Tag Archives: travel

Very little can happen in a month

23 Oct

So, just what has been going on in life that has been keeping me so busy? Oh, I’m sure you are expecting tales of amazingness. I’ve no doubt been to exotic locations and done loads of amazing work and met amazing people and been on amazing dates and done amazing snogging and maybe even had some sex.

Nope.

I’ve mostly been working. Travelling to places like Nottingham. Keeping myself busy with yoga and swimming. Doing handstands. Hell yeah.

Let me try and make my life sound marginally more interesting by breaking things into three categories: The Good News, The Bad News, and the News I Am Yet to Write.

The Good News

The good news is I don’t have cancer or any pre-cancerous cells. Yayyyy for my cervix. I need to go back every six months until my body proves that we’re planning on staying that way. But it was a massive relief. And I want to say a big “thank you, you lovely people” to all the buddies who messaged me with best wishes and to tell me everything would be OK. I was scared, and it helped.

The Bad News

Yup, pretty sure I’ll never get over my ex. I haven’t been on any dates since the incredibly boring man. I’ve been mulling a lot. Thinking about a future alone. Scaring myself. And then I just say, “screw it” and focus on work, or making my flat feel autumnal and lovely. Both of which are marvellous distractions, but don’t actually stop the deep down uncertainty and fear of never meeting someone.

The News I Am Yet to Write

So, I figure, I need to change. I need to do something that will take me out of myself and shift me one way or another. It’s been 14 long months since the Pizza of Doom and I still cry over him. Not. OK. Which is why I’m planning on taking a month off work next year and going to Japan. On my own. Scary? Yes. Exciting? For sure. And hopefully I’ll come back a changed woman and able to actually move on with life.

I’m not going ’til May next year. But hang on til then, and I can assure you this blog is going to get a lot more exciting.

In the meantime, I’ve missed you all very much. Thanks for bearing with me. I am trying.

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Nine good things about being single in your thirties

17 May

marquee number - 9

So, I’m on my way home from Florida. Which is sad news. But I’m sipping a Bloody Mary in the business class lounge. Which is good news.

In the past nine months, since finding myself single, I’ve tried very hard to find some positives in being all alone in my thirties. It hasn’t been easy. But since it’s nine months since the pizza of doom and all, I’ve made a little list of nine good things about being single when everyone around you is married and producing children.

Here we go:

1. Flying business class. Why not treat yourself? You have nobody else to pay for. Let me tell you, skipping all those lines for check in and security, swanning through to the lounge and pouring yourself a drink… it’s nice. Really nice.

2. Flowers. Buying yourself flowers means that you always get the ones you want. In May, that means peonies. In fact, buying yourself flowers means that you always get flowers. I don’t care what kind of flowers. I like having them.

3. Tinder. This is new to me, but hilarious and thrilling all at once. I’ve been playing while in Florida. I can’t meet any of the guys, but it’s still fun. And what an ego boost.

4. Garlic. Eat as much as you like. Nobody cares.

5. Sex And The City takes on a new level of relevance. I’m going to watch the whole thing again when I get home. Now I actually understand.

6. If you want to eat nothing but olives for dinner, you totally can. Same is true of Maltesers. There’s nobody to tell you to eat like an adult, or watch your sugar intake.

7. You join some pretty great company of other hot to women who have been single in their thirties. “Who on earth?” I hear you ask. Well, Cameron Diaz, Jennifer Anniston, Sandra Bullock.

8. Let’s be frank. While in the summer months you do need to shave your legs, there are other body parts that you can pretty much disregard from the grooming routine for a while. Some of the trickiest of body parts, in fact. Some of the most painful to take care of.

9. You can plan your next holiday as soon as you’re done with the one you’re on. Or even before. I’m so ready to come back to Florida in a few months, and there’s nobody to get in the way of my plans or that sunshine.

Now, you all know as well as I do that all I want is someone to love. Someone to love me. And yes, of course, a cuddle can be worth a lot more than a Sex And The City marathon, while eating garlic olives for dinner, on a business class flight, to go on holiday, not having touched my bikini line for weeks, safe in the knowledge that I am just like Cameron fricking Diaz (although I can’t confirm her bikini line routine), and there are beautiful peonies sitting on my window ledge at home. But I gotta find some reasons to smile. It’s not a bad start.

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Grief loves sunshine

7 May

Buddies.

Apologies for not writing for a few days. I’ve been terribly busy lying on the beach, walking on the beach, reading on the beach, drinking Sam Adams and frozen cocktails, eating lobster, and generally having such a nice time.

This is so different from my trip in November. I’m so much happier. So much calmer. So much more connected to the world. When I look back, geeez, in November we’d only been broken up three months. I don’t know how I was still breathing, to be perfectly honest.

Well, Saturday (as I was flying across The Atlantic) was nine months since the pizza of doom. Nine. Fricking. Months. How the hell did that happen?

He’s further from me than he’s ever been. And, yes, that makes me sad. But it also makes me breathe a sigh of relief and get excited about the future.

I’ve been reading a book about a woman grieving her husband’s death. I won’t tell you the name of the book because I’d already have ruined the story for you. But I am so surprised by how similar her feelings and symptoms are to mine. The physical side, too. The pain which comes from nowhere. The crying that starts when you least expect it. And the kidding herself that he’ll come back.

In those first two months after the pizza of doom I used to seriously think he would be there when I got home at night. That he’d realise it was a mistake and let himself in and surprise me when I got back from another day crying at work. And every day I cried for hours when I was so disappointed that it didn’t happen.

Grief is a funny thing. And nine months isn’t that long in the grand scheme of things. But I’m getting there.

And sunshine definitely helps.

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Floridaaaaaaaaa

3 May

Back at Gatwick airport, buddies.

There’s a lot to be said for travelling alone. I’m so efficient! I’m the ideal travel companion for, well, myself. I really pride myself on finding the shortest security line, having my documents ready before asked, grabbing a coffee and locating the best seat in the airport. Not everyone is into that.

I am feeling super stressed. I keep waking at 4 am these days. I guess it’s a work/ex and the keys/pre travel anxiety cocktail. My skin has completely broken out, which just doesn’t happen to me. I’m a grease monster!

But I can’t think of a better remedy than two weeks on the beach in Florida.

See you in twelve hours, beach.

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Getting my life in gear

30 Apr

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Right then, buddies.

I am getting my fat ass in gear. Actually, my ass isn’t that fat. It’s the rest of me that is the problem.

I felt a bit clearer this morning after cutting the chord of LinkedIn yesterday. I know I’ll start crying soon. I know I’ll still cry myself to sleep at night. But this morning, well, this morning I felt pretty awesome.

So here are some wise words from my buddy Kate, “If you can’t control meeting someone, concentrate on what you can control.”

She’s a wise one.

Today I have booked an Italian course to start in July. Booked a yoga course to start as soon as I get back from holiday. Booked a weekend in Edinburgh with my buddies. I’m booking myself a first-class ticket back into life.

If I stop for even a moment to dwell on everything I’m missing in life, I completely dissolve.

But if I look at everything I’ve done, and think about everything I have planned, I feel genuinely ants-in-my-pants excited.

Maybe it’s just the extra large coffee I had this morning.

Or the fact I’m going to sunny Florida on Saturday.

Or maybe it’s the knowledge that he can’t hurt me anymore.

F*** him.

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Why I hate train companies. And my ex.

18 Apr

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I’m on the train from London to Edinburgh to see my friends and family over the Easter break.

When I got back from New York yesterday there was a whole thing with my tickets for this journey. By “thing” I mean “incredibly upsetting, aggravating, enfuriating and downright f***ing stupid situation”.

Let me explain. Remember in January I had tonsillitis? Well I had a booking to go up to Edinburgh and have a weekend with my friends. I’d booked it back in November when feeling particularly sad about my life one day. £160 for the pleasure of five hours on a packed train, rattling up the East Coast.

Well, I felt so ill in January that I couldn’t travel. So I paid another £30 to change the tickets to Easter weekend. I was supposed to pick the original tickets up from a machine in the station, but since I wasn’t using them I did not. I got my new tickets emailed to me. Boom. Only three months to wait to use them.

So yesterday I printed off my tickets and realised that I also needed the originals. Jet lagged. Tired. Confused. But never mind, I went down to the station to get the original tickets.

Tickets no longer on the system.

I had several phone calls with East Coast Mainline. The answer to each one was this: your tickets no longer exist. You need to buy new tickets.

WHAAAAT?!

I finally got through to a nice man called Stefan who said to buy new tickets, then write and explain and they might (note “might”) refund one of the journeys.

I had no idea what to do. New tickets were an additional £250.

So I did what I always do when I need help or advice: I called my Dad.

And his advice was, “Life’s too short. Pay the extra money. Go and see your friends.”

I took a moment and a few deep breaths. Made my peace with the injustice. Flexed my AMEX. And booked new tickets. Angrily.

But I feel OK about it, you know.

I want to see my friends.

And I booked the original tickets because I felt sad. I was ill because I didn’t sleep for six months. I didn’t notice I needed the old tickets because I was ill. You see what has happened here.

It’s all his fault.

Well, his and East Coast Mainline’s.

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New York

16 Apr

Manhattan Office Vacancy Rate Drops In Second Quarter

Well.

I haven’t blogged because I’ve been working my paws off.

But.

I also haven’t dissolved.

I’ve been in New York for five days. While I’ve hardly had time to eat or sleep let alone spend quality time in Sephora, I’ve also not had time to think too much about the ex. Or his summer here. When he decided that he’d never been in love with me. Sh**head.

As it happens, my walk from the hotel to my office goes right by a restaurant where we ate in the summer, on a hot July night when he seemed determined to pick arguments with me and act like an asshole. The ribs were delicious, mind you. Whenever I pass this restaurant, I do feel a little stab. But it’s a little stab of anger. Not sadness.

I think I find self esteem in my job. I find my inner Beyoncé. Although I’m writing copy and lecturing people on branding, not hitting the stage in tight-fitting lycra, it is kind of the same. Really. It’s my game face. It’s when I muster up every ounce of confidence and go go go. And there ain’t no space for feeling sh** about myself. There ain’t no space for a man who eats half a pizza before breaking my heart.

So there’s four hours til I head to the airport. Just time for a quick run to Victoria’s Secret and Sephora, and another iced coffee.

Maybe even time for a slice of pizza.

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Scaredy cat

10 Apr

DJ+CAT+NYC+2iks2x

I have so much to talk to you lovely people about and so little time in which to do it.

For now I will tell you this: I am going to New York tomorrow.

And I’m scared.

I’m scared of how it’s going to make me feel. I know I’ll be washed over with memories of my time there with him. And the knowledge that, well, New York’s kind of where it all fell apart. For him, anyway. I was sat at home in Hackney being miserable, pining for him, crossing my paws that he still loved me.

My counsellor says that I will feel weird when I get there. Really weird. But that I must try and “meet the feeling” rather than let it “dissolve me”. Hmm. I think I have a tendency to dissolve these days. If “dissolving” means breaking down in tears every hour or so and forgetting that I have mascara streaked right across my face.

But it’s my business trip this time. Because I do sh** like that – flying across the Atlantic on business. People pay for me to do it. I’m just as important as him. I’m just as good at my job as him (OK, maybe not, but I’m definitely quite good at this particular aspect of it – presenting and stuff – it’s my favourite). And, hell, I’ll spend as long as I like browsing in Sephora, thank you very much.

I talk a good game, but I’m genuinely a little petrified that this trip is going to erode me further still.

I guess I’m just a massive scaredy cat.

Meow.

 

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One hell of a journey

30 Mar

Funny things, airports.

They make me think. A little too much, maybe. Everyone’s going somewhere. On a journey to another destination. And, yet, Glasgow airport will always remind me of the week after the pizza of doom when (after lying in bed at my parents’ house for hours that turned to days) I had to face up to life and head back to London.

Surrounded by people in transition, that day I felt paralysis.

I couldn’t eat or drink anything. I couldn’t read. I walked around the shops but couldn’t focus long enough to take anything in, let alone make a purchase (god knows what I’d have bought if I had been able to). So I sat perfectly still, crying my eyes out, until my flight was called and – like it or not – I too was on the move. Back to my life in London. Without him. And my first night alone since the break up.

Sitting in the departures lounge nearly eight months later, I wonder how much I have moved out of paralysis since then.

Well, I have to give it to myself, I’ve come a long way. I managed to start my new job and keep going to it until that started to feel less like cruelty and more like routine. I’ve made some new friends. I’ve kissed two boys, and dated four. I’ve had sex with someone else (and it was fantastic). I can be in my own company now, watch TV, read, eat – all those things that become strangely impossible when you’re in distress. Most importantly, I’ve kept trudging through the fogs of sadness and pain to a point where I’m nearly OK.

Nearly, but not quite. Because it only takes one moment letting my mind wander to him for my eyes to swim with tears. It only takes one glance at a happy couple travelling together to knock a little air out of me. It only takes one person with a baby to set my mind racing through the, “OhmygodI’mgoingtobealoneforeverbecausesomething’swrongwithmeandI’llneverhavekids” cycle of craziness.

I guess the point is that I’m still mid-journey. Because however far I’ve come, I still wonder why I wasn’t good enough. Why he didn’t love me. Why he said he did. And I do still love him.

Eight months on.

I guess this is a long-haul journey. And I’m just on a stopover.

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Gatwick airport

27 Mar

I’m sitting in a bar at Gatwick airport drinking an Aperol Spritz, waiting for a flight to Glasgow.

In just over five weeks time I will be back here, headed for Florida.

This is great news.

As is my Aperol.

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