It Was All Whirlwind, Heat and Flash

image source: sonicyouth.com

The media bombards us with information and images, telling us that life is short and that we should live each day like it’s our last and constantly be in a state of adventure seeking. However, life is the longest thing that we will ever experience, we have a roughly 1% chance of dying today- so it is likely not your last- and maybe we’re too tired to seek adventure and would rather snuggle up for a TV marathon instead. 

I scroll through my Instagram feed gripped with a kind of paranoia that everyone else is doing more than me and that that consequently means that they are leading more fulfilled lives. I see photographs of exotic locations, fun days in sunny parks with friends, dates in cute cafes and other such FOMO inducing aesthetics that bring to question, ‘are these people living their lives more/better/in a more worthwhile way than I am? Should I be outside trying to replicate these adventures?’

I have never been frightened of seeking adventure and find leaving my comfort zone quite thrilling. When I was six years old, sitting in my grandmother’s sundrenched back garden in the middle of summertime family get-togethers, my older cousin would ask me if I wanted to ‘go on an adventure.’ Of course I did. I had been waiting all day for him to ask me that question. We would leave the garden through the back gate and walk amongst the suburban neighbourhood of garages and corner shops. Although walking round the block no longer holds the same tantalising fascination that it did ten years ago (unless I am listening to ‘Pure Heroine’ whilst I walk), I like to think of it as a metaphor for the more adventure seeking parts of my personality now.

A few years ago, instead of giving up something for Lent, my friend and I decided to say ‘yes’ to every opportunity for 6 weeks. We attended Spanish film club though neither of us studied Spanish and we entered a school gym competition (and came second!) though I’m hopelessly inflexible. Somehow I have tried to carry this philosophy through to today.

Adventures in books and films have an unshakable glamour about them that is often difficult to translate into everyday life. Going on a walk somewhere different and letting yourself get lost for a few hours or driving with no destination can feel like an adventure. But where do we draw the line between healthy escapism and adventures where the main appeal lies in their danger? Teen years are a time when this kind of adventure appeals the most. It is a way of escaping the clutches of routine, asserting independence and a way of coping with everyday adolescence stresses and struggles. Every new experience can seem like a new adventure. However, in this mindset it can be easy to glamourise terrible situations such as engaging in sexual activity that you’re unsure about or taking drugs just because you want to know what it feels like. At a party last summer, my friend and I lay down on the grass and looked at the stars and likened our situation to Jack Kerouac’s ‘On The Road’. In reality, we were both just a bit drunk and had leaned out of a game of spin the bottle in which we hoped we wouldn’t have to kiss anyone gross. I have started to sneak out in the middle of the night just for the sake of it. One time a friend rang me when I was ready for bed so I got changed to meet her in the middle of the night but I left still wearing my retainer. Perhaps these factors make such adventures less glamorous, but at the same time they make them much more epitomising of teenage years in a nostalgia ridden way.

These are things I have been thinking about a lot recently because there are a lot of things that I would commit to under the pretence of adventure in order to escape the singing regret that I fear will grip me as I lie on my death bed some day in the future. Adventure is definitely an important way to feel free and the text on the cover of Sonic Youth’s ‘Goo’- I STOLE MY SISTER’S BOYFRIEND. IT WAS ALL WHIRLWIND, HEAT, AND FLASH. WITHIN A WEEK WE KILLED MY PARENTS AND HIT THE ROAD- still sounds edgy and exciting to me but, in reality, killing your parents wouldn’t be that great. I’d rather go for a walk or something.

As published in Issue 4 of Cherry.

Beginning to Love Yourself

image source: soulsistersxoxo.wordpress.com

Beginning to love yourself is difficult. It might even be one of The Most Difficult Things. A year ago I would not have felt at all qualified to write this, but in the past few months I have taken baby steps towards the all elusive self-love.

There are times when even accepting yourself can be a challenge, and liking yourself one of colossal proportions. It makes complete sense for loving yourself to be arduous. When a couple move in together, it tests their love for each other, but even the most devoted and inseparable couple have some alone time; even if it is only when they go to the bathroom. We cannot choose whether or not we move in with ourselves. We already have; and we never truly escape. Absence makes the heart grow fonder, but we are never truly absent from ourselves. This means that being critical and getting easily annoyed at yourself is an easy routine to fall into, but allowing yourself to become truly embroiled in such troubles- which we are all guilty of doing every now and then- is quite a waste of time when you could be spending those same minutes, hours, days noticing the great things about yourself.

The first step to loving myself, for me, came from being kinder to myself and praising myself for little things. I wrote something today? Great. I found time to watch my favourite film? Awesome. Instead of dismissing the things that I liked to do, I started to view them as important, because they are important. They are important in making me who I am, and it’s wonderful that I have such a strong sense of individuality.

Next I looked for some people to look up to who are big on promoting self-love. Obviously, there’s Kanye West (“I Am A God” is my anthem when I want to feel on top of the world.) Internet famous Joanna Kuchta is also fabulous. Of course one of the perks of being famous is all of the external gratification you receive. When everyone else is telling you how fantastic you are, it is much easier to believe it. However, with fame comes a lot of criticism as well as praise. Other people’s voices can therefore battle in the same way that our internal thoughts about ourselves do. So it’s not like Kanye and Joanna are aliens who we can never understand. Even if you do delude yourself a little bit and post online as if you have millions of fans, you’re not harming anyone by doing this. Be proud of the 10, 20, 30 likes your Instagram photos get, but remember that online gratification does not necessarily translate into real life.

Another obstacle in loving yourself (on top of the inevitable self-inflicted ones) is society’s attitude towards those who do so. Coming across as conceited or egotistical is seen as something to be avoided above pretty much all else, but I would rather be a little bit on the conceited side than go back to hating myself. Furthermore, I have found that being around people who perhaps are verging on the egotistical is more positive than surrounding myself with those who dislike themselves. People who do love themselves most of the time tend to be a lot more positive all round. Sometimes it’s nice to pretend that you and the people you are with are better than everyone else, as long as it’s not in an openly spiteful way.

There are no terms and conditions for self love. Don’t just love yourself after going on a 5K run or receiving a compliment; love yourself after eating a donut; love yourself when you’re dancing alone to your favourite song. There is no one size fits all formula for happiness; we’re all just doing our best. 

(Originally published in Cherry)

"Most People Are Other People"

image source: wikipedia

Oscar Wilde once truthfully said that ‘most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.’ The search for complete originality is rather a futile one, as people have been pointing out for some time. It is far easier to let other people’s traits permeate into our being. 

When I sit down to write I always feel stunted by the fact that the people I look up to are so much better at writing and cooler and funnier and more talented than I am in every way. I have stuck quotations from my favourite people all around my room with hope that I will somehow absorb their genius. I even wrote a Wilde quote in my maths GCSE exam. It was an impossibly difficult question that I had no hope with even trying to answer so I simply scrawled, “In examinations the foolish ask questions that the wise cannot answer’- Oscar Wilde.’

I am other people. I am my parents, who raised me, friends from the past, who influenced me, friends of the present, whose mannerisms subtly slip into my own behaviour. However, (without discrediting those people who I know in person) more than anything I am Coco Chanel. I am Morrissey. I am Allen Ginsberg. I am Oscar Wilde. I am Tavi Gevinson. I am James Dean. I am Edie Sedgwick. Just a slightly less cool version.

I have an obsession for each of these people I call my ‘heroes.’ They are my idols, my influences, the books I read, the music I listen to. And I do not hesitate to say that without them I would not be the same person I am today.

However, where must we decide to draw the line with how much these strangers influence our lives? We are constantly bombarded with reasons why celebrities like Lindsey Lohan and Pete Doherty are negative role models but many still idolise them and their lifestyles. Then of course there was that ridiculous and inconceivably insensitive ‘cut for Bieber’ trend on Twitter last year. Celebrity culture is weird and sort of messed up. With the decline in religion people are turning more and more to their favourite celebrity to comfort them and give them guidance. 

A friend once told me that she was glad that I was obsessed with Coco Chanel and James Dean as opposed to Justin Bieber or Nicki Minaj. However, Coco Chanel was allegedly a Nazi and was constantly embroiled in affairs with married men. James Dean had an often unpredictable personality and, somewhat ironically, was a dangerous driver. Hardly ideal role models, right? 

There’s admiration and then there’s imitation and sometimes I worry that I’m slipping into the latter category. It was Morrissey who penned, “If you must write prose and poems, the words you use should be your own” but it is sometimes so tempting to want to fully become the people you look up to. I even managed to paraphrase two Morrissey lyrics into my English Literature exam last year. Morrissey himself wrote the anti-plagiarism line in response to being harangued about using the line, “I dreamt about you last night and I fell out of bed twice” in an early Smiths’ song ‘Reel Around the Fountain’ as the line originally came from Shelagh Delaney’s play ‘A Taste of Honey’.

I love the idea of escaping myself to become somebody else. Coco Chanel once said “How many cares one loses when one decides not to be something but to be someone.” I cut my hair to imitate Coco Chanel. I sometimes find myself daydreaming about styling it in a quiff like the teens imitating Morrissey in The Smiths’ ‘Stop Me If You Think That You’ve Heard This One Before’ music video. I want a bongo drum and perhaps a motorcycle like James Dean. I want a collection of fashion books as vast as Bill Cunningham’s. I want to dress like Tavi Gevinson. I want to write poetry like Patti Smith. I want to make witty quips in conversation like Oscar Wilde. I will just have to live my life with the worry that one day I may perhaps be serenaded with the song ‘Lighten Up Morrissey.’

I am definitely other people and my life is mimicry, my passions a quotation. However, I have not altogether lost my individuality because I am yet to find another person influenced my all these exact same people. Sometimes I feel like I am having a complete identity crisis but, at the end of the day, aren’t we all a product of the things that we love? The things we like can be just as telling about a person as what we are like and because of this I think we should move forwards and imitate whoever the hell we want to.

The Smiths

The Smiths songs are the songs that saved my life. Sixteen, clumsy and shy I am riddled with teenage angst, I wallow in an all consuming sense of loneliness and have suffered from bouts of anxiety and depression. (Well it wouldn’t be right to start an article about The Smiths with anything other than a small dose of self pity now, would it?) When everything becomes too much I lie on the floor and listen to ‘I Know It’s Over’, cry to ‘Asleep’ or commit to flailing around my bedroom in a Mozzerian style, trying (yet mostly failing) to hit the falsetto notes in ‘Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now.’ I own 7 CDS, 3 DVDs, 3 magazines, 6 books, 2 fanzines, numerous posters…and a shrine…

The Smiths are something I can write quite freely and endlessly about. However, it is difficult because so much has been written about them. Furthermore, my boundless admiration for them puts on pressure to do the band justice. I am going to write about what The Smiths mean to me and why I love them. Hopefully it will be readable and relatable. 

Let’s go back to where it all began; to my humble entrance into Smithdom. ‘Twas January 2013 and snow was steadily falling to the ground. School had closed early and, as we drove home, I persuaded my mother to let me download ‘The Sound of The Smiths’ from iTunes onto my phone. My official ‘Smiths weekend’, as it later became known in my diary and in my head, had commenced. I summed it up a few days later, saying that “I really don’t know what to do. The Smiths have changed my life. Morrissey’s words are beautiful and everything all goes so well. I’m so obsessed. All I could think about all day at school was listening to The Smiths and I was constantly singing their songs under my breath. I just lay on my bed with all the lights out except my lava lamp and listened to them with my phone turned up as loud as possible and my earphones in.” Then later THE SAME DAY, “It’s me again. Off on another rant about The Smiths.” The pages surrounding such entries were filled with lyrics and illustrations. At the time I was definitely not aware that, a year later, I would still feel the exact same sense of wonderment every time I listened to them. 

However, the story starts before that day. It starts with something that music snob Smiths fans would line me up and shoot me for and ends with a very proud and emotional moment. I made a mix CD for my then best friend for her Christmas present and put the song ‘Asleep’ on it because ‘The Perks of Being a Wallflower’ had become very dear to us both that year. Accompanying the mix CD was a booklet describing why I had put on each song. Feeling how I do now about The Smiths, the description for ‘Asleep’ is so cringey. However, on the day it reduced my friend to tears. Literal real tears. My writing made someone cry!!! 

The next song is the song that Charlie is always talking about in Perks. It’s Asleep by The Smiths and I have never really listened to The Smiths much but know that lots of cool people in movies listen to them and their music is kind of depressing. This song is usually interpreted as a direct reference to suicide but I like to think that "There is another/better world” does not mean that death is the better world but imagination is. This sounds really cringey and when we listen to it on Friday I’m gonna blush so much but I just want this song to make you happy not suicidal so my interpretation is that when you are feeling down, create another world for yourself; whether through reading, writing, doodling, dreaming, whatever. Just create. And I hope it makes you feel infinite like you’re standing at the back of a truck and screaming happily whilst driving going through a tunnel and listening to the perfect song at the perfect moment.

So that is the complete story of my introduction to The Smiths. Their music continues to have a deeply profound effect on me today. There have been long stretches of time where Morrissey has felt like my best and closest friend. The Smiths’ self-titled album is my after school album. ‘Meat Is Murder’ is my morning album. ‘The Queen Is Dead’ is my night time album. ‘Strangeways, Here We Come’ is my travelling album. 

Morrissey’s dreamily imperfect voice soothes many maladies and Johnny’s guitar always lights up the horizon. I have absorbed so much knowledge about The Smiths in the past year. I have cried because I will never see them live and because of the sad situation surrounding their break-up. 

In February last year I went into town one afternoon. I got ‘Morrissey and Marr: The Severed Alliance’ by Johnny Rogan out from the local library. I went to a café and got a cup of tea. When I finished the tea I walked round the park in the dark and listened to The Smiths and Morrissey and wrote. The darkness and isolation was simultaneously scary and exhilarating and magical. 

I went on a French exchange in March but I left my iPod charger at home. I ended up paying FORTY EUROS in Paris to buy one because I could not cope without listening to Morrissey’s voice. The struggle was real, I am telling you. 

In the Easter holidays I spent a week in a cottage in Dorset. There were lots of markets there, selling CDs. I returned home with 4 Morrissey CDs. 

Last December I told my guy friend that I wanted to be more than friends and, hearing that he did not, I wrote in my journal, “I feel like listening to ‘I Know It’s Over’ on repeat for 70 years until I die.” Morbid, I know but unrequited love is painful. 

So, that is my experience with The Smiths in a nutshell. Morrissey has introduced me to so many new and wonderful things. I have learnt new words, watched films I wouldn’t have otherwise watched and taken new moral and political stances. I don’t think that the way in which music impacts some lives can ever be overestimated. The Smiths have legitimately saved lives. They performed on Top of the Pops and did television interviews but behind the inevitable showiness there are the people in the dark bedrooms climbing into empty beds with tear stained cheeks, letting Morrissey sing them to sleep once more- the comically morbid, controversially political, intelligently superficial and sometimes hopeful Morrissey. 

The Smiths created a boundlessly beautiful discography that links people together the world over to this day. There is a silent understanding between Smiths fans; one that shall be whispered down through generations. The Smiths are VERY IMPORTANT and remember, when making an important decision; always ask yourself, what would Morrissey’s hair do?

Why Read? Why Write?

image source: galleryhip.com

Words are one of the most powerful forces in this world. A picture can tell a thousand words but a thousand words can tell a thousand words too. Words spread ideas. Words take you to other places. Words fill you up and make you feel alive. Words are a part of who we are. Words are our favourite poems, our favourite songs. Words are the quotes we keep close to us, the kind words that we say to ourselves to get through each day and the dark words that are whispered in our minds that can make for a sleep deprived night. Words are the kindest compliments that we thrive off and the insults we carry on our backs. We are all novels and love songs and heartfelt poems waiting to be written.

I have wanted to be a writer ever since I realised that the illustrations that accompanied the stories I wrote as a child were too inept for me to ever make it as a conventional painter. I wrote all the time and made up stories to pass otherwise empty days. 

When I was younger I made my way through many a book series. ‘Harry Potter’ and ‘A Series of Unfortunate Events’ are the most memorable. More recently my novels of choice are either classics or biographies. 

I read ‘On The Road’ just over a year ago and since then have been embroiled in beat literature. I have whirled through many a poem by Kerouac or Ginsberg or Cassady and I love how free and alive they all seem. The words rise from the page and dash around the room in a drug-fuelled haze. In many ways it is very different to anything else that I have read. Although the tales of New York and road trips and Mexico sometimes make my life feel a tad lacking, I feel so blessed to have come across this genre that makes literature feel so alive to me.

Books are so tender and so delicate; both pragmatically and metaphorically. The pages tear with an ever so slight tug at thin paper. The prose trigger memories and emotions as much as a whole album of photographs.  

I read to feel a part of something. I want to feel like I have been let in on a secret that has been shared with generations of people who have read the same words and felt the same ways. I write to feel a part of something. I want to feel that I am part of my generation and I want to make a difference. I want to participate in this phenomenon that is the written word. That is the thought that hangs over my mind when I sit down with pen and paper or poise my fingers over my laptop keyboard. It is the need that motivates me to write every bad poem, every trite song lyric because we need to get past those to someday write something beautiful.

(originally published in Issue 1 of Cherry)