So
it’s been three weeks since I became English and I have learnt the following
things:
- The English/Scottish hatred seems to only be on the Scots side, the English love a Scottish accent.
- You can’t beat the simple things in life, like the ability to go home and sit in front of the telly with a cup of tea.
- Life isn’t the same without daily emails filled with cat memes.
- The world isn’t as grey as Aberdeen led me to believe. In fact, there are other stones in the world other than granite.
It’s
weird, it feels like my Aberdeen life was decades ago, and I am still having
difficulty believing that I have actually moved. I know it doesn’t really seem
like a big deal, but giving that I spent near enough 24 years living in
Aberdeen and the shire it still doesn’t feel real. But you always get used to
this sort of thing, I can’t remember now what it was like having my mum live in
Ellon, her being in Halifax just feels natural, and one day, hopefully soon,
not living in Aberdeen will no longer be this new thing I’m trying out, but
just life. And also hopefully soon I will stop having dreams about butteries
and no longer dread walking up a hill (which by the way is what Halifax is
completely made up of.)
So
yes, it’s been interesting living here. It’s kind of all fitting into place
now, I found a job within just 2 weeks, and ok it’s not my dream job but it
beats the dole queue any day. I have a routine with gym, swimming, TEFLing, and
making pretty things in place. My room is fully unpacked (thank Christ for the
40 odd bin bags of crap I threw away in Aberdeen) and I’m ready to get a
wriggle on and do something with my life other than administer other people’s
gripes. I can’t help but wonder if I’m having some sort of quarter life crisis
and I’m only going to live until I’m 96. I read a friend’s blog about them and
the phases feel all too familiar to me;
Phase one: feeling 'locked in'
to a job/relationship.
Phase two: growing sense that change is possible.
Phase three: building a new life.
Phase four: fresh and exciting commitments.
Phase three: building a new life.
Phase four: fresh and exciting commitments.
So basically, I’m in the middle
of phase 3, and planning for phase 4. I’m not doing too badly considering I
didn’t even know I was having one. In my opinion this crisis is inevitable for
most twenty-odd year olds coming into the real world in this day and age. It’s
great that we can do and be whatever we want to, but with so much choice out
there the possibilities can get confused in our minds. Do I want to be a writer
like I always said I did? Do I want to teach like everyone assumes I do? Do I
want to follow my childhood dreams and become a ballerina/post lady? I don’t
even know any more I have very exact desires about how I want to look, and how
I want my personality to be perceived, but what I want to do with the rest of
my life? The jury’s still out on that one.
But as some wise person who I
found quoted on an artistic picture on Pinterest once said: we must take adventures to find
where we truly belong. And to be honest, if we translate
that to travelling across Europe teaching English as a foreign language for ‘a
while’ (as my vague timescale dictates) then this whole quarter life crisis
thing ain’t too shabby at all.
You can read about Katy’s quarter
life crisis here:
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