The Winds of Change

Yesterday as I walked into town for a gig, two separate things happened to me:

1. A man on the street tried to hit on me. It was a weird and uncomfortable experience and kind of started with him just walking inexplicably close to me while I pretended that my headphones were also obscuring my sight. Eventually this got too difficult as he was having to do a walking backwards trippy uppy type walk to try and meander casually in front of me but maintain some very bloodshot eye contact. I took my headphone out of one ear and he said,

"Hi, so what... are you on your way home from school?"

Now, I don't really know where to start on things wrong with that sentence. For a start, no - I'm 24 - it's been at least 8 years since I was walking home from school. But, also... if you suspect strongly enough to ask that I am walking home from school, should you really be trying it on at all?!

The answer is inevitably going to be no because you clearly don't even own a calendar - school broke up last week dickhead! Unless you think I'm in summer school? By which you must think I am so remedial that despite having been held back for 8 years I am still needing catch up classes? This relationship is never going to work out.

I had to hastily stuff my head phone back in my ear and continue along my merry way. It was then that I walked past a group of people who had newly graduated. You could tell they were newly graduated because they were all dressed like Severus Snape and looking a little bit smug.

What this means is that it's 2 years since my own graduation which means I am supposed to be all evaluative of how my own life has gone since I stopped being a student.

My own graduation was quite a soggy affair - not because it rained all day, I graduated in Canterbury which was a city designed to be picturesque at all opportunities. No, twas soggy because my boyfriend at the time chose 1am the morning of my graduation to end our relationship. This wouldn't have been so bad had we not been living together at the time... I therefore turned up at my ceremony carrying almost everything I owned, wearing shorts and flip flops and looking like someone had inflated my face with saline solution.

My mother's reaction to this mess of a child was to ask why on earth I thought it was appropriate to wear shorts and flip flops to my graduation ceremony. I've always blamed it on the immense heart ache - it's never felt right to tell her that I'd have worn them anyway. I really enjoy flip flops and shorts. The ceremony itself is a bit of a blur. I have the good fortune to have a surname that put me next to one of my closest friends for the service and so he and I spent a merry hour making sarcastic comments and wishing we were less pessimistic.

The highlight was going up to actually collect my scroll (which I have since lost) and to receive my handshake from the man with the shaky hands. Now, if you received a certain grade for your degree, the shaky handed man would ask you what you were going to do with your degree... bearing in mind I was not thinking straight and was fairly certain my life had ended at 1am that morning, I gave the obvious answer -

"So, Laura, what are you going to do after your degree?"

"I'm going to be an elf in Lapland."

See, I was about 4 months off disappearing to the snowy wilds at that point and having the time of my life. It all seems like so much more than 2 years ago... and with new massive changes on the horizon (a third Edinburgh festival next week and a possible move back to Somerset after Christmas) it seems like an exciting time to wonder what on earth the next two years is going to hold... hell, as long as I come out of it still looking like I could be on my way home from double Science class I suppose I've got nothing to worry about. Who needs Oil of Olay? Just get yourself some adventure...!