22nd October, 2024
There are 3 main reasons that this blog exists in the world – 1. I have to do a fair bit of writing for university and work, and sometimes brain dumping about different things genuinely helps me get on with my work afterwards – it’s good to write for no real reason. 2. For other people – some of my family and friends read my little updates and I think it helps me keep in touch with the people I love on a semi-regular basis, especially the ones I can’t see in person week-to-week. and 3. It is an enormous body of consistent work and employers really eat that up.
There is also a kind of secondary appeal to me. I can go back and read things I wrote all the way back to 15 years old. There is almost a decade of personal growth and change, readily available on this blog. That said, 15-23 is obviously an enormous time in anyone’s life for change. I’m sure we are all at odds with the 15-year-old version of ourselves. I don’t tend to go back and read my posts very often at all – I only read over the vast majority of posts on this site once, just before I schedule them to be posted. Some of them, I haven’t even read once. I’m certain that if I were to meet my 15-year-old self, it would be an embarrassing experience – and that’s how it should be!
That said, I’m about to finish 5 years of university. The opportunity to go back and reflect is readily available today, because I wrote and posted something when I finished highschool in 2018. So, to celebrate, I am going to go back and read that post, and report my findings. Then I will write something sappy about my university experience. So, feel free to hang around for that.
Observations & Feedback for my 18-year-old self
Sappy 5 -Year Reflection
This is actually a 6 year reflection, because I’m going to talk about my gap year for a moment.
I did not have a fantastic time in 2019. But also, yes, I did. My gap year involved a lot of uncomfortable change and stagnation. I couldn’t wait to start university. I was bored with Dubbo and frustrated. I did not speak kindly about Dubbo at all. I spent most of my time working, and the rest of my time, I was going out and having fun. When I talk about 2019 now, I say that I was having the worst time and the best time. Obviously, Covid came in 2020, and suddenly, my gap year didn’t seem so bad. I couldn’t believe that I took things like festivals and the Amaroo (Dubbo’s equivalent of a nightclub) for granted.
We went into Covid shut-downs about 3 weeks after I moved to Wollongong and started going to classes. The prospect of this mysterious disease didn’t bother me until they started cancelling concerts I had tickets to. Specifically, I had tickets to see San Cisco, Mallrat and Tyne James Organ at the Unibar, and I remember crying actual tears looking at the cancellation email. After an emotional hike up Mount Keira, my best friend Caitlin and I both decided to move back to Dubbo a few months later.
In the six months that I spent at home, I did my classes on Zoom and Discord. I felt like I was missing out on making friends at university, but in hindsight, I was on Discord and Twitter, laying the foundations for some of my favourite and most important friendships. One day, my friend’s future kids might ask how we met and we’ll get to tell them the funniest story – and explain what Twitter was.
Eventually, Caitlin and I moved back to Wollongong. A month later, I got in a car accident that turned my world upside down and deeply changed my relationships with myself and others. The months following that accident were probably the hardest in my life. But I am happy and healthy now, and I might not be if I hadn’t gotten in that accident. I still miss my car, though. Caitlin and I enjoyed a few months of freedom. I got to meet new people in person (those people are also some of my favourite people now, if not favourite stories to tell). And then, of course, the second lockdown happened. Caitlin got stuck in Dubbo and, understandably, stayed there. I miss her very much, but I still get to see her when I’m in Dubbo. I stayed in Wollongong throughout 2021 lockdown, and I am glad that I did. It was one of the most enriching times in my life, actually. I learned so much about myself and ultimately came out of it very self-assured. It was hard, of course, but the time I spent by myself was important.
The end of 2021 and 2022 are a blur to me. I remember wanting to do as much as I possibly could do, because lockdown was over. I felt a sort of pressure to always be going somewhere or talking to someone. I was very confident, socially speaking, because I didn’t want to waste time. Again, I met some of the most important people in my life. I met the person I’m going to spend my life with because I very boldly walked up to her in the line at the pub in late 2021 and said hello. Obviously, I have no regrets about my over-confidence. Except that I was constantly sick. I contracted every strain of covid; I had a disgusting chest infection for 3 months; I got tonsillitis at some stage, and university accommodation definitely mould-poisoned me. I am glad to report that I am no longer violently ill every two weeks. I wish I had more to say about that period of my university experience, but the memories are mostly lost to me. I know important things happened, but I don’t know exactly when. It feels like a lifetime ago. My best friend Taylor and I certainly became inseparably close at that time, which is a relationship that I am continually grateful for. It’s very special to have someone who has been so close with me through my early 20s, given that we didn’t know each other at all as teenagers. It feels extra special that our early 20s coincided with the pandemic.
Toward the end of 2022, blessings and opportunities began coming my way, and they’ve kept coming since. I started my photography business, and I’ve gathered some really fun stories through that.
I see myself as a very lucky person. 2023 was awesome. I bought a firepit, had a great time, and most importantly, fell in love with the aforementioned girl from the line at the pub. 2024 has been incredible. I have friends and family that have supported me, from a distance and right by my side. I’ve had so many incredibly cool and fun experiences through uni, work and my personal life.
I am full to the brim with love, joy and appreciation for everyone and everything that has influenced the last 5 years of my life. There are a few people that I’ve worked with or been taught by at university that I think very highly of. I feel completely different from my first-year self, but I’ve remained adoring and appreciative of the people around me, even as my circle formed and shifted. My friends and family in Wollongong have supported and encouraged me through some really funny moments, and my mum, dad, siblings and friends in Dubbo have done the same.
I’ve learned an incredible amount since my first year, and most of it had nothing to do with coursework. I could not have possibly predicated that, but it is evidently true. I haven’t mentioned my coursework at all during this post. At this point, I don’t have a strict plan I’d like to follow finishing university. In the words of my 17-year-old self “Que sera”. We have learned from the pandemic that nothing is promised, and whatever happens will happen regardless of my plans. That said, I’d like to continue with the work that I am currently doing, in community news and photography. I love my job at Women Illawarra, and the people I work with there. I don’t have any expectations about what my work looks like 5 years from now. I would like to quit my job at Woolworths, when I am confidently in the financial position to do so. I may or may not go back to uni the year after next, because a teaching degree seems like something I’d like to do. I’ll see how I go. I’m looking forward to having some more time post-grad to spend with loved ones. Sinead and I will likely be married or planning our wedding in 5 years’ time, regardless, my future is with her.
The possibilities are still endless, and they always will be. There will be new, amazing opportunities, experiences and people to influence me over the course of my life. I’m looking forward to seeing how it all goes down.
If you made it to the end of this post, thanks for having me.
