Early adopter of the mirror selfie even with my Sony Ericsson
Blogging is absolutely huge these days and everyone and their nan is documenting their lives online for everyone to see in one way or another thanks to social media. I remember though, back in the day having an online diary at TeenOpenDiary (LOL - I still try wonder what happened to some of the people I followed religiously), before progressing to OpenDiary and then Livejournal. It was kind of embarrassing and a little bit geeky back in those days and I would have been mortified for anyone I knew IRL to discover it and read it. Kind of hard to imagine these days when the whole point is to gain as many followers and reach as many people as possible.
Anyway, it got me wondering.... I never actually deleted my Livejournal and after some scrambling around in my email archives to try and rediscover my username and password, I managed to login. I had a flick through the archives. It did make me laugh. Is it really 12 years ago since I got my A-Level results and was about to start uni? Ten years since I was having epic meltdowns about having to move to Germany?
Here's a few excerpts from the archives....
21 August 2004
guess who passed their a levels?! whhhooooo yeah, that's right me -lol- i got BBC. i was slightly disappointed in not getting a B in psychology but i'm over it now. i'm disappointed in people saying it's virtually impossible to fail etc and that a levels are getting easier etc but i'll save you my opinion on that. i got 410/600 for psychology altogether with all the modules added up which is 68%. in french i got 453/600 with all the modules together (76%) and in my written exam i got 83/90 which i'm really pleased about. in german i got 464/600. only 16 marks from an a. i think that is 77%. and i got 108/120 which is pretty amazing because of all the cases etc which are pretty difficult to grasp. anyway, i just wanted to get that out of the way. i'm sure you don't really care about my little breakdown and analysis -lol- anyway, to cut a long story short. i got into my first choice university, hull and i got my confirmation letter this morning so i'll be sending it off tomorrow.
we decided to got to hull. well i did. i kinda just wanted to see the university as that is where i'll be in three weeks. we ended up arguing lots whilst in the car over directions -lol- there was lots of swearing. once we were out of the car though, we were fine! i didn't buy much. just two tops. a green halterneck with blue polka dots (sounds nicer than it is) and a blue goldigga vest. i wasn't really in the mood for shopping i guess. i nearly did buy cowboy boots in topshop though. gonna definately go back for them. i felt kinda strange. i was feeling kinda blah. i dunno why, i'd just got great exam results and i'm about to go to university and start a new chapter of my life but instead of feeling excited i just felt like crying. i guess it hit me how much things are gonna change for me and it's terrified me. i told J how i was feeling and he took me to pizza hut for my tea to cheer me up which he did. we had a garlic bread starter, chicken feast pizza to share and then a chocolate fudge cake each. it was v. delicious.
I guess grammar and capital letters weren't my forte back in 2004. Also, gotta love the fashion of the noughties.... cowboy boots and golddigga vests! Quite funny how I was dreading leaving, yet loved uni almost straight away and dumped my at home bf for the boy in the next room in halls. What a cliché.
21 August 2006
i am starting to actually shit myself now. i fly out to germany in one weeks times. i'm trying to block it out. i haven't even started to get things ready for it yet. i need to pack, buy things, get my euros, speak to the my mentor over in hamburg. argh too much to think about. i don't even have anywhere to live :( i've seen a few places in the internet which i need to enquire about.
i've spent pretty much all this weekend with andrew - trying to spend as much time together as possible until i go. he came down on friday after i'd finished work. we just chilled out with a take-away and watched the big brother final which was a bit shit actually.
I was terrified of moving to Germany for my year abroad. Looking back though, it's one of the things I'm most proud of and I have the best memories of that time.
I don't think the girl who wrote those entries would have thought her life would turn out the way it has. Then again, who really does? It's hard to reconcile the girl who'd never really left Yorkshire and always had a long term boyfriend with the 30 year old eternally single Londoner. I still do struggle with change though and moving house/jobs and being pushed out of my comfort zones terrifies me. I am a lot more confident and independent though and I am so grateful for that.
I bet in ten years time forty year old me will be cringing at all the snapchat filtered selfies and artfully placed coffees, cocktails and meals that dominate my feed these days!
