19.03.13- Black Dogs, Early Christmases & Sibling Love

I haven't posted anything on here for nine days.
NINE DAYS.
That's practically like the whole lifetime of some sort of fly.
I can't be bothered to update every little detail as I'd get bored and so would you. To be honest I'm surprised this even gets so many views; is my life that interesting or is yours that crap? I appreciate it anyway. Keep the kind comments coming, they make me feel like Jesus, thanks.
Unless you're all just pitying me, like when you tell the fat kid in PE "Oh but just because running isn't for you, you're good at other things. No other 10-year-old has been in the Guinness Book of World Records for eating 46 French Fancies in 10 minutes. Now you're really good at that."
Just know it was filled with 4 nights of wine, a jazz night in Uplands, a surprise birthday party, a drink with someone I haven't seen since my birthday and of course a poetry night at Mozart's. And a lot of unsubtle ogling of my lecturer. My appreciation of his face has reached a ridiculous level and I can't actually hold his eye without breaking eye contact and blushing like a bottle of Heinz. I've also embarrassingly noted that I start shaking after I've spoken to him.

I swear my essay wasn't handed in like this

I think all those hours writing about sex and bodily fluid in Dylan Thomas' poetry have finally had quite an effect. I'm going to end up like a little terrier that humps everybody's leg.

Hugh Grant: great during times
of high hormonal instances

Right, let's fast-forward, essay handed in, considering PhD, looked at TEFL courses, applied for Masters funding, will probably re-evaluate life plans another 400 times anyway, blah blah...and here we are today. I've been in a terrible mood these past couple of days. I'm used to bad moods occasionally; as a woman, you deal with that shit with hot baths and chocolate and Bridget Jones' Diary. But then there's what I call the "black dog" mood, which goes a step further. It is just that: like a black dog that follows you around and you don't know why the hell it's there but once it smacks you down with its paw it's hard to get back up. So you stay in bed.

Fuck off, Rover

And when the night comes, your thoughts don't leave you alone and you find yourself tracing the patterns in the ceiling and listening to the seagulls at 4am.
But tonight I feel much better, which is good. It means I'm getting better at pulling myself out of it before I get stuck, which I absolutely can't let happen when I'm so close to my final ever exam and the end of my degree. I nearly dropped out of Uni in the second year because I saw no point in anything and I will not get to that point again. So I did the things that I know make me feel good and put my Uni reading on the back burner for today.
9am lecture was never going to happen. It was pissing down again and there's not a single Shakespeare lecture this term that has honestly felt in any way useful. And I happen to really dislike rain.
Yay, lie-in.
It was nearly 12pm and I was lying in bed wondering what the hell to do for 7 hours (when I'd be meeting my sister to introduce her to the sweaty world of the gym) when I had a phonecall.
"Play area today?" My little brother.
How the hell could I say no? He has the cutest little voice ever. It's about 2 octaves too high, and everything he says sounds so bloody innocent. For example as we got out of the car so I could take him to the play area he said to me, "It's such a lovely day." I love how children are so innocent and they notice all the little things and are fascinated by them. I think the more you can think like a child sometimes, the more you can really live in the moment and appreciate life.

My ginger ray of sunshine

I was learning life lessons from a 4-year-old.
He was such an angel the whole time and spending that quality time with him and seeing his little face light up cheered me up more than anything ever could. I bought him lunch and won him a toy and he got more and more excited and stood on the chair next to me, turned to me quite seriously and said: "Natalie, I love you for taking me to the play area." And gave me a big kiss.
And that was my day made.
He also gave me a card to take home. Yes, it says "Merry Christmas from Callum" on it, but it's the thought that counts and I've put it on my desk. I keep smiling every time I see it. As I was dropping him home, we were discussing bedtimes. He told me he was a good boy and went to bed at seven.
I told him I was a naughty girl and sometimes didn't get to bed until the morning because I've been out.
He was horrified. As I said goodbye, he said, "Bye bye Nat, love you. I'm telling Mammy you go boozing."
Cheers, bro.
Then home to get my stuff together and head to the gym. I thought this would be a repeat of circuit training with my sister when she started gasping on the sidelines after 5 minutes asking when we get to go for a fag break.
But she really surprised me. She even showed me up on the rowing machines; she has the upper-body strength of Action Man whereas I couldn't arm-wrestle an earthworm.
And they don't even have arms.

My cats do not share my
enthusiasm for the tub

It felt great to burn up some energy for an hour with some intense cardio and sit-ups and a cheeky bit of planking. I found I worked harder, the time went faster and I really enjoyed the whole workout when I had company. I'm not usually social when it comes to exercise, especially running, but at the gym you can go at your own paces and it feels good to have someone there to feel exhausted with. It motivates you to work a lot harder.
Now after a hot bath (the imaginary cats scattered; they don't do baths) and a meal and a cup of tea, I'm feeling the best I've felt for a few days. My anxiety has eased off a bit tonight. I'm thinking of my siblings and smiling. One may be a super-happy, squeaky-voiced, Garfield-worshipping 4-year-old and the other a hair-and-makeup-loving, fake-tanning girly-girl but both of them have made me feel so lucky and I love them both to bits. Yes, my sister and I often want to smack each other stupid with Tefal frying pans. Yes, we have on more than one occasion called each other the sort of things usually only heard on a particularly heated episode of the Jeremy Kyle Show. But I am proud of her, and opposites though we may be, we know that no matter how many times we swear to kill the other in a battle worthy of a scene from Gladiator, we will always always have each other's backs.
Sibling love is pretty special.

Natalie and Emilie Holborow. You'd never
have said they were opposites

10.03.13- Mother's Day, Doomful Deadlines and Running On the Moon

This time last week, I completed my charity half-marathon at Llanelli Waterfront. You know those really awkward situations where you try and shuffle somewhere unnoticed and play with your phone, hoping no one has noticed you're a complete loner?
Try it when you're the only one who's turned up dressed as a Pokemon.

Team Rocket were coming, so I had to leg it
for 13.1 miles. 

Getting to Parc y Scarlets stadium for 7am was a killer. I bought my third cup of (overpriced) tea to settle my nerves, but all it did was turn my stomach and fill my bladder and I suddenly became gripped by nightmare visions of being caught on camera with my Pikachu ears peeking over a hedge as I 'discreetly' squat to urinate.
I didn't mind being remembered as "Pikachu Girl" (as most people did later and added me on Facebook--turns out the onesie is quite distinguishable), but being remembered as "The Pokemon With A Really Weak Bladder" wasn't so desirable.
The day itself was bitterly cold. Although I felt a bit sad about being there alone (my mother had booked the wrong weekend off work-- she was all ready to cheer me on the week before, ringing up excitedly on the Saturday night, bless her), my mother's partner and my little brother were there to wave me off at the starting line and my grandparents popped in to wave for the finish. The atmosphere was great too; everyone was so supportive of each other and perhaps my favourite part of the whole race was pissing off a bloke in a Mr Men vest, so it was Pikachu vs Mr Happy for the entire 13.1 miles.

The tiredness just catches you by surprise the whole week after

I managed to sprint the last mile and seize victory in the end ("I WAS BLOODY CHASING YOU ALL THE WAY ROUND!" another bloke said to me later. That's the thing with races; you never know who's simply the same pace or really trying to kick your ass).
It wasn't until the 11-mile marker that I really began to want to lie down in a hot bath and started craving a hot dinner. I think this was my epiphany point of the race. Epiphanies (unrelated to Pokeballs and Pallet Town) included:

• I'm so glad I've looked after my body properly in the last few weeks leading up to this and haven't gone to sleep in a hedge. I love feeling healthy and full of energy.
• I'm thrilled to have raised so much money for a local charity-- I really feel like I've done something I can be proud of.
• I'M RINGING MY MOTHER AND WE ARE GOING FOR A SUNDAY DINNER, GIVE ME TURKEY NOW. I DON'T EVEN CARE IF IT'S HORSE.

That last mile was one of the toughest points of my running so far. I sprinted. I whipped off my Pikachu ears and pushed on my aching legs to overtake as many people as I could, having started the first mile cautiously with all the speed of a pissed snail. My thigh muscles were tightening, my calves were sore, my hands were red and swollen with cold and my head was swimming with dizziness. But as soon as I saw the stadium emerge from the hill that had been hiding it, I felt like Frodo approaching Mordor with the One Ring.

Welcome to Llanelli

Llanelli and the burning hellfires of Mordor aren't that far removed.

Crossing the finish line was one of the best moments of my life. All my months of training, all my setbacks, all my achievements merged and crystallised into that one moment where grinning, I didn't care how sweaty and unattractive I looked crossing the line amidst kids crying, "MAM LOOK IT'S PIKACHU!" "PIKACHU I LIKE YOUR EARS!" Up yours, torn knee ligaments. Up yours, diabetes.

I just did a half marathon.

Slowing down to a stop, still grinning like a pervert in a changing cubicle, I collected my heavy medal and glanced down at my time on my iPod. 1:59. A second under two hours, but that still counts as sub-two hour which apparently isn't bad for a first half-marathon. That first bottle of water felt like drinking the nectar of the gods (I usually refer to this as wine, but for once, wine wasn't what I craved at that moment). 

I couldn't find my grandparents in the crowds and felt a little sad again when people were rejoining in big groups and I had to trudge up four flights of stairs to collect my bag, walking with all the grace of a bulldog with blue balls.

My legs had never been so painful.

In that time I was running, I'd collected another £20 of sponsorships online which was great, and had a lot of 'good luck' texts and words of encouragement which really made me smile. This is just one of the reasons my friends are so special too me; they always support me in everything, no matter what.

Like last Thursday for example. I'd been stressing out all week over the looming deadline for my Dylan Thomas essay; arguably the toughest, yet most intriguing essay I've ever had to write. The thing was, even though it took over everything, I really enjoyed the challenge of exploring it. I chose to do a close analysis of Our Eunuch Dreams that not only challenged Thomas' image as a drunken misogynist, but also challenged any feminist readings. What I wanted was to read Thomas' work as critical of the whole concept of gendered society itself--how illusory and unreal it is-- rather than pick one side: pro-male or pro-female. Dylan Thomas is a merger of opposites.

But it did mean that my thoughts were preoccupied for the whole week by analogies on castration, sexual fantasy, male rape and proper ladies giving in and discussing sex and sanitary towels. Which can make you a bit twitchy after so long, especially when you're half-living in Sainsbury's and a lot of your notes are being scrawled on the back of receipts for Taste the Difference potatoes (very nice potatoes by the way. Go buy them. Vivaldi ones. Not like I'm advertising or anything).

You've got to take the criticism well in writing

On top of this, all I could think was "OH MY GOD HAVE I GOT ANYTHING HALF-DECENT TO READ ON THURSDAY?" 7th March was World Book Day and I had my poetry reading at the Dylan Thomas Centre with Alan Kellermann. But despite all my fears of having candles thrown at my head and being taken aside and told politely to take something up other than poetry, I had an amazing evening and a really encouraging experience. Everybody was supportive. Some of my best friends and my friends from Uni turned up to support me, which I was so grateful for. I had most of my glasses of pinot grigio bought for me (pinot grigio is wonderful, confidence-boosting medicine which I found that amazingly does not give me a hangover) and met some really talented people. My poetry lecturer/personal tutor was there too and gave me words of support, which I was thankful for.

And most interestingly of all, I met my long-lost Aunt Wendy Holborow. Turns out she lives not far from me and happens to be a fantastic poet and does a lot of readings. She told me I looked like my grandmother whom I've never met, and I wish I had met her. I can't really remember what she looks like in photographs so I don't know how far I agree with this yet-- as far as I'm concerned, the only person I vaguely look like is Pebbles Flintstone when I wear my hair all red and pineapple-y, which probably isn't a flattering comparison but is sadly true. Especially when I wear animal print. 

I've yet to find my Bam-Bam.

Point sadly proved

I'm definitely going to read there again. This week it's Mozart's, which no doubt means drinking so much I start crying on my bed about the fact I want to write but am too drunk to pick up a pen and have forgotten how to make porridge. I do not punish myself for this; I have accepted that this is the idiotic norm for me during the second and third Thursday of every month.

And finally, to conclude my catch-up, yesterday was of course Mother's Day. Another silly, commercial waste of time (hi I'm Grumpy Cat, pleased to meet you. Not). My mum is special to me, an inspiration and my absolute rock every day of the year, not just one. And I want to make sure she knows it because without her, I'd never have dealt with some of the times when it's felt like everything is up against me and utterly helpless. I always like to surprise my mum with things any time of the year. If she's having a bad day, I'll come over with flowers. If she's got a long shift, I'll cook a meal. It's sad that the only time some people will make their mother a cup of tea is on one Sunday of the year in March just because they feel they have to and then make a big song and dance about it for the rest of the week.

YOU POPPED A TEABAG IN A MUG AND ADDED WATER AND MILK, NOT KILLED A FUCKING DRAGON AND SAVED HER FROM A BURNING TOWER.

"Move over, boys. Mum needs a cup of tea."

The same goes for my Nan. I bought her Anna Karenina on DVD which she'd wanted for ages. I am lucky to have such a close relationship with my grandparents; I lived with them for my first year of Uni and in many ways they feel like my second set of parents. They are two of the nicest, least judgmental people you could ever wish to meet. 

Plus they're only in their sixties and have iPods and my Nan is addicted to eBay. Which is cooler than knitting.

Hi I'm a pie and I'm going to ruin
your diet *pie-laugh*

But I got in the spirit of things anyway and cooked a leek and potato pie from scratch (obviously this one culinary achievement now means I am a Michelin-star chef and have to change my name to Nigella and open a restaurant immediately). By the way, thanks Sainsbury's for a great recipe card. I baked it lovingly at my Nan's for hours then put it in my car carefully to take to Mum's house.

It fell upside down.

"HI YOU MADE US CREAMY"

After screaming at a pile of chicken and pastry for a few minutes, I managed to carry it into the house and salvage it. Which is good. Because if it had been ruined, I would definitely have howled and microwaved my dog and served him with noodles and shaved all my hair off and go to live in the tumble dryer for eternity, mentally broken.

I then made fresh strawberry and cream all-butter pastry tarts which were my own creation but turned out surprisingly pretty (Nigella? Hmm. I need to move up I think. Gordon Ramsay? I could do Gordon. Though I don't really look like a Gordon). I also bought her a bizarre present. Most mothers ask for flowers or chocolate or wine or jewellery or a DVD. What did my mother want?

"A red toaster."

"What?"

"Nat, I really want a red toaster."

I bought her a red toaster. I hope she's going to have fun all week with it, experimenting with varying degrees of toasting.

Love you, Mam.