It’s been a while. I’ve fucking plateaued and I’m not mad about it. I’m living an utterly normalish (for me) life and generally feeling a sense of peace which has rarely been found at all. Huzzah!

Anyway.

Two of my most favourites in the universe had not one, but two weddings, both sides of the Atlantic. A boozy night a good few months ago, M asked if I would say something at the NYC wedding. I set about being my usual cockish self. Yet the longer and harder I thought about it, I couldn’t find the words which could truly convey how proud and amazed I am at their relationship with each other. There’s so much love, respect and acceptance between them. They are #relationshipgoals and I don’t even give a proverbial bollock about how basic that statement is.

Back to the wedding. Excited as I was… This was a moment of MASSIVE anxiety for me. Sure, I can walk into any bar in any city and look like a fox. Jeans, a moderately offensive tit enhancing tee and too much mascara is my uniform. But this is a wedding, and not just a wedding, it’s the Fortnum’s of weddings. And I’d been asked to say something (which blew my mind, because anything could have happened!). In the end I stole somebody else’s words, because I burned through notepad after notepad spewing out prose which seemed trite and unworthy.

Many dresses were tried, and one eventually found. A hat was made. The best boots in the world were purchased. I was a wreck. I didn’t want to disappoint my friends and for other guests to think that I was just a fat mate. I didn’t want to be disappointed with how I looked. Shallow AF. But the thing is – no one actually cared, because I look pretty normal now (whatever normal means), and whilst maybe the largest woman at both events, I wasn’t so large that people looked at me with ‘the look’ that I was so well acquainted with before. It was a freeing experience and one I shall not forget.

The NYC wedding was an unbelievable day that I still feel utterly blown away about being included in. Their second wedding was a banger too, even though I did fall in a bush and almost lose a knuckle on my right hand to a rock. Turns out that the only way one should drink Pomerol is from the bottle whilst shimmying on the dance floor in a back garden which you haven’t seen for 20 years. And there was also a flying Jesus. And Mushes I haven’t seen since the late 90s. Many awesome human beings both sides of the Atlantic. Both weddings have me in a love bomb right now.

Then because I was in the UK I got to spend much needed time with family and friends. Walks, kittens, dogs, ice creams, beaches, Wimbledon, hangovers, amusement arcades, more hangovers, bowls clubs on a Sunday, another hangover, meals, barbecues, gigs, guncles, boule lessons and making unexpected new friends.

I think the point of this is that it was so utterly fucking marvellous and normal and I’m normal. And I wasn’t for such a long time. And it’s good to remember that sometimes. So I don’t forget, so I don’t go l back. Because life has pockets of being rather lovely, even keeping an eye on the abyss.

Mic drop x