The Loop Guide to Clubbing, Drinking, plus West Essex and East London living.

Spring, my favourite time of year the days are longer the nights are shorter, everyone’s talking about holidays and sunshine and it seems like the whole world is waking up from its winter sleep and things are starting to grow and hatch. Its sunny spring days like today that make me feel like writing a children’s story about a married hedgehog or a fable about a rabbit who basically steals from farmer Giles but I have a feeling that Beatrice Potter beat me to that! No instead I will stick to my usual composition of relationships, Essex and the struggle to make the transition from girl to woman and in fact it’s that transition that I am going to be discussing more profoundly.

Lots of my friends are turning 30 this year including me, there is something exciting about turning 30, not at first, at first when approaching the big 3 0 you feel old and you end up winding yourself up about all the things you feel you should have achieved by this age and haven’t. In the past I have spoken a lot about not sticking to your life plan and as I’ve often reiterated there is no such thing as a ‘life plan’, fair enough have a rough guide and some fundamentals but give yourself a massive break and plus there are wonderments that were never in your plan that I bet you can look back on and think ‘well I never’! Anyway apart from that slight worry about getting older, turning 30 can feel quite refreshing. You’re finally accepted as an adult you can say things like ‘she is merely a child’ (to someone who is 21) or ‘I went to school with your mother’ I also like the fact that the relationship between your parents changes, you can now answer back with things like ‘I am a grown woman, I will make my own decisions’ when they’re trying to chastise you, sometimes even the roles are reversed and your parents will come to ‘you’ for advice, that’s my favourite! Don’t get to excited though there are times when my mum still has ‘mothers power’ and I haven’t lived at home for 7 years, we can be having a very grown up, civilised shopping trip and she’ll say something like ‘you’ve got about 100 tops like that’ and in a bid to defend my choice of purchase I end up feeling 15 again, I mean how the hell would she know I doubt she’s even knows the contents on my wardrobe (quite handy actually as I have collected a few of her items over the years). Anyway back to the point, so growing up it’s a good feeling, looking back on the past 10 years and literally seeing myself as a different person has made me change. Luckily my obsession for oversized Chanel Suits, my crush on all of the New Kids on the Block and the fact that I smoked more than Dot Cotton are in the past but there are things about being a lairy 20 year old that I do miss. I seemed to take a lot more risks at 20 (not always good ones) I was a lot braver and bolder. I now make a conscious effort to try and do things to keep this trait alive, the thought of being scared of anything would be like prison for me, (although did you watch Holloway, it made prison look like a bit of a rubbish health farm, I want to go on their detox programme, crime anyone?). Fear stops people doing so many things, not just physical fear but emotional fear, not being about to talk about your feelings or being truthful with yourself, all these things stop you growing up and you can be 101 years old but if you don’t learn to develop as much as you mature then you’re going to miss out on a lot of fulfilment from your life. This I came to realise after a few things, the way I have changed in the last few years, people I’ve met, the way my friends live and of course the tragic death of the young like Jade and my friend Stel who died when he was only 20. I have always tried to make sense of the young dying and I have never come up with any viable reason so on reflexion I feel it is important for each individual to live unreservedly as boundless as you can and remembering that there are enough hurdles in life for you to stumble over without creating your own.

It is so important to reflect and I know it might all sound a little bit deep but it’s something I wanted to share because I meet so many people that just won’t challenge themselves because of fear. I wouldn’t call them naïve in fact most people that are naive tend to take more risks as they are oblivious to the outcomes. Things like moving on, changing patterns and breaking chains are all elements to help you grow but you have to patient, a lot of these fundamentals don’t happen over night. It’s a bit like when you trying to lose weight, it’s as much about changing your mind as it is your body, the body bit is easy but you have to change your way of thinking about food and your lifestyle. Its times when you hit a milestone Birthday that you think things like this and in my case 30, no one said life was ever easy but it can be fun and if you have faith and trust in fate you won’t spend 90% of the time worrying about things that will never happen. So on that note I will leave you with this, everything we learn is a change and a stepping stone nearer to reaching more and more knowledge and in my eyes knowledge about life is freedom to live – I just made that up, how clever am I!.

From a very philosophical Miss Essex & The City see you when I am 30!!

P.S Had the best time at Gammy’s Birthday and Pav’s..... I am so sorry I told mumma about nanna.... she has a right to know!

P.P.S Mercedes… I love you!! xxx