First Year at UEA - Done.
Living Away From Home - Completed free from disaster.
Growing Up - Partially completed.
Personality traits - Altered?
I feel like I have become several things at university, some of which are helpful, some of which are strange, and some of which are just downright pointless.
For example, I have become a....
Speed Reader:
Three novels a week are not going to read themselves. This, alongside 14 criticisms, countless emails from people and academics that you are supposed to recognise the name of, and the translation of an ancient train timetable to try and get yourself home for the weekend ensures that a side of A4 in size 10 font can be devoured in seconds. War & Peace now looks like a bed time story.
Speed Writer:
'Writer' is probably too much of an exaggeration, 'scribbler' would probably be more appropriate. Not only do lectures and seminars provide you with hours of hand work outs, but there are so many things to do that list writing has pretty much become a constant in my life.
If you don't write down somewhere that you have to buy laundry tablets and then do your laundry, then you will, one day, find yourself without pants.
Pen and paper at all times, children.
Cheerleader:
Yeah, literally. Pom poms, bows, smiley faces, legs in the air, the whole thing.
Mummy:
Not a self-awarded label.
Not in the literal sense of the word; the six month period of me being at university would have been a very quick and more than likely very messy experience were those words to ring true.
Apparently I'm 'Mummy' because I'm the only one who thought to bring a first aid kit to university and I feed people bolognese when they're poorly.
Urbanised:
Rural life is rubbish. Returning home for the summer has led to more questions and frustrations than it has relaxations and recuperations:
It's 10pm, why can't I catch a bus?
It's 10pm, why is the shop closed?
It's 10pm, why are there no street lights?
It's only 10pm, where is everybody?
Why can I read a yik-yak that was posted eight weeks ago?
Does anything actually happen in this place?
Why are all of the elderly people staring at me?
Why do the bus timetables only have listings for every half an hour, when are all of the other buses?
What do you mean you 'don't sell halloumi and falafel wraps'?
What do you mean you don't sell fresh chilli because it's 'too exotic'?
Where are the cycle lanes?
Why are my friend's homes now a fifteen minute drive away?
Why isn't there a Tesco on my doorstep?
Why are there absolutely no shops?
WHERE HAVE ALL OF THE PEOPLE GONE?
How in God's name did I cope living in this place for the primary eighteen years of my life?
Feminist:
I had previously fallen into the stupid assumption that 'feminist' was a negative label; why would I want to burn my bra? The last thing that I would want would be saggy, bouncy boobs. Of course, I would always denounce sexism at every available opportunity and I had always been an advocate for gender equality. Stupidly, I had never paired the phrases 'feminism' and 'gender equality' together.
I was sat in a lecture just after Christmas when a young, female lecturer said something along the lines of 'I am a young woman, I have an education, I have children and I am married. Yet ,I have every intention of aiming for every success in my line of work, whilst simultaneously raising my children happily and successfully. How can I not be a feminist?'
How can I be a woman in search of an education and not be a feminist?
How can I be a woman and not be a feminist?
Self Assured:
I have always liked weird books, going to art galleries and spending my Friday night reading Classics and eating cake, but now I am just not afraid to admit it. I can now quite happily declare, I could exclaim it from the rooftops if I wished, that: I hate nightclubs, I love Virginia Woolf, I am impartial towards Jane Austen and I like vegetarianism!
I have always felt these things, but being surrounded by geeky, bookish, non-meat-eating people has liberated me!
I like cous-cous and Thomas Hardy and I don't care who knows it!
Domesticated:
Oh, you want that really tough stain getting out of your white t-shirt? No problem!
Oh, what was that, you want a nice, home-cooked dinner on this cold November evening? Sure, I can do that!
Oh, you want some incredible shelf organisation solutions? Step right in and observe my impeccable stationery organisation.
Whilst you're here, why not admire my collection of pretty, girly, yet pointless stuff from IKEA that makes this room feel really cute and homely.
This one doesn't really fit with the whole feminism thing.
Sober:
SURPRISE!
Yep, I'm fully aware that university is supposed to perform the opposing function, but my First Year experience has turned me sober. It's not a health choice, it's not a premature mid-life crisis (quarter-life crisis?), I just haven't had a drink in weeks and I don't really want to.
About two months ago I was awarded a position on my university's bar staff team and I have really enjoyed the work, however, there is one massive downside...
Jaegerbombs.
Anybody who knows me knows that I cannot stand Red Bull. It makes me feel physically sick, I will gag and cough and have to move away from anybody that has a can open near me. Seriously, that is no exaggeration.
On my first Saturday bar shift I poured and served more than 150 Jaegerbombs alongside countless other drinks, and inevitably, small bar with lots of staff, the stuff was all over me by the end of the night. I simultaneously smelled of vodka, red bull and all four flavours of VK and, unsurprisingly, on my return to my dorm, I threw up.
I haven't had a drink since that moment.
Although, I can now smell Red Bull without gagging. Silver lining, I suppose.
I have never been a big drinker so this isn't really that much of a massive life change. Having said that, because this hasn't been a conscious life or health choice I'm not going to turn down a drink should I be offered one just for the sake of 'staying sober'; say the word 'cocktails' and I'd be first in the queue at the bar.
I don't know whether I have just become bored of it, whether my body is rejecting it, if it really was the horrible Red Bull and VK moment, or whether I'm being subconsciously turned off by the price tag; regardless of the cause, unless it's yellow, fruity and has an umbrella in it, I really can't see me having a drink in the near future.
More Important:
A little bit more important - people want to give you more things than they did 18 months ago.
I'm still the same age as I was when I was living at home and I'm certainly still the same person, but now I'm at university, I feel like I'm a little more important. I have a nice, neat box that society can put me in.
People want to give you cheap things, people want to give you free things, you're now a stated demographic, politicians want to please you at the same time as demeaning you and old people don't seem to scowl at you as much.
People just seem to take me more seriously, a stupid decision considering the only thing that has changed about me this year is my possession of a university lanyard. I'm still just as opinionated and idiotic as before, but that's okay now, I'm a 'student', rather than just a mouthy teenager.
I am still as yet unsure as to whether social labelling is a good thing, whilst I am pretty sure that I have become all of these things, should I be declaring my associations?
I feel like students are given a bad name far too often, whilst none of these should ever be taken too seriously, I hope that I can go some way to showing that there's more to students than Wetherspoon's and Netflix.
Until next time....
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