Monthly – SAMANTHA MAE

Isolation and Confusion in April

With three family birthdays thrown in to the mix, social distancing hit a little harder this month. Being stuck in Southampton while my family celebrated birthdays, even if from a safe distance, was weird, but life goes on.

April 5th was my Grand-pops’ birthday, and I think this was the hardest one to be away for. Even so, I enjoyed a lovely little phone call, after which he told me he was going to sit down and have a drink. Specifically a glass of wine, red. Or no, maybe open that nice new bottle of Rosé. As much as I wished I could just sit and have a glass with him, I did find comfort in the fact that my Nan was cooking up a good meal, and that those who could go round and talk from the front garden, did. I also learnt that some of their neighbours who are more able to go out have offered to grab any bits of shopping they need. Still, nothing could quite shake my want to give him a big old hug. Soon Pops, real soon.

Oh, What a Month March Has Been

Well, what a complete turnaround this month has been, huh? It’s fair to say that everyone is feeling it a bit lately, whether working from home, being laid off, or going through it all to keep people alive. I think we can all agree that the NHS deserve not only a huge round of applause but some actual real support and recognition for what they do, right? Let’s also not forget the shop assistants and everyone else who is any way, shape or form helping to keep things ticking over.

February’s Holy Trinity of Feelings, Food and Music

First things first – she has a job, she has a job, she has a job! True, it was only three weeks of being unemployed, but it felt so much longer, dear lord. Funnily enough, it is another hospitality based job, despite me apparently wanting absolutely nothing to do with that line of work ever again. Things change though don’t they? Sure, perhaps that thing can be sheer desperation, but I prefer to look at it as determination. Why cut off one whole industry just because one job in particular wasn’t for me? So here I am giving it another go, and so far, so good. It certainly helps that I am not having to get the train to work or consider moving to a different town.

Change, change and more change

I am only just starting this post and already it feels very familiar. A return to the blog after a fair bit of silence on this page to talk about changes and admitting defeat in my bid to upload weekly music posts etc etc. Ah, life.

It has been a mad couple of months and not in the exciting ‘Oh I’ve been up to so much!’ way. No, much more along the lines of ‘Oh life is soooo draining right now’. Cor, don’t I sound like a ray of sunshine? In all seriousness, a lot has happened recently and it is only now that I have managed to sit down and reflect on it all.

Let’s catch up

It has been a while since I came out with a load of words about the last month in general, so my initial thought for this post was, hey, let’s give May the spotlight for a moment. Then I looked back. Other than starting at a new job (which I covered to death in my last post), the last month has been pretty plain sailing. Also, by the time I got round to really writing this post, we had already been through most of June. So it is a sort of two month roundup. Don’t worry though, I’ll keep it short and sweet. Relatively.

Difficult Decisions and New Starts

Well hello there! It has been a while since I last published one of my more personal posts, but by golly do I have an update for you.

Normally I like to do these sort of posts as a little round up of the last month, but this time I have two (and a half) to catch you up on, and to be honest, March seems so far away I can barely even remember what happened. Though these posts started up as pretty simple pieces about what I got up to, more recently they have been centered around certain themes. That being said I have still striven to make sure it is an honest reflection of the month rather than me shoehorning some random idea in. Towards the end of March I had drafted a little piece about needing to care less, and perhaps that will be feature later on, but for now let’s talk about the change that April brought around.

A New Outlook

Let’s talk about February. It started with my mind a flood of thoughts about work, home, relationships and well, life in general to be honest. I felt a little bit lost, but – you might want to grab a chair for this – just as I thought I was reaching an all time low, my life picked up. I started to feel like progress was being made. Shocking, I know.

Embrace Everything

When I rambled on needlessly about wanting to change my monthly posts, I was not exactly sure how (if it all) they would differ from what I had already been doing. The one thing I did know was that I wanted to focus more on progression as well as reflection.

Not a New Year’s Resolution

Oh how terribly cliche of me, making changes in the new year. I know, I know, how original. Under the usual plan, this post would be looking back on the last month, December; an opportunity for me to close a chapter in my life. This retrospective view on life has been particularly useful in moving on, but the one thing I have been lacking is the plan of where to go next.

Continue reading “Not a New Year’s Resolution”

Reconnecting with home while finding peace in the city

Remember when I had that really tiring month? If only past me knew what was coming.

I’m not going to lie, this month has been a struggle, but at the same time, I have felt the support of so many people. Not everyone, but a fair amount. That’s not to say I’ve always listened to those supportive words, or even that I haven’t dismissed them for one reason or another. Imposter syndrome (a psychological pattern in which an individual doubts their accomplishments and has a persistent internalized fear of being exposed as a “fraud” – cheers Wikipedia/Mel for introducing it to me) is real and the craziest thing is being SO aware of it and still making excuses. The brain honestly baffles me.

Continue reading “Reconnecting with home while finding peace in the city”