no. I got ‘see you around’. Very, very disappointing. For once, real life is more exciting than the movies. However, in an attempt to prevent this turning into a film review,  I must turn to the real reason I’m writing this; because of the way the film made me think about my own break up history.

Having been through only two major break ups in my life, I feel a little inadequate on the discussion of relationships falling apart but I personally think that the first is always the worst. Not because you love them more than any later lovers, just because it’s so new. At the age of around sixteen, you find yourself completely falling for someone with the entirety of your heart, body, mind and soul. (I don’t think one ever falls harder or faster than when falling for a first love.) So when the inevitable happens and the relationship crumbles due to conflicting university choices, travelling, or worst of all, cheating, your whole world seems to fall apart. Once you’ve been through The First Love Break Up, whether you are sixteen or forty-five, a lot of things are put into perspective. I think it makes you a little colder, a little more closed and a lot more cynical about the future…

But once the first is somewhat behind you, you follow it up with the next break up which is usually The University Break Up, or as I like to call it, ‘the early twenties freak out’. You get to twenty-one, final year of university and think ‘Oh Holy Fuck, I have a year left to go wild. What am I doing?’ You call it off, there are tears, a lot more break up sex than you could ever possibly imagine and then that period where you decide that it would be a good idea to see who can hurt each other more to make yourself feel better. This is the worst phase of all. It is the numbness of this break up which is the scariest because it is nothing in comparison to the childish hurt you felt from the first. You think you don’t really care as much as the first time. But you really do. You just have to hope that when you realise you made a mistake, it’s not too late.

The Long Distance Break Up isn’t much better I’m afraid. This one appears to be all about how much effort you put in, how much you love each other or the amount of distance between you. In reality, it isn’t any of the above. Instead, it is simply just really really hard to be away from the one you love. The whole reason you are with someone is because you enjoy their company, you find them physically attractive and because your life is much better when you’re around them. You can’t experience any of these things to their maximum potential over Skype or through text messaging which is why these relationships generally fail. Think about it. How many long distance relationships that you’ve experienced, personally or not, have actually worked out? I don’t know any that have. If there’s an end in sight then it might be worth the struggle, but if not it might be time to think about the cut and run?

The thing you need to remember is that until you find ‘The One’ or at least ‘One of the Ones’,

“Love always begins with a smile, grows with a kiss, and ends with a teardrop.” Anonymous

As long as you know this, you can limit the pain and live for the moment. But is it all worth it? I think I’ll leave that one up to you…

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The Fancy Dress.

There is nothing better than receiving an invitation to a costume party.

You can be whoever you want to be for an entire evening. A superhero, a rockstar, a popstar… even Amy Winehouse if that’s your thing. I wish I could dress up everyday, which is why I just cannot understand why people are so impartial to a little dressing up!

You’d have thought it required more effort than the weekly rigorous trawl through Topshop Oxford Circus on a Saturday afternoon or something, when in actual fact, you can probably find an outfit for a costume party in your very own “I never wear this. Ever. But you never know” cupboard. It’s cheap and promotes recycling. It also allows you to have fun and play around with your identity and when submerged in work, exams, essay deadlines and these tiresome winter months, why not add a little frivolous sparkle into your life?

Due to this strange adoration for fancy dress, I was so excited when mum decided to celebrate her 50th birthday this month with a huge fancy dress party! I opted for Jessica Rabbit. It was a little bit of a ‘She-thinks-She-could-look-like-her-but-She-really-can’t’ costume, but I still loved it nonethless.

The key is for everyone to go for it. When they do, the sights are mind boggling. You get Shrek snogging the face off Princess Leia, Cleopatra dancing to some sort of Grease megamix with Madonna and if you’re lucky you might even get to see Jasmin and Aladdin having a barney in the corner. The photos are cracking too. People start to take on the personality of their characters. Shy party-goers start to pout like Katie Price and your boss always lets out their inner wild child. One family friend dressed up as Gomez Addams and even took it upon himself to break the law for his costume and smoke cigars all night. Inside. Epic.

I’ve always loved fancy dress. When I was 18 I went to a ‘Smash And Grab’ night at Punk in Tottenham Court Road where a fancy dress booth is provided for your own amusement. Instead of heading to the bar, I strode over to the booth and kitted myself out in a leotard, spotty pants and a huge pink bow in my hair. I totally don’t have the thighs for such attire but I have to admit; it felt amazing. It meant that people would approach you because you look hilarious and you can act however you like because, well,  its not really you is it?

All in all, I have to agree with Blanche, “I don’t want realism. I want magic! Yes, yes, magic. I try to give that to people. I do misrepresent things. I don’t tell truths. I tell what ought to be truth.” (Blanche Dubois, A Streetcar Named Desire) and I should urge you to do the same. Go and dress up as someone new. You wouldn’t wear the same shirt or skirt everyday because it would get boring, so why restrict yourself to the same body everyday? You never know, when you finally clamber back into your own skin, life might seem that little bit more exciting knowing that actually, you can literally be who you want to be…

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The Library.

Okay, so I’m in the depths of revision/essay/third year hell and thought I’d take another trip to the library today in order to relieve this stress and get lots of work done. However, as my concentration dwindled this afternoon, I began to notice things about the London library.

London libraries invite everyone inside, making for some sort of mad hatter’s tea part or something. Without wanting to sound too elitist, it seems as though all the people of London who have no one to talk to, come to the library, a place to study IN SILENCE, to talk to people. It really is beyond me. There’s always some nutter asking the librarian lots of utterly pointless questions, gaining everyone’s attention as they peer from behind their desk lamps, pretending to be absorbed in whatever it is they’re reading. There’s always a group of cackling GCSE or A Level students in hysterics over dropping a pen or flirting with eachother over Chaucer. There is always a fittie reading some romantic novel making him seem even more attractive due to his intelligence… actually that I am not complaining about. Distractions are welcome in this case.

A distraction that is not welcome, is the ruffling of newspapers. It really irritates me when people come to the library to read the newspaper. I will never understand this. Why would one choose to sit on a hard wooden chair in partial darkness and in a cold room (because libraries, for some reason, are always cold) to read the morning paper? Go and BUY a newspaper for 30p and enjoy it in your own living room. Or coffee shop. Or anywhere but here. You are taking up valuable study space.

However, despite all these issues with my local library, I still don’t know which library I prefer: the university library or the London Library. I mean, the London library has easy access to ameneties such as Starbucks and Pret but at least university libraries have wifi access! Maybe it’s just Fulham that is stuck in the dark ages but all they provide are four computers for the public. Four. That’s incredibly helpful isn’t it. On the other hand though, university libraries are tedious because everyone who goes there to study is there to be looked at. They’re all like ‘ooohh i’m studying. I’m going to do better than you because I’ve been here for five hours already and you’ve only just arrived.’ No you won’t. I do English and you do Maths. They’re completely unrelated. Pillock.

Not only that, people actually dress up for the library. I’ve been informed it isn’t just Exeter that upholds this rule of compulsory eyeliner and a fit pair of leggings whilst studying, it happens at Nottingham and Durham too. And probably everywhere else for that matter. The thing that annoys me the most? I uphold this tradition and I don’t even know why!!

My concern centered around study space only goes to show how boring my life is. So much for 2011 being eventful eh!

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The Decade.

This year I saw in one of my most potentially life changing years.

In contrast to previous New Years Eve celebrations which have been clouded with anxieties about the future, seeing in 2011 felt so liberating! Although we already saw in this freshly squeezed decade at the start of 2010, 2011 is the year that I and the rest of my gap year tragified friends graduate, it is the year I will see one of my best friends go off to travel the world, I will lose friends, forget friends and gain new ones, but more importantly I will be affirming my new phase in life: my twenties. By 2020 I will be 31 for god’s sake. I could have babies and a husband, converted to Islam or even become a lesbian by then!

I see this decade as pretty much the start of my life and I cannot wait. As much as I’ve enjoyed the entire university/whole further education experience, my god I can’t wait to leave. I want to be back here in London; feeling the buzz of city life again, breathing in dirty air, befriending people on the tube and just generally being free again.

Bring on this confuzzling phase I say! It’s pretty much our parent’s version of the 80’s, recession included and they seem like they had a blast!

On the other hand though, Nostrebumnus or whatever his name is, predicted 2012 to be the end of the world, as did the wonderful Jay Sean (both of which, very reliable) which makes me think maybe I need to just focus on the year ahead rather than the next ten. What if the world does end in 2012? Guess I’ll have to live it up in 2011 just in case.

I think it’s going to be a good one. I can feel it. And if not, at least we know it’s going to be eventful!

Happy New Year you beautiful people.

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