A Head Full of Beauty

I woke up to the sound of my blackberry alarm in pitch darkness. What... Why was it so dark? Fuck. Welcome to winter. I dragged out my coat from the cupboard and pulled it on as I shut the front door behind me. Memories came flooding back. As a teenager, I pulled on my frumpy school fleece or jacket as I went to the bus stop. A huge cloak of ugliness and foul shapelessness - years ago I felt the disgusting poison of my blood seeping out the pores of my face, ugliness, fatness. Why couldn't I be fresh and pure and lovely, why did I have to be an unclean lump? I pulled on my jacket on the morning of the new season to feel these same emotions flooding back - covering up the pretty pencil skirt and fitted blouse with a woollen jacket and woollen discomfort. I felt the cold daylight burning my skin as it had been for years, harshly highlighting the foulness of my skin, my attempts to patch over my natural ugliness - but nature is harsh, is cruel is TRUE - the natural daylight show...

Tuesday Scrolling down my emails on my work blackberry something is very clear- the last few days I have spent far too much of my time in the office flirting and far too little time working. After a fair amount of flirting and copious amounts of emails being pinged across the row of desks, I'm going out with the new guy in our department on Friday for drinks. As I explained guiltily to Rhianna: "I've been email flirting with Chris... But I don't fancy him - he's just SO good to flirt with!" And all of that statement is true- I don't fancy him, I just like pretending that I do... And I imagine he's the same - his asking me out for drinks wasn't asking me on a date, after all, banter is banter, banter isn't a relationship. So hopefully it won't be awkward and I won't get carried away beyond the bounds of flirting. As for Sam, I seem to be more attracted to the older brother everyday. All I keep thinking is of his arms underneath ...

I'm bringing the new blog back to this site... (if I can work out how...) I've realised that what I'm writing isn't actually a new story, it's just an extension - my history is the shaping of my present and future, I cannot pretend to have forgotten it. And I don't manage to merge the two blogs, here it is: http://www.glasscitygirl.blogspot.com/

See Part One here . I sit down at my desk first thing on Wednesday morning to find an email waiting for me from Aiden, the City Lawyer. I read it hurridly and smiled. "Aw, so sweet...he's so sweet." This is the standard reaction I seem to have from every message he sends me. He's incredibly thoughtful and sincere, a textbook nice guy. He had no reason to email me and I wasn't expecting to hear from him until he was back in the UK at the end of the month. His unsolicited email indicated that he'd been thinking about me. His emails were getting more personal, he was talking about emotions, things he likes, experiences and dreams... With every email he sent I began to recoil from him further. Of course in my replies I gave him just as much back, but I couldn't help thinking that he was giving too much to start with and being too keen. I would never have sent him emails like that - and I'm queen of keen. The final nail in the coffin came with: "I'...

07:30 on a Monday morning in The Square Mile. A girl wanders up and down the isles of a food store, nothing I can eat, nothing I can eat , as she wrings her hands, flustered, getting in the way of impatient men in suits I managed in the end. Three packets of microwave-in-the-bag mixed vegetables, three mini packets of cooked chicken breast and one packet of plain mixed nuts. I've decided I'm allowed plain nuts now after reading a few Paleo blogs - which also means fruit is back in the diet - hurray! (The Dukan Diet which I followed strictly a few months back was utterly depressing in it's lack of fruit). So, for all those who are interested here is the new plan of what Ophelia is eating and keeping down happily: All vegetables (except beans) All fruit (except dried fruits) Plain nuts and seeds (not peanuts) Chicken Fish and Seafood Skimmed milk - A diet which is my own personal hybrid of Paleo and Dukan, which is restrictive enough to have the right effects, but...

"Do you hate Harry?" asked Rob, "No." "Well, I just thought... you just said you hated men, that Harry might be one... because you haven't seen him since..." "I don't know the guy. How can I hate him." I retorted aggressively. "Ok, ok" he said, surrendering, "I only have myself to blame for everything with Harry. I only have myself to blame." We were sitting on the top of One New Change again eating our salads. I was angry. Talking about relationships always made me angry. I hate men, it's true, I hate them, I hate them for the power they have over me, the desire that I can't control, the need that I have for them. I hate men. I hate all the men that I have starved for, thrown up for, taken laxatives for, exercised for, wasted my money for and wasted my precious time on. I hate them all for leaving me with nothing but a sick, empty, worthless feeling in the pit of my rotten stomach. All the men that I have neve...