Where did I go?

“...after about five minutes of sitting in my room watching my Dad's car turn the corner and travel down the road out of sight, my sadness is replaced by the eagerness to 'be a student'. I decided to open my door and introduce myself again to my fellow flatmates, and find that just talking to them eases my insecurities about living on my own with strange new faces. I have only been here for an hour, I haven't even had any lectures or seminars, and yet already I feel like a 'proper' student.”

Student at the Centre of the Universe - where did that person go? That person who was so full of confidence, so full of life; so young, inexperienced and immature, and yet so kind and fun at the same time?

“We have to remember that sometimes what we refer to as 'fate' can shape our futures and determine us as a person. It is therefore possible... that some things in our lives are meant to happen... and for the better.”

Where did this person go? The person who was so spirited and thoughtful? The person who was so excited about life that he didn't care what other people thought?

I don't like that he's right, but he is! Never have any words been truer than, “what we refer to as 'fate' can shape our futures and determine us as a person.”

I feel awful. I'm starting to regret who I've turned into. That kind spirited person has gone, and what's left is an empty shell of what I look like from the outside. I'm still the same ugly person as I always was, but now I've lost my personality. I'm dead.

Those words, those blog posts... they feel like a decade ago, and yet it's only really half that - 6 years.

Six years since I started university.
Six years since I first left home.
Six years since I became someone.
And yet, now, I feel like another nobody.

Loner. Outcast. Outsider.

How are you supposed to feel about returning to being a loner? How are you supposed to react when you feel like the outcast of your social group, and the outsider to your own social life?

All of the above, is true of me. I am returning to a life I never thought I'd return to, and once again I feel lonely.

I feel like the outcast in my group of mates. That is definitely becoming true: over the past year, I've been studying for a qualification in Journalism, and a lot of my spare time at weekends has instead been spent revising for exams. Recently, I had some free time and was looking forward to going out - my mates and I even had a Facebook message group going about meeting up. But then I found out that I was being ignored by my mates, who decided to go off and have a night out without me (having already said they couldn't because they had work in the morning - lies? Why are they avoiding me?).

I am the outsider to my own social life: the summation of this petty blog post. It is the inevitable conclusion that I must face in order to review a set amount of events that can only be realised with one horrible little word: fate.

I had a social life - I did! But that was called University. My social life started when I started university, and finished just after my graduation.

About a year afterwards.
But still, it has ended.
Finished.
The End.
Fin.

Every photograph - every memory - has now faded like shoddy photo prints and poor quality Polaroid-wannabes.

Every meet-up in the future now just a worthless heap of never-will-happen's lying amongst the banana skins and household waste in the bin, outside.

Everyone who can be out tonight, is out tonight. All while I lay on my bed, typing this meaningless garbage, wondering if someone else is out there reading this and laughing at me and my problems while they enjoy their life.

Or, am I over-reacting? Did they forget to check their messages, and I just accidentally fell into the never-ending spiral of texts? Was it all just a mistake and I'm the boon for over-thinking everything?

Have I finally become mad? Obsessed with how others view me and how they'll view me when I'm no longer here? Is this what madness feels like? Am I ready to be imprisoned and locked (or, kept?) away from society - in a mental asylum.

Is this the beginning of the end, for me and my life?

Acceptance of Being a Loner

[Context: I'm a journalism student, I've had a lot of work on my plate and a lot of studying to do. For this reason, I haven't been able to meet up with my mates since February for our monthly pub crawl around London.]

Our latest meet up was gathering a bit of momentum, everyone was looking forward to it - especially me, as I haven't seen my mates for the past few months. I was really optimistic about seeing them, about having a break for a day or two and then returning to work.

About a week ago, everything started going downhill. First, I messaged one of my mates about staying over again (overnight accommodation is expensive in London, so it's a great help and a thank you to him for putting me up each time).

His reply was that he couldn't be bothered, that all of our other mates will say the same thing yet again - that they will come but then won't. Little did I realise, he was actually talking to me, about me (!).

Next thing I know, he's on Facebook telling everyone he's got work the next day so won't be able to come out.

The conversation goes quiet, for a whole week. I tentatively send out a message asking if our meetup is still going ahead, or are we giving it a miss.

Nobody answers. Instead, everybody chooses to ignore me. Then Saturday comes along, and still no reply. Maybe we aren't meeting up, I thought, maybe it's next weekend.

Then, to my surprise, my tactless buddy puts up a Facebook status about how he's enjoying watching a football match with mates. My/our mates. In a pub. On a night out. Did everyone just choose to ignore me and go ahead anyway? Why am I being ignored? If they wanted to hang out without me, why not just say so?

I'm beginning to doubt my life, and question whether or not its all just a bunch of lies. Nobody likes what I like, no one I talk to is interested and always changes the subject while I'm talking.

Have I lost touch with society? I'm nearly 25 and I'm now getting the same treatment as when I was a teenager, but with different people. Have I returned to being the person nobody wants to talk to - because they think I'm gay, weird... etc.

Maybe I should just give up on life. Maybe I was destined to be a loner after all, and my student life while at university was just a summer holiday for my life - and now I've crashed back into the reality of being me.

Maybe I was never meant to have mates, to be normal, to live like other people.

Maybe this is the world's way of telling it to me like it is, like it really is. Maybe I should stop dreaming, and start accepting. Accepting that I shall never be better than my past self. Accepting that I'll always be the sad person that nobody likes. Accepting that nobody could care less if I died next week.

Lonely Life of a Writer

Writing has always been a solitary hobby for me, one that I conduct behind closed doors, away from distractions and interruptions from the outside world. I'm very much an outcast of society, and always have been.

I had a fantastic time at University. It was a wonderful experience, meeting new people, making friends and getting drunk together. But I realise that most of that life is now behind me, and as I move closer along the path to my chosen career as a journalist, I can feel that solidarity returning.

Weekends are no longer spent socialising and drinking with mates. Weekends are now an extension of my week, my daily routines overrunning into most of Saturday and Sunday.

It's strange: years ago, I would've accepted being this lonely as just a way of living life, my life. But the return of this solidarity has made me question who I really am.

I've learnt a lot about what it means to be a journalist through my training course, and how much you're expected to know about our country, our politics and our laws. All of this knowledge may be secondary to the job at hand (reporting news) but I've started to think recently that maybe my initial aspirations of being a journalist were unfounded, immature and nonsensical.

And there is my problem, also returning to my life: when things get tough, I give up. When failure knocks at my door, I open the door out of some kind of compulsion and welcome it into my life. I'm compelled to believe that I'm a complete and total failure, a waste of space on this planet, another unnecessary human wasting away our oxygen supplies.

And you know the worst part? It feels like I never left this life, my past. It feels like university was just someone else's experiences planted into my brain. I remember this loneliness and it feels like home. It shouldn't, but it does.

Train of Embarrassment

“Rusty C**t Bucket! F**k! F**K!” was my reaction as I missed my train under embarrassingly stupendous circumstances –  thanks to Ari Gold, of Entourage (played by Jeremy ‘Mr Selfridge’ Piven) for that expression of anger and frustration.

Apparently writing a personal blog helps to alleviate frustration, so I’m going to give this a try. Here goes:

I wasn’t due in college until later that day so I decided to take a later train, and tried to practice a mock exam paper for my NCTJ news writing and reporting exam. I arrived in Cambridge at 9.39am.

As I disembarked from the Ipswich to Cambridge train, I saw what looked like my pal Rajat. From behind, it was unmistakably him – the coat, the trousers, the height, hair, and boxer stance.

My first question was what on earth he was doing in Cambridge station waiting for a train to Ipswich – so I proceeded to tap him on the shoulder and ask him.

Embarrassingly, it wasn’t him. Or, at least, it was the Japanese Rajat, looking rather bewildered as he asked me “have we met?”

A facepalm moment, I quickly walked away and was blinded by the sunlight as I trekked across the platform to the small WHSmiths outlet.

I came back out and looked at the overhead electronic timing boards. My train was due to depart at 10.04am, from platform 8 instead of platform 4/1. I hurried across, via the overhead sheltered walkway and stairs.

Sitting there, at platform 8, was a Stansted Express train. Looking again at the timing boards confirmed that this train was delayed, and would leave prior to the arrival of the rusty bucket with wheels that would hopefully take me to Harlow (arriving at 10.40am).

That train eventually left at 10.04am – late. When I looked up at the timing boards, however, the 10.04 train (to Harlow) had vanished from existence (you’ve probably already worked out why!). The posh Stansted Express train had gone, and there was no sign of a rusty bucket with wheels.

I noticed that there was a rusty bucket train sitting over at platform 3, so I rushed back over there, only to find that this was, in fact, the delayed Kings Cross service.

And then it hit me. The penny dropped…

For no less than 20 minutes, I had stood with my back to the Stansted Express (my train, actually going to London Liverpool Street and stopping off at Harlow Town), on platform 8, and had simply waved it goodbye without realising that, that train, was MY train.

(Lots of expletives here, many too offensive to post).

Realising my embarrassing mistake, I went up to the info desk and asked when the next train was – 10.21am, getting me to Harlow at 11am. I would inevitably be 20 minutes late. F**k!

That woke me up. No need for coffee today! Although I did realise, upon eventual arrival in Harlow, that a Wetherspoons breakfast was needed. Probably the only good decision I’ve made today…

P. S. Here’s that Ari Gold quote I used at the start of this post:

Life Improves with Shorthand

Following on from my ‘jobless’ post earlier this year, where I stated that I was feeling depressed and unmotivated, I’ve started an NCTJ Journalism Diploma. I’m now three weeks into the course and thoroughly enjoying every minute. Lectures, work experience, writing articles… the whole damn lot!

Shorthand is hard (I’m not going to deny that!). We have a shorthand lecture every morning, whereas others modules are covered by one lecture per week. Shorthand is almost becoming second nature to us. Almost… I mean, I’m still making mistakes here and there, and some symbols are so difficult to write that it’s probably just quicker to write the actual word at this stage.

My Career (or, lack thereof…)

Life – well, it’s boring. Why? Because I’m full of poisonous ‘self-doubt’…

I have no confidence in who I am as a person. It’s the thing that’s always held me back – both in my personal life, and my professional life. I cannot sell myself properly when light-heartedly flirting with women (thus ensuring 23 years without even a whiff of a girlfriend). Okay, maybe “selling” myself is the wrong word or phrase. Maybe what I really mean is that my lack of confidence when flirting stems from my inability to recognise my own personal achievements.

Also, I want as much as anything to write for a newspaper or magazine as my full-time job. But that’s just it – a JOB. I haven’t got one yet. Since finishing my university degree in June 2014, I haven’t even been motivated towards getting a job. Yes, I’ve sent out a few applications and been to a couple of interviews, but I have other interests too, like volunteering for CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale).

What I’ve done, is I’ve tried to ignore this indoctrinated expectation that when you graduate, you must then immediately get a job and start earning your way in life. I want to do that, and believe me, I do! But I also don’t want to be pressured into anything I don’t feel comfortable with.

Unfortunately, I feel this has now gone too far, and as a result of my volunteering for CAMRA and thoroughly enjoying it, I now feel left out – seeing my mates get a job straight out of university has made me feel depressed, and I’ve now lost all motivation to do even the simple task of getting out of bed every day so that I may complete yet another application to some godforsaken company to earn a wage.

I was over the moon (quite literally) when I learned that I had graduated from my English Literature degree with a Grade 2:2 Bachelor of Arts with Honours, but I am now facing the music and the harsh reality when it comes to job applications – in the real world, a 2:2 is just unacceptable.

According to all these employers, a minimum of a 2:1 is expected, as stated within the job descriptions… BUT I’m now getting sick of seeing “Minimum 2:1 expected/obtained degree in any discipline” – supposedly, a 2:2 (as in my case) means you’re thick, unmotivated, and not worthy enough for a position at their company. Even though “worthy” accounts for the latter half of my surname!

That’s why I’m stuck writing this blog, and volunteering for CAMRA, and writing articles for a beer magazine on a voluntary basis, and living off my parents’ retirement pensions until I can get a job of my own…

That’s not to say there aren’t ANY jobs out there – there are loads of jobs if you know where to look. I suppose I’ve just set my sights too high. I don’t see the point of working at the local supermarket with all the high-school dropouts I used to see on a daily basis at age 16. I’m now 23. If I worked there, I’m afraid that I’d then have no justification for going to university, enjoying life, studying a subject I enjoy, and accruing £20,000+ of student debts in my name.

But the more I send out applications and receive an email starting “on this occasion your application has been unsuccessful”, and the more time that passes, I get to thinking that it’s the hard life or no life at all…