It's a mans world, so put some god damn effort into it

Ok, so at the weekend I was talking over how easy men have it compared to women (this conversation was with a male, and I think he agreed...atleast in my version of events he did).You see, men don’t really have to deal with half as much as women.

I could start with this blog, with the typically generic pose of how men don’t have to go through pregnancy, or even worse, child birth - but as I am completely not sprog friendly,you argue, never do I. So heck, I’ll begin with the alternate (yet still very generic) statement that women have to suffer periods. Now, mean say that they also have to suffer women’s periods...hello, we get this twice over, not only  our own PMT, but every other girlfriend and female family member that we know.But do you know what? That’s not where I am going with this post.

Today is a leapday, an occurrence that happens every four years.Today the newspapers will run stories about women who have proposed to their boyfriends, and of course the fiancés that said yes.  Don’t worry, am not about to go into the evils of marriage or the hardship of divorce (did the second one yesterday). You see woman have to do everything, it’s expected of us. I’m not sure if this is our own undoing for flaunting the ability to multi-task :D or whether it’s purely factual for female brilliance, but it’s true.

Men like to claim that they are the hunter gatherer – but let’s face it, women are the gatherers...how many men do the weekly food shop? Ha,point proven. Woman have fought for years to equal men. Well, we go to work, we work our arses off, we then go home, tidy house and cook dinner. Now, you’re probably under the impression, that I am going to launch into a feminist rant.Well I’m not going to do that either.

Nope, I am going to rant about chat up lines. You didn’t seethat one coming huh?

So the only thing that men are expected to do, is to make a move in the dating game. I mean women can do it, of course we can, but it’s the only thing thats truely expected of males. I know someone, who if reading this, would be shaking his head arguing that women have gone to a lot of bother to get equality, but then revert back to type in the dating game. But, come on it’s men’s responsibility to roll that ball, so could they not put a little more effort in?

I have officially had the worst chat up lines delivered EVER. I mean, I’m not talking the variety that are cheesily focused on your clothing. The below of which, have ALL been said to me:

Is that a ladder inyour tights or a stair way to heaven

 – It’s a ladderNumpty-boy, thanks for pointing that out, I also have a lost button on my coat,would you like to tell me about that too?

Get your coat you’vepulled

– Pulled what exactly? And what has that got to do with mycoat?

I love your dress, itwill look great on my bedroom floor

 – Why? Are you somekind of plus sized transvestite?

No, I am  talkingabout a) really lazy b) totally inappropriate c) ridiculously repulsive chat up lines, which have also been said to me, and here they are...

• Your well fit – fancy a snog
• I love your eyes...theirlike...open
• If you were my daughter I’d touchyou
• If we were in a relationship,could I cum on your boobs?
• I would ‘eat’ you
• If you were dead, I wouldn’t kick you out of bed
• You look like a girl who would take it up the “£$%

See, I really wasn’t kiddingabout the WORST laziest, inappropriate and repulsive chat up lines. How can anyone think that these are acceptable introductions? I I mean, you can really tell why they are single, you can also tell where my hand slapped their cheek.

Yes, I’m single. But I’m single through choice, not situation, and with offers such as the above, the game seriously has to improve. 

I let it fall, my heart...

It’s not often that I jump on band wagons, I’m normally the one driving the cart, however, today, I am going to surprise the world and follow suit. A friend of mine had posted a blog regarding divorce. I read it, and thought, fair play, was going to leave it at that, but someone once told me that you should write about what you know. Unfortunately divorce is something that I know.

Now before I get too ahead of myself, this is his link:

http://neilmonnery.co.uk/2012/02/27/pain-divorce/ 

I know he doesn’t need the traffic, and he gets more views a day than I can hope for in a year, but I thought it only fair to give him full credit.

Ok, so his blog linked to an article from the Independent stating how it should be harder to get divorced, and to that, I argue that you have no idea how hard the divorce process actually is. I’m not talking about the legal implications, legally the only the only people who win from divorce are the lawyers, but the piece of paper that they are fighting over is just the seed to everything else.

Legally divorce isn’t that difficult. You go to the office accompanied with a friend who will prop you up as your vision becomes blurred on the stairs, a friend who will ask all the questions that you need to know, but your brain can’t compute, a friend who will hand you the hanky as you tearfully recall the reasons why he walked out whilst your brain still cannot understand itself, and whilst the lawyer doesn’t bat an eyelid, nor does she look up from her paperwork. You hand over the money, and in return you are given a small piece of wafer thin paper a bitter trophy to the beginning of the end.

But let me tell you this, divorce is emotionally hard. It breaks every belief that you’ve ever had. It takes your memories and soils them and it most certainly ‘drops your vase’. People say that there is no stigma now days with divorce – the people who say this, clearly don’t have to carry such a label. If the pain of losing a loved one is not enough, if the hurt of knowing that you’re not good enough anymore doesn’t destroy you, then having to confirm your divorcee status as a regular occurance is a pretty good nail in the coffin. I hate how when I fill in forms, that I have to tick the box that states ‘failed wife’ – why does that make a difference to my Tesco club card? How does that impact my pet insurance? People who used to know me, now see a bare left hand where a sparkly diamond and wedding band once sat, people who used to know me, heard down the grapevine about my big D, and pass it from acquaintance to acquaintance, after all, the mighty have fallen and one simply cannot keep such gossip alone.

The night ‘hims’ officially left me, I had returned to our marital home under the belief that everything was going to be ok. I sat there alone waiting for him to come home, I watched the clock as the minutes turned to hours, and the daylight turned to dusk. Eventually I called him and he told me, that he wouldn’t be home that night or any other night. I remember my skin turning cold, my legs buckling from underneath me, and the most violent racking great sobs erupting from inside me. I remember my landline and mobile phone competing for my attention, as both his and my parents tried calling me, and I remember thinking I would never face the world again. I don’t remember how much time passed after landing on the floor, but I remember my parents coming through the front door, and I remember hugging my dad so very tightly begging him to make everything ok. I remember my mum whisking around the house taking down all of the photo’s that once proudly displayed our smug married faces. They stayed that night, but as they slept in the room next door, I sat there in our bed, in our bedroom, in our home silently sobbing throughout the night, knowing my life would never be the same again.

Since that night I have a had a network of support, whether it was my sister bagging up his belongings , my mum and dad enduring estate agent viewings as I tried to sell my home, my aunt sending a polka dot care parcels, or my best friend ruining my liver and building my ego. I owe everything to these people as they have got me through up until this point. I wanted to write that they have got me through my divorce, but the truth is, even after all this time, I still wobble. I still want to wake up and forget that this ever happened, because it’s hard and it’s scary.

My biggest fear used to be hims being in an accident and not returning one night. If he was out without me, I would worry that when the door went it wouldn’t be hims, it would be the police asking if I’d like to sit down. When someone walks out on you, it’s like they’ve died, except from when a husband or wife dies, they don’t have the choice to leave you, they are ripped away from you. Divorce is far worse, for the very reason it is a decision that has been made that whatever life offers, it is better than staying with you.

I still hear from hims every week, whether it’s a text or an email, asking how the cats are, how the fruit bushes are doing or whether I have signed the petition against Andrew Landsbury. He’s moved on. He is with ‘little miss emo’ and from what I understand he is happy. Please do not get me wrong, I don’t cry into my pillow each night, and I have a new world which is mine for the taking, but it’s still  hard to know that I am no longer his significant other, oh and whilst I am on this topic, what’s even harder is the complete devaluation of my title. I have gone from being Hun, or The Mrs, to Nicola. I received an email from him today with a link to Annie Lennox's 'Why' music video - which opens talking about divorce. Ironic really, considering this post. but yeah, shortcut to my email was named to Nicola (I have always hated my full name with passion, and have never once allowed him or anyone else to call me by it), and even worse, the surname is of my maiden name, not even our married name. I don’t even know where to begin with that.

I’m sure you are reading this, thinking woooah she has issues, but please don’t get me wrong, I may be broken, but I’m still good.

...So yes, Divorce, legally, isn’t hard, but don’t ever believe it’s easy. 

Let me put on a show for you, tiger Let me put on a show

I remember from a junior school report, one of my teachers writing about my vivid imagination, and you know what – they were right.

 I don’t know whether it was the dullard journey home, or whether it is because my brain is mentally exhausted, but I found my mind drifting as I sat in my fourth red light between work and home. A track came on my Ipod, and as I listened to the rhythm and the lyrics, I began to think how fabulous this song would be as a burlesque backing track.

As the song continued, I began imagining a routine that would work well with it. Happily in my world of oblivion I considered the shimmies, the leaning back and forth, the biker glove removal...Oh hang on, biker glove? That wasn’t in my initial outfit choice – it was only then that I snapped into reality and realised the dance wasn’t only in my mind, but had been in fact dancing out the moves. 

Apparently it’s not the done thing to do whilst riding a pink Vespa – who knew? The guy in the van next to me...well... his flabber looked quite ghasted.

Vroom Vroom

Miss Austen Regrets

My favourite writer of all time, like most females, is Miss Austen. She writes of the love that even two hundred years on, we lust over. The women are always headstrong and vibrant, they know who they are and no matter how bleak things seem, things always turn out for the best. Take Emma for example, she may mean well, but she is shallow and this flaw almost ruined the chances of her best friends happiness, and yet Mr Knightly accepted her flaws and loved her anyway.

But within the same blog, I must admit that I do believe that all men are tainted because of such stories. How can they possibly measure up to a character not only of fiction, but idolised by the imagination of all females. No matter how good the man may be, he won’t be as warm natured as Henry Tilney, he won’t be as magnanimous as Captain Wentworth, nor as generous as Mr Darcy.

But even Darcy is a damaging ideal to women of the 21^st century. My best friend had been struggling with her boyfriend’s behaviour, on the final week, she cried how she didn’t want to lose him, how he was the perfect man for her...or she’d at least make him the perfect man for her.  That there, that one disclaimer sums up so many of us. Woman give their heart completely, and by doing so, we block out the niggly bits, the bits that we never wanted, but would put up with, because we so badly want to believe in this one...after all Mr Darcy seemed so very far from perfect when he first arrived at Netherfield. Apart from his dashing good looks and well suited attire, he generally acted like an arse. He was rude, unfriendly and seemed to lack compassion in every way, and yet, on completion of the tale, he became a heartthrob all over the world for centuries to follow.

Maybe this is the illusion that women toil under. If I can just hang on in there, he too will be the man of my dreams. I’ve never been a lover of empting those half full glasses, but the stories just aren’t true. The girl doesn’t always get the guy. The girl may get to sit on the sidelines of his life, or cook his dinner and wait for his call, she may even take to bed with him, but the truth is, if he isn’t what you want him to be in the beginning, when everything is fresh, new and exciting, he sure as hell isn’t going to transform further down the line, when his efforts aren’t required.

I have written before about the time when I first found myself without ‘hims’,  and how a friend of mine told me to write a list of everything I would want from a man. I listed everything, looks, personality, interests...totally brutal and one day I hope to meet the mythical  creature who is my would-be soul mate. In the meantime however, I will be my own heroine, in my own story, I know how I want it to end, and I will not substitute my final act in anyway; likewise, and equally important, I will not substitute my lead.  

Alright, lets go get the shit kicked out of us by love

After a week of leaving for work at the ungodly time of 5.50am every day, to do a two hour penguin walk on the ice, and a ‘oh my gosh I can’t reach the handrail’ train surf, to then have a ten hour day, followed by the reverse journey home; I was, it is fair to say, ever so slightly shattered by the time it got to Saturday. In the space of one week I had walked nearly 20 miles...and after falling down my stairs the weekend before that, and dropping a solid wood bed frame on my toes this weekend, my feet had well and truly had enough. So, I decided, whilst two men were hard at work up in my bedroom (ha, that sounds far sexier than the real-life event of having a new carpet fitted...although I am totally loving my new carpet) I was going to embrace the month of romance and check out a romantic movie.

Two hours of my life later and I am crying my heart out...ooh, do you know why people cry? I looked it up, I’ve been meaning to find out for ages, so now I will dispatch such vital information, here comes the science bit: When we become upset, our brains and bodies overreact and work overtime by producing chemicals and hormones. Crying helps eliminate these extra chemicals that we don't need. The chemicals and hormones disappear from our body through the form of tears. As our tears flow, they sooth our sadness or distress by withdrawing these chemical agents. Ok, so maybe that wasn’t the most scientific explanation known to man, but that’s as science-y as I get...ok so back to the actual post...

I watched ‘One Day’, it was so sad. I know the film got slated, but, I didn’t hate...it did however ruin the rest of my day. The film is based on David Nicholls story about Emma Morley and Dexter Mayhew who meet after graduation in the late eighties; although they spend the night together, they agree to simply be friends. The story then follows their lives for twenty years, and it’s a case of wrong place wrong time for the majority of the plot, but eventually, they get together, and I was sitting there with a big dopey grin, only to have it horribly wiped off minutes later when she is hit by a lorry and dies. Similar with Atonement – totally beautiful film, totally hated the ending, I know that its artsy and their souls get to live on, but let’s face it, lifes lonely and if you spend all that time waiting for someone only to lose them moments later, what’s the point? I watched this film called Remember Me -  again, the prominent ‘until death do us part’ was ever present. Whoops sorry, should have mentioned spoiler alerts...too late now I guess...sorry.

Anyhoo, I’ve always picked the books with the happy endings, and when I sit through a film and it doesn’t end how I want it to, I tend to dwell on it. If I want sad stories, I can look at real life, but I am a hopeless romantic, I like for my head to be in the clouds, I love to dream of heart-skipping declarations and I wish with all my heart for the happily ever afters, not only to arrive, but to last. So yeah, morbid endings do not fit into my fluffy romance.  

 So, here I am on single on valentine’s day for the first time in nearly a decade, and I am trying to work out, is it better to have loved and lost than never loved at all? I mean, who am I to argue with the bard, but, if you’ve never loved, then you don’t know what you’re missing out on, therefore if you don’t know what you’re missing, how can you miss it? If you have loved, and then had your heart royally stomped on – it hurts. I’m not a sprog lover, but I love that line in Love Actually when the sprog turns round and says ‘lets get the shit kicked out of us by love’, because, I guess that’s true. You can only really love someone by giving them your heart, but by doing so, you risk so much.

I’m ok with being single, I am meeting the expectations, maybe not fulfilling the entire brief, but being single on Valentine’s day, is like being single any other day. The world doesn’t stop turning because hallmark decided for the price of £2.75 another should have the power to rock or destroy your world. At this point in time, I actually quite like being me. I am a whole person. I might not be someone’s other half, but that doesn’t make me a lesser being. xx

The bigger the figure...

If you are evil to black people, you’re racist, if you’re nasty to women then, your sexist, if your against lesbians your homophobic, heck, if you mistreat the aged, you are ageist; so why is "fattism" seen by many as an acceptable prejudice? I was going to write this post yesterday, but my brain was like mush by the time I got home from work, therefore the idiot box (as a good friend of mine would call it) triumphed over my rather ready soap box.

You may have heard or read in the media yesterday Karl Lagerfeld’s comment about Adele. The whole statement was “I prefer Adele and Florence Welch. But as a modern singer she is not bad. The thing at the moment is Adele. She is a little too fat, but she has a beautiful face and a divine voice. Lana del Rey is not bad at all. She looks very much like a modern-time singer. In her photos she is beautiful. Is she a construct with all her implants? She's not alone with implants”. So was the headline ‘Lagerfield approves of Lana’s implants’? Hell no. The headlines were ‘Adele is a little too fat’. *drags soapbox into centre of room, picks up laptop and steps up*

When I initially heard the headline, I went through two thought processes

1)      Who the hell is Karl Lagerfeld?

2)      What right does this Karl Lagerfeld have to make such a statement?

I was outraged at yet another fashion-faux-pas, where the catwalk condemns the curve once again. I mean, why did he even feel the need to point out her figure? Which by the way is lovely. If he is her biggest admirer, then why make such a callous comment in the first place? Especially as his latest statement admitted ‘I know how it feels when the press is mean to you in regards to your appearance’. In his apology he was quoted to say ‘She is my favourite singer and I am a great admirer of her. Adele is a beautiful girl. She is the best. And I can't wait for her next CD’. So why the hell, didn’t he just say that in the first place? If he had said that initially, he could have sounded like he actually meant it, rather than is saying it to save face.

I have had another train of thought since hearing that headline over 24 hours ago. Yes, he was stupid, insensitive and callous for making such a comment in the first place, and all who know me, know that normally that is reason alone for castration, however, it was not him, who plastered the insult over the radiowaves, newspapers and internet. No, that was the media, because for some reason, known only to the members of the press, they felt it perfectly acceptable to hurt someone further for the sake of selling their story.

Why do people believe it is ok to make fun of fat people? If you Google the words ‘fat’ and ‘funny’, Google finds 538,000,000 results. It brings up ‘funny’ fat people pictures, youtube videos that contain atleast three minutes of ‘funny fat people’ photo’s, and endless jokes about fat kids and fat momma’s, and yet, that type of prejudice is socially acceptable.

During my school days, I was a fat kid. I had people laugh about my size. After a while, I began to think that I had nothing to offer the world, because I carried extra padding... but, you know what? That’s b******s (yes eloquently put I know). During my teenage years, I became Nu. I was confident in my curves, I had far more male attention (for the right reasons) than my skinny friends and I began to realise that actually, I liked who I was. I was proud to be myself. This is why, today, I was pleased to read Adele’s response, when the headline retort was 'I represent the majority of women and I'm very proud of that'.

Adele is talented, funny and beautiful, like many other curvy women of the world. You see, people who do not fit the social acceptance mould, are forced to evolve their personalities, because, they can’t just smile and twiddle their hair as they gain free entry into a nightclub, they don’t have men rushing to help them with their suitcase on the tube, they have to hold their own in a world of more beautiful people, and regularly have to justify their position in the world. Adele was quoted to say ‘I’d rather weigh a ton and make an amazing album then look like Nicole Richie and do a shit album. My aim in life is never to be skinny.” As much as I love her for saying this, part of me feels like she is saying it, because she has to justify her shape. She is gorgeous. No justification required.

Ok, look at these two women - One woman is slated in the media, the other one is paid a fortune to reinforce a negative body connotation.

If you had these two woman in the street, you could say that both women had beautiful faces, but you must admit that one body would cause more commotion, one body would provide teenagers with a reason to smirk, and allow shop assistants the opportunity to look up and down smugly, at the clearly disillusioned individual who believes she could ever wear their clothing.  

I , like Adele, have a curve to me, and I love it. I love my bust line, I love my hips, I love my silhouette on a Friday night. I am good at my day job, and if someone wants to say I’m doing a good job, I wouldn’t expect it to be barbed with a comment about my figure, so Mr Lagerfeld, think it through next time, that will save you being a villain, it will save Adele having to justify herself, and it will allow me to return to the idiot box.

...But hey, I guess he is a man after all.

P.S Not sexist, ironic!

Sometimes it lasts in love, but sometimes it hurts instead

Eleanor Roosevelt once said ‘No-one can make you feel inferior without your consent’. This is a quote I have pinged around my brain on many occasions, and yet, as easy as it is to transfer such a statement into my daily world, I tried to supplement ‘inferior’ for another word and I have found that you cannot transfer the logic so easily - Pain for example. ‘No-one can make you feel pain without your consent’. It doesn't work. I'm not talking about physical pain, I’m talking about emotional pain. You see, if someone is going to hurt you, or if you are going to hurt someone else, then it’s going to happen one way or the other. 

My motto for the past year of my life is ‘broken, but still good’.  I see people like vases. Each time you are caused pain, it is like a vase falling off of the shelf. You can pick up as many of the pieces as possible, and glue them back together, but although it looks a similar shape, it’s not the same; the more times you drop that vase, the less chance of finding all of the pieces. In the end, it depends on how much you love the vase, or whether it’s time to replace it for a non-chipped version.

Your heart and your head (I say head, I mean brain, but I like the alliteration) are two vital organs required for living. It seems brutally unfair then, that they conflict so easily. We are always told to follow our hearts, but in my experience, my heart is not the best judge of character, and often leads me into lots of trouble. If I could listen to my head, I would say ‘Meh!’ (a highly eloquent term, that I have learnt in the past year) and continue on the path I was on last week, but by listening to my heart, I feel pain, steering my path onto an alternate journey.

I hurt someone yesterday, and by doing so, I not only caused them pain, but continued to break myself. I deeply want to blame another person for the reason that I hurt someone close to me, and partly I can, but I also need to take responsibility. You see, my vase was dropped and now it is chipped, cracked, and slightly broken. Although I never gave my consent to be initially hurt, I guess I am somehow allowing this historical action to continue to cause me pain in the present. This is why I was thinking about the opening quote. I understand that no-one can make you feel inferior without your consent, but feeling inferior, is still feeling, just the same as feeling sad.

I don't know where this post is going, I don't have a summary or a genius moment of enlightenment, I just just have one final statement 'Oh for a time machine'.

Slightly off on a tangent, have you ever noticed how moments of your life are sound tracked? Ironically ‘You Outta Know’  by Alanis Morrisette played on my shuffle play list as I typed this entry.