When happiness is in fashion (fleetingly)

Even Jared Leto would tap that double denim delight 

This recent 90's revival is doing funny things to me, first I left my house in full blown double denim and felt smug about it, then I found myself seeking out No doubt songs, or Nsync until eventually I had an entire night going through a back catalogue of all the stuff I used to listen to when I still day dreamed about my school crush Steven Huggins or Mark Owen, who some said Steven looked like. Sighs. Guys, I was singing along to Emotions by Mariah Carey. Well, I say 'singing'...who can actually 'sing' along to that song? 

Look Millennials and all the potential men I am likely to date (you gotta look down when you hit your 30's and discover everyone your own age is married), this post just isn't for you, you're not going to understand a word I say from this point in and I won't throw in a single Harry Potter quote #TEAMROALDDAHL. So you might as well just go and invent an app that matches denim with other denim shades whilst the adults have a little trip down memory lane. Off you go now, scoot. 

Whilst staring at the almost full moon, I listened to, in no particular order, No Doubt, Nsync, Backstreet Boys, All 4 One (I swear - obvs), Boyz II Men, Take That (old school, 90's style), Mariah Carey and Jewel. And do you know what? I was happy. 

I was happy the way I used to be back in 1995 when Steven Huggins would come and talk to me at lunchtime. Advice to any teenagers still reading (seriously there won't be a single Potter quote, not one), if you are to have a school crush make him be three years older so that you can't actually date him (if he dates you, judge him, judge him harshly, you are too young) and make sure he is the kind of crush who will go out of his way to talk to you because he knows you have a crush on him. The kind of guy who enjoys the flattery of your crush and will indulge it but never, ever act on it. This is the perfect kind. It means you have so much material for the letters you will pass under the desk to your best friend during French. Guys if you're still doing French at school, don't bother, if you ever go to France they will pretend not to understand your perfectly acceptable attempt at their language and talk to you in English anyway - so fuck them and their pretty sounding words, send notes to your friends instead. 

Send notes about whomever you are crushing on, then go home and listen to, I guess One Direction(?) or Taylor Swift whilst flip-flopping between daydreams of said crush or marriage to Harry or Liam or whatever the other ones are called and be happy. Be really, really happy. 

Because the next time you get to be that happy again is basically when the decade in which you were a teenager comes back to haunt you when you're way past your best and no where close to the day dream version of yourself of yore. In fact your future husband, Mark Owen, is now in the real future and not married to you, thank God because he looks like someone’s old Aunt Mildred, all Paul McCartney loose jowls and sex-addict apologetic for sleeping with every moving female that got within arm distance of him (which is close because he is tiny). 

They all turn out this way, boy band crushes, school crushes, the people you were convinced were definitely going to be the love of your life and would cry buckets over because LIFE IS SO UNFAIR WHY IS HE GOING OUT WITH LISA CHALKLEY? Because she is his age and stunning - shut up Hannah. You'll feel differently when he breaks her heart in a few years time...just you wait. 

With the exception of Jared Leto, your crush only has one trajectory; down. He'll get fat, spotty and greasy, or Aunt Mildred-y like Mark Owen and he'll either go on to be a drug addicted waster with ten kids by different Mum's or a sex-addicted alcoholic or worse, like actual Paul McCartney, a jowly vegetarian. Never trust a vegetarian. Don't even talk to Vegans. Jason Orange I am looking right at you. 

Can you imagine how Cameron Diaz feels now? She dumped Jared Leto, dumped him. And not only has he been preserved in some kind of special vegan diet (it's okay to talk to Vegans when they are Jared Leto) but even though the 90's ended and took his TV show with it, all the things you might expect to have happened to Jordan Catalano in My So Called Life didn't, he just simply put the 90's in his pocket and kept walking until the only part of the 90's that still existed was Jared Leto, and now, now the 90's are back and there he is, all perfect hair and face, a cool as fuck rockstar who eats healthy and smiles. Jesus. Poor Cameron, she married one of Good Charlotte who even in this new 90's revival still aren't cool and whilst her ex has won an Oscar, the closest she’s ever come to an Oscar is sleeping with Oscar winning Jared Leto before he was Oscar winning. It’s enough to make me want to cry for her, thinking about Cameron has almost knocked me off my 90’s-when-Britney-had-the-best-abs-in-the-World high. Which, whilst we're on the subject, are BACK. Yep, go on Instagram, even Britney's abs have come back to celebrate the 90's revival. 

Back in the early 00's my sister, my nemesis, Steven Huggins real life ex-girlfriend Lisa, and me were invited back to Jared Leto's hotel by Jared Leto's no-where-near-as-cool brother Shannon: we said no. WE SAID NO. So, Cameron, we get it...damn, we get it. 

But she was right, of course, she acted on instinct, everything was screaming at her that he would become a Paul McCartney; of course, he had to. In the future, science will carry out tests on single pieces of Jared Leto's hair to work out how he managed to be so perfect regardless of decade, age and veganism. 

He is a miracle; I would put money on it that your crush won't be. Although...maybe Harry, I mean, it's the hair, the hair is a big sell, like Jordan Catalano before him, he could be a candidate for staying exactly the same regardless of decade. Time will tell, invest wisely teen crushees, forget Zayn; he'll be in rehab in five years max. 

I mean, I digress, but who wouldn't at the mere mention of Jared Leto? I mean, please. All these memories and the music and the Jessie from Saved by the Bell Mum jeans and denim shirt style that I have been rocking has got me all happy. Happy the way we can only be when we are teenagers. Yes, I do mean happy in a way that is permanently miserable and or angry. But that was happy. That was blissfully happy, the worst thing that happened is the school dick head picked on you for being ginger and I can tell any of you suffering this now (I’m really not going to quote Potter, why are you still reading?), that guy will be dead at 23 from a drug overdose, or jobless and fat, or who even cares, he'll be nowhere you want to be so forget him. Look, Ed Sheeran got rejected by music industry school bullies who thought he was supposed to be prettier and that man is getting laid as many times a week as he damn well wants. So whatever sadness you feel about the crush who you can't have, or the fact that Harry Styles isn't single (don't panic - he probably is or if he isn't he will be and then he'll be a sex pest like Mark Owen and you won't care for him anymore), forget it all because this is as happy as you will ever be. 

Later when happiness visits it will be so damn fleeting and unstable and full of other considerations that you will look back at your school years with longing. And then, bonus, they'll be in fashion and you'll find yourself crying with happiness for all the memories and the fact you didn't ever give up hope that double denim would be back. But then, as soon as it comes back, it will go again and the only constant certainty you will ever know is that no matter what decade and what age, Jared Leto will always be cool. 

Surviving Twenty (also known as life)

I had to scroll a long way down on Facebook to find my 20's #sadfaceemoticon

This week the Guardian have been doing a series called "How I survived my 20's" in which they have asked other writers to write about their experience of being in their 20's. Which seems as good a place as any to start this weeks blog post that I should have posted at lunchtime but started writing at 2pm.

Late, that is probably the theme of my 20's, late and following a path already trodden. My 20's were book-ended by two breakdowns. The first was reactionary to a whole plethora of shit events and toiled up with teenage angst and a lot of anger. The kind of anger you can only feel when you've got youth on your side. In fact, I am jealous of 20 year old, angry and depressed Hannah. Rage like that can only come when the most you have to worry about is that NO ONE UNDERSTANDS ME. No they don't Hannah because they are too busy trying to understand themselves and pay the bills, put food on the table, navigate heartbreak, house sales, deaths, births, horrible bosses, unemployment, naughty children etc. 


What a luxury it is to be 20, although this is quickly followed by the realisation that in the words of Macaulay Culkin in Home Alone "This is it, don't get scared now." You are from here on in, forever, until sweet death comes and takes you, on your own and like Macaulay himself tried to warn you, it might start out as fun and exciting to be FREEEEEEEEEE! But soon, before you know it, you'll be protecting your house from burglars (landlords) and wishing your parents would just come back now (pay your rent). Literally, who knew that Home Alone was a metaphor for growing up? Who knew? John Hughes you fecking genius you: next week we look at why Uncle Buck is really a lesson in why you should always just be the Uncle, not the parent.


As your 20's draw to a close and you realise that yes, you've drank a lot and had a lot of 5am-might-as-well-go-straight-to-work-from-the-club days, you've met some brilliant people, you've lost some brilliant people and you actually looked way better than you realised the whole bloody time, you probably should have worn hot pants every day; you're still not entirely sure 'who' you are, 'why' you are or 'how' you are. So you just go ahead and have another break down, but this time that lovely sweet rage is replaced with endless tears, blank stares and a crippling lethargy similar to that you felt when you had Glandular Fever, which SPOILER ALERT, is not actually caused by kissing. I got my little bout of Glandular fun just from living in the same house as a blonde northerner. Other things I got from living in the same house as a blonde northerner was a love for Cliff Richard calendars, red wine, cheese and swearing. 


Before you know it you wake up with a hangover on your 29th birthday, single (again), still temping as a receptionist whilst pulling pints four nights a week, still not a Hollywood star / writer / events manager / peace keeping envoy / insert whatever achievement you haven't yet reached and that all that fun hasn't actually got you much further than where you started. But fucking hell it was fun wasn't it? But still, eggs are drying up (watch Uncle Buck - you don't need kids, just niece and nephews), exes are getting married or starting their own companies which they go on to sell for literally hundreds of pounds so they can be a fucking politician (some of that is true) or just walking away from you to go and be the same as they were before you, because that is a better prospect than being the same as they were with you. 


This is the moment where the twinkly music comes in and your Mum comes through the front door shouting "Kevin! Kevin!" just in time for Christmas day. Except, it isn't. It's the moment you stare 30 in the face and you cry like a baby because you know you need to get all this "WHY ME, WHY ALWAYS ME?" out before the real work that is your 30's begins. You can already sense that over that decade pay wall is the career you always wanted and a life you haven't been imaginative enough to envisage in your 20's because you were too busy doing shots and going to uni and following everyone else's path but your own. This is your moment; so have a break down and then bloody well get on with it.


Oh and stop being late.  


But seriously though, can I have an extension on my deadline because my cat just ate my homework...


WHY ME? WHY ALWAYS ME? 

Together

"All I want to say is that Leonard has been so astonishingly good, every day, always; I can’t imagine that anyone could have done more for me than he has. We have been perfectly happy until these last few weeks, when this horror began. Will you assure him of this?" 

I have always found a huge comfort in the prose of Virginia Woolf and especially her diaries; when reading them I feel as though a best friend is talking to me across the years. Even though I know where the diaries end, each time I get there I am overwhelmed by heaving sobs for a life lost, for all the words she didn't go on to say, and for all the stories that stopped with her life. She, a stranger and yet she holds my hand, and although I know her life ended when it shouldn't, the fact that she survived her illness at other times, put her pen to paper and clawed out her thoughts has always given me strength. 

But Virginia Woolf couldn't write when she was in a depressive state; her diaries go silent for months at a time. Her depression is almost completely invisible, in fact, reading her diaries it is hard to find any evidence of it at all. Here instead is a woman who is lively, opinionated, deeply intelligent and well loved.

Where we do get a glimpse of the voice behind her depression is in the two suicide notes she wrote, one to her husband Leonard, the other to her sister Vanessa. The letter to Leonard has been widely published; it is in fact a beautiful and even romantic letter of love to the man who tried so hard to save her. Less known are the words she wrote to Vanessa (as written above), imploring that Leonard be made aware of what he meant to her and how much he had helped her. 

This for me is the hardest part of depression, knowing that the illness directly impacts those around you. I am happy to write my experiences for strangers to read but always when I publish anything I have my Mum and my sister in the back of my head, will this provoke them to worry?

Silence is depressions weapon, depression does not want you to talk about it, or even challenge it because it knows that we are always better together than we are alone. It is when we are alone that it gains access to our thoughts; in the silence it can hear our fears, our doubts, and in the silence it can whisper them back at us. 

"I know that I am spoiling your life, that without me you could work. And you will I know." - Virginia to Leonard Woolf 

My depression has been a little loud this week; in truth I am just feeling normal emotions about something that has made me a bit lonely and sad but sensing a weakness the voice that was whispering around the corner started to shout: you are not good enough, you will never be happy, you will never be successful, you will never be truly loved, there is no point. Give up Hannah give up now. If you tell anyone, you will upset them, you will worry them, you will make them angry.

Only a bully wants to keep you isolated. 

Only a bully wants to take what makes you 'you' and turn it against you.

Only a bully wants to lead you to the river with stones in your pockets.

Only a bully will watch as you drown all the while crying out how worthless you are.

Only a bully…

"I have fought against it, but I can’t any longer, Virginia" - to Vanessa Bell

On Monday as I sat alone with the tears that simply wouldn't stop, there was a knock on my door. It was my sister and with one look at my face (which try as I might would not stop leaking water) she enveloped me with her love. Quietly, calmly and gently she sat with me until my tears had dried up, until my eyes had brightened, until a smile appeared. She stayed with me until I had spoken a bit about how I was feeling, until I had calmed, until the voice had been silenced. I know that if you asked her, she wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere else but beside me as I cried. My depression knew this too so it had to shut up shouting that no one cared, that no one wanted to hear me talk, that everyone would be better off without me. By being together, we silenced the voice, even if only for a few hours. 

"I know that V. will not come across the garden from the Lodge, and yet I look in that direction for her. I know that she is drowned and yet I listen for her to come in at the door. I know that this is the last page and yet I turn it over." - Leonard Woolf 

History is made up of men who have loved women as full heartedly as Leonard loved Virginia and as my family and friends love me. With Leonard by her side she had recovered from her illness before; it was only in the silence of solitude that she was able to write her note to him and walk to her death. Here, on her own, she chose to turn her back on him, on her sister, on all those who loved her; she chose to turn her back on life. 

On her own she was helpless to the voices that marched her towards her death.

On her own...

“All this pitting of sex against sex, of quality against quality; all this claiming of superiority and imputing of inferiority, belong to the private-school stage of human existence where there are 'sides,' and it is necessary for one side to beat another side, and of the utmost importance to walk up to a platform and receive from the hands of the Headmaster himself a highly ornamental pot.” - Virginia Woolf, A Room of ones own

  

When we leave people alone, when we leave them outside, when we stay silent, we are all contributing to the depression of the World. We are watching as someone drowns, we are turning our backs as someone cries, we are putting the stones in our own pockets and allowing the current of the river to pull us under. We are better together: men and women, black and white, East and West. It is when we pull each other apart that we flounder.

“It is fatal to be a man or woman pure and simple; one must be woman-manly or man-womanly. ... Some marriage of opposites has to be consummated.” - Virginia Woolf, A Room of ones own

Period: Full Stop

Period - a definition: 

"A rather large interval of time that is meaningful in the life of a person, in history etc. because of its particular characteristics: a period of illness; a period of great profitability for a company; a period of social unrest"

And of course: a period of menstruation. 

Hi Gents!

Do you see what I did there? By using the most common name we use for it I've managed to get you to click into an article you would not have read if I had used one of the other names we use to remove ourselves from the cold reality of the fact that women bleed once a month; until of course they stop bleeding and get hot sweats and a whole host of other shit hormonal symptoms. 


But don't leave.




Periods are everywhere (literally), heck, you could be stood next to one RIGHT NOW(!) From the company who have announced this week that they will be giving women time off for bad periods, to the app launched by a New Yorker called Shvrk (that's a silent V or an upside down A or just a gimmicky pile of bollocks because God forbid the app be called I'M ON MY FUCKING PERIOD YOU MORON), that was specifically designed so your partner, bless him, can know when your on your period without you ever having to say the word. The woman who invented this is 26 - fucking millennials. 

Periods happen, we all know this, half the Worlds population (roughly) knows a lot more about this but we all know this. However, we really don't like talking about them, which is a shame because they won't go away. From the ridiculous Tampon tax, to yesterday's news, periods just keep coming back - which is appropriate because that is how they work. If you're bored of seeing them in your newspapers then imagine how bored we are when they keep coming back month after month? 

I started my period aged 11 years and 10 months; I was so excited I can even remember the date, 15th December 1993. I felt like a woman, I felt like I was part of a club and I felt so proud of myself. But much like when the first pubic hair arrives and is swiftly followed by an unbearable continuous itch as the rest of them force their way through the surface of your skin, I quickly realised they were not much more than a giant pain (literally) in my stomach, back, heart and tear ducts. 

NEWSFLASH: I am actually on my period as I type this. Don't worry, my PMT was last week, this week I am all spots, pain, gassy, overly hot and bloated. Which is a walk in the park after the emotional fall out I always have the week before, sometimes two weeks before, every single month. 

And every single month I forget. People say you forget childbirth, which I can believe because I forget PMT every single month. Every. Single. Month. It happens around the same time every month yet and I can't say this enough, every single month for the last 22 years, 2 months and 20 days (I think - maths?) I forget until after two days of unrelenting, unreasonable, uncontrollable emotions I have a wake up moment: "Oh...I'm due on next week." And like that all the horror of the last two days disappears down a tunnel of memory loss. 

When I try and remember the depths of my depression, I can remember facts but I can't ever quite grasp the memory of the feeling, thank goodness. It has disappeared down the same memory tunnel as my monthly PMT. But the thing with depression, much like a period, is that it never really goes away. It comes back and you have not only forgotten what it is, you don't know you're in it until seemingly a cloud lifts and you're on the other side.

I think, despite all my protests last year, that I was actually depressed and I can only really see it now that I don't feel like that any more. Now I'm working creatively and actively trying to use my skills and the things that make me ‘me’ and that make my life worthwhile the cloud has lifted and I feel happy. Scared, yes, emotional, yes but not the kind of uncontrollable emotions that come once a month for a few days, or with every visit depression pays, these are normal emotions, not that depression doesn't come from normal emotions, it most certainly does, but the emotions become bigger than life instead of life being bigger than them. 

That is also true for the two days every month when I am lost in my pre menstrual fog. Last week that coincided with the lead up to my birthday. Despite having lots of lovely people around me, doing nice things, being spoiled, I had a terrible birthday. I wanted to cry all day and I did for most of the two hours that I couldn't get the Sky go connection to work that evening. I should have been sleeping ahead of an all night Oscar viewing party but instead I was crying into my laptop and wailing "WHY ME? WHY ALWAYS ME?" Yeah, I know - first World problems. But if you'd have said that to me on Sunday, I might have ripped your actual head off with my bare hands. 

Depression, much like periods, is cyclical and like periods we don't like talking about it, especially men. Not talking about these subjects doesn't make them go away. Not talking about them doesn't lesson them. Not talking about them doesn't help anyone. 

And men more than anyone need to learn to talk about all the things that make them feel uncomfortable: periods, emotions, fear, sex, sexuality and depression. It's time to talk, women bleed, men cry and everyone struggles with life. 

Full stop.