write-as-raine

[write-as-raine]

Hibernating Hopes

 10.26.24

Is it funny to think about new beginnings in the fall? Or perhaps I am thinking of things that have been hibernating. 

I think once, as a young person emerging independently into the world, I found solace in having a level of control over the people I cared about. In my friend groups I always played very similar roles. The glue. The organizer. The mom. It brought me joy to make people happy, and it brought me joy to have them around. But maybe a small part of me was still people-pleasing. I think that’s why I always lost all my cool when it came to any romantic interaction, because it required a certain lack of control to be replaced by hope and trust. But I had been burned by those before, and much preferred control. 

Control is growing roses, knowing you are also growing thorns. Hope and trust are picking wild blackberries, reaching for something sweet, staining your fingers with juice, and the bite of pain. 

I never did it maliciously, but like all creatures, I possessed a sense of self-preservation. It was like a symbiotic relationship. I could take care of them, bring them together, variables I could expect and align, and in turn, I couldn’t be disappointed if no one hung out with me, because I was hanging out with them. If they weren’t choosing me, at least I was choosing them. 

I could hide from the what-ifs. 

The hardest part was when I couldn’t hide anymore. When I stopped reaching out and realized the line went dead. 

What do you do with that feeling? You can acknowledge that people have busy lives; not everyone has or wants to spend their free time the same as you. But in your heart, you hear the little hurt whisper, ‘If they wanted to they would.’ That thought will hurt more than a slap to the face, more than words ever could. 

So I got tougher. That’s how I thought of it. I wouldn’t care if they didn’t. Easy peasy. I slipped out of the lives of two close friends this way. Like a specter, there one moment, gone the next, without even a shift in the breeze. I guess they didn’t notice, and I guess I’ll never know if they did. They didn’t reach out. They never told me if so. Maybe they thought the ball was in my court. But I was done playing games. 

I grew up on a diet rich in stories, of best friends against the world. Who chose and fought for each other, against all odds. In simple scenarios, or literally saving the world. I wanted that, more than anything. I wanted someone to choose me. 

Something I’ve been told quite often throughout my life is that what I was yearning for was a romantic life partner. But that wasn’t it. My soul is old; it comes from a time of close bonds, women who experienced joy, sorrow, and life side by side. A chosen family. A village. I crave that community. I craved someone who wanted to get coffee and talk about art, philosophy, our lives, and our dreams on a weekly basis.

I have reflected a lot on the past, sometimes with deep-seated nostalgia and wish to go back, and sometimes through the bittersweet lens of regret. I have found myself wanting to amend the loose ends I left with some people, times when I let my feelings and pride stand in the way of a better outcome. When I let hurt become the focal point of my heart and could feel nothing else around it. 

I have wanted to tell people I was once close with how much they mean to me. How I still think about them and wish them every good thing life has to offer. How I was immature and rash and could’ve been the bigger person, at least to assuage some of my own regret.

I tried to reconnect with one such friend a couple of years ago, but after reaching out and getting a short response back, I realized what I really wanted her to say. I wanted her to say that she missed me. She wished things had been different. That she was sorry. But things felt like they picked up where we had left off, and I guess I wanted closure before I could open myself up again. 

The last month before I left London was a strange time. One of the most intensely emotional seasons of my life was being neatly folded into a carry-on, friendships were about to only exist in photos and texts, and life was going to be altogether different. We were all grieving this loss in our way, the loss of closeness. It was so hard. I cried every other day probably, for what was and what could be. For the people who had been my everything for the short time I was there. People who had laughed with me and at me, who had cried with me and for me. I cried as I left my village. 

But I left on bad terms with someone I had been close with. I never expected to not be speaking to her by the time I left, but there I was, spending a fraught spell sidestepping and avoiding her in our postage-stamp flat with a shared bathroom and kitchen. We were all experiencing growing pains. It didn’t sit well with me. But for the first time, I didn’t leave quietly without a fight. I said my piece, tried to make amends, and I left a letter. Hand-typed and heartfelt, bruised feelings but a scrap of pride. She read my letter and kept it in her heart. I saw her. I saw her and she saw herself too. She was one of the first friends I ever confronted. It felt…right. Not good, but I know as well as anyone that bottling things up only ever ends poorly. I had spent so long denying myself that personal justice out of a sense of fear that confrontation would lead to the knowledge that I wasn't deserving of the love I so wanted from them.

It all felt so silly looking back, at what we fought over so small and insignificant I struggled to remember what it even really was about. 

Time is so funny like that, smoothing out the sharp edges, breaking open the hard shell of the heart. I am prone to melancholy, to sitting in those moments and wondering 'what-if'. I thought and thought until I decided to do something about it. I reached out to her, told her how I missed her and wished her happiness. The most miraculous thing happened. She replied, told me how she regretted things the way I did. That my letter helped her grow. I, of course, recognized my own mistakes in our last days, but my heart felt so whole by clearing the air, and realizing that I had not lost a dear friend, but that we were growing in our own patches of sun until it was time to grow back together again. That feeling is hard to match. It is a small warm glow, sunlight on a cold day, or the feeling of sharing someone’s umbrella.

This has turned into a weirdly personal online diary of sorts, but I think it feels therapeutic. Like sending a message in a bottle (some things must be bottled, I suppose), no telling who will find it, but I hope someone sees it—sees me—and feels something. I used to hold all my cards close to my chest, until they were indiscernible for myself, scared to be perceived. I think I am learning to let others in. To just be, no matter who might be watching...

jess

[write-as-raine]

Spring Cleaning

1.29.24

Since I last posted here, things have really changed, or at the very least, come full circle. I moved away from home in 2021, to live near my boyfriend, and when the distance from my family seemed too far, we moved back a little closer, to the coast of Georgia. Then we got engaged. Now, through some good fortune and stars aligning, we are back right next door to my family.

Life is funny like that, invisible strings all over the place in the most unexpected ways. I always saw myself living in a city, or a charming New England town, very Hallmark-esque, but ultimately, I find that those things are not quite as alluring as being surrounded by the people you love and know so well. Do I wish I could have both? Of course, the future holds unexpected changes. But right now, I dream of a little house that has a cozy place to read, and a garden where I grow a lot of my own food, invite family over for dinner parties, and travel when we have the money and time.

At the moment though, we are focused on fixing up my great-grandparent's home that we are living in, and preparing for our wedding in April (!!!)

It feels a bit like we're in limbo while we work on the house and move toward April, but after that, we have big plans for the future and look forward to having the time to work on them together.

Until next time, which will hopefully be within the next month,

jessi

[write-as-raine]

This isn’t a poem; I am.

05.14.2020

Summer, with its stifling heaviness, has not even descended yet, and I am already coming into my season, turning vivid and sullen. Though I am a sweet summer child by birthright, toward the end of the hot season I crave the cold of the fall, and its crisp and subtle presence. I don’t feel like a bright young thing, but rather like a melancholic spirit who can finally rest for a time. Summer is like haunting my own body. 

I am often told by others that I have a soft voice, that I am always smiling. It is like being handed a window and told it is a mirror.

Have you ever seen the moon? No, I mean, have you ever really seen the moon? A whole thing, seen as a fraction. This is my greatest defense mechanism, showing my hand while concealing a secret ace. I think I have this dormant fear that if people see how terribly human I am, that I will cease to be desirable. They will see that I am a false goddess they leave offerings for even as their crops die and rains flood their homes. 

Did you know that when you touched my body I felt so much that I felt nothing at all? As if a thousand fingertips tracing down my ribs cancelled out your five.

Have you ever been an accordion, body folding in on itself and pressing all the air until there isn’t a sound left? It is a bitter torture, folded and unfolded over and over, and you can’t even see it. It makes me want to crawl into a bathtub, where it is cold, like the earth several feet below the surface. 

Sometimes I think that perhaps I am just full of sand, and if I open my mouth it will all pour out and down the drain. It would be a quiet slipping, and perhaps I would find the ocean.

I have never done hallucinogenic drugs, but sometimes at night, if I close my eyes and let my mind loose from its leash, I feel like I have fallen into a vortex where everything is misshapen, and my body seems to collapse like a fallen star. I feel very sorry for Alice in those moments, because when I open my eyes, I am snatched back from the rabbit hole and into my body again. It is nauseating.

Writing gives me the ability to contain myself into a human shape, which makes me feel less foreign in my own skin. I can type a shoulder here, ankles there, the curve of waist and the sharp corners of knees. It is so reassuring, to look at the words and know that they’re just as arbitrary as the ideas themselves.

things got weird here didn’t they? I’ll try to tidy up before you visit again

-jess

[write-as-raine]

quarantine thoughts

       I’ve been having a difficult few weeks. This spring, I was already planning to be taking a break, spending some time at home and just enjoying a rest. What I wasn’t anticipating was a quarantine.

       The quarantine, of course, effects everything else in a myriad of ways. What I imagined to be a quiet spring on the farm has turned into a bit of a family reunion. I have been trying to grasp how precious this unexpected time with family is, while also leaving myself room to be an introvert. It is reminiscent of when we were children, just like the weeks when we had several cousins visiting in the summer. There is always something new and exciting going on. Never a dull moment; our home, which hasn’t been bustling since my siblings and I left for college, is suddenly full of life again.

         The most confusing thing to my mind is that the sadness that I can’t control is often layered over happiness, so both of those emotions are stuck in me at the same time. I have been trying to do the opposite of my old coping habits, which was shove it down, compartmentalize the feelings and worry about them later. That did not work for me in the past, and I needed a new strategy. Instead of pushing myself as hard and fast as I could to ignore my mind, I have been sitting with my thoughts. Staring off into the distance for long periods of time. There have been so many days when I didn’t want to get out of bed, and I would allow myself a slow morning. When I felt so tired that I couldn’t keep going, and took a nap. I have had the patience that I denied myself for so long. This is hard for me because my natural instinct is to go go go and do do do, and the absence of productivity makes me feel like a waste of space. This is obviously a toxic mindset, and dismantling it is hefty work. Which is what I have been telling myself over and over in the kindest and sternest of voices:  time spend working on yourself is never time squandered.

       Today I woke up feeling a little better. I decided to look through some old photos and get some printed, but just the act of seeing the moments I felt needed to be captured really lifted me up. Such simple, unassuming things, and yet they take me right back, into those places in time. I think that’s really powerful. It also reminds me that in a lot of those moments, I was feeling this same sadness superimposed over the joy I was trying to choose. But sad doesn’t photograph as well as happy. It’s interesting to me that I can look through my camera roll and see the pain in between those smiles, or to know that even though I was laughing, I was also feeling anxious. I just wanted to jot this down because it felt important to note that while a lot of the things we see are the good moments, not to say that there aren’t good moments, but they are usually tangled right up in bad moments, because such is the way of life. I think that’s why I tend to focus my writing on the problems I encounter. I fill in those blank moments, I balance the scales of joy and pain with my writing. But still, if a picture is worth a thousand words, well, those words far outweigh any that I could write.

       I hope this little glimpse into my mind helped you in some way, or at least perhaps offered you a new perspective on this quarantine time. I feel really lucky to be surrounded by people who care about me deeply and are allowing me this time to focus my energies on my mental health, and for those who are far away and sending their love from all corners of the world. Good vibes are always free shipping, same day delivery. Send some out anytime :) 

-jessi

[write-as-raine]

From Dreams We Must Wake

     I could write, for hours upon hours; I could spin consonants and vowels into beaches covered in a thousand tiny pearls of sand, I could write moonlight onto cherry blossoms, I could even write you here into my arms. Eventually, all that is written must come to be. Maybe not today, maybe not in this world, on this plane of existence, but in some form or another, it will happen. It’s a dizzying knowledge to have, that with blank space and one long sleepless night I can push this world over the edge of existence and recreate it. But all I have in the time being, is a page, and a pen that is low on ink, and a sky that is turning gray and light and now. I cannot write myself. I can only write that which exists beyond me. So you see the limits of my power, my vast and hollow kingdom, where everything is paper and echoes and you. 

-excerpt from my mind

     Who knew that snappy blog posts and ramblings about my goings-on would come to a rather severe close? I certainly did. It’s pretty normal for me to live my life on a cycle of ups and downs, and this whole blog thing has been much the same, as I expected. But while the blog pauses, my brain does not, and if I am thinking I am writing. Sort of. Part of what makes a writer is not only what they have written, but what they will write. At least, that’s what I tell myself.

     This post will be a time machine of sorts, and we will go back to January, when the year was not yet even a week old, then maybe to February, and perhaps even into the future. Buckle up, as always, and thank you for travelling with me today ;)

-jess, 03.05.20

12.31.19

     I keep seeing the phrase “New Year, New Me” everywhere, but the problem is, I don’t want a new me. I want to fully embrace the me that’s here,  even though she doesn’t know what’s next, or what will be happening on new year’s net year, and those things stress her out a lot. I don’t ever want to lose this beautiful radiant soul that never stops singing or humming, who befriends small creatures and puts so much love into the world.

     In the new year, I want to excavate some of the ruins I have let her fall into. I want to dig past the cynicism and find the softness I used to have before the blunt edge of life’s gentle toils buried it beneath layers of pessimism. I don’t want to be jaded, I want to be wise, kind, a positive light. I want to radiate joy, not negativity. But I also want to accept that not every day will be a happy day, some days will simply be days, and the joy will occasionally have to be manufactured, or worked for, and that is okay too. I want to practice the self-love that I preach.

01.05.20

      As the days following the hubbub of Christmas roll toward the impending year, my brain becomes a flurry of planning and thinking, and most of all, stress. My worry for the uncertainties of another year clouding all of my excitement for what could happen. I know this is a flaw, to always fear the unknown, while putting aside the imminent joy that I could harness should everything go right. This year, instead of wrangling together a list of 'resolutions' I didn't really want to make, like losing weight or sticking to some arbitrary life track plan, I made my goals for the new year a bit softer, hazy around the edges. My list of resolutions resembles a very soft manifesto.

       The problem I began to see with my past resolutions, and why I always ditched them is because they were usually something that wasn't going to make me happier (i.e. getting super swol) and they weren't going to make everything magically fall into place (i.e. planning out my every move). Neither of them addressed the real problems I had faced in the previous year, like being too tired for physical activity because I was running myself into the ground with work and school, or that I wasn't able to keep with my personal timeline because I was fighting an uphill battle against depression that I was stubbornly ignoring. Instead, I pinned these shortcomings on myself, thinking I was too lazy and lacked motivation, which actually made those problems much worse. This led to a lot of sleepless nights, which led to a lot of snooze buttons hit, a lot of classes daydreamed through, and a lot of naps, which kept this wheel of misery rolling straight downhill. I set myself up for failure. This year, after learning so much about myself and the deeper workings of my mind, a lot of things became much clearer to me.

     I always put so much expectation on myself, that failure could only ever have been the final outcome. I never had compassion with myself, I was too busy giving it all away to friends and family until I was bankrupt of all emotion. Secretly, I think my subconscious did this on purpose. My brain knew that my fear of failure was not as great as my fear of trying my best and it still not working out properly. I almost never wrote anymore at that point in my life, unless it was for a class. Just my struggle to make it through most days kept me so busy that I didn't want to write. I never read things that I enjoyed, too busy slogging through reading that I didn't allow myself to enjoy for class.

     We live in this strange world that is changing faster than we can really keep up with, and it's hard to deal with the emotional repercussions of that. I'm only writing this to say, that this year, I took emotional stock of myself and kept tabs on how things impacted me, and I did a lot of digging around in my own mental toolbox and figured out how to use more than just duct tape and a sledgehammer to do general emotional maintenance.

     My very soft manifesto, which is by no means perfect, and is, of course, completely tailored to my brain and heart and soul so may not work for you, is about observing the world around me, but also observing myself in response to it. Instead of physical self-scrutiny, it is finding good things about my body each and every day, while acknowledging that I am not perfect (who is??) but I have legs that let me dance, and arms that give good hugs, I have hands that are just right for rubbing the soft nose of a horse and plucking discordant chords on my guitar. I have eyes that allow me to see the raindrops slip down the window, mostly unaccompanied, and I have a mouth that lets me convey my emotions through speaking and smiling and singing and weird sound effects. I have a body that is soft and warm and loves to be piled on a couch with my friends in a cuddle puddle.

     I also included in my manifesto, that I would accept the days as they come, knowing full well that they will not all come with happiness in tow, and that is okay. It will not always be fun, it will not ever be perfect, but it will be my reality, and it will allow me to grow. I will not stop trying to be the best version of myself that I can possibly be, to extend kindness without fail to others, even especially those who do not extend it to me, because that is the only way I know how to keep from becoming cold and hard and cynical.

Oh, and also to maybe drink less caffeine.

   These 'resolutions' are really more of a change in mindset, and I think these will help me immensely, not only in the coming year but throughout the rest of my life.

February

     Small white-capped mushrooms popping through waterlogged soil, a chip in the rim of my fifth favorite mug. A new leaf breaking through on my ivy. The certain and never-failing goodness of strawberry jam on toast. Hot tea on cold nights. No less than fifteen pillows, blankets, stuffed animals on my bed at any given time. Bullfrog eyes resting watchfully on the rims of puddles. Wispy ringlets against the nape of my neck in the steamed bathroom mirror after a midnight shower. The ragged edges of my anxiety fingernails. The mosaic jar in my window that throws a shower of pastel light into my bedroom right before sunset. The sweet fragrance of nostalgia dabbed against the thin skin of my wrist in the form of Floral Street’s London Poppy perfume. The stop-and-stare brightness of the moon. Lavender scented everything. The poetry of ordinary days.

03.05.20

     Here on the farm, our compost bin has just been completed and has excellent approval ratings from the hens. I’m quite pleased with how it turned out despite my brother’s grumblings and my own battles with the drill. Toulouse has become quite the guard goose, and though I think that if it came down to a fight with an actual attacker she wouldn’t do much harm, she certainly sounds the alarm and waddles into the driveway when a car pulls up. She also successfully laid 8 incredibly large eggs. As for our three silkie bantams, aptly dubbed Coco Puff, Cheeto Puff, and Powder Puff, well the poor dears have yet to figure out this going back into the coop business. At sunset, they huddle up against the side of the hen house and wait dutifully for someone to come along and place them in their special pen. Such silly and delicate creatures. Our newest addition to the family, Cleo, a rescue cat, has acclimated well, and even sneaks into my bed at night now. Moo moo, our calf, has gone on to greener pastures. Quite literally. After his time with us, he was thrilled to join a herd of other cows, where he now has a friend his own age and species. The goat kids are growing in leaps and bounds, pun intended. You would think they have electric currents shooting through them the way they hop and skip so. I can’t imagine what magnitudes of joy they experience. 

I think that’s all I have in me for now, until we meet again, 

jess

[write-as-raine]

12.30.19

       Though this won’t be my final blog post, it is my first one written while being back in the United States. In recent months, the writer within me—who sits at a desk that is covered in post-it notes, half-empty coffees gone cold, and pages of unfinished thoughts—has only wanted to stare off into the distance. Ironically, that distance has been me. While many variables combined have created the perfect situation for some high-quality introspection, my instinct always has been to document the maelstrom of thoughts that run through my mind in large volumes. At first, this took place as fiction, then I turned to poetry, but as of late nothing else seems quite right to write except for my own life. I do value introspection highly, but never before have I felt inclined to share so much of my life with any other living soul, so count yourself among the lucky few, dear reader. It feels entirely wrong to do so, but at the same time, it seems like such an extraordinary waste to keep it to myself.

       It is presumptuous to assume anyone is even reading this, which I think makes it easier to write when my audience is more of an apparition than actuality.

       All of that to say, however, that part of my process is writing random bits here and there, and that ultimately these blog posts become Jess's monster, one big body (paragraph) built of many different parts. This will likely be a mixture of things because returning to the United States has, emotionally, been a mixture of things.

Written 12.26.19, in reflection on 11.28.19 

       I was pondering my trip to London today, particularly the day that Lindsay and I saw Phantom of the Opera. That day has such a glimmering quality in my memory. We were both giddy on anticipation for the theatre, and we were all dressed up as we walked arm in arm, our music split between us in our knockoff AirPods. It was one of those powerful days where nothing could really go wrong if it tried. As we sat in the theatre, drinking overpriced Prosecco and basking in the sophisticated and somehow imposter-ish feeling of being in an ornate theatre in London, I could feel a strange sort of shifting around me, like everything was changing and undoing and becoming all at once. I was realizing, I think, that nothing would ever be quite like this moment again. I would never be in London, with Lindsay, on the cusp of everything ever again.

       Between the theatre and the DLR, as we trotted through the city at London speed, the crisp air and bustle of a populace that is always up to something, I kept getting hints of it. Catching my unquenchable joy in the reflections of the windows we passed, my full moon cheeks aglow with my smile. Our reflection showed Lindsay facing what was next resolutely, while I looked into the present and attempted to hold it there in my mind.

       On the DLR, as we watched the city shift from old to new and back, black water glittering with nightlife, side by side as the present flew past us, I was filled with some inexplicable settling within my chest. It was a sudden and rapid, heavy but not in an unpleasant way. It was just a falling in love, or a re-falling in love, with my life, and with the present, and the past that had somehow led me right up to the brink of what was to come. Lindsay, on this evening, paid me one of the loveliest compliments I think I've ever received.

       "You've taught me to see so much beauty in the world that I never saw before,", she told me as we looked out over the diamond cut cityscape.

Such a simple, perfect day.

       I think I was settling into the knowing that the near and inevitable future would not be easy. That I would come home and feel the initial surge of excitement over what my heart had missed for these months, but that a hollow and aimless feeling I am so accustomed to would creep in around the edges. I would feel the siren call of the city in the soles of my feet. Knowing that feeling would come, I still pushed my heart into the hands of those I loved, even though trusting people who have the power to hurt me has gotten me before, and would again. Because others have taught me that there is no point in bottling yourself up and pretending to be someone you’re not. My soul, in all it's wild and whimsy, will always be spilling over, and why not free it.

12.14.19

       I feel that my time abroad was a transformative experience, I just don't quite know how to sum up what changed. I feel different, not in the way that I expected. London, sleek, elegant, historic, magical London left its mark on me in a new way. I saw so many real aspects of it, the hidden places that aren’t the ‘London’ that we imagine.

       It all began with me accepting that my depression was too much for me to carry alone, which didn't magically solve my depression, but when I say that it felt like a fifty-pound weight had been lifted from my shoulders, I am not even kidding. Dealing with the scope of my complex and often confusing chemical imbalances and how they manifest in my every day, well that was a whole other beast. I am still on that path, and will always be. Sometimes I don't feel like getting out of bed, sometimes I feel nothing at all, sometimes everything all at once. 

       I stepped through a looking glass and into Ireland, where I met a cute stranger, and things immediately fell into place and then promptly apart again. In London, I moved in and became very close with two very lovely and wise Norwegian ladies, and I found my feisty personality doppelganger from Iowa, and nothing ever really went according to plan, or exactly as I imagined, but it was right, and it was one of the best semesters I've ever had. The last week was one of the most bittersweet moments of my life. As we wandered around the flat, we all felt a bit lost. I don't think any of us were quite capable of figuring out how to transition to not seeing each other every day. We ate most of our meals together, sometimes in companionable silence, just to be near each other. Lindsay essentially just moved the rest of the way in. On our final evening together, we had the last supper, and then we had our own small Christmas. When all the gifts had been exchanged, and the dinner tidied up, we dragged their beds into my room and had a very large slumber party.

       On the way to the airport in the morning, as the four of us struggled to carry two people's worth of luggage from flat to bus to tube, we laughed to push back tears. At the airport, tissues were passed out, goodbyes were attempted, final words were choked on, and then we parted. Just like that, it was over. I felt a bit numb as I moved through the airport, alone. A full heart is a heavy burden to bear. All I could think as I sat on the plane as we taxied was, 'I feel very lucky, to have met such amazing people'.

       As every mile between myself and London increased, I took deep, calming breaths, feeling a bit lost and very found, and every glance out of the window reminded me that life is magical and that castles seen from the sky are magical and oceans of clouds are magical, I really couldn't seem to do much else aside from sit in awe of what I had experienced in the past three and a half months.

       It sounds like an exaggeration, or too good to be true. Don't get me wrong, there were plenty of mistakes, screw-ups, awkward times (did I tell you about how I fell down some castle steps, or completely forgot my ID the one time I tried to get into a club? Not me at my best, but me all the same).

       But, those were all the pinches for the moments that often felt like dreams.

       I learned a lot about my own mind, which I couldn't have done without the wildly intelligent, kind, and intriguing people that I met along the way. I learned a lot about the world too, and about how I interact with it. I learned a lot about kindness and the Universe. I learned valuable lessons about confrontation, which were stressful, and upsetting, and so very necessary. I learned a lot of Norwegian words, which I was not expecting. What I did not learn a lot about, was creative writing, at least not in the academic sense. Actively writing did teach me endlessly though.

       Just a few nights ago, I saw a shooting star in a sea of other celestial bodies. I have gotten to play with my chickens on the farm, and with our baby cow, who is very hungry all the time because he is a growing boy, and with our baby goats, who are absurdly tiny and very vocal. Also, since I arrived at home, our cat, Tabitha, a proper aloof feline in all regards, has decided that she thoroughly enjoys my company, and will often stretch herself out on the floor next to me for rubs. This is a very large win because she is an adorable, fickle creature.

       Now, as a new year looms before me, although 'looms' isn't the correct word, because looms sounds scary, and while change is nerve-wracking, I have so much to look forward to, as I keep reminding myself, and so much to look back on. So, as the future dawns before me, I feel apprehension, of course, but also great powerful hope and excitement, because there is so much unexpected goodness stored there. I know that it is not always sunshine and even if it were, that I cast my own shadows. Yet here I am, showing my shadows that if I dance, then so must they.  

   Until the next time, or perhaps, until next year,

jess

P.S. I’ve decided to grow my bangs out. If getting bangs signifies a mental break, does growing them out mean I’m starting to figure things out?

[write-as-raine]

Pack Accordingly

     While preparing for studying abroad, I read packing lists, travel guides, how-tos, and numerous blogs on what to expect. Still, not one thing explained that I would need to pack so much kleenex. 

     Tissues for the first night, when you're lonely and nervous, and in a strange place. For when you get your first winter cold in a new country, and the medicine is confusing. Tissues for when you laugh so hard you cry, and for when you're a klutz, and you spill coffee everywhere. 

     But most importantly, tissues for when your heart is ripped in half because you miss home and your loved ones there, but you can't imagine leaving this whole new life that's built up around you. Tissues for when you borrow Johanne's hairdryer for the hundredth time. Tissues for when Andrea mentions The Day That We Don't Speak Of, also known as Departure Day. Tissues to share with Lindsay, who has filled my days with laughter and vines and sound effects and a healthy dose of adventure and downtime. Tissues for when you leave your ugly, cramped room that you are actually quite attached too because there are so many lovely memories packed into it. Tissues for the airport, when you have to say goodbye to people who have been your rock for three of the most wonderfully turbulent months of your life. 

     Tissues for right now, as I type this blog post.

     The heart wants what the heart wants, which sucks when the ones that the heart wants are 4,267 miles away from each other.

tearfully, jess

[write-as-raine]

The Real Deal

When you think of someone studying abroad, you probably think of all the ridiculously beautiful travel photos and outrageous stories, and it seems too good to be true. I’ve certainly experienced my fair share of unreal experiences, but the truth is that there are times that are not going to get a featured blog post or Instagram highlight. Like when you have a terrible cold for more than a week and you really just want your mom, or when you have a fight with someone, or you get your heart stepped on just a bit. One of the most difficult moments for me was being sick, and going to the grocery store, and not being able to find any of the things I was used to—who knew that the store would not have simple things such as coffee creamer? It was a small thing obviously, but it was the first big hiccup, and it knocks you down a few steps.

Being the outsider in a new place is a bit daunting, and they don’t mess around in London. No one hesitates to get huffy if you do the wrong thing or hold them up on the sidewalk or break the blessed queue you didn’t realize was forming. These are all simple things, but you have to be quick on your feet, and you have to be flexible, and you have to learn a whole new social code.

So, all this to say, when you see someone “living the dream” while studying abroad, also know that behind the scenes things are probably very, very normal. You still have to argue with your flatmates about tidying up the kitchen and who’s buying toilet paper next and hair getting left in the drain and “why’s all this rubbish in the freezer” (on a side note ask me about composting, my flatmates love that I essentially hoard garbage). The thing is though, I wouldn’t trade all this normal for all the movie magic in the world, because movie magic is all smoke and mirrors, just like a filter for a camera, but the normal, the mundane, and the every day, well, that’s the stuff that memories are made of. When I look back, I will likely not care much about the one night I went out, but all the nights spent downing a pint of ice cream and talking about philosophy with Mina, Andrea teaching us choreography to a Mariah Carey song in our kitchen, playing mystery chef with Lindsay by just throwing whatever on the stove and creating an edible masterpiece, those are the things that will stick, driving Johanne insane by pointing to everything and asking to know the Norwegian word for it, or recreating an entire Thanksgiving meal in a country that does not have cornbread. These moments have been the water and sunshine to my growth.

p.s. you’re also probably wondering where class fits into to all this normal. that part is pretty movie-like, there isn’t ever really class, and there aren’t that many assignments. I know, I know, it’s terrible. Except, it actually kind of is. I am a high-functioning procrastinator. I need deadlines, and guidance, and probably supervision. this place is a bit of a madhouse in that regard. Ain’t that just the way though.

with all my love and I’m not crying you’re cryi- okay well maybe I am but I just miss my family a whole lot, and I preemptively miss this home I have here too now,

jessi

[write-as-raine]

This, That, and Everything in Between

I think we all knew that regular and punctual updates were going to fall to the wayside. Luckily they will still be punchy and colorful and fun, but let me catch you up on some of the things I’ve been up to. After my trip to medieval Edinburgh, another whirlwind week flew by. I’ve been to Dublin since my last post, to Windsor, the Jurassic Coast, Spain. A little bit of everywhere. Dublin, while beautiful, didn’t capture my heart the way that the Irish countryside did, but it was wonderful to experience. The first night we arrived, our hostel, which stood next to the river Liffey, allowed us the perfect vantage from which to see the myriad of lights glittering across its surface. An attempted outing into Bray was thrown off course, and we ended up in the lovely seaside town of Howth, which was frigid and adorable, with a petite lighthouse and a small harbor dotted with bobbing ships.

Windsor, what can I say about Windsor. It was lovely to experience, but I was in a stormy mood that day, and the only thing I found truly interesting was the massive dollhouse that belonged to Queen someone or another. When you stepped into the room that housed (pun intended) this work of art, the lights were dim, and the dollhouse, behind panes of glass, glittered with light. Its walls were open, displaying rooms adorned in such miniature accuracy that it made me want to crawl in and live in victorian bliss among its dainty glory. With running water, electricity, and a working lift, it would have been awfully cozy and quite livable. After leaving the castle, my mood lifted with the addition of food, and then Abby and I went off in search of Eton College. When we found it we discovered that it was closed, and we wouldn’t be allowed to enter, so we did the obvious thing and began poking around for another way in. We traversed a great field that circled behind the campus until we came to a spiked wrought iron fence. Nothing to do but go over, we decided. Our devious misdeeds of climbing spiked fences left us with mischievous energy and me with a torn jacket sleeve. After the acquisition of coffee, and a peruse through a dusty old bookshop, we wandered back along the river. The day preceded to go completely south as I experienced what I assume is akin to the emotional maelstrom behind toddlers’ tantrums. I was in a foul mood, and after being unable to locate anything at the grocery store, having to walk behind London’s most ambling meanderers, and slinking underground to catch the tube, I was quite perturbed. I believe it was a stress reaction to being overwhelmed.

During my first week in London, surrounded by strangers who would soon become friends or simply acquaintances, we went off in search of adventure. Into the heart of the city we wandered, across the Thames and accidentally into the street where London Fashion Week was happening, through tight, winding alleys, back across the Thames. I look back on those early moments with great fondness because those moments thrilled me with the freedom of the city. The sky was blue, and jackets were frequently in need of shedding because of the balmy breeze. Because classes wouldn’t begin for another week I was filled with the wild abandon that summer instills. The entirety of forever in all its overwhelming glory felt frozen on the horizon.

Now this particular adventure nears its expiration date, and as holiday lights flicker on in the city and the leaves swirl down onto the sidewalks (it’s dangerous out there honestly they’re flying all over the place and they hit you on the nose and they coat the sidewalk in a damp slippery mess), home is on my mind. Of course, with every single holiday song ever about wanting to be home for Christmas piping out of every shop and store, it isn’t hard to feel melancholy for your loved ones, but thanksgiving is right around the corner, so it’s extra hard.

Luckily, I’ve decided to combat this particular scenario by throwing a Friendsgiving, which will be lovely and chaotic and stressful and much needed. Did I mention that I’m in charge of the turkey? Holiday comedy hijinks will likely ensue, but as long as I don’t accidentally burn my flat down I count it as a success. Also, if you know where to buy a whole turkey in this country please do tell, asking for a friend.

Determined not to be bested by a fowl, 

                         jess

[write-as-raine]

Knowing me means knowing that you may only ever know part of me.

Because I know that there is no rainbow without the rain, I know that happiness and sadness are two sides of the same coin, and contentment is the spinning flip before it lands, heads or tails. I don’t want to get out of bed, and when I do I want to go back straightaway. Pushing myself all the time is a problem of mine, one of those fatal flaws that continuously entraps you despite your knowledge of it.

I have a problem saying no. I like to be a gravitational pull of love and joy and fun, I love to host, and I hate to say no. It is hard to be this strange mixture of things, this ambivert in extroverts’ clothing. I physically cannot do all of the things I want to. When the melancholy sets in, it is worse, because surrounding yourself with wonderful, well-meaning people when you are feeling things you can barely make sense of yourself—much less to others—is so much harder than it should be. I joke about being a pessimist because “if you never get your hopes up, you can never be disappointed, only pleasantly surprised,” but this is one of those little lies I tell myself to distract from the aching hopefulness I will always experience. My reminder to myself today is that it’s okay to feel the way you feel, even if the way you feel is not happy. I put a lot of pressure on myself to be happy. In fact, I think happy is my default setting, my lips always naturally turned up at the corner, the threat of a smile always imminent. But this makes my discontentment extremely palpable to others when I feel it, and I try to be an open book, but it’s impossible to explain things the way they are in my brain. The shoebox full of photos and imprints and scraps of conversation, all doused with my overthinking and refusal to give up on anyone. I could dump the shoebox in the floor, tape the bits together like a strange neurological map, and it would barely make sense to me, much less to anyone else. So I just have to sit, alone, and leaf through the shoebox, sit with it and let it wash over me before I close it, shove it under a cabinet at the back of a dusty room.

I wrote this before I left, as a blog post I hadn’t quite built up the courage to post:

August 20th, 2019

I keep alternating between moments of extreme coolness and confidence which nosedive into “how did I ever think I was the kind of person who could go to another country and stay for 4 months?”.

For a while now I have had this nagging feeling in my chest, something not quite right, something sitting askance. This summer I finally reached out, gave in and verbalized those feelings. I was told I have depression, anxiety, one leading to the other. It is not constant, but it is there. With a family history of depression like mine, it was not surprising, and I think perhaps I knew deep down all along. But I didn’t want to be the girl with depression, I didn’t want to have to take medication to exist peacefully. So all these years I told myself lie after lie. “You’re just not like other people.” You feel things more strongly, especially sadness. You just get tired easily. You get anxious because you’re shy. At my heart I could tell that the way I was feeling was not really…me. At times I felt so confident and proud of myself that I could burst, so to me this meant that I couldn’t be depressed, because people who are depressed are never truly anything but sad deep down right? Once I finally spoke the words out loud I felt like part of a weight had been lifted from me. I had finally stopped running from my truth. I had finally stopped covering up how I felt with “I’m fine” or “I’m just tired”. It felt good. After that moment, the dark clouds that obscured my life passed a bit, though I still felt dull and lackluster, like even doing menial tasks was beyond my ability. But no intense sadness. I began to doubt myself again. Every time I laughed, a cold voice in my mind told me that I wasn’t depressed, only seeking attention.

What I wish I had known all this time, is that depression is like a parasite, and to survive it has to keep its host down, in pain, in the dark. I wish I had understood depression this way, instead of as some kind of weakness. \

I am a whole person, multifaceted, I get sad, sometimes for no reason. As a family member told me, “Depression is like white water rafting, but instead of water at the bottom of a four foot drop that people who aren’t depressed have, we hit the rocks. Medication is just water on the rocks for us.”

As I step into this next chapter, of study abroad, and living far away from everything and everyone I’ve ever known, I want to be honest, with myself first and foremost, but also just in general. I don’t want to hide behind a mask of perfection and pretend to have it all together, which I think is an assumption people make of me. Because I very much do not have it all together, like, at all. I want to write it all down. The good, the bad, the messy, the stuff that is usually hidden behind a pretty picture perfect facade.

This is really weird for me, because you can imagine that someone who spent a very long time lying to herself about her own mental illness probably wouldn’t want to begin posting those very same feelings of doubt on the internet for anyone to see. You imagine correctly, as I type this my stomach is knotted up, my shoulders are tense, my eye is twitching a little bit. But as someone has said before, we only have this one wild and precious life. I do not want to spend mine denying who I am, not even the bits that make me uncomfortable and vulnerable. I’m human, and I’m going to start treating myself like one.

the past, present, and future jess

[write-as-raine]

I’m not Always So Existential

I bet you thought that you were going to get positive, upbeat and spunky updates about my travels in the form of a “Today I went to such and such and did this and that” but my hands would be bleeding if I were to try and fit it all in. But I shall try to bring us back from the edge of the existentialism that was taking place in the previous post, to a parallel universe in my mind I like to call Optimism.

Each little paragraph is like a taster sip of whiskey, different notes but all warm in your chest and the pit of your stomach. Enjoy each of them thoroughly.

Recently, while visiting Brick Lane and Whitechapel in London, I entered the church to the overtures of the organ, played with exquisite loveliness as I marveled at grand architecture and then descended into the crypt, which had aptly been renovated into a cafe. You could have your coffee next to walls that contained corpses. Charming and only mildly problematic for digestion.

Also on Brick Lane, a girl marched by in typical Londoner fashion, staring straight ahead with a look of utmost dignity while at her feet on leashes three comically twiggy Italian greyhounds in Sherpa jumpsuits trotted along with her. A sight so enjoyable that I had to write it here for you.

We wandered through a vintage market where I found a fluffy blue coat the shade of the Georgia sky at four in the morning, deepest Royal Navy. It is cozy, and just oversized enough as to seem extravagantly elegant. When I wear it and walk along in my black leather boots I feel like a an heiress, and I pause to admire the effect in shop windows and metal panels often.

Since arriving in London I’ve been battling a mild head cold, and to help with this I purchased a smelling stick from the drugstore, which is quite literally what it sounds like, a tube that resembles lip balm and contains a concentrated dose of eucalyptus and menthol and other such things to help clear the nasal passages. I delight in whipping this out on public transport and watching for reactions from those around me to see how many think I am using lip balm incorrectly and how many think I am snorting cocaine.

So far, I have purchased a ring in each place I’ve been so far, a claddagh in Ireland (still stubbornly turned heart out), a trio of simple band and two stones from Camden market in London, and a Celtic knotted band in Scotland now. Every time I look at them I am given a lovely reminder of my adventures. I’ll try to include a photo of them soon. I have also been purchasing tea towels voraciously, and they work nicely as wall art. One day I will have a kitchen drawer full to the brim, a lovely thought.

At a beach in Ireland, my sister waded through freezing water on Keem beach in search of sea glass, bringing them back and forth to show me, a magpie like I was and still am. Collecting small treasures, a sprig of lavender, a rock, a shiny coin. I now have a little collection of sea glass, stones, and a lighter that have been foraged, they sit on my desk in my room, a shrine of lost and found things.

In my flat, we have made it a habit to have family dinners. It is so lovely to be packed into the kitchen, our 6 increased to 8 or 9 as friends are enticed by my cooking (thank you Mother and Mema for showing me my way around the hob, nothing like good food to bring people together). I oversee and direct the addition of ingredients and chopping of vegetables. The end result amazes everyone. This only inflates my ego slightly.

Roehampton has an environmental and earth positive initiative called Growhampton, so through this I can take care of chickens, and harvest fruits and vegetables for the campus cafe, the Hive. Last week, Andrea and I went or the orchard to pick apples, and on the way we passed a solid black cat, perched on the grass, as if waiting. I am a hopeless animal lover, so I dropped to the ground immediately and we were quick friends. I’ve decided to call her Mage. She was excellent, solid black and one ear tipped. She accepted a back rub and behind the ear scratch, before trotting off into the forest. Andrea and I then walked into the hundred year old orchard that has a very still and wise presence. So it’s officially Halloween now in case you were wondering.

When we flew from Dublin to Birmingham after a whirlwind last day in North Ireland, on the bus from the airplane to the terminal, I sat next to an older lady, who’s name I learned was Cece.

She was Irish, and on her way to visit her daughter in Stratford-Upon-Avon, where we too were headed. In my curious way of genuinely wanting to know, I asked about her life. She clasped my hand and told me about her siblings, her children. She imparted wisdom in the way that those with lived experience must, her eyes glittering with impish light and the whisky that she had on the flight.

“Meeting you has been so lovely, you’re so kind,” I told her.

“Well my dear, the thing about nice people, is that they always meet nice people,” Cece said, and then our bus arrived. I helped her down, and we parted ways after exchanging phone numbers and promises to check in.

“I believe that our paths crossed for a reason, and I know they will again,” she said with certainty as I turned to go.

Most recently I went tumbling down exactly two steps at a castle in Scotland, the image of beauty and grace. I would like to claim that cold medicine is to blame but it’s my general klutziness and the fact that I was FaceTiming my mother and not paying attention. Ideally a Scottish man—preferably in a kilt—would have caught me. Of course, the only way I was caught was likely on film by some other tourist on their phone. I laughed, picked up my dignity which was lying a few feet away, dusted it off and went on with my day only mildly wanting to sink into the cobblestones.

In Edinburgh, dark alleys will let into secluded cobbled courtyards where one single lamppost sits alone, and across from it is the Writer’s Museum. The Writer’s Museum is exactly what you would expect, if you are a fellow writer. Cramped stairwells and random knickknacks and words on every available surface. When you leave the museum, and enter another alley, you will find a man with his pet owl, Hazel. Her eyes are piercing, and she will stare into your soul intently. She is telling you nonverbal secrets. We all hesitantly asked her owner the burning question that had been debated among us

“How long are her legs?”

He laughs, once, and then again when he realizes we are serious. He then shows us her knee, her fluffy foot, how it is tucked under her body like a folding chair. Very long indeed, we discovered. Much longer than they ought to be. Comically long.

I hope these secondhand memories bring you as much joy as they have brought me.

Many miles to go before I sleep,

jess

[write-as-raine]

Unofficial Guide to Living

A backlog of writing from my journeys around Ireland in August combined with some new thoughts.

When driving through Ireland, it is prudent to first read a guidebook, and then completely disregard it as you turn down knobby lanes flanked with stones and hedges, at the end of which you will be met with a glimpse of dove grey stone peeking through seven shades of verdant foliage. Even though this place is already discovered many times over, there is a feeling of being the first and only person to ever step foot in grass not yet bent.

As our car pulled into the lot, a man was loosing cows into a plot of land separated from a graveyard by one of the low stone walls that divide all things in Ireland.

The man was called Porick O’Malley, gentle and kind. He told us about his herd and about his collie who died recently. His eyes were wet with the loss of her. He asked us about where we were from, who we were, and he left us with the feeling of warmth that every encounter with the locals has instilled.

The abbey/friary/priory, as the signs confusingly referred to it as, was a stone skeleton on a gentle slope of grass, the earth dotted with headstones and wildflowers, the hollow bay’s tide out for the afternoon.

In America, cemeteries have a feeling of being generally abandoned, but here, living things reach down to hold that which is dead. The graves are covered with planted flowers and mementos. One grave was a headstone and plot of earth that was used as a garden. The Irish love of remembrance is balanced against the slow crumble of the elderly friary, it’s roof gone, walls and footpaths cracking slowly.

When I walked around the back of the structure, I paused to look over the bay, where ships bobbed in the small puddle that was left just out of reach of the shore, and the wind combed the grass until it curled. As I turned, the open arch of the doorway to the abbey loomed before me, and the hollow room pulled me. It’s hard to put the feeling into words. But as I stood there, and the silence engulfed me, and wind tunneled through the structure to push me back a step, it felt like nothing had changed for hundreds of years.

Silence of that nature is rare, so full of prayers and the sounds of an abbey in motion, a place where shelter was taken in storms and where the ceremony of religion was upheld for decades and which now falls down against itself, a new era of remembrance and letting go.

Last year I discovered that I had some Irish ancestry, among other things. To stand on a soil, where new grass creeps up from its own ancestors, in a place that is home to a part of my past is surreal. And I feel it always, like a stone in my pocket, smooth with time and no longer knowing which shore or riverside it came from, but holding in it the knowledge that it was shaped by waters that have flowed away now. It is a curious thing to know ones mortality yet to feel amaranthine.

We say that watches have a face, we refer to it as Father Time, we imbibe a life into the thing that rules us to lend it some mercy, but it does not see its passage as cruelty, but as it is, glue that binds second to century and moment to millennia. What more could we beg of something that gives us years so that we may experience all that was before us and to shape what will come after. The answer is nothing.

With much contemplation,

jess

[write-as-raine]

On the Train Ride Home

Some of the things that I miss from home are strange. The most prominent and usual of these are my family. At night there is an absence of their settling sounds, and in their place new sounds, music from Mina’s room, the creaking of the kitchen door as Andrea gets a midnight snack, the evening sounds of a home drifting off to sleep.

Some of the things that I miss are not things I expected to miss, like salsa, which is very hard to find here, and just not the same. 

When I see a dog, I make an immediate beeline to pet it because I miss puppies. The owners apologize profusely when their pup tries to lick my nose. I make direct eye contact with them and shake my head, “It is completely fine,” I tell them, pressing my forehead right against the dog’s, “nothing has ever been more fine.” 

Something I did expect to miss, and do miss deeply, is the sky.

The sky here is a hazy aubergine, like a bruise, at all times of the night. Before I left home I stood under the stars on a clear night and I thought, until next time. The London sky is a frosted pane of glass on a freshly warmed car, but the Georgian sky is velvet blue and dotted with blinking stars in shades of pale yellow and burnt orange, and it’s wider than the mind can comprehend, tucked around the edges of the earth snugly, like a cosmic hug. No city lights to stifle it. I miss feeling so small and human under the wide perspective of foreign galaxies, an ocean hanging above us. 

When Johanne saw me after I returned from Stratford-Upon-Avon, she asked me how the trip was.

“It was lovely, but it’s nice to be home.”

“You called the flat home,” she said with a smile.

And it does feel like home, when we’re crowded into the kitchen, arms snaking around waists to stir a pot and wash a spoon and pour a cup of tea.

When I sit with Abby in her kitchen on lazy mornings, sipping coffee and staring out the window far longer than we should, quiet in each others presence. When Lindsay lets herself into the flat with the extra key I gave her, our honorary seventh flatmate.

I miss having lots of little houseplants to take care of. I sit in my window and waffle on to my ivy, Harry, but he’s patient with me. Not a single leaf has browned yet, so I know he’s content. A small joy.

It is a baffling thing to feel so split down the middle, to crave home and feel it here too, one of those unanticipated emotions that no orientation or blog prepared you for as you set out with your suitcase and your expectations. An excellent reminder though, that home is not a place, but rather an experience, and a place to rest your soul.

until next time,

                   Jess

[write-as-raine]

Saturday morning in Oxford

In the wee hours I was woken by the sound of latecomers to our room at the hostel, giddy on the last bits of drink and too noisy to sleep through. But beneath the groggy layer of my irritation, there was a sense of understanding, that they’d been out living, squeezing the life out of the last dark hours before sunrise. A small part of me envied them, but only a small part. The larger part of my wanted them to shut up.

The evening before was spent wandering the streets, peeking through wrought iron gates and flower beds at spires rising into the dusking sky. We popped into a local ice cream haunt and got 1/2 liters of sorbet and ice cream for dinner, then decided to be partial adults and picked up some soup to go along with it. We carried our simple meals back to the hostel and watched Beetlejuice as we scraped our pints clean and explained the plot of the movie to a Polish and British guy who had never seen it before.

Surprisingly, even at 8 in the morning, the hostel was abuzz with activity, and we danced around people to get to sinks and toilets and showers.

After sipping languidly through a latte at a local cafe, we meandered through cobbled and antiquated streets of Oxford to get to a market situated conveniently next to the coach station we are leaving from.

Now, as I sit on the coach and the contrast of yellowing leaves against rusty brick wobbles by outside the window, a little girl, no more than 5 years old, speaks French mesmerizingly in the seat behind me, her mother teaching her to read from the sound of it.

What a strange and wonderful life I am leading at this moment in time. It seems very natural to be exactly where I am, but I can’t help thinking how this moment will impact the next, and that moment will, in turn, change the one after, like dominoes of possibilities.

write to you soon x

-jess

[write-as-raine]

New Blog

Hi! 

This is my blog, an eclectic mix of things that are 100% me. If you want life updates from me over the next few months, then please feel free to follow :) 

xoxo, jess