Tuesday 31 August 2010
Tuesday 31 August
Today is not a good day. I can never tell why or when it kicks in, but this afternoon it has. How to describe it.... utter unbearable sadness and hopelessness. What's the point? Why bother running the same mind numbingly dull treadmill every single day when you desperately don't like it? There's only one answer. I will never ever ever leave my children, I am absolutely and completely in love with them, so the rest of it will always come second, desparation or not. But that doesn't make it any easier to cope with. What should I do? Do I go back on tablets so my days hum along at the same "fine" pace or do I manage the waves as best I can and keep hoping that one day things will get a bit easier? One of the shining beacons in my life once said to me, only the mediocre run to form. I detest running to form, but should I accept it in the form of medication to make the sadness go away? I still miss Dubai right to the pit of my stomach. Not the actual place, but what that place gave me. Even with no money it was still a different way of life, a more fulfilling way of life. Different ideas, different events, different views. Always something new to learn or understand. My children would grow up with such open minds and diversity. They'd be multilingual and "different" would be normal to them. Every colour, every faith, every chance to help them naturally grow into what they will become without judgement, prejudice or social boundaries. But here we are. In Skelmersdale. There's no money, there's no opportunity to make more money, there's no culture, no diversity, no inspiration, no controversial opinions on anything of any significance to challenge my own forcing me to change and grow. Sometimes I am drowning so much in the nothingness of here that I think I may actually suffocate. And then I cry. I cry for my own selfish sadness, for all the things I dream of that I just don't have the means to fulfil, and because of guilt. Guilt that my children and the love from the most wonderful man in the world are not enough.
Thursday 26 August 2010
Thursday 26 August 2010 - England
I had a dream once. It started from as early as I can remember. From as early as I knew there was another possibility, another reality, than the one I was in. I don't remember a sudden jolt of realisiation, it was just something that was always there. I didn't understand it at the time, this urge, this need for something else. I always thought it was something that not another living soul would understand, and so I always hid it, scared and embarrassed of being so emotional about something that I couldn't even explain. Deep in the night when I would sob from fear or longing of this thing that I couldn't explain, I wanted to wake my big sister and ask her was she different too, did she cry, did she know what it was? But I never did. I hoped so much that she would hear me, come to ask why I was so upset and then tell me that she understood completely. But she never did. Was it exaserbated by the the child molesting step-father, maybe, I can't know for sure, but I do know that it absolutely would have been there anyway, was there even before I understood that what was happening wasn't right. And what was this thing that gripped me, that made me feel so different from everyone I knew, from my own family? An innate, overwhelming, all consuming need for something "different". Something more. Something better. Something soulfully fulfilling. Something to get me out of this fucking hole that just did not feel right.
So then I got a bit bigger. School and college were done, relatively successfully, what should I do now? I went to work, followed the protocol, partied with my friends, learnt the joy of shagging and the shitness of boys in their youth, and I learnt that it wasn't only me who felt I was different. People disliked me. I didn't understand why, I was a nobody. Not in the cliques, not one of the pretty ones, not one of the ones to be jealous of. But I just didn't fit. And then after school I heard through the whispers that people thought I was "up my own arse", because I didn't talk like them, because I didn't aspire to the same things as them. Their boyfriends would chat me up and when I would turn them down they would run back to their girls making up stories to get me into trouble. Who did I think I was? But I was always too afraid to stand up to any of them. To stand up for who I was. I didn't know who I was. I did what I had to do to stay under the radar and keep my head down on the treadmill. And then one day I saw an advert in the local paper. It was for something called a flight attendant with an English charter airline called Airtours. I had seen these women on the tv as a child. Strolling through the airport in slow motion, not a hair out of place and looking like they knew exactly who there were. It takes more than a uniform and some red lipstick for inner peace, I know that now and God damn I wish it was that easy, but at the time, it was a bloody good place to start.
I applied. I had to go to London for the interview, on a BA shuttle and everything. And guess what, you'll never guess, I only went and got the fucking job! And from my first day of training, everything changed. The realms of another possibility were now tanigible. I could see further than Connie dossing, further than the limits I had had to learn to keep myself inside. I know it's only a silly waitressing job on a silly aeroplane, but I saw things, things that fill your belly and fill your soul. My first warm sunset over the ocean. My first drive along a road lined with palm trees like you see on American tv shows. My first accent other than British. My first Christmas in 35 degrees eating a baked potato next to the pool. My first time realising that my longings were not so unfathomable. And no, it's not about money, although I would be naive to think that these things would be possible without money or backing from some source. But no, absolutely not, not about money per se. I could see that what I wanted for my future was not so pie in the sky, not so cinderella fairy tale. It was there. IT was real. All I had to do was choose to make it my life. And so I did.
Eighteen months later I saw another advert. The one that would change my life forever, and now haunt my every waking moment. Emirates Airline. Dubai. I'd never heard of it. I asked everyone at work about it. Many had applied, my peers included, but it was too tough to get into. I sent off my application. It's been 13 years since that phone call and I can't remember what I did this morning, but as cliched as it sounds, I remember that phone call like it was yesterday. It was a 6am standby with Airtours and so I was ready for the phone to ring and me to answer in a half asleep hazy state. I had been told that you normally heard within 2 to 3 weeks if you had been successful. It was 3 weeks to the day so I had already started to process my disappointment. It was 4am, 8am in Dubai when office hours begin, and when I heard the ring I assumed it was my expected 6 o'clock wake up call. Hello Clare, this is blah blah from Emirates Airline. I'm very pleased to tell you that you've been accepted and we'd like you to fly out to Dubai as soon as you're able. Congratulations. Would you like to accept the position?
And that's when my life really began. The day I flew to Dubai is the day that I finally, absolutely felt like me. This was my life, my dream, now my reality, and it was starting right then and there on a flight from Manchester to Dubai with a skinny, blonde gorgeous girl called Kirsty Nimmo.
So then I got a bit bigger. School and college were done, relatively successfully, what should I do now? I went to work, followed the protocol, partied with my friends, learnt the joy of shagging and the shitness of boys in their youth, and I learnt that it wasn't only me who felt I was different. People disliked me. I didn't understand why, I was a nobody. Not in the cliques, not one of the pretty ones, not one of the ones to be jealous of. But I just didn't fit. And then after school I heard through the whispers that people thought I was "up my own arse", because I didn't talk like them, because I didn't aspire to the same things as them. Their boyfriends would chat me up and when I would turn them down they would run back to their girls making up stories to get me into trouble. Who did I think I was? But I was always too afraid to stand up to any of them. To stand up for who I was. I didn't know who I was. I did what I had to do to stay under the radar and keep my head down on the treadmill. And then one day I saw an advert in the local paper. It was for something called a flight attendant with an English charter airline called Airtours. I had seen these women on the tv as a child. Strolling through the airport in slow motion, not a hair out of place and looking like they knew exactly who there were. It takes more than a uniform and some red lipstick for inner peace, I know that now and God damn I wish it was that easy, but at the time, it was a bloody good place to start.
I applied. I had to go to London for the interview, on a BA shuttle and everything. And guess what, you'll never guess, I only went and got the fucking job! And from my first day of training, everything changed. The realms of another possibility were now tanigible. I could see further than Connie dossing, further than the limits I had had to learn to keep myself inside. I know it's only a silly waitressing job on a silly aeroplane, but I saw things, things that fill your belly and fill your soul. My first warm sunset over the ocean. My first drive along a road lined with palm trees like you see on American tv shows. My first accent other than British. My first Christmas in 35 degrees eating a baked potato next to the pool. My first time realising that my longings were not so unfathomable. And no, it's not about money, although I would be naive to think that these things would be possible without money or backing from some source. But no, absolutely not, not about money per se. I could see that what I wanted for my future was not so pie in the sky, not so cinderella fairy tale. It was there. IT was real. All I had to do was choose to make it my life. And so I did.
Eighteen months later I saw another advert. The one that would change my life forever, and now haunt my every waking moment. Emirates Airline. Dubai. I'd never heard of it. I asked everyone at work about it. Many had applied, my peers included, but it was too tough to get into. I sent off my application. It's been 13 years since that phone call and I can't remember what I did this morning, but as cliched as it sounds, I remember that phone call like it was yesterday. It was a 6am standby with Airtours and so I was ready for the phone to ring and me to answer in a half asleep hazy state. I had been told that you normally heard within 2 to 3 weeks if you had been successful. It was 3 weeks to the day so I had already started to process my disappointment. It was 4am, 8am in Dubai when office hours begin, and when I heard the ring I assumed it was my expected 6 o'clock wake up call. Hello Clare, this is blah blah from Emirates Airline. I'm very pleased to tell you that you've been accepted and we'd like you to fly out to Dubai as soon as you're able. Congratulations. Would you like to accept the position?
And that's when my life really began. The day I flew to Dubai is the day that I finally, absolutely felt like me. This was my life, my dream, now my reality, and it was starting right then and there on a flight from Manchester to Dubai with a skinny, blonde gorgeous girl called Kirsty Nimmo.
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