Ohh. Emm. Gee. I think I must have slept through this semester - nay, year! - because I was floating along and out of the blue my Creative Writing tutor, Rodge, said “well, next week is your last class”. What?! Are we not just getting started? I don’t know what scares me more, the fact that I’m now half-way through my degree or the fact that I can’t think off the top of my head of anything I’ve learned! I have two exams and even then looking at the timetable doesn’t make me feel like they’re actually going to happen. Just some classes that someone called Nadia has been to and knows enough to regurgitate the main points in two hours…
Then there’s summer. I’ll need to start looking for a new flat with my friend from school, David. Please, please, please no bed bugs this time! Rubbish accommodation need not apply! And there’s a week in the sun with my boyfriend - I plan to do nothing but brown pleasantly by the pool. And turning 20, which seems quite grown-up and important. Even though I had to drag myself away from buying flip flops and kaftans the other day I still can’t quite get my head around the fact that it’s not still Christmas. I’m losing track of time in my old age.
We were talking recently about how in the summer between school and Strathclyde my friend Kat and I did a two-month stint of work, out, work, out, work, out, work, collapse. Maybe it was the novelty of her being just over eighteen and me being just under (with a fake ID), or maybe we just had a lot of time and money to waste. Even in first year though, in the beautiful days of Garnett Hall, I remember all the random excitement and always being busy. Weekly 12-Hour, flat parties, ABC on a Thursday…ahh! Then this year, what have I actually done? Not been in classes that much (due to a lot of ‘self study’ course content), I could count in single figures the amount of times I’ve gone clubbing and I’ve not really done much of anything else.
This time round I did discover that going out for tea or lunch was sort-of better than going ‘out out’ because, apart from being far less expensive, when you see your friends you can actually hear what they’re saying. Also it’s ok to put your pyjamas on and have an early night, try some proper cooking and take your make-up off before you go to bed. I also really appreciated the good relationships that I had perhaps taken for granted before, especially my Mum and my boyfriend. Although living somewhere as 24/7 as Glasgow is amazing, the things that I enjoyed the most were things that I’d loved all along. I guess that’s what I’ve learned in my second year in the city. Not a bad lesson.