yearly R.E.P.O.R.T

I haven't posted since my birthday *last year*. An update of sorts.

HAPPY SPRING.

I haven’t updated in just over a year - not since my 38th birthday. I am now thirty-nine, in the final year of my thirties.

Last year I gave myself a mission, a promise to myself to embark on an exciting and adventurous year. I was terrified to approach forty with nothing to show for it, but a full wardrobe, indecipheriable notes, aimless wanderings and half fulfilled dreams.

Dear Reader, I did it.

Well. Some of it.

I did not have the capacity to record as my life careered down swamps and through rainforests. I became so ridiculously busy, just living that writing about my life had to take an enormous backseat. I barely had time to edit my novel (I sent it to a beta reader over the summer) and finished edits in December. So, no my novel hasn’t reached the shelves of Foyles just yet.

I did however do some rewriting this weekend as my much-more-succcessful-than-me writer boyfriend said the opening did not do it justice. He was right. I’ve just ducked out of comp title research for my agent querey letter to begin writing this substack entry. Pay day arrives tomorrow and thus my six book longlist of books I need to read for my query letter/comp titles will need to be read and purchased. Back to book admin reality it seems. Back to achiving that goal!

I keep joking to my friends that the past six months (seven months?!) of my life actually needs to be a work autofiction published by Fitzcarraldo Editions. Perhaps I’ve read too much Annie Ernaux (more on that later). Thus, this is my attempt to quickly summarise. As I truly need to save the guts of the story for my mid-forties and the Fitzcarraldo Editions dream.

lolz

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R is for READING

It turns out being busy for a year leaves little time for reading. Between joining the gym, editing my novel, my 9-5 crushing my soul, applying for jobs, not getting said jobs, severe chronic migraines (am now on beta blockers!) getting all manner of vaccinations for a trip to Cambodia, one of my closest friends getting married, and several more having beautiful babies, getting an ADHD diagnosis and medication which made words dance on a page (still have yet to find meds that work for me), socialising, falling asleep the second I get into bed, a commute where I am crushed by sweaty bodies… and the death of my grandmother…

…it’s a miracle I read anything at all. I always aim for at least one book a month. I mananged twelve. But did read one book twice.

Heartburn by Nora Ephron

Pachinko by Min Jin Lee

Kala by Colin Walsh

Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain

Madonna in Furs - Sabahatti Ali

I Who Have Never Known Men - Jacqueline Harpman

The Use of Photography - Annie Ernaux

Just Kids by Patti Smith (audio and paperback)

Hot Milk by Deborah Levy

The Driver’s Seat by Muriel Spark

I also had to read a phenomenal amount about rabies. I now know so much about rabies. Too much maybe?

E is for EATING

I was on a tuktuk with my Cambodian vet nurse V. Hot, dusty, sweaty, covered in fleas, mud and shit but exhilirated. I stank. We had just completed our first day vaccinating dogs against rabies in Phnom Penh, we reached 100 dogs. V suggested we stop by a street stand selling coconuts. I bought us some coconuts, and we stuck the straws into the soft flesh and suckled happily letting thee cool, refreshing electrolytes of the sweet coconut sooth my tired body.

We arrived back at our hub to pack up our vaccination kits and wait for the other teams to return. I leant against a cool wall and enjoyed the rest of my coconut in my red sunhat. After our first day vaccination success, paired my ridiculous sunglasses and sunhat I garnered the nickname Disney Princess.

Hours later, after wandering the hot streets for ice cream and snacks with another gitl from my team, my stomach began to gurgle. Just jet lag I told myself.

The next day we were sent to inner city slums of Phnom Penh, a sight that was truly shocking to my Western eyes. We met some incredible people living in horrendous conditions, seeing dogs with skin sloughing off. We met some of the most aggressive dogs of our entire trip, and carefully weaved our way through each street searching for dogs like spiders. My stomach gurgled yet again. A different kind of sweat dappled at my brow.

I needed a toilet now.

V remembered a friendly family who owned a garage whose dogs we had just vaccinated, we traipsed back as I held my stomach. They kindly let me use their toilet. I must’ve looked utterly insane to them; A sickly redhead in a sunhat and plaits, wearing bright green trousers and a yellow tesshirt, sweaty and pale clutching her stomach. Their toilet was spotless, but was not what I was used to. It could only be flushed with a bucket from what looked like a well. I crouched down and… well you can only imagine. I had to use a bucket to wash the rest away. I felt like I was in there for days, despereate to not disrespect this kind family. Luckily I had packed all manner of emergency medical bits-and-bobs in my uniqlo bag.

Thus THREE WEEKS of severe gastroenteritis followed. I had to go to an emergency doctors during my second week in Cambodia for antibiotics and various other medications to try and stem the flow. I lived off electroltes and plain toast for two weeks! My plan to try as much Cambodian food as possible completely wrecked me by the first day! V my Cambodian vet, managed to get us some street grilled chickens which were delicious. Buddist monks in one of the pagodas gave us bananas. Many villagers and mayors gave us water. But despite my sadness at not being able to devour Cambodian cuisine the kindness of the Cambodian people while I was so fucking ill will never be forgotten.

I only missed one day of the vaccination drive, but trying to vaccinate thousands of dogs in various landscapes and conditions while constantly wanting to shit yourself was quite the adventure.

But I’ll never have another coconut ever again.

P is for PLAYING

Safe to say I am a pop girl.

O is OBSESSING

Capturing images of my life remains a constant obsession.

I already take photos of everything I possibly can on my phone. I already have an expensive analogue photography hobby. I already do 1 Second Every Day (and have done for years).

But for Age 39, I’ve decided to take one black and white photo on my Olympus 35mm camera every day for the final year of my thirties.

Project Thirty-Nine

still from Perfect Days [2023] dir. Wim Wenders

Inspired by Annie Ernaux and Marc Marie’s Use of Photography and Wim Wender’s film Perfect Days. I have begun taking one black and white photo every day on my Olympus 35mm camera using Ilford XP2 400 film. My aim, is by the time I turn forty, I’ll have a book of 365 photos recording the final year of my thirties, the people I love and the things I see.

I finished my first roll two days ago, I’ll send off the film to be developed tomorrow. The first photo will hopefully be a portrait of me in the biography section of Foyles on my birthday taken by my bf. A hopeful manifestation for the year and years ahead. I couldn’t predict anything that happened in the past few months, but whether I have an interesting year or a quiet one, I hope to capture the authentic beauty of every day.

R is RECOMMENDING

Side-Quests.

I have embraced them. Of course, not of all them were joyous adventures.

I entered a vegetable sculpture competition with a homage to David Lynch’s Twin Peaks (Twin Leeks). At work I signed up to go to Cambodia to vaccinate dogs against rabies. I trained for said trip to Cambodia. I went to Croatia with my glorious friends for a week of island, waterfall and boat hopping. I attended my grandmother’s funeral alone in the icy despair of January. I re-joined Hinge and it was a resounding success (I met one man). I went to Australia, again. I appied for the same job twice that I didn’t get twice and drove myself a bit insane with it. Had a colonoscopy that wasn’t as bad as shitting myself in Cambodia. I was in in three magazines (technically one was just reporting the vegetable sculpture competition!), one was published prose, and the other was an article for my 9-5 job. But they still count.

Everything counts.

There’s been one side-quest I won’t fully elabourate on for fear of jinxing it, but it has been so suprisingly peaceful, dreamy, joyful and also weirdly triggering (or as my friend Charlie said, Healing). but we shall see. That’s material for the autofiction.

T is for TREATING

Nothing deep here. I started to get professional manicures. It started in September for my holiday to Croatia as I knew I was coming up to what I thought was a busy three month period. Which extended into seven months.

I now have an addiction to cat-eye biab manicures.

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Hopefully, normal service shall resume as the week unfolds like a spring bud.