The Mundane, The Normal and The WebStress

A very patient reader of my blog, the overnight editor, had obviously been wondering when I was going to write about something other than tea and pointed out, very kindly, that I don't appear to have much of substance to write about.

They are, of course, right.

So now, instead of hastily finishing off some mind-numbing (but also problematic, which is the worst sort of mind-numbing) html which has a deadline in, ooh, an hour, I've decided to abandon my web duties in an attempt to explain why I write about the mundane, the dull and the boring building blocks that construct my day to day office life.

I have no home. My belongings are all in storage. We are staying with my boyfriend's wonderful relatives, who I will forever be indebted to. But my boyfriend of over two years leaves for New Zealand in a little over a week, and we will be apart for the most part of the next eighteen months.

And, to be honest, the mundane is all that I can immerse my busy little mind in at the moment in order to do anything more than merely function.

At night, like I used to when I was a child in order to stop myself from being scared of the dark, I construct highly detailed characters that I can bury myself in, creating every nuance of their character (at least inside, as I have a terrible memory, if I were to construct physical features they'd probably look like a patchwork frankenstein's monster of various famous people that have their faces ingrained into my brain and I really don't think any features pilfered from the external DNA of George W or Tony Blair would help me sleep easy at night, I'd have to leave the light on).

I do this so I don't have to think.

Television provides little escapism for me, I can't switch off, so instead I simply make things up. I am hoping that these characters and scenarios, that I slip in and out of, with their uncomfortable personal characteristics and all their faults, will one day, when I have the time and energy, actually become physical, in the way that I will be able to see them on paper, where they belong, instead of in my head where they often become so mutilated in their exhaustion that I have to leave them for a while and attend to someone else, to give them a break and allow them to generate some fresh perspective.

And my blog is basically my day distraction, the word doodles that allow me not to think (or, instead, concentrate all my brain power on the joys of tea and the stresses of CSS), and it also attempts to make light to myself of the fact that I utterly despise what I do (my boyfriend has been severely relieved since I started it as I have another way to vent my frustration).

When I first met my boyfriend I knew him going away has always been a possibility. It has hung oppressively over us since I can remember. At the start of January, after a long, gruelling process, and a huge personal struggle for both of us individually, we found out that this possibility had become a reality.

At a time that my friends are largely settling down, getting married and, god forbid, even talking about 'trying for a baby' (which is a phrase in itself that instills fear, sickness and dread inside me, but I can safely push that one back a little), I am going to begin a tough personal journey. On my own.
Three months is an awfully long time to think about the person you love more than anything in the world leaving. But it hasn't been three months, its been two years. Three months has been simply the final stage of the realisation process, the confirmation, the green flag.

There are days when, sat in the office alone, like I am at the moment, or on the train, or at any opportune moment that something snaps in my brain, like a thought has accidentally leant carelessly on a switch which starts a domino effect of emotion, I break.

I would like to think that I am a strong person. But I know, through and through, I rely on the people I love, I depend on them, I need them. I think you need that vulnerability in order to love, and allow others to love you.

If I were to begin to prize my limpit like emotions off of the people I love, to release that dependency, if I detach myself from them then I am not sure who I will become.

I have been told of the exciting possibilities of the freedom the next 18 months will offer for me. I have been offered support and accommodation from so many people I have been so touched. I have made plans, I have decided to pursue my dream so that I can create something positive.

But if I realise my vulnerability, and if I acknowledge the sense of loss I am about to endure, then I will not cope and I will not be able to root this last week in the normality that we both fundamentally need at the moment.

Nothing is normal outside the mundane endurances of TheWebstress. Nothing is stable, everything is fragile.

I have been informed enough of the opportunities that I am now open to. I am told repeatedly that it won't be as bad as I think, that everything will be fine, that once he's gone I won't miss him as much as I think, that I'll enjoy the freedom.

And somewhere inside me there is resilience, there is independence, there is strength. People have to cope with a lot worse. And the waiting is the worst part, of that I am aware, that I know. Its like dreading an exam, creating terrifying scenarios of unrevised questions, of revision evaporating from your head just as the text from the paper in front of you muscles its way in. But at least once you're in there, even if all of your worst fears have been visualised, even if your terrors have come to fruition, at least you can think about having a pint post exam.

But right now I'm a week away from the start, I am just about coping, I am just about keeping it together. And I can preserve what little strength I have left in the normality and comfort of a cup of tea (hence why I really get upset when I have awful soya milk).

Which reminds me, after my emotional regurgitation, the HTML calls behind this window, I can see it lurking behind the notepad window, looking suspiciously unsettled and I think its eyeing me up seeing if it can take me on.

But there's no way I'm going to war without a cuppa.