December 22nd I think. Or maybe it was the 23rd, I can't remember. But what I do remember is having to run home last minute to get changed out of the leopard print skirt and slogan knitted jumper I was wearing, and into the blackest most 'I'm too cool to be 'cool', but I'm obviously very cool with this ensemble' turtleneck and some matching black jeans, hanging halfway out of my laundry basket. I crawl on the floor searching for my comfy Topshop leather boots, pile my hair into a top knot, grab my oyster card from the dressing table and quite literally, leg it to SE1. Out of breath and mildly confused, I reach my destination when my phone rings. Bzzzzz Bzzzz Bzzzzzzzz! I'm already tight on time, so I consider clicking the red decline button, but then I register the number and my heart drops into my stomach. Oh no, oh no, oh no, I think as I answer. I hear a frenzied "We are so so sorry oh my gosh! Your interview has been cancelled - Have you arrived at the office yet?" "Yes... Yes, I have, I'm literally outside" I say very quietly. After much back and forth, I accept their apologies, wish them a lovely Christmas and walk pointedly to any coffee shop I can find and I sit with a flat white in one hand and a mixture of tears, concealer and smudged mascara coating the other. "In your time", I whisper to myself on the train home later that evening. In your time. 

December rolls into January with terrifying speed, and I return to the UK with my belly filled, my skin two shades darker and my soul filled with memories of family, sunshine and a lot of dancing. On the second Monday of the new month, I receive a phone call whilst writing notes on encouragement and persistence in achieving goals, it's the same kind woman from December asking if I was still looking for that particular role. I say yes and the next day I'm repeating that same journey again, this time with less laboured breathing and a heart crying out "In YOUR time. Everything good in your time". Usually, when it comes to job interviews I prepare methodically, almost insanely. I arrive two hours early to go through my obsessive notes about the practice profile, brushing up on my BREEAM and Lifetime Homes Knowledge. This time, I barely looked up the practice and only remembered my portfolio as I was halfway to the bus stop. 

I've been settling into my new role, tackling heavy deadlines and simultaneously trying to figure out a tonne of construction lingo as well as technical and structural drawings (my pet hate) with a sense of gusto. It has been... Extraordinarily challenging so far. I laughed with a friend the other day saying when we finally get what we pray for, more often than not, it's what we prayed for but with some life lessons attached to it. We don't get what we want and then a full stop. Oh no! Life is a series of commas, ellipses, dashes, colons, semi-colons, brackets, exclamation marks!!! (of which I am very fond of) and inverted commas. So right now, I think... there's a semi-colon at the end of where I'm currently at, thoughts of what next squeeze their way around my mind as I'm click clicking away at my desk, sipping a coffee and informing the client of when I'd be able to tackle that structural section. But for now, I welcome this semi-colon, the idea of a rolling stone gathering no moss, the not-so-impossible notion that finally, finally, my life seems to be heading somewhere again, and that my friends, feels oh so very very good. Another chapter of this book called life.

What I Wore...

Wrap Dress* - Likemary | Circle Bag (similar)* - Next | Necklace - Lekki Market | Merino Scarf* - Likemary | Block Heels* - Next | Lipstick - Colourpop 

x

It is 23:28 pm and I am on a flight to Istanbul. My mouth feels like a cavernous desert, arid and crackly. My eyes damp with a mixture of "I miss you already" and a heated exchange from the hours before: a blazing standoff between two very different, but very similar women. I sigh realising, it has only been eight days into the New Year and the air is already thick with palpable tension, tired bodies and unsaid words that lay just on the tip of our tongues, ready to roll off with the slightest intonation of enmity. I want to write and write and write and write on this flight. I want to jab the paper with my pen and let the ink bleed off of the pages. I want to transfer all of this pent-up energy into something, something good. I want to sow these seeds, fertilize and see.. something, pregnant with purpose. Carthasis. My favourite word. It rolls off my tongue too - Much like the words I spat angrily and half meant earlier.

With little sleep under my belt and my head and heart pounding rhythmically to the beat of one too many plastic tumblers of wine mixed with three cups of coffee, I eventually close my eyes and I think. My eyes spill over with tears, not happy or sad tears, just tears. I exhale "Whooooooosh..." and thicker and faster they fall, blurring my vision and then leaving me with a sense of clarity and vision for the remainder of the year. I glance over at my phone, registering that something is playing quietly in my ears, it's 'Oceans'. I feel my eyes well up again and this time I smile to myself.

Communication is said to be the key to life, and sometimes, just sometimes I think it is. Communication, unwavering love, kindness, humility... And the strength to say, "I'm sorry" and truly mean it with every fibre of ones being. Here's to, brick by not so boring brick (Paramore reference), rebuilding and restoring relationships, after all, we're only human.

x 

I thought long and hard about what I wanted my first blog post for this new year to be about but nothing came to me. I don't have an extensive list of things I want to do or even achieve in 2018. I don't have a detailed bucket list of items I'd like to tick off before the year is done. Nor do I really have any expectations of how this year may pan out.

If 2017 taught me anything, it's that "The best-laid plans of Mice & Men often go awry". Almost everything I thought was concrete disappeared in what felt like the blink of an eye. So for me, this year I just want to free fall. I want to take each day as it comes. I want to truly understand what it is to live, to wake up each morning, feeling the electricity we call life flowing freely through my veins, to inhale crisp sharp breaths of air deeply into my lungs, filling up my whole chest and breathing outwards, expelling this lifeforce and understanding what a privilege it is for me to be able to do such a thing. To walk and feel every weighted step pressing into the God-given dirt beneath my feet. I want nothing more, but to live this year. To be alive and be aware of the life that stretches out before me. 

Here's to a lively and lovely 2018

xo