Letters to Mr. Nobody

[Source-Muffet on Flickr]

When I was with my first boyfriend, I developed a (bad) habit of writing him letters telling him all the things I couldn't bring myself to say to him because I was scared of the consequences (namely that I couldn't bear the thought that he might break up with me...again). I'd pour my heart out into those letters, smudging the ink with my tears (disadvantage of using fountain pens, right there) and telling him all the reasons he was making me unhappy and then...I'd never send them. I probably still have those notebooks full of my misery, full of letters that were never read by the person whose name they bore-he probably doesn't even know now how much I cried over him, over a relationship which I can now see (ah hindsight!) was already doomed to fail. Not even the strongest of bonds between people could be maintained with that wealth of unsaid words between them, and ours was certainly not what you would call a strong bond!

Why did I write the letters if I was never going to send them, I hear you ask? (I do, honest...) I guess I thought that if I could just get the feelings out onto paper, to feel the pain and cry the tears then I wouldn't feel them any more, that they wouldn't affect me when I was with him, that they wouldn't matter. Of course, that's nonsense-feelings don't go away because you took them out of your head and wrote them down, they still persist if you never speak to the appropriate person about them, unless you tell them that they're making you unhappy.

I tried harder with BoyfriendII to actually talk about stuff that was upsetting me, and for the most part it seemed to work much better-we had more arguments than me and BFI but felt like we tried to resolve them instead of pretending we didn't have problems and that our relationship was perfect. I stopped writing my feelings down as often, and when I did I showed him them-so we could discuss it and try to work through it. I felt like this was the much more mature and rational response to having a problem than just trying to hide it away from everyone and I guess it was really-airing grievances and all that, rather than leaving them to fester away in a drawer somewhere, niggling away at the back of my mind. Every sensible Discworld fan knows that words have powers of their own.

[Source-Open Clip Art Library]

I thought I'd left my letter writing habit behind me, more or less, but I recently seem to have fallen back into old habits. It's just easier to confess things to a reassuringly blank page than to tell someone something that might change the way they see you, or lead to judgement and condemnation. It's not just letters now, it seems, but blog posts too-I write them and never publish them for fear of revealing too much of myself and then never being able to go back to a point where it's not been read. I've got a letter full of emotions just itching to be sent, but I don't think I'll do it. I don't know if I can, or even if I should. I'm too hung up on the idea that telling people how I really feel just gives me nothing more than a million reasons to end up regretting it. I can't dissuade myself that revealing my emotions means that something will hurt me more than the contents of the letter ever would, that will make me wish I'd kept it safely tucked away in the dark with the rest of them.
Realistically I know that it's just a letter. A letter with some feelings in. Its something that by its very nature should be shared, should be read, a story that isn't told until seen with different eyes. Realistically I know that it won't make my world end, and that I really should just post the damn thing, if only as a way to get over the silly idea that the way someone reacts to something I have to tell them will just end up hurting me more, to get past the idea that feelings sometimes should be hoarded more closely than a dragon and its treasure.
Realistically, I know all this. Emotionally/Sub-consciously though? I'm not so sure.

What do you reckon?

-Jenni-

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30 Posts of Truth-Part 7

7. Someone Who Has Made Your Life Worth Living

There are lots of people I could have mentioned for this because there are lots of people who have, one way or another, done something amazing for me that I really needed at the time. Some of them have been there for the big things, some for the small things but they've all been there for me and I'm very grateful for all of them. But there is one person who I feel I should mention above all others and that's my best friend Rara.

Rara has been my best friend for all of my life, and I realise I'm incredibly lucky because not everyone has someone awesome in their life that long. She's known me every day of my life (she's 3 months older than me so not every day of hers!) and I've known her every day of it-our mums are best friends too. As I tried to explain it to someone the other day-it's like when you have a brother or sister. You can never go back to a point where you don't have a sibling, and they'll always be someone you're inexorably linked to-I'm like that with Rara. She's my constant-no matter where I live she'll be my bestie and provide me with endless endless giggles. Every time we get together we laugh ourselves silly for one reason or another, and we have so many in-jokes between us that it's almost like we're talking in code. We went for a photoshoot together in December (thank you Wowcher!) and the photographer even commented how we were a proper double act. We got him laughing pretty hard too!

She's my perfect bed partner and doesn't wake up even if I get out of bed (and clamber over her in the process), we go on holiday together and bicker like an old married couple and we always text each other when one of us does a stupid thing that'll make the other one laugh. We have a million memories between us (most of which she can't remember at all =p) and they all make us grin like loons. When I told her I couldn't ever find her on Facebook because I always searched for 'Rara' she added it into her name to make life easier for me. We go on adventures and day trips and have sleepovers and giggle til our sides hurt. She's the other piece of my jigsaw and I love her to pieces.

She's made my life worth living just because I can't imagine what it would have been like (BORING) without her in it.

I loft thee, Razziepants!

-JB-

This bit's just for you, hope it makes you gibbon:

-Ungh Ungh-Fleckle Fleckle Fleckle-Can I put my finger in your moth?-Every day on a regular basis-I wear goggles when you are not there-sneezing and farting-"I'll put in on Macro...Where's it GONE?-MUSHROOM-Bit nits-Baps and cream, baps, baps and cream-Mummy B's turning into a turkey!-You know the quality street wrappers? I put them on my face!-Clubfoot and Strokeface-Cabbages? Cabbafges? Cabbamfges?-That had lumps in but I swallowed it anyway-Colosseum?-I can see your badger-Whisking and sieving-I left boob behind the cat-

We are such wrdidpoos =D

Also this:

Fringe Fever

Yesterday I arrived home from a mad but wonderful weekend away performing at the Brighton Fringe festival, tired out and achy but content. The weekend has sped by so quickly and I have almost no idea what day it is any more-it feels like I've had four Saturdays in a row. There's this weird atmosphere I've noticed around Fringe Performances-like you're living in a kind of bubble universe separated out from the real one. Everything else temporarily stops existing and your world shrinks down to your cast and crew, the show and the in between time (often spent flyering, eating or getting drunk!). Emotions are exaggerated and heightened and feelings get stretched and flipped about on their head until you're not quite sure what's real or what's not. The same faces become your life-you spend 24 hours a day with them-eating, sleeping, performing and of course sharing a bathroom. You learn each other's habits almost unconsciously-who snores, who isn't a morning person, who spends ages in the shower, who sleeps almost naked, who is a fussy eater, who will hog the mirror in the bathroom. Nerves are pulled taut and strummed like a harp, thoughts don't make sense and you start to feel differently about people just because you've spent all that time together.

And then, like someone taking a needle to a bubble, it all stops.

I always feel a bit melancholy on the last evening of a Fringe show, because I know that that is it, it will never feel like that again. Even if you gathered the same people together it wouldn't be the same without that fevered intensity, without the only thing that matters being The Show, without the stresses and awesomeness of living and performing together as one highly functioning machine made of many parts working side by side. It's always such a come down to reality again, to exams, to deadlines, job applications and work. And while it's always blissful to sleep in your own bed again, you still wake up half expecting to be surrounded by people in various states of undress and sleep deprivation. I always find I need a bit of a readjustment period, to get used to how normal life feels again, rather than the slightly off-kilter world of the Fringe. I find I need to realign my thoughts too, to get used to thinking in straight lines again rather than the topsy turvy helter skelter of trying to have three different conversations at once whilst drowning out several more. It's almost too quiet to be on your own, yet the solitude is lovely after being around people constantly for four days.

The come down also gives you time to think about the madness of it all more objectively, now that the Fringe Fever no longer holds you tight in its grip-time to work out which emotions and feelings were real and which would have never happened in a 'normal' situation. You can forgive people some of the things they did, decide which you want to hold on to and which you just want to forget. You can feel shame at some of things that you did or said, pride or happiness at others. You sink slowly back into your normal life and it's almost like it never happened, like the madness never wrapped you and drove your every move, your every thought.

It's always there though, at the back of your mind, waiting to be pulled on like a comfy sweatshirt the opening night of the next show that takes over your life. And I, for one, welcome it back.

The cast and crew of Titus at the Brighton Fringe, May 2013

Thanks for an awesome weekend folks. Back to reality, for now...

-Jenni-

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30 Posts Of Truth-Part 6

-I'm still performing in Brighton so this post has been pre-scheduled-

6. Something You Hope Never To Do

Honestly, I meant it when I said it, I never want to have kids. People never seem to tire of pointing out to me that I'm ONLY 22, that one day my hormones will kick in and I'll feel all broody and that this is pretty much an inevitable part of being a woman, and I'm pretty sick of hearing it all to be honest.
So what if I am only in my twenties-I still know my own heart, my own mind, my own body-and none of these things are telling me that I want to procreate-in fact they're saying the opposite. A large part of me doesn't really understand the desire so many people have to have children, and I'm not sure I ever will. OK, so perhaps one day I will come over all hormonal and start cooing over babies whenever I see one until I feel like my ovaries are about to explode with longing. Maybe. Maybe I'll change my mind someday and decide what will really complete me is a tiny person entirely dependent on me for its survival,  that will leak all manner of disgusting bodily fluids everywhere and ruin all my precious things. Maybe. Maybe, though, I won't. Maybe I'll never feel that inexplicable urge to breed that so many people seem to share. Or perhaps I will feel it but will ignore it anyway in pursuit of a life that is entirely mine. Who can say? Perhaps I'll actually end up having 13 children and living happily ever after under piles of toys and dirty washing and whatever other strange and mystical things kids seem to cultivate. Right now, I can't think of anything worse.

I also hope to never end up in a committed relationship with someone who is desperate to be a father-someone who will never be happy to be with just me but will always feel like something is missing. I doubt it'll ever happen, but if I end up with someone who has always pictured having children then there's no way it could work forever-at some point I'd have to make them choose between having me and having something that they'd always dreamed of-and I'm not sure it's a battle I would win easily. I don't want to be that person, I don't want to give someone that ultimatum, don't want to make someone choose between the love they have and the children they might have someday. I also wouldn't want to lose, to end up broken hearted because I wouldn't give them the thing that they'd always wanted, because no matter how much I loved them, I couldn't have kids just to keep them mine. It would be wrong. I just really hope it's a conversation I never have to have.

So there we go-something I never want to have to do in my life-create another person. I'd also really like people to stop expecting me to want to as well, but that might be a wish too far ;)

-Jenni-

Friday Letters The Second

Hello again!
Apologies for not blogging again this week, but it's slipped through my fingers like a fish in a stream and all of a sudden it's Friday again, when it feels like Monday was only yesterday. I've not been doing anything particularly huge, but all the little things seem to have added up and stolen my time from me. And now, today, I am off to Brighton to take part in a show that's running over the opening weekend of their fringe festival.  Some friends of mine have started a small theatre company, and I am in the cast of their very first show-Titus-and thoroughly excited about it. I'm sure you'll get a full blog on the matter next week!
Here's some Friday letters:

Dear People of Brighton: Please look after us, come and see our show and laugh at us. There's nothing worse than performing to an empty theatre, and it is a very good show.

Dear Weather: Stay as lovely as you were yesterday, pretty please. It was glorious.

Dear Body: Please, please let me get to sleep OK in the hostel room with my fellow cast members. It's going to be a pretty rotten weekend for us if you insist on keeping us awake with stupid anxiety, as usual.

Dear Headphones: We've got a lot of train journeys ahead. Please, please last this weekend before you fail completely.

Dear Bag: Please fit all my stuff in OK without bursting at the seams! You've never failed me yet *crosses fingers*

Dear London: I've got three glorious hours to explore you today, be kind to me and please don't let anyone steal my camera again. Camden Market/Covent Garden, I'm coming for you.

Dear Fellow Cast Members: Break a leg and let's have a ball ey? Just please no more crustacean references ;)

Dear Brain: I get it, you think we need a boyfriend again, and that we need one now. Fine. But please can you stop sending me sexy dreams with my friends in, it's getting kind of awkward now.

Dear Future Love of my Life: Can you arrange to meet me soon, if only to shut my stupid subconscious up? I'm looking forward to awkwardly falling for you.

Dear Me: Enjoy your stage time and your weekend. Just have fun.

-Jenni-

If you're in the area and fancy a giggle, please come and see Sheep Theatre's performance of 'Titus' at The Old Courtroom, Brighton. More details/tickets here.