Catching my breath

Monday has come round, met with a combination of relief and despair. After the last few days, it feels like it's bound to disappoint. Maybe I'm being cynical, but more so, realistic. 

Thursday was our usual evening, spent at the pub quiz, where we usually avert our gaze from those teams who wrongly assume that because we are the youngest competitors, we must cheat our way into the league. To our shock this week, after going for what must be months, we won. Most of the teams clapped and cheered for us, Agatha Quiztee, the winners at last, if only for one week. Some stared resentfully in our direction as we celebrated with raised glasses and big grins. 

Friday began, and it was hell. Waiting frantically for results of my final degree grade was torture. Results were supposed to be released 12pm, on the dot. Little did we know, that meant everyone. Every single individual graduating from Northumbria university in 2015 got their final degree classification posted online on the same day. Later, obviously, this proved that the planning had failed dramatically, as five and a half hours later, I was one of the first to receive my classification, with others left to wait for an email instead that would arrive by 7pm. However, I couldn't complain. Three years of intensely hard work, tears, anger, stress, headaches and laughter, I got a 2.1 classification for English Literature and Creative Writing. All I could've hoped for. I was ecstatic. 

And what a way to end a weekend, than a Saturday spent in York, shopping, eating and drinking cocktails with my boyfriend. I feel like I'm just taking it all in now. With just over two weeks until I graduate, and no real career path in sight. I'm trying to be optimistic, trying to enjoy the lead up, trying to catch my breath and take it all in. 

It's all over.

Well, this is it. We're officially waving a fond, nostalgic little farewell to Christmas 2013 and yet, are stuck in the limbo that is the six days between it and the new year. A new era. A new start, full of fresh prospects and opportunities. January sales. Also, January spells end. No more christmas tree, fairy lights, or gift-wrap. No more drinking cava at 3 in the afternoon because "it's Christmas!" The tins of celebrations only have the bounty's left, the weather goes from bad to worse, and getting out of bed for work, school or uni becomes almost too much to handle. It's grim. It's out with the seasonal stuff and in with the real-life. Full-force back to sensible. For me, it seems like I've been partying and lazing around since about May. Exams ended, along with uni, and summer was full of parties and long lie-ins, light nights and suntans. As autumn arrived, we held onto the memory of summertime with an intense sort of nostalgia. The hottest summer we'd had in years. It seemed so bittersweet, so unfair, that now it had all been snatched from our grasp so viciously. Autumn turned to winter, December arrived and received a mixed reception. Panic-buying was at it's highest. And then the dreaded day. The one day everyone is left wondering what to do. Today is 27th December. The day after Boxing Day. Sales are in full-swing, families are back in their own beds and the January blues are peeking over the horizon. I'm deciding to take it all with a pinch of salt and an overly-enthusiastic smile. Let's get optimistic people. 

Silver linings.

It's a typical Sunday for me, unfolding as they usually do. The skies are looking ominously grey and moody, the rain is only appearing subdued for a short period. Usual tequila-shaped hangovers are strangely not hanging in the air, so it's a bit weird. A sense of regret. A weird feeling of nervousness sits waiting in the pit of my stomach, like a lion about to break out of a cage. It's only ever summer for a few weeks of the year in the North East, and this year seems no different. The big yellow thing in the sky has done a disappearing act yet again, and everyone is waiting longingly and perhaps, urgently, for its immediate return. I feel life my life has been wrapped in so much turmoil since I blogged last, yet can be excused with an over-exaggerated shrug of the shoulders, too many vodkas and bad decisions. Chipped nails, sore feet and moody faces. Anger, upset and someone shouting "how could you?!" Days like this are overrated. I'm only happy because of the typical Sunday practise, of dinner with my family at my Grandma Juney's. This always happens, so it's quite a comforting release usually. Forgetting everything going on in my life, any problems or quarreling go sharply out of the nearest open window, and relaxation and laughter are welcomed in.

I've admitted on more than one occasion that I'm a pessimistic person. This is unbelievably true. With everything going on at the minute, I got to thinking; maybe sometimes, the grey skies and the blurry edges are sometimes all you can see. That a silver lining is just actually a stupid way of looking at a grey cloud, and that no matter how much you hope, the rain will still pour. You can only get screwed over so many times before you start to think that maybe that's just you. Maybe everyone else isn't the fuck-up types, and actually, you're the root of your own problem. Maybe, just maybe, your 'bad day' isn't something you want to shrug off. You want to hide in your room, close the doors, get under the bed covers, and cry until you fall asleep. You want to turn off your phone and turn up the volume on the television, and pig out, and not care what anyone else thinks, because sometimes, you need to put yourself and your own needs first. Not every sky has a sun peeking out of from behind the clouds, not every situation can be dealt with using a positive outlook and a cheshire-cat sized grin, and in my book, not every cloud really does have a silver lining.