Alongside news outlet The Swindonian, I’ve started doing freelance work for the ‘what’s on’ website Total Swindon too. Check out my recent review on Swindon based restaurant, 20 at The Kings, here:
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When The World Came Together at Oxford Station
Standing in the terminal of Oxford railway station I’m familiarised by a classic mix of passenger. The cyclist awkwardly pushing her bike through the ticket barriers, a toddler being led by the impatient mother, the Asian tourist with overflowing bags in hand. Watching the tides of people pour in and out of the confined space it reminds me that at any given moment the order of society, including this station, sits on the brink of collapse and chaos. All it takes is one broken signal and everything will grind to a halt.
If you thought the term ‘diversity’ could only be applied to whole streets and towns then you may need to think again. For contained in these four walls of peeling white paint, tapped across the utilitarian stained floors there speaks a more fascinating image of a fast-paced melting pot. An environment where, for the most fleeting of seconds, East bumps into West, North connects with South, rich mingles with poor. At this train station everyone is unified in the same gripes and grumbles. A delayed train, an out of order toilet, another drunk passenger, they are all received with the same unimpressed reaction.
Waiting for an old friend to arrive from London I am left to wandering thoughts which flow as seamlessly as the passengers coming in and out of the terminal. In this sea of faces and voices which type of passenger am I? Someone awkwardly shuffles behind me to get to the ticket booth I inadvertently block. Does my insistence at lingering beyond my welcome make me the tourist? Men in suits glance my way for a short period before I realise they are staring at the LED light boards above my head. If they are London bound they will need to go to platform one. Does my in-depth knowledge of platform order make me more a commuter? Next to the screaming child and passive aggressive guards it’s hard to think much beyond the bigger question “why am I here still?” It is just at this very point that my friend greets me with a cheery welcome, snapping me out of trance.
Leaving behind the dim and crowded terminal and entering the light exterior my friend’s first thoughts mark a very different take on modern life. “What an awful building!” he says, gesturing to the bricks behind. All thoughts of passengers and trains disappear as I’m faced with a more pressing question from my companion, “now, where on Earth are we headed to Miss Bennett?”
If only life and cityscapes were as easy to interpret as the passengers at train terminals.
The Most Middle Class, Passive-Aggressive, Valentine’s Day Card You’ll Ever See
Ok, so let me get straight to it, yesterday was my first Valentine’s Day with a another human being* (*not to say it’s the first Valentine’s spent with company, I have enjoyed many a V Day with cats, TV, wine, chocolate…). However I just can’t seem to get my head around making a song and dance out of chocolate and roses. I thought it would make complete sense when you have someone to buy stuff for but instead it’s actually worse. Its like Inception, the deeper and more involved you get the less and less it makes any shred of sense.
For me, the pinnacle of the V Day confusion and inner turmoil was the important part of selecting a low to medium value cruddy piece of tree we call ‘gift cards’ (you can probably see where this post is going already). The difficulty selecting a suitable Valentine’s Day card embodied completely the inner awkward-come-British-come-Alice reaction to the whole Western festival.
Now most people (including the tall bearded one) just write in their cards, “To X…Love Y” No one gave me this memo. As a result, instead of getting a cutesy, charming note, my Valentine essentially got a passive-aggressive message reflecting the inner frustrations of his other half’s quest to find (and buy) said card.
Message reads as follows:
To Stewart,
My God, if you knew how much middle class, British, stress I went through just to find this ruddy card. Like seriously why do all Valentines cards have to be either so ridiculously over the top (since when are men turned on by fluffy bears?!) or look like they belong at a funeral? Christ, where is the middle ground? It’s like buying low fat hummus when there’s a shortage – it shouldn’t be that big a deal but it damn well is!
Anyway, happy Valentine’s day. Your face and personality are kinda awesome (unlike my lovey dovey card writing abilities). I bought you man stuff (vodka + energy drink) because they contain red. Boom – should plan weddings.
Christ, don’t make me write another one of these.
Alice xxx
And let it be known that I deliver on my promises, this is what the tall one got from me…
(See what I did with the bubble wand? After a bottle of vodka that bubble wand is going to be the greatest thing since sliced bread.)
I know right? Best damn girlfriend there is.
The Birth of the Grimgrad
On July 16th something monumental happened. The Ukrainian Government were continuing their struggle against pro-Russian rebels, and Ben Affleck had crashed a Superman-themed party. Neither though can compare to what was going on at the University of Southampton’s Highfield Campus in, oddly enough, Southampton.
At 10:45am I officially graduated from the university with a 2:1 BA (Hons) degree in History.
I walked out of the ceremony all smiles and compulsory posed photos…
However, while this development in my life story was happy and exciting, after 30 minutes the realisation of my new status started to sink in. Photos like this started to appear in the photo real:
(Mumma Bennett was not happy)
I was an actual adult now. An adult with debt to pay off, a job to find, a career to build, a life to make. All that debt and nothing to show for it but some fancy hired robes and making people call me Alice Bennett, BA.
Some say life begins at birth, others pin it on moving away from home, buying a car, or going to a club. They are all wrong. No, the start of one’s ‘life’ cannot be pinned on something we build ourselves up to. It is the sudden removal of a structure or support base that forces one to make their own choices without the help of friends or Google. That’s when our independence is finally marked and when ‘life’, as we know it, begins.
With the removal of my education the inner child was officially dead, but the adult was born. And with the birth of the new adult came the decision to create a blog three months later. Watch this space for more blog posts about my job, outside-of-work stuff, and everything else under the sun.
Hello there Mr. New World, are you ready for me?
My Housemate's a Mermaid 