Last week I finally caved to responsibility and started properly looking for jobs. Prior to that I'd just been pretending to look for jobs while actually looking at facebook. Quite who I thought I was fooling when I was the only person in the room I'm not sure.
The result of this flurry of job-search productivity is that I am heartened, perturbed and pink.
I am heartened because there are actual jobs out there that I actually want to do and believe I could do well.
I am perturbed because that means that I actually care if they like me or not and that's always a little unsettling.
I am pink because writing cover letters never fails to make me squirm. No matter how qualified I feel I am for a job, no matter what skills or experiences I genuinely have, the process of putting this information into a cover letter and 'selling' myself mortifies me.
However this is not a time for meek and reticent Englishness to hold me back. Therefore I have developed a technique for writing cover letters that has so far succeeded (in that I managed to write the cover letters, not in terms of anyone responding to them): I write with an American accent.
I find if I list my skills, abilities and qualifications with an English accent I sound smug and self-satisfied and more than a little unconvincing. Yet when I switch to American I just sound like a girl trying to get a job. I think this is because we British are so uncomfortable with anything that isn't self-deprecating and wry, whereas Americans have a frankness and an earnestness that makes these things far simpler. I'm not saying that Americans don't experience similar horror when stating they are a perfect fit for a job. Just that, in 'American' it sounds better, more acceptable, less...stiff.
I wonder whether there is any credibility to this theory - whether I write any differently than I would in an English accent - or whether it's just a matter of adding 'zees' to words like organization (but never advertised - confusing that - ooo, or confusing... don't Americans think we're weird for not using Zs? There are a few holes in their argument)
Apologies. This post was really just a long exercise in procrastination.
The other side of the wedding fence... sort of
Life right now feels too big to encapsulate in a blog post. Mostly because nothing is happening beyond me feeling incredibly overwhelmed by everything that needs to happen and that's not particularly easy to write about.
People warned me that I could face post-wedding blues. That all the glitzy glamouryness of the wedding would leave a big wedding sized hole in my life.
I don't feel this way.
In fact, I have decided that while I loved my wedding, and while wearing a ridiculous-but-beautiful white dress for a day totally lived up to the superstar princess celebrity feeling I'd secretly dreamed of, other people's weddings are much more fun. At other people's weddings you just happily accept food and drink and more food and more drink and do not notice that the canapes seem to have shrunk or that the caterers have neglected to tell vegetarians that there is an option other than pork and lamb. And you most certainly do not obsess over napkin quality (that one comes with a warning - steer clear of napkin conversation with me for the next er 5 - 10 years ). At other people's weddings these details are irrelevant and unperceived (except perhaps if you're a vegetarian or napkin enthusiast.)
So, I have resolved never to get married again and to enthusiastically attend all the other-people's weddings I can.
I do however miss the excuse that the wedding provided. Everything I didn't want to do was put off until after the wedding - casually thrown over the wedding fence, mounting and piling into a big life-sized to-do list just waiting for the wedding and honeymoon and week-of-jet-lag-recovery to be over.
And now here we are.
So rather than doing what I should be doing, here is a list of what I learned over the past few wedding-filled months:
1. That I need to get over my need to appease people because I really just end up pissing off everyone.
2. That the steak and ale pie served at The Plough (in Dibley) is delicious and should always be ordered in preference over fish and chips.
3. That Jeremy cannot be trusted to share his steak and ale pie.
4. That I'm writing a novel (as announced by my dad in his speech...)
5. That I'm a saint (as announced by my father-in-law in his speech)
6. That if you're holding hands with someone when dancing and they fall over, you may end up damaging your finger for life.
7. That I have Miss Havisham tendencies that absolutely need to be suppressed
8. That Jeremy is capable of dancing - sort of - but it takes the peer pressure of 100+ people to make him do it.
9. That England can always be trusted to produce terrible weather
10. That I should never underestimate the power of Dibley - from accommodating guests to donating metric tons of hydrangeas to church transformation. That village is one of a kind.
11. That Jess is guaranteed to do something like turn an electric toothbrush covered in toothpaste on while wearing her bridesmaids dress...
I think I knew the last one already.
People warned me that I could face post-wedding blues. That all the glitzy glamouryness of the wedding would leave a big wedding sized hole in my life.
I don't feel this way.
In fact, I have decided that while I loved my wedding, and while wearing a ridiculous-but-beautiful white dress for a day totally lived up to the superstar princess celebrity feeling I'd secretly dreamed of, other people's weddings are much more fun. At other people's weddings you just happily accept food and drink and more food and more drink and do not notice that the canapes seem to have shrunk or that the caterers have neglected to tell vegetarians that there is an option other than pork and lamb. And you most certainly do not obsess over napkin quality (that one comes with a warning - steer clear of napkin conversation with me for the next er 5 - 10 years ). At other people's weddings these details are irrelevant and unperceived (except perhaps if you're a vegetarian or napkin enthusiast.)
So, I have resolved never to get married again and to enthusiastically attend all the other-people's weddings I can.
I do however miss the excuse that the wedding provided. Everything I didn't want to do was put off until after the wedding - casually thrown over the wedding fence, mounting and piling into a big life-sized to-do list just waiting for the wedding and honeymoon and week-of-jet-lag-recovery to be over.
And now here we are.
So rather than doing what I should be doing, here is a list of what I learned over the past few wedding-filled months:
1. That I need to get over my need to appease people because I really just end up pissing off everyone.
2. That the steak and ale pie served at The Plough (in Dibley) is delicious and should always be ordered in preference over fish and chips.
3. That Jeremy cannot be trusted to share his steak and ale pie.
4. That I'm writing a novel (as announced by my dad in his speech...)
5. That I'm a saint (as announced by my father-in-law in his speech)
6. That if you're holding hands with someone when dancing and they fall over, you may end up damaging your finger for life.
7. That I have Miss Havisham tendencies that absolutely need to be suppressed
8. That Jeremy is capable of dancing - sort of - but it takes the peer pressure of 100+ people to make him do it.
9. That England can always be trusted to produce terrible weather
10. That I should never underestimate the power of Dibley - from accommodating guests to donating metric tons of hydrangeas to church transformation. That village is one of a kind.
11. That Jess is guaranteed to do something like turn an electric toothbrush covered in toothpaste on while wearing her bridesmaids dress...
I think I knew the last one already.
Post ceremony with the Dibley river and mist for a background.
Evening attire and one of Abbie's amazing cupcakes.
The original Italy crowd, 7 years on.
A particularly cold gust of wind.
My wonderful bridesmaids, who did an amazing job attempting to keep me sane. Hats off to Abbie for braving the Stratton Family madness and emerging unscathed.
Decompression
Later this week I will rewind back 3 weeks or so and recap on all the adventures of Wedding preparation and the Dibley Flower Army and grooms with flu and sprained fingers and sleeper trains and honeymoon scooters on the French Riviera. For now though, I'm sat on Helen's bed, trying (and failing...sorry) not to get slightly-scorched croissant crumbs on her bed (The no-croissant diet is being put off for the foreseeable future), drinking coffee and gearing myself up to shower and head to richmond for a day of coffee and shopping and probably a fair amount of cider with a conveniently unemployed friend.
Two days in London before heading 'home'. It feels like a Hannah Decompression Chamber. I don't thnk anyone has ever referred to London as decompression before. Normally it's total compression, in the form of packed tube-trains, sucking all the air out of you and cramming you in to the tune of 'can you move up please' (seriously, who are the people who say that?). But these few days are allowing me to become accustomed again to my family being further away, to me being the independent adult that I'm supposed to be, before I really do the distance and resume life in Waltham.
I'm not sad about going back. Ahead of us is moving house (I'm far more excited about this than Jeremy is) and me getting a job (Jeremy is far more excited about that than I am) and me learning to drive (neither of us is looking forward to the effort required for that to actually happen). Lots of busy, good, life-building things.
I am sad to leave though. There is always a moment when I say goodbye to the crucial people when it feels like the air has been moved just out of reach and I have to gasp to find it.
Which is why saying goodbye in stages is helpful and good. From the hugs of family to the hugs of friends to the free wine and strangely comforting food of BA, I am decompressing back into a person who can handle living 3000 miles away.
(Jeremy is guaranteed to be asked to confirm about 10 times a day this week that yes, one day, we will live in England.)
Two days in London before heading 'home'. It feels like a Hannah Decompression Chamber. I don't thnk anyone has ever referred to London as decompression before. Normally it's total compression, in the form of packed tube-trains, sucking all the air out of you and cramming you in to the tune of 'can you move up please' (seriously, who are the people who say that?). But these few days are allowing me to become accustomed again to my family being further away, to me being the independent adult that I'm supposed to be, before I really do the distance and resume life in Waltham.
I'm not sad about going back. Ahead of us is moving house (I'm far more excited about this than Jeremy is) and me getting a job (Jeremy is far more excited about that than I am) and me learning to drive (neither of us is looking forward to the effort required for that to actually happen). Lots of busy, good, life-building things.
I am sad to leave though. There is always a moment when I say goodbye to the crucial people when it feels like the air has been moved just out of reach and I have to gasp to find it.
Which is why saying goodbye in stages is helpful and good. From the hugs of family to the hugs of friends to the free wine and strangely comforting food of BA, I am decompressing back into a person who can handle living 3000 miles away.
(Jeremy is guaranteed to be asked to confirm about 10 times a day this week that yes, one day, we will live in England.)
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