Feather Head

Very soon, I have got to return to the festering grit hole that is commonly known as Plymouth.  As the opening sentence may suggest, I am not particularly looking forward to this.  Over the Easter break,I have been lullabied by paper boxes and expansive doodle diaries, cocooned by ragrug weaving, whick will not pay the mortgage/utility bills etc in the long run.

It is no news that I hate uni, but have to complete the English BA course.  There are multi-layered reasons for my extreme reluctance, but mostly it's because I feel that I am done.  Yet, I owe it to myself to complete this course, because this is it - the 'one shot', the very achievement that will lay down those ghosts, beat down those shadows inside.  It ihas been partly accomplished by the FdA last year and because of the achievement, I finally know (rather than merely guess) my worth.  In time, the full degree will top even that humble qualification.  I do not expect to find a rich seam of cool jobs, but I will have a better chance of hitting the vein with a newly-minted BA.

There is a part of me that feels why didn't I know my worth before? Why DO I needed it measured by the standard 'gold star' educational ideal?  Why do I need a piece of paper to validate me?

Inside the darkness, glittering eyes utter the unspoken words: Because you needef the tangible proof...

Now, I have always kicked against convention - Lord alone knows just how much trouble it has caused me in the past. I have spent most of my mature adult life piecing the precious template back together, ironically reflected in my recent scrapbook emdeavours (how very post-modern of me - trying to make something beautiful out of life's fragments). I am fulfilling this academic death sentence because when I am done, I can cause wonderful chaotic mayhem, replacing ill-timed gestures with well-timed words - and (God love my enduring, adorable naivety) maybe even get PAID for it.

Right now, I repress the reckless rampage of thoughts that are currently well-hidden under video clips, pretty gifs and banal-but-humourous asides.

For I am a seething soul...

Writing a module for Plymouth University is like having a one night stand with the same person each week, but they will find some way to uniquely fuck you over. This is later endorsed by a faceless educational sub-committee, who sit at the foot of your bed with the sexual equivalemt of lousy skating scores. I have to find a way through it all - I am hoping that by learning my craft at the foot of my dissertation subject (the divine Angela Carter), that I shall redeem myself somehow.  That and read the Academia Obscura page - which will remind me that there is humour derived from all of this, silly but not stupid.

Maybe this has been my problem all the way along...that I have needed to prove to myself that I am not stupid and all of the other corrosive asides from various parental implantations (thank you Philip Larkin).  It doesn't matter whoever the jeer-leaders were and the fact they have long since gone - I have to exorcise them from myself.  Or get permanently drunk.

Tonight, I know I will not sleep properly again - though tired, my eyes will be saucer-wide and until J's test results are back it is unlikely that I will settle comfortably.  It rather depends on his prognosis - stick or twist.