Every now and again, fortunately not too often, I discover something truly horrific about myself. I'm not talking about a blemish or, gulp, growth. Something hideously repulsive about my soul.
Rather than keep these horrible trinkets of my personality a secret, I think the best - most cleansing - thing to do is to share them with you in the hope I'll be so ashamed I'll force myself to change.
Jenni's Top Five Hypocrytical Thoughts
1. When couple's have arguments in public I judge them, and am yet disappointed when one of them says through gritted teeth "we'll finish this when we get home".
2. I tut loudly and roll my eyes when builders shout "'ello sexy!" Embarrasingly, I'm flattered.
3. Nothing's more annoying then when someone talks loudly on their phone on the bus. Except when people grumble when I need to make a very important call on public transport!
4. I think the Daily Mail is evil. It doesn't stop me from being addicted to their online Showbiz section.
5. When people declare their favourite band is N-Dubz I snigger. I live in fear they'll discover Girl's Aloud's back catalogue on my iPod.
Sunday, 31 October 2010
Sunday, 24 October 2010
Yester-Me, Yester-You, Yesterday
Hello, you.
Have you forgotten about me? I wouldn’t blame you if you had.
I haven’t forgotten about you. In fact, I think about you every day. When I’m at work, when I’m on the bus. But whenever I sit down to write to you... well, you know. I can reel off excuses but the truth is that I’m here now and that’s all that matters, isn’t it?
Don’t take it personally! It seems that all I write these days are text messages, work emails and notes to my flatmate. Even they can feel like a stretch at times, and I end up leaving a doodle – hoping that we’re in tune enough that he understand that a picture of a cow denotes that we’re out of milk. Not out of cows.
Now, I’m aware that what I’m about to type with make me sound like a wanker of the wankiest degree. But since I moved back to Laaaaaahndan (London for those not of the cockney persuasion) I seem to have no time to do anything other than to complain about the tube and how little time I have. I’m not complaining, please, please, don’t think that. But it turns out that when you’re out in the big wide, world
doing – you have little time to write about it.
But the other day, in the midst of hundreds of junk emails, I spotted one that literally made my hands freeze over my keyboard. No subject. Just a name that I hadn’t thought about since I was about 10 years old.
Many months ago, whilst living in the West Country, when I would have done ANYTHING to complain about my lack of time I had (I think that time is actually slower in the countryside. It’s the same timescale that Santa uses when he does his rounds) I was doing my daily Facebook stalking session. (Remarkably, I still find time for these)
After hours of mindless clicking I stumbled across said childhood-friends name. He was the kind of child that was so full of creativity and life that you’d be genuinely saddened to hear they’d ended up working in Co-Op. With a little bit of a Google I found out that my fear couldn’t be further from the truth. He’d turned into a film-maker, writing, generally witty, fun person. Well, this is what I could garner from his witty, fun website.
“Contact Me!”
...To click or not to click? I pondered this while I made myself a cup of tea. What would I write? How do you start off a conversation with someone you haven’t spoken to for 15 years?
I plumped for “hello”.
Thereafter, I painstakingly chose every word. Reading and re-reading and re-writing as I went. The whole process took me the best part of three hours. Three hours to write five paragraphs. Five paragraphs of cool-but-not-too-cool-breezy-but-not-too-breezy-friendly-but-not-overly-friendly waffle.
Send.
Yes, I thought. Send that into cyber space. That’s good. And off it went.
Three months past. I started a new job. I moved to a new city. My family started new jobs and moved to the same new city. My friends had birthdays, grew up and got married. New lives were created. (Maybe not that last part).
I resigned to not hearing back from my friend-gone-by. Even more time passed and I forgot about not hearing back altogether.
And then I did.
It was cool-but-not-too-cool-breezy-but-not-too-breezy-friendly-but-not-overly-friendly load of loveliness. I was genuinely riveted by how a memory of a boy I once knew had gone into the world, move countries, and became a full actual life-sized person.
The next reply came a lot easier. In fact, spurred on by our electronic reunion, my fingers could barely keep up with all the things I wanted to tell him.
Even after I’d signed off, and pressed the dreaded “Send” button my fingers were still eager to type.
So I came on here and wrote to you. And I’m happy that I did.
Till the next time.
Jenni
Have you forgotten about me? I wouldn’t blame you if you had.
I haven’t forgotten about you. In fact, I think about you every day. When I’m at work, when I’m on the bus. But whenever I sit down to write to you... well, you know. I can reel off excuses but the truth is that I’m here now and that’s all that matters, isn’t it?
Don’t take it personally! It seems that all I write these days are text messages, work emails and notes to my flatmate. Even they can feel like a stretch at times, and I end up leaving a doodle – hoping that we’re in tune enough that he understand that a picture of a cow denotes that we’re out of milk. Not out of cows.
Now, I’m aware that what I’m about to type with make me sound like a wanker of the wankiest degree. But since I moved back to Laaaaaahndan (London for those not of the cockney persuasion) I seem to have no time to do anything other than to complain about the tube and how little time I have. I’m not complaining, please, please, don’t think that. But it turns out that when you’re out in the big wide, world
doing – you have little time to write about it.
But the other day, in the midst of hundreds of junk emails, I spotted one that literally made my hands freeze over my keyboard. No subject. Just a name that I hadn’t thought about since I was about 10 years old.
Many months ago, whilst living in the West Country, when I would have done ANYTHING to complain about my lack of time I had (I think that time is actually slower in the countryside. It’s the same timescale that Santa uses when he does his rounds) I was doing my daily Facebook stalking session. (Remarkably, I still find time for these)
After hours of mindless clicking I stumbled across said childhood-friends name. He was the kind of child that was so full of creativity and life that you’d be genuinely saddened to hear they’d ended up working in Co-Op. With a little bit of a Google I found out that my fear couldn’t be further from the truth. He’d turned into a film-maker, writing, generally witty, fun person. Well, this is what I could garner from his witty, fun website.
“Contact Me!”
...To click or not to click? I pondered this while I made myself a cup of tea. What would I write? How do you start off a conversation with someone you haven’t spoken to for 15 years?
I plumped for “hello”.
Thereafter, I painstakingly chose every word. Reading and re-reading and re-writing as I went. The whole process took me the best part of three hours. Three hours to write five paragraphs. Five paragraphs of cool-but-not-too-cool-breezy-but-not-too-breezy-friendly-but-not-overly-friendly waffle.
Send.
Yes, I thought. Send that into cyber space. That’s good. And off it went.
Three months past. I started a new job. I moved to a new city. My family started new jobs and moved to the same new city. My friends had birthdays, grew up and got married. New lives were created. (Maybe not that last part).
I resigned to not hearing back from my friend-gone-by. Even more time passed and I forgot about not hearing back altogether.
And then I did.
It was cool-but-not-too-cool-breezy-but-not-too-breezy-friendly-but-not-overly-friendly load of loveliness. I was genuinely riveted by how a memory of a boy I once knew had gone into the world, move countries, and became a full actual life-sized person.
The next reply came a lot easier. In fact, spurred on by our electronic reunion, my fingers could barely keep up with all the things I wanted to tell him.
Even after I’d signed off, and pressed the dreaded “Send” button my fingers were still eager to type.
So I came on here and wrote to you. And I’m happy that I did.
Till the next time.
Jenni
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