Tag: young adult

not a girl, not yet a woman

She was a baby just a breath ago,

Toddling, laughing as the vicar splashed

The holy water on her golden face.

And now she is a woman with a view

Upon the world and life the way

The writers told us it should be.

Fitzgerald and Jack Kerouac

Are men who make her pulse race fast

And wish to be another year

Into life so she can take to road trips

All across the dusty tracks that zig zag nations

Calling out with men, exotic in their lives

And wanting her to fall in arms

That soon will turn and make her weep,

But isn’t that what girls will need

To grow into a knowing woman

Ready to go out and roar?

I sat in a lesson today and I clocked a girl in the back row called Lily. I don’t know what made me double take apart from the fact that she looked the spitting image of her mother.

I was at the very same college I’m at a placement in now, and it was at the same time her mother was there. She was beautiful and cool and dating the coolest guy on campus. However, she was like me and was hating her time there. She left and got pregnant shortly afterwards. And she had a girl called Lily.

I dropped out and then got pregnant the year after she did and we became friends during that year. I was heavily pregnant when I was invited to Lily’s christening and I attended her second birthday.

I’m a crappy introvert who loses touch with everyone because I don’t like phones or coffee dates, so I lost touch with Lily’s mother. It was only when I saw this girl behind me, aged about sixteen, that I remembered that friendship.

Lily is a beautiful woman now and she was analysing The Great Gatsby like a boss. This didn’t make it any easier to match her up with the toddler that I remembered and it just reminded me how much our children grow and how quickly it happens. It’s made even more interesting by the fact that these kids are on the cusp of adulthood. They have fully formed opinions and soon they will spread their wings and fly. Soon they will experience all those highs and lows that make life so much like a novel.

Much Love

Rachel xx

A letter to my 21 year old self

It’s the night before my birthday and time to think about how I have grown and changed over the years. It would be nice if a couple of 21 year olds could be reading this blog and stumble upon this letter. It would be nice if that’s you, that you read this letter and realise that you are not alone. Being 21 is such a funny age. You’re no longer a child but you know that you’re not a proper grown up yet. You’re winging it and you hope that you won’t fuck it all up and that nobody will notice that you don’t have a scooby what you’re doing. Well, we all feel the same at your age and this is a letter to me when I was feeling all of those things. I had a bit of a bumpy ride but this is what I would say if I could write to her now that I am through it all.

Dear Rachel,

Happy birthday, enjoy the cake and a couple of glasses of wine. Enjoy this moment as much as you can because things are about to get tricky. That man that you are married to, the father of your child, he is hiding a secret and it’s all going to come tumbling out in the very near future.

It’s going to crush you and it’s going to make you hate that baby you share. You’ll resent him and wish that you never had him. You will think awful thoughts and then you will beat yourself up for it. And unfortunately, the only way that you are going to get through it is by turning to drink. Alcohol will be the only thing that soothes those horrible feelings but it will get its claws into you and eventually it will swallow you whole.

Your twenties will have their moments of fun and success but it all feels a little bit empty because you’re running on vodka. You’re achievements will be awesome. You will run 100 miles races and swim the English Channel. You’ll get a couple of degrees and one of them will be a first. How the fuck you manage it even I don’t know. It’s a shame because if you’d have been sober you would probably have been a raging success.

But you do make it through. You are tough and there is something inside you that is a survivor. You know when things are getting too much and you’re not too proud to ask for help when you need it. You will get sober and you will start to get your life back. You will change your values and re-evaluate what you think is important. You will start to take care of the people around you and become a much nicer person. You will reach your mid thirties and still be far from perfect. Those degrees are all but useless because you work in a shop and you struggle with anxiety so you can’t even work full time. But you enjoy your work and you go at it with enthusiasm. You have raised that baby and now he is fourteen and such a credit to you.

There are going to be so many horrible moments between you and me and I wish that I could stop them from happening or be there to give you a hug when they knock you down. But you’re a little toughie and you’ll make it through. You’ll have some highs too but try not to get carried away. Keep a level head and make sure you make it safely to 35 because I have a feeling things are about to get good.

Much Love

Older Rachel xx