On maturity and growing up

Strange post for me to be writing, this one. I've fought against "growing up" for years but alas it seems to be overtaking me. It's with a bemused and slightly wistful tone that I write these words.

Maturity. What is that? Many, many, far too many people seem to think maturity means being "grown up", grown up apparently meaning to be serious. When we say someone is "immature" we usually mean they're a bit weird and they act a bit childish. I would argue that maturity doesn't require a person to become boring, plain and serious. To me, maturity, in the ways that count, means dealing with ones responsibilities. Finances, relationships and work being the main ones.

Everything else is academic. One can grow old without "growing up", and still be mature. I think it's a sad state to assume that growing older means we must abandon the things which make us happy. Spontaneity, a sense of wonder and adventure. Doing something we feel like, because we want to and it makes us happy, like rolling down hills or climbing trees without worrying what some strangers we'll never see again will think about us. I see friends lamenting lost childhoods on Facebook, all the things they used to do because they simply wanted to and it was fun, and don't feel they can now because they are "grown up".

Why block out that inner child? To what end?

As I said before, maturity, true maturity that counts, means looking after your responsibilities. Being an adult to me, mainly seems to consist of doing things I don't want to. But I AM an adult, I AM mature, I do those things. I get up at 5 in the morning to go to work. Or I head in at 7 in the evening and leave at 7 in the morning after a night shift.

I have matured a lot since I left University. I could never have imagined working 12 hour shifts when I started, or reaching a point where I can support myself. When I began, I was a wide eyed innocent little teen, with no idea what I wanted (ESPECIALLY when it came to relationships and girls). I had no sense of responsibility...9am lecture? No thanks, I'll stay in bed! And it's that which I have fought since leaving University...the real world is too harsh, it hasn't got time for you to lie around in bed during the day and stay up late drinking every night. Do that and you'll end up jobless and broke. The real world is difficult and cruel, but it's something which must be not only faced, but embraced, if one is to get anything out of it.

And it's in this terrifying "real world" place where keeping in touch with your inner child is so very important. It would be awful to lose touch with the innocence and joy of simply doing things which make you happy, for the simple reason that they make you happy. Being "immature" is the only way I can deal with being "mature". I'm proud to say I'm immature.

And I've grown up too.

The dreaded question - "Where are you from?"

A very difficult question for me, which I am often asked when I meet new people, is "where are you from?"

Those of you who know a little about me will know why this question causes me trouble. If I answer "the world" people think I'm trying to be clever.

See, I was born in Berlin in 1989. When I say this people go "Oh wait, you're German?" NO! I was born in a British Military Hospital to British parents. This makes me British. My Dad was in the army, so we moved every two or three years, and so I have never really had a "base" other than the quite literal base I would be inhabiting at the time.

People often try to place my accent, which is an unenviable task given the nature of my upbringing. It's very strange when people to try to place me as "Northern" or "Southern" given that those words don't really hold any meaning to me. In fact, believe it or not, up until about 2 years ago I didn't really understand that there was any difference between "Northerners" and "Southerners", I wasn't aware that there was any animosity between the two. Having lived OUT THERE in the wide world, it seems ridiculous that one country should be divided in itself. Even more ridiculous is that I find that there are more divisions, between people who live ridiculously close together.

Take Warrington and Wigan for example. They are less than 15 miles apart. 15 miles people. And yet there is this huge rivalry. As an adopted "Warringtonion" I am supposed to hate the "pie eating Wigans" with fierce and amusing intensity. What baffles me is that we eat pies here too. We're practically the same. If anything, people from Wigan seem friendlier.

As a forces kid, I have no idea what to say to people when they ask me where I'm from. Is it the place I'm currently living? The place I've lived the longest? It feels very weird and quite disconnected to not really have a "from" for me. Some people suggest I'm from the places where my family live, but I only ever went to Leeds at Christmas to see family, and although my mother, and thus I, currently live in Warrington, I definitely have no connection to this place.

Where are you from?

I have no idea.

Smiles are my weakness.

I wrote this while I was bored in my old job and I just found it again recently. Yes it's soppy. Deal with it ;-)

She had an amazing smile. A beautiful grin which bloomed across her face and lit up her eyes. When she smiled I was entranced. There was pure, unashamed happiness and honesty in the upward curve of those lips, the shine that entered her eyes and lit them from within. When she smiled, for a moment all was right with the world. Every part of her came alive, she seemed radiant, larger than life. When she smiled, I wanted to take her up in my arms, squeeze her tight, kiss her forehead, and then her lips, and then clasp her head tight to my chest, my hands running through her smooth hair. When she smiled...I felt happy.

Snelling Cornbottom

The inspiration for this little story came from an amusing interaction with someone with an amusing name. I had a mischievous idea and from that came this delightful little short story, written as an intro to a more complete work.

And so without further ado,  I present to you, "Snelling Cornbottom".




Snelling Cornbottom hated his name. His parents had been whimsical creatures who had a teapot named Eric, an iron named Peter and a child they decided, against all reason, to call Snelling. The unfortunate last name of Cornbottom was something his Father was afflicted with through the pure bad luck of being born to a proud line of Cornbottoms. Perhaps this was why his Father felt the need to pass on the injury and call his only child Snelling.

Snelling lived in a tiny flat above a bakery, the scent of warm baking bread wafting up at all hours to fill his single room, permeating the air with a friendly atmosphere and making his stomach grumble constantly. Snelling was good at grumbling, in fact it was his favourite past-time next to picking the fluff out of his belly button and adding it to his collection, stacked in neat rows of jars along the windowsill. His friends were disgusted by this habit, at least, he assumed they would be, but his friends couldn't speak, being in fact a spider that lived on the lampshade and a moth which had one night flown in through an open window and couldn't seem to find it's way back out again. He hadn't named the spider and the moth and so they were simply known as Spider, and Moth, respectively. But they were his closest friends.

Snelling himself was an old man of about 70, with a curved nose and a wart upon his right cheek, hair sticking up out of it like little spiders legs. Maybe this was why Spider hung around, perhaps he thought he had found a mate. Snelling didn't like to imagine what Spider got up to at night when he was asleep, but he sometimes woke with an unpleasant tickling sensation upon that cheek, and he would swear he often heard the odd tiny joyful squeal as a small dark shape swung off into the darkness.

Moth never seemed to care much for Snelling, in fact he seemed unreasonably enamoured with the light bulb which he danced around while Spider sat closely by, watching and hoping, but Moth had an uncanny knack of avoiding the carefully laid web.

It was a precarious friendship, founded on necessity, bad luck and not having anywhere better to be. This was Snelling's home. This is where our story begins.

Vodka Revs.

So I've started to write a novel, or rather, a series of novels, four in total. They may never be published, they may never be read, but it's something I've always wanted to do. I don't want to get to the end of my life and look back and think "what if" or "should have". No fear, no regrets. For your viewing pleasure, here is a snippet from book 3, chapter entitled "Vodka Revs".

That familiar feeling was sinking in, threatening to create a long night of loneliness, anger, self hatred and paranoia. It was looking like another endless night of despair for Mike. He had an event to go to, some student party thrown by some company desperate for an influx of new minds. "Ha, if they get minds like mine, they'll be quickly wishing for the old ones" Mike whispered vehemently to himself. The long walk there to sit in fake happiness with people he didn't know for a cause he didn't believe in proved a less than tempting possiblity, but he knew he had to get out of his funk or he'd end up in trouble again. The sort of trouble leading to a late night of drinking by himself and turning himself into the hospital at 3 in the morning.

There has to be a time to change. A time when you decide that NO, that will not be your fate. It doesn't have to be that way. Armed with such thoughts, Mike picked up his phone and sent a group text.

"Hey guys, going to Vodka Revs tonight for some business thing, free cocktails! Anyone fancy coming?"

The usual false enthusiasm which was all he could seem to muster, true enthusiasm lost so far back it might never have been.

The sky darkened outside as he sat alone and waited for a response, the clouds sulking across the face of the moon while the wind moaned against the windows, complaining to be let in from the cold, adding to his sullen mood. One text, two, three, all excuses, too busy, too tired, not my thing, the usual reasons. After all, why would anyone want to head out in the cold to sit in a bar being talked at by falsely overenthusiastic young employees in the hope of sneaking one watered down cocktail too many?

"Yeah sure, what time?"

A response. And then another. Time for the game face. In truth, Mike was desperate for a drink, the cool feel of a cider in the throat, or better yet vodka and coke, double, ice of course to take up more space - more vodka, less coke. A little something to drown the self loathing. And a little company to make sure he didn't damn well drown himself while he was at it.

With a resigned sigh, he shuffled his coat on and started on the long walk into town, the close dark at first hugging him like a blanket, before the strange half light from the streetlights cloaked the world and made everything seem surreal, fuzzy and out of focus, and then suddenly too sharp as he came closer. A world outlined in stark shapes of shadow and relief. The kind of light in which you could walk forever, timeless, the world never changing, shapes and shadows blending, merging and splitting again. An endless, timeless world, for an endless, timeless existence.

And then suddenly, from a side street, into the harsh, glaring, too bright light of the main road, students drunkenly stumbling already, everything too loud, false people going about their false lives, forced happiness, boisterousness, postering, trying to emulate their idea of what a student should be, a parody of a parody. All that faked confidence, each and every person the centre of their own universe in which they must be the brightest star, each and every one of them a step away from going supernova, from shattering like a dropped mirror into a million tiny pieces. It was with these dark thoughts Mike arrived at the bar, sneering around at the hysteric masses, the fights waiting to happen, at the women who would no doubt end the night on their backs in some grungy bedroom and start their next day with painful heads and painful cunts as their rewards, shame burning hot upon their backs, only to do it all over again another night. The endless, pointless, hysteric futility with which humanity fills it's days.

A drink, a drink. Anything so he could join the foolish masses and make his own mistakes, his own regrets, stop THINKING once more and start DOING without a thought or a care. A drink, a drink. No consequences, no regrets. At least not until tomorrow. Tonight was all that mattered.

Depression and recovery.

This post is all about me. So sue me and call me self indulgent, grumble to yourself a bit and then go on living your life because it's really not that important and you have better things to be angry about. Probably.

I was not a popular kid. The same way a can of propane is not good at putting out fires. I was weird, quiet, some would say arrogant, but it wasn't arrogance, just self defence, and something missing from my head. I was the kid whom the unpopular kids picked on to make themselves feel better. Anybody who knows me now (presumably you do or you wouldn't be reading this) would probably call me eccentric, highly charged, overly sexual, more than a little bit weird, and a host of other, less savoury things. But never quiet. Never unconfident. Socially retarded perhaps, but on the over-the-top side of the spectrum. Believe me I count this as an improvement.

You wouldn't recognise me as a child. I needed routine. 7: breakfast (always cornflakes, regulation table spoon of sugar - don't hold it against me, I was a child). 12.30: lunch. Two ham sandwiches, a yoghurt, crisps, and a chocolate biscuit, consumed in that order. Dinner: 18.00, whatever was prepared for me. Any deviation from this pattern was enough to make me feel deeply uncomfortable, and resort to a strange need to grind my teeth together, a certain number of times, in just the right way, or it would feel WRONG.

I was deeply unhappy and intensely anti-social. I didn't understand why people spoke to each other - they never seemed to be saying anything important. I didn't feel the need to speak unless something NEEDED saying.

I was lonely. Cripplingly so. I looked at all these other kids going to parties, having friends, exchanging gossip and rumours and no doubt entirely magnified stories of adventures and conquests. I DESPERATELY wanted in, but the limit of my social interaction with other kids was when they were beating me over the head with the metal strap of a watch, spitting at me, spreading horrible rumours about me, and generally making my life as miserable as they could. Face it - kids are shit. Never again in your life will you ever face enemies so relentless, remorseless, and unforgiving.

I cried. A lot. I considered suicide, but always convinced myself I was just too cowardly to do even that. Looking back now I know that was a stupid way to think, but forgive me, I was young and emotionally immature. Even more so than now.

It felt like my life would never be anything more than deep upset, spurned advances, and crippling social insecurity. For much of my life I have had periods of time where even the act of getting up in the morning is impossible, because once you are up, it means you have to face everything again. Face the world, and everything, and everyone in it. Sometimes living was just too difficult and dying seemed the ONLY option. Some people may see this as grossly overacting, but consider this - if you get to a point where your wish to die overrides your natural, inbuilt self preservation instincts, something is seriously wrong. When the thought of what it would do to your family doesn't even figure in, because the NEED to be gone is simply THAT strong...that is not mere unhappiness to which one is overreacting. I was never the type of child or teenager to throw loud, dramatic wobblers, kick up fuss and a storm of reaction, and then go on next day as if nothing had happened. I internalised. I cried by myself. I never told my parents I wished to kill myself. This was something so deep, and so shameful, and yet so much a part of my life.

Letting go was one of the most difficult things I have ever done.

When depression has become your lifelong partner, always there hanging by your side, it becomes familiar. You forget it's possible to feel any other way. At best, a constant feeling of dread and deep seated unhappiness, and a feeling of WRONGness, like you've forgotten something important, that sort of deep seated unease you can't put a meaning to. At my worst, all logical thought was overtaken by a feeling so strong, so intense, so overwhelming...words cannot describe. This is not mere unhappiness or an off day. This is the point where death is the ONLY option, where the NEED to end everything is all pervading, where desperation takes hold.

I dealt with this throughout much of my childhood and throughout my entire time at University.

And yet, University was a different experience for me. Freed from the expectations of my friends and family, and the pre-conceived notions of who I was, I could be who I wanted to be.

Truth be told, I overdid me. I was ME as intensely as I could be, and damn the consequences. I alternately had a blast being the most extreme version of me I could be, and hit damning lows of utter despair, of late nights, tears, pills, knives, police and hospital visits.

I tried my best to keep all this side of me hidden throughout my time at University. A few close friends had a hazy idea of the buzzwords of the 21st century, depression and anxiety. Fewer, closer friends, or simply people who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, saw me in full flow and had to deal with the consequences. I wronged people. I hurt the people I loved. I was desperately unhappy at times and yet, I could be ecstatically joyful and energetic, both sexually and socially. I swung between the two extremes, but always endeavored to only show my, on the balance, more socially acceptable side. This is the side most of you will know. This is the side I chose to show you. Both sides were equally as genuine, and very much a part of who I was.

On the whole, I like to think people think good of me. On the whole, I like to think I made a good impression in my time in Nottingham. I'm so proud of all I achieved there, and of all the friends I made. On the whole, I'd like to think that those who did not know about my depression, are surprised by this post.

Now, my story is not all doom and gloom. Socially awkward, quiet, shy, suicidal kid I may have been, but University provided me with so many experiences, and so many friends and so much room and time to mature and grow. They say we learn by our mistakes - that being so, I reckon I must be a genius.

I truly flourished at University, in between the suicidal thoughts and the alcoholism. I was able to come out of my shell, and by god did I do so. The man I became in Nottingham was indistinguishable from the socially crippled child I was. Anyone who knows me now, if they could have seen me then, would not recognise me. I had so many experiences, met so many people, learned so many things,and have memories and friends I will cherish for the rest of my life. I may not get in touch with you as often as I should, but it doesn't mean I'm not thinking about you. Each and every one of you who touched my life in some way or another, who helped shape the me I am now.

And the depression? It's more or less a thing of the past. After 4 years of shunting me around on different SSRIs, I've finally been given a happy pill that works.

Today, I have a job, I have realistic dreams and the motivation to achieve them. I yearn to get back to Nottingham with all the good and bad memories it holds for me.

I have emotionally matured. No longer do I need alcohol to feel human. For the first time in my life I am truly confident, I'm excited for the future, I know who I am, I know what I want, I know how to get it, and I have the drive to succeed. I feel happy, in a way I never knew was possible. I'm no longer quite so manic. I'm still a little odd and I always will be, but it is not acted out in such desperation, such a massive swing between utter despair and intense elation. After so many years of holding on to my depression, walking side by side, hand in hand, I'm beginning to let go.

And for everyone who was expecting a more "Paul" like post, I leave you with this:

My new pills do not inhibit my sexual performance.

For the first time in 3 years...I CAN JIZZ AGAIN.

And it feels fantastic.

It's what's on the outside that counts.

People often say it's what's on the inside that counts. This is usually used by ugly people to say that physical beauty doesn't matter. Well, physical attractiveness is hugely important biologically and evolutionarily, but I'm getting way off course here, that's all for another post. When I say it's what's on the outside that counts, in this case, I'm talking about how we present ourselves to others. Let me demonstrate what I mean with a couple of examples.

Let's pretend there is a nice guy, let's call him Nick. Nick the Nice Guy. Nick KNOWS inside that he is a lovely guy and would be great for any lady. He is caring and thoughtful and generous, inside. Nick is sure of this, he's always known he is a Nice Guy.

Now, Nick is shy. Nick rarely speaks to people, and certainly never to new people. Nice Guy Nick has SRS (Social Retard Syndrome), an unfortunate condition which afflicts many people of all ages, genders and nationalities.

So how do WE know Nick is a nice guy? Simple; we don't. Nick never speaks to us. Nick to us is Nick the Shy Guy. As much as Nick is sure he is a Nice Guy, the fact is that he isn't.

Then there's Mike. Mike is a ladies man. He's played through in his mind a thousand times the moment where he spies a lady at a bar, walks over and effortlessly delivers that smooth opening which gets him talking to her all night, until they're dancing together, and soon they're kissing and he's leading her to bed. He is a Smooth Operator and he knows it, on the inside.

But then Mike heads to the bar with some friends. He sees a lady he likes the look of. His friends have heard how he is such a ladies man and one of them pipes up "what about her Mike?". Mike takes a casual look and goes "Nah not her, I can do better, I mean I can see why you would like her, she's okay, but I'll wait till something better." Then he sees a girl who is undeniably good looking and he wants to go say hi, but he notices she's with her friends and decides he doesn't want to bother her and distract her from her friends.

When it comes to turning thought into action, he chickens out and gives himself plausible excuses. In his mind he's still a Smooth Operator because he didn't get turned down did he? He could have had any of those girls, he just chose not to for various reasons. But to the real world, he's just some guy who stood at the bar all night. In reality, in EVERY WAY that matters outside his own head, he is NOT a confident person. The simple truth of the matter is that we are judged on how others see us.

I'm sure you think this is terribly unfair but answer me this; how else are we to be judged? Others cannot see inside our minds. To the outside, observable world, we are that which others see us as. And it is in this outside, observable world, in which events happen and things are actionable, that how we are perceived matters. You can know for sure that inside you're nice, or confident, or romantic, or successful, or whatever the hell you like, which is all well and good if all you wish to do is sit around alone congratulating yourself on what a good well rounded person you are.

But if you truly want people to see you as the person you believe yourself to be, you have to show them that person.

It's what's on the outside that counts.



NOTE - for those who do not get what I tentatively call my sense of humour, I don't honestly believe that only ugly people say "it's what's on the outside that counts". This should not have to be said and will not be repeated in future - YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!