Guilt, guilt, unimaginable guilt, and the doom that we don't speak of

For the second time this week, yesterday I felt absolutely dreadful about N’s revision. I know that if I wasn’t around, he would get a lot more done, and I feel so guilty about it. These exams are so important- he has to pass, there’s no debate about that- but he’s not really started revising yet, and he certainly hasn’t become the revising machine he said he would turn into. And it is at least partly my fault. I mean, maybe he wouldn’t have started on his work anyway, but I am certain that I have been a hindrance. What’s even worse is that he was worrying about how I would feel, and he wasn’t more to-the-point about needing to study because he didn’t want to hurt my feelings. That makes me feel absolutely awful. My feelings are not the primary concern here, by any means. The exams are the most important thing, not me. Next week I am not going to go round until late, like 11pm, so he can work until then. Neither of us think we can sleep anywhere other than next to each other, but I don’t know whether it would be easier for him if I didn’t come round at all, as then he could work solidly until five minutes before he has to sleep and not have to have banal conversation with a stupid girl. It would absolutely kill me not to be with him every night, but I can’t be this selfish. The exams are in five weeks time and we have the whole summer to be together after that (well, two weeks after exams finish, as he’s going to Singapore the day after exams). I just can’t help but feel really bad that he’s not yet done a vast amount of work, as it is definitely at least partially attributable to me. It seems I have more in common with Yoko Ono than I would like (forgive the in-joke there).

I don’t want to whinge about this, as that would be so selfish. I just honestly don’t know what I will do without him there all the time. I guess I will just have to stop being so childish and just accept that this is the mature thing to do. I am trying to think of positive things that will result from this. For example, if I spend more time at home, I might actually get the internet working. I am moving to my new bedroom next weekend, so that will take up far more time than it realistically should, what with my endless organising and re-organising (I know exactly how long it takes me to move everything- and more specifically, pointlessly move things around- as I have moved so many times in the last four years) and sticking pictures on the wall and so on. These things should keep me occupied. Plus it’s the F1 season. Once all of that is out of the way, I will probably develop OCD or stick pins in my eyes. I don’t know.

Thing is, I used to be really good at spending time by myself. Mainly because I was a bit of a loner as a child and people didn’t really like me when I was at school. I can quite happily entertain myself (not in that way, you sick fucks… or maybe in that way, it’s not what I was talking about anyway), but now, I don’t think that I can. It’s rubbish. I sound so needy and lame. I’m sure everyone I know, and even more so, everyone (if there is anyone) reading this, thinks I am a pain in the arse, always talking about N. I can’t even say that I’m sorry about that, because I’m not (there’s nothing worse than disingenuous apologies). I don’t want to think about this anymore. It’s making me miserable.

In other news, the air con in the office has broken again. According to the head of finance, it’ll cost a million quid to replace. A million? What the fuck? The auditors are in at the moment and R suggested we tell them that we need more money, but I don’t think it works like that. My very VERY basic knowledge of auditing tells me that auditing, as far as I can work out, is essentially checking things. N tells me that I have grossly oversimplified, which may well be the case, but you know, I don’t DO numbers, so that’s as complex as it’ll ever get for me. For some reason I was in top set maths at school, but I think that is a fairly damning indictment of my under-achieving school rather than proof of me having any sort of talent in maths.

Last night at ballet, my friend (her of the shoe analogy I think I mentioned ages ago) was there who I hadn’t seen in ages. She used to come every week and then she stopped coming, and we didn’t know why. Turns out she’d slipped a disk in her back. She’s okay now though (hence being back at ballet). It did somewhat silence me though, what with my back pain and I only let out a few involuntary grimaces. N thinks I should go to the doctor. I don’t like my doctor so I probably won’t go. Paragon of sensibility, me. I was very pleased to see my friend again though. I got the bus with her and this other girl (or is it woman? How old do you have to be before you reach this transition?) who makes me want to burst my own ear drums. I have seriously never met anyone so dull. Seriously, she makes * and * (names/initials no way appearing in this- do you think I am mad? You all know who I am talking about anyway and I don’t want to get in trouble!) seem like the most interesting people in the world. No lie. She told me the dullest story ever that went like this (gaps are where I zoned out): ……………………… Honestly. I was riveted.

So yesterday was polling day and I had to go to some school near Loughborough Junction, completely out of the way for where I was going. My ward was apparently going to be “really close” so I went along to cast my vote for the Greens. No need in the end as Labour now controls the council, and no Green councillors at all. I’m pretty sure I’m the only one of my housemates who voted. Apathy huh. I think everyone should vote. And my housemates certainly should have. It’s not like they had anything else they had to be doing. I was half tempted not to go because I was running late, and my feet hurt. Next time I might try and get a postal vote- though I do like the physical act of going into the polling station and standing in a booth with a pencil on a string. Anyway, my act of democracy has cost me dear as I now have two large blisters on the soles of my feet. The soles! I ask you. I suppose it’s my own fault for wearing my cheapo Primark shoes with no socks. I have not made the same mistake today.

Other news: we have a new housemate, officially. It’s the engineer. He came round and said that our freezer needed defrosting and that he’d get right on it. Errrr… okay. Still, it might be nice to have someone who is domesticated and doesn’t eat solely porridge (like #2), ready meals (like #1) or a variety of dishes that only ever include rice, onion, garlic, spices and cheese (me). As long as he doesn’t eat fried chicken, the food of pure, unadulterated misery.

And my arms have gone pink again from the sunshine. Being a Celt is so rubbish. I remember last year I fell asleep in the park and burnt my back so badly that I couldn’t wear clothes for a week. Obviously I still had to go to work, so I had to wear night shirts. I looked like a cross between Wee Willie Winkie and a seven year old boy in paediatric ward in spring. When I had a bath, all the water got trapped under the top layer of my skin and I had all these water bubbles. It was quite fun but incredibly painful. In the end all my skin came off, like those kids in Vietnam. It would have been such a traumatic experience had I not found it really funny. What was the funniest was that there was this guy at my work who found it really erotic. My friend told me that he’d been talking about me with my skin falling off (though he’d incorporated a car crash into the fantasy as well). He was a nice guy, but that’s one sick fantasy. Typing that has made me realise just how much so.

Can you see how good I am at keeping secrets? Yes, I’ll keep all your secrets and I’ll never tell. Even when the secrets weigh me down and I wonder why on earth anyone told me anything because it’s not like I’m special and it’s not like I’m the one anyone would tell if they had any choice in the matter, I still won’t tell. Which makes me wonder whether what I write is really me, or am I more a product of the things I can’t write about? Ignore me. I’m having an emo moment. Less so than the unforgettable shitness of: “Things are so good. Maybe I should never see him again and then things will never have to go bad.” Hopefully I will never come out with verbal excrement of that calibre ever again (I say this, all the time knowing that I will, I know I will, I am weak and essentially pretty fucking lame).

Anyway, the weekend is upon us. There is a giant elephant to be seen – www.thesultanselephant.com which I saw, legless, yesterday by Battersea Power Station.