I ended up not going to see RedJetson tonight. Simon was complaining of being tired, hungry, poor and in need of a bath, so we stayed at home instead. Tomorrow I have training at SHIP around answering the phone and the door buzzer, things I could do with help with. Afterwards I fly to Belfast for a week and a half of hugs and hummus. I've been eating too much and although people say I look as if I've lost weight due to the gym, I'm feeling particularly fat and horrible tonight. The accumulation of all the junk food I've been eating seems to have caught up with me. Bleugh. Need hugs. 23:08  

My fan heater is dead. My precious, lovely fan heater, which has helped me through years of cold winter nights and which has provided untold hours of comfort, is no more. After seven years it has left me. I bought that fan heater before I moved in with Simon, I was 16 at the time. And the night before last, which was a little colder than usual, I switched it on to warm up my feet when a rattling noise could be heard. I turned it off for a minute or two but upon recommencing the heat, the rattling continued, followed by the sound of something coming loose and a lack of rattling. Shortly followed by the smell of something burning. I haven't dared reattempt to use it. All these long years we have shared are now passed. I'm not sure I shall ever feel the same about another heater. With time perhaps I can begin to patch the hole it has left, but things could never be the same again. Excuse me, I think I need some time alone...

Elsewhere, other things are beginning to die. The first leaves have started falling from the trees leaving a thin, crunchy layer over the grass. The weather is no longer swelteringly hot, though still quite humid occasionally. We've even had some rain every now and then. The insects and animals are still in abundance though and today alone I've seen about 20 bees (all on the same lavender plant), 1 spider (on my arm, unfortunately), 2 cats (one of whom I stroked for a while and who then meowed pitifully at me when I tried to leave. And who followed me. I managed to persuade it to go back to play with some children though), at least 4 dogs (one of whom was a tiny cocker spaniel puppy whose ears were bigger than its head), many ants and two gorgeous girlies, one of whom had dreadlocks and was beautiful and made me very jealous. It's been an exciting day. 17:43  

Still not much happening. I've been sleeping a lot. This may be due to the fact I started taking a reduced dose of my anti-depressants on Monday, or it may not, I don't know. I've been spending far too much money buying things I don't really need but do want, I can't seem to get out of the habit of doing it now. I try to justify it by saying that in 2 months time I'll get my student loan and will have more money than I have now, so it's not really important. But that's just making excuses and isn't a very good way of looking at things. Going to Rory's in a week, also hopefully going to see RedJetson. Life is fairly uneventful right now. 11:30  

Not much been happening. Gym, reading, SHIP, eating strawberries... Maybe next week will be exciting instead. 20:37  

I've had a dull couple of days. I hurt my neck whilst asleep on Wednesday night so yesterday I didn't go to SHIP and Ibuprofen has become my best friend. Today I went to my second CBT session but not to SHIP. At the appointment we talked about eating again. It was quite difficult, to admit to it all. That I have problems with something so simple. What must he think of me?

I'm having a break with London: The Biography. I'm around half way though its near-800 pages and interest is waning a little. I tried to read Labyrinths but kept falling asleep, I only just made it to the end of the introduction.

Most of the police cordon up the road has been removed now, life is slowly returning to normal. There's still a heavy police presence, and although the numbers of journalists no longer supports use of the term "a swarm", they're far from absent. I passed one who was talking to a colleague, saying he wished he'd gone to Luton instead of here.

The wankers in the street are still at it. There was shouting and something sounding like a fight last night. One of the women over the road came out and shouted at them for waking people up at 1am, to which one replied he didn't give a shit about anyone else, which sums it all up really. Still, I thought it was pretty rich of her to complain like that when she's held loud parties until 5:30am before. All this is making me depressed, and fearful. When I hear people in the street, I start cowering, worrying they'll do more than just hurt each other and turn on me too. Simon says my only solution is to move back to suburbia, but that's not something I want to do, I like living here usually, and it's extremely handy for college. So I don't know what the solution is. I don't know how long the people who are doing this have been living here for, and although most tenancy contracts are only 12 months long, can I really wait another 9 months (I think I've had these issues with them for 3 months or so) for them to go? I just don't know. 22:00  

Another wonderful site for your bookmarks is No Help. Here you can submit all your most serious problems and receive advice (usually bad) from a variety of inexperts. One such problem runs as follows:

I am living in a hotel here (Barbados) on a five-month contract with four months to run, and paradise is turning sour as my boyfriend back in England thinks he loves someone else. how can I sort this one out using only a phone?

Which received this reply:
if you get yourself a very strong catapult and work out some complex and accurate mathematics you can catapult your phone at the back of the bstard's head. it may kill or severely mentally impair him but if you dance you must pay the piper.

Quality Item, or what? 12:46  

I've just found one of the most beautiful sites on the net - PostSecret. The idea is simple: "You are invited to anonymously contribute your secrets to PostSecret. Each secret can be a regret, hope, funny experience, unseen kindness, fantasy, belief, fear, betrayal, erotic desire, feeling, confession, or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything - as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone before. Create your own 4-by-6-inch postcards out of any mailable material. But please only put one secret on a card."

The result is astonishing, and, again, beautiful. 23:29  

The police raids in Leeds are happening two streets away from me. I've been at SHIP all day and found out about it when Eamon, who was travelling to a meeting at Leeds Mind headquarters, near Headingley, was seriously delayed on the bus there due to the roads being closed off, and rang to tell us. There are police and journalists everywhere, vans with huge satelite dishes on the top, and plenty of children stood watching them all. Apparantly they've been here since 10am, half an hour or so after I left for SHIP. It's all very exciting, no doubt, though I'm just annoyed because the corner shop is in the section which has been cordoned off, so I couldn't go to buy bread or popcorn. Such a hard life! You can see a handful of photos about it all here. 17:26  

The summer heat has returned. Yesterday was very warm, bordering on hot, today has been sweltering. I've spent my day reading, sleeping and trawling eBay needlessly. By 9pm I was sick of it, and of the stagnant air, so decided to go for a walk. The sun was just setting and left the sky purple and pink in the east. When you can get a good enough view, unobstructed by houses, the sunsets here can be very beautiful. Possibly the sunrises too, I don't know, I've never been around to see one.

I walked up to the park, wandered around the remnants of people and rubbish. There were beer bottles, bottle tops, cigarette butts, plastic bags, disposable barbeques, glasses, drinks cans and leaflets laying everywhere. It saddened me that people could abuse such a lovely, and communal area, though to be fair, the piles of rubbish by the bins were overflowing and large. I suppose the problem is that it's a communal resource - many people seem to have the opinion that if it doesn't belong solely to them then they shouldn't take any responsibility for it. Another thing which saddens me.

I went to the swings and played on them for a while. I always love playing on the swings. The exhilaration always gets my heart going. After I left I had a slow walk through the rest of the park. It seems the fashion for taking furniture outside of the home has spread, and I saw an arm chair and sofa bed, abandoned, on my way.

I was feeling happy and content, though lonely. Everyone else was there with friends and I was alone. Two months and I shall friends, if I engineer it right, and I know that I've spent much longer times than that alone. But right now it seems like an eternity. I tried not to think about that though and instead focused on what my walk was evoking for me: summer nights walking down to the quarry with Simon and Ste where we'd light a fire and talk for a couple of hours, playing out as a child until it turned dark - those endless days of summer spent mostly naked and playing with water bombs or water guns and running around in the streets barefoot.

I think I've become happier in the last fortnight or so, since I've been rereading my Craft books and trying to work my way back into that world. I've been trying to notice the trees and the clouds, the sun and the moon, the grass and the flowers and the wind. I'd forgotten my love of the Craft and of the Earth, and whilst I may not appreciate all its inhabitants, such as those spiders in the gym or the drunkards up the road, it's still an immensely beautiful, mysterious and enchanting world and I feel very privileged to be able to experience it.

Still, I'd rather not have experienced seeing the dead bird with a large hole in its chest, laying in the park. It upset me and I decided to cut my walk short and make my way home. Luckily I found a cat to stroke, still a kitten really, and that restored my good mood. I'm now listening to Nazis From Mars, always a mood-improver, and tomorrow Rory comes home and we can have a proper talk, instead of five minutes of snatched conversation between bands. He says he's been having lots of fun, going to see lots of bands and bouncing around the crowd. He'd never have been able to do that if I had been there and so I'm glad I did go. He said he was glad too. 22:28  

Don't ask why but I was thinking about wings, and about what a pity it is that you can only wear them attached to you with elastic round your shoulders. Then it occured to me that all it would take would be two surface piercings, jewellry such as this, and a pair of suitably designed and weighted wings, and then I can have a proper set of wings. Maybe I'll be heading off to the piercer's in the morning... 20:30  

The music described below stopped after a little while but I went to the gym regardless. By the time I was back, so was Bob Marley, or one of his friends. I could hear it three streets away. When I finally reached my road, I discovered two men sitting on a sofa, drinking cider, in a car parking space with their door wide open and the music blasting out. I can't put up with this for much longer. 17:15  

The men with the armchair are back, though this time they're restraining themselves to just sitting on the pavement and not in the middle of the road. It seems it was them who were playing Phil Collins, I know this because they're doing the same right now. Punctuated with spells of Sting. Oh joy.

I started reading London: The Biography after all. It's very interesting and well researched, very engaging. I think I'm missing things though by not knowing London intimately. If I could picture the places he talks about, no doubt it would all mean much more to me. That was certainly the case when I researching for my essay on photography of West Yorkshire. Now when I pass the places mentioned in those books, I can remember what had been said about them, and knowing their history brings them more alive to me. By being unable to do the same for London, the information is less likely to stay in my memory and to resurface if I ever do see these places. That doesn't make the reading of the book pointless however, and I recommend it to all. Along with dancing around your room to the Features.

Update: The people opposite them have now started playing Bob Marley, even louder. I think it might be time to go for a walk... 12:49  

I'm going to be spending a lot of time alone this weekend. Well, weekends are usually spent alone, but this time I won't even have Rory on the end of the phone or to talk to online as he's gone to Oxegen. This could be difficult and it's very daunting for me to spend so long without the reassurance of having him around if I need him. Yes, I can still ring him if I need to, but as he's in the south of Ireland, his phone will be on roaming and thus it'll cost him about £3 a minute to make or receive any calls, so such luxuries are for emergencies only. In four and a half years, this is the longest I'll have gone without being able to call him if I need to. When he went to Milton Keynes to visit them, he was still within reach if I wanted, we could still talk for a long time in the evening. Now all our communication will be short, expensive bursts, no room for verbosity or prevarication.

It's intimidating, not knowing yet how to take advantage of such a small opportunity for connection and dialogue. It's only for three nights, so it's do-able, though not desirable. I know from how I feel about this situation that I rely on him too much. What would I do if there was no chance at all for our talks, whether for a week or forever? But such things will have to be dealt with in due course, there's no need for such worries yet.

I could have gone with him to the festival, of course, but chose not to, after I coped so badly the last time. The line-up wasn't particularly special, though now I wouldn't mind seeing so many bands I love, as long as it was outside of the festival situation. That's the bit that I can't deal with. Instead I'll listen to them at home, and dream of Green Man next month. And read. I finished Electric Brae earlier, a wonderful book. I don't know what to read next. I was going to go for A Gathering Light, but after the way I felt when I finished Special, I promised myself I'd stay away from books with troubled teenagers in them for a while, they struck far too close to home. Perhaps I'll change tack completely and go for London: The Biography, I don't know yet.

The weekend will of course be punctuated by trips to the gym. Andy and I had intended to go for a visit to the sculpture park on Wednesday, but he rang me in the morning to say he had a stomach bug and had been throwing up all night. I took advantage of the chance to go to the gym and went to a Liquid Bliss class, which turned out to just be a kind of aqua-aerobics. I was the youngest person there by at least twenty years, aside from the instructor who looked to be in his late twenties. It was a very amusing sight, watching these middle aged and old women flopping around in the pool like dying fish. The workout itself wasn't too strenuous, and we were allowed to only do as much as we felt able to. The really difficult part, once I'd managed to understand his mumblings above the blaring of Kylie and Tom Jones et al, was running up and down the swimming pool, in the water, whilst trying to stretch various limbs, not drown, keep out of the way of everyone else, and, in the worst part, trying to keep thfoam dumbbellsss we were given under the water, let alone use them for exercising. In that way it was definitely a work out. The truly worst part however was half way through when I noticed a giant spider crawling around on the wall opposite. One woman noticed my quivering, shaking stance, saw what I was looking at, and took it upon herself to exclaim, "A spider! And a big one too! [She grinned at this point.] You're a thousand times bigger than it you know." One thing I do know is that trying to rationalise with people who have phobias never works. She did point out the spider's existence to the instructor though and once he'd gathered that my gesticulating and frightened demeanor meant I wanted it killed, he did so. With his hand. I can see him do it now. It fell to the floor and stayed there on the poolside, in my view. Not a good thing at all. I managed to mostly carry on with the class though.

Afterwards I got changed and went and did my first session using the exercise equipment. After a lot of faffing around with the hyped-up memory sticks we have to use for the machines, I managed to get going. First I was on the rowing machines, then a cycle and next the cross trainer. Sweat was pouring off me and by the time I made it to the cross trainers, I had to stop a few times as I'd run out of energy. I started thinking about how maybe I liked my lumps and bumps after all. They've been with me so much, like an old friend, it would be a pity to get rid of them. Regardless, I finished my workout using various leg-focused machines and changed, then made my way home. Slowly. Consequently I spent most of the rest of the day asleep.

This morning I had my first CBT session. It was hard. He asked me questions I found difficult to answer. Not because I didn't know the answers but because I didn't know the person I was answering to. Being able to open myself, expose all the things inside me which hurt so much, I can only do that to people I've already reached a certain level of trust with. I wanted to tell him, but I found myself incapable of. Fear of ridicule I think, for people who know me a little can see how my mind works, how I might reach certain conclusions about myself, but for people unused to SarahLogic, there's a high chance they'd just laugh and tell me I was being silly. Knowing that he was a professional and it would be not only inappropriate but also plain wrong didn't help. I also have a bad history with mental health workers. The only one I've trusted properly was the one who upped and left to move to Switzerland. All others I've seen, whether accurate or not, as trying to make my life harder rather than easier, or as being unable to see how my mind worked and being able to work with that. I was able by the end of the session to confide some things to him however, so there's a good basis for successful future appointments. I have to try and remember that this person genuinely does want to help me, and it's irrelevant whether that's due to personal concern or because he's paid to do, and that he can help me too. To throw the chance away would be stupid, and inconsiderate on all the other people who could have had the appointments I had / will have instead. I want to make a go of this, though as I explained to him, I like stability, I don't like change, no matter how much I desire and know I need that change. It will take a long time for me surmount the problems I have, and it's taken a long time to get to this point, where some have already been conquered. He said he was willing to work at whatever pace necessary though and I hope we might be able to come to some space where the greatest of my problems can dealt with, and left behind. I just hope I feel as optimistic in future weeks. 15:33  

Worried about these troubling times? Concerned about loved ones still out of communication in London? Then dance around your house to the sounds of the Features. I can personally recommend it. 20:05  

Oh I ache. I went to my first pilates class on Sunday and did abysmally. I kept giggling at how badly I was doing. But whether or not I was doing what I was meant to be doing, I've certainly done something as my abdominal muscles ache and my right leg is in a similar state. Then I slept badly on my neck I think, as yesterday I woke up with my shoulder hurting too. I wasn't planning on going back to pilates as I had done so badly, but together Simon and Rory might have changed my mind. Things don't happen immediately, I shouldn't expect to be able to master pilates after one class. So I think I'll see how I feel on Sunday and decide then.

Today I'm starting volunteering in the SHIP office again. June wasn't very enthusiastic about having me in, whether because there's no work for me to do or because she doesn't like me, I'm not sure. We agreed though that I would come in a few times and if we think it isn't worth it then we'd leave it there. I think my role today is updating the mailing list, preparing for a large mailout at the end of the month. Joy. Tomorrow I'm going to the sculpture park with Andy, as he has the week off, so that's something exciting to look forward to. 09:17  

There's been a few things I've intended to write about recently but never got round to: a fiasco with my bank involving some customer services woman who insisted that despite the average time for a new debit card to be received being 5 to 7 days, I had managed to get one, which looked exactly the same as the previous one, in four hours, in the middle of the day, due to a change of title from Miss to Ms. I didn't believe her. I got one yesterday with a Ms on it. I'm getting quite a collection.

I also wanted to write about going to the gym: I went swimming on Thursday for the first time since I left school 8 years ago. I kept panicking almost, I'm not sure what about, a fear of drowning perhaps as I'm certainly not as strong a swimmer as I was in school - I was in the slow lane and people were overtaking me. But then I would remember that the pool was only just over a metre deep at all points and I could stand up anytime I wanted to. So I would, then I'd carry on swimming and soon I'd be feeling panicky again... It was an achievement to go though, I swam about half an hour in all, with a long break in the middle whilst I sat in the spa pool, giggling as the bubbles popped around me. I'm booked in for my first pilates class tomorrow, we'll see how it goes.

College has all finished now. There've been mini-finishes previously, stages of completion: handing in of my photography coursework, the photography exam, the handing in of all work for the diploma, putting the exhibition up, taking the exhibition down again... But now it's all gone, nothing left to do until September. It feels good, all this stop-starting all the time with the stages of completion was tiring me out. Though there is really one more thing I have to do: I received a letter this morning saying that I could receive Disabled Student's Allowance "in principal". I have to book an appointment with the college's Disability Officer to discuss my needs and how the grant could help meet them. Then they'll consider our report. Good news, "in principal."

Other news in brief: my Dad's gone to Crete; we're looking into having the cellar re-done so I can turn it into a work space; I have lost arsedness for everything cooking-related - anything more complicated than cereal seems to be beyond me, even sandwiches are trying; been spending far too much money splashing out on non-essentials: knickers, make-up (don't ask), new bag, trainers (though I did need those for the gym); feeling lonely. Please donate hugs. 18:07  

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