39 years down... and this is what I've learned...

Some reflections and life lessons, on my birthday... (plus two poems and some strange tips)

Nothing ever looks how you expect it to look. I keep thinking of the messages I’ve absorbed through the seams of my skin, ‘musts’ and ‘shoulds’ that snuck in slowly, cementing themselves throughout the years. The way they’ve settle there inside of me, inside all of us, and they shame us when we try to steer our lives away from their rule.

They can be as small as ‘your house should be tidy’, the whole ‘cleanliness is close to godliness’ thing that reminds me of an old school friend: her home was all cream fluffy carpets and tight, miserable faces but still, I felt worried to show her my home, one that was chaotic and full of dusty books, but a place where we laughed around the kitchen table. Or they can be bigger – how society tells us the happiest people are married, with children. Leaving those with full, rich lives but no partner or children feeling alone and lacking on other people’s wedding days.

These messages are why I’ve had to spend the last few years grappling with fear around my decision not to have kids, terrified my value will drop if I don’t become a mum. We’re told women should be two things: young, and hot, or old and motherly. If we don’t we’ll end up alone, surrounded by cats, which… actually… doesn’t sound so bad. I know it’s bullshit, but we’ve been nurtured and fed by lies, it’s very hard to expel them out of us.

I wrote a poem recently, about wanting to tear it all up. Rebel against the notions of what happiness should look like and carve out our own. But that’s easier said than done, particularly when the messages come from the external and the internal. Particularly when sometimes the classic things do make us happy – I’m married, and my husband makes me happy. My friends’ kids bring them so much joy.

I’m questioning all of this, as today is my 39^th birthday. One more year until I’m 40… and my life looks the opposite of what I expected it to. I don’t really know what I expected, but it wasn’t this. I kind of thought I’d have my shit together more, that I’d at least have a leather purse with a range of credit cards inside it. Instead, I have one Monzo that the tube barriers keeps rejecting, that I leave floating around my bag and is now, I think, lost. I am grateful for that freeze option. I’m not tidy, I don’t have a five-year-plan, there’s a spot above my left lip and I don’t know how to pop it, I haven’t read any Zadie Smith and… I am not a mother.

When I woke up this morning I felt dread begin to settle in. I thought of calling off my birthday drinks later to attempt to get my life in some sort of ‘reasonable’ ‘good girl’ order. But then I began to list the things I do have, and the things I do know. The top being – nothing ever looks like how you expect it to look, and it doesn’t have to. There will be days you’ll be happy, and there will be days you won’t be happy. This is true, for everyone, no matter what life path they went down. You can’t tell how someone is feeling, by looking in on the outside. But truly, I believe, what’s meant for you won’t pass you by… that no matter how lost we might feel, at some point, we’re going to find our way and see that rocky patch as part of the journey.

These are two poems I wrote recently, followed by a list of the little things I know… for a more comprehensive list of lessons, I also have some here.)

Please share any little tips or life lessons that you’ve learned over the years!

Poem no. 1

Don't you just want to tear it all up? This map youve been handed. It tells you who to be, how to be. I was hoping it would be gone by now. But old school ideals have been recycled for a new school algorithm. You need to be a clean girl, a wifey with a low body count. They want you to check, check, check it all off. Marriage. Mortgage. Babies. Colour those boxes in, using their favourite shade of beige. 

You can go for it all... if you want it all. Tumble head-first into love. But know you don't need it. Any of it. Don't be tricked into believing a ring makes you legitimate, that a ring makes you worthy. You do not need to mould yourself, on the command of someone else's gaze... 
You'll end up carving down your very being, with society's knife. 

We breathe their conditioning in daily. Feel guilty when desire sweats it out of us. We have to learn to lick that salt off our skin. Relish in the umami of our unique existence. 

As, really, it's all a lie. We all get lost. No one knows what comes at the end of the road. 

So, let's shred it to ribbons. Rip it into tiny pieces. 

Let's create confetti out of the chaos. 

Then this is the list I wrote this morning, as the dread began to set in…

39 today and...

I can't find my bank card, my bedroom is a tip, the sore throat I've been ignoring has pounced, cruel and raw, nothing in my wardrobe matches, it's all ripped and stained, I've built a fifteen year career in an industry that's collapsing, I'm a frog in a pot waiting for it to boil over, I slept in my make-up last night, I bought a Glastonbury ticket in Trisha's beer garden and now I am selling my belongings so I can afford to go, recently I ate too much edible and got caught in a loop dancing, wearing just a t-shirt, no pants, in the living room window...

I don't really know where I want to be in the next five years, or what comes next. 

This is definitely not what I thought this age would look like...

But... I laugh every day. I love hard. I have friends who are family and family who are friends. A kind, handsome man just brought me the papers, so I can read them in bed. Sunshine is streaming through my window and I have a very fluffy cat who slightly dislikes me, but I don't take that to heart. The thing is, I've constructed my existence knowing how quickly it can all be snatched away from you, 

so... I'm making these shambolic seconds count. 

 I'm so in love with my life.

And here’s a list of little things I know…

1, Gargling TCP really helps with a sore throat. Mix a little with water, gargle, spit out, repeat.

2, Burning incense will instantly make you feel wise, and spiritual. Plus, it’s much better at making your home smell nice than a candle, and cheaper too. Oxfam do some brilliant ones.

3, Own a soft pair of pyjamas. Sometimes when you’re really, really sad your skin can feel painful. Soft pyjamas bring comfort in the toughest of times.

4, If you don’t know someone very well, but have to attend their birthday party, don’t spend a fortune in Oliver Bonas on something that cost £25, but looks a fiver. Instead, write a poem in their birthday card (Kim Addonizio’s On Desire or

Charlie Brogan

Girls are good ones) and buy them something little and vicelike, such as a vape (if they vape) or a scratchcard.

5, If you put drops of essential oil in the bottom of your shower, before showering, the smell gets caught up in the steam and your bathroom becomes a mini spa.

6, If you’re really tired, put one drop off peppermint oil in between your hands, rub them together and then inhale. You’ll feel alive again.

7, On a hot day suck on frozen cherries and frozen mango, misting yourself with a rose water spray that you kept in the fridge. Just… embrace the little things.

8, Cats don’t like it if you pet them, on their head, before letting them smell your hands first. Your hand hovering is like an Eagle to them, ready to pick them up and fly you away, it scares them.

9, You can cook instant noodles in white wine, and weirdly they taste amazing.

10, Remember, you love and are loved, and no one can take that away from you.