Life Update | Finishing University

So after having a (somewhat lengthy) blogging break, I feel a life update is a good place to start on the road back to bloggerdom. The past 4 months have been preeetty crazy- filled with laughter, stress, and a lot of tears.

I guess my not so small piece of news is that I finished my degree! After what felt like an endless run of essays, revision, and exams, I can finally say that I did it. 3 years. University. Boom. Done. I feel like now is the time when everyone gets super nostalgic and has a few (probably pretty dramatic) mental breakdowns about where the heck all that time went, and the inevitable thing that is having to brave the big wide world alone- something no one planned on happening so soon. It took me 3 years to learn to cook something other than pasta. I feel like a baby bird that isn’t strong enough to fly out of the nest yet. I just don’t think the world (and by world, I mean me) is ready to see me being unleashed into it.

However, I can somewhat relax with the whole ‘so what comes next?’ thing, with my teacher training place patiently sat waiting for me to tootle along up to it in September. Now with my degree actually over, I am counting my lucky stars that I have this lined up, otherwise I would currently be sat in the inevitable pit of doom which is OH MY GOD I HAVE TO GET A JOB?!?! So yep, going to put that one off for another year I think…

Other than moving back in with my parents for at least the next year (au revoir freedom!), I may be alone in saying this, but I’m actually pretty excited for the next chapter in the rather odd book that is life. Don’t get me wrong, I’m going to miss university like MAD. Getting wasted on a school night and rolling home (quite literally) at 4am is no longer going to be acceptable. Although this may take me a while to adjust to, with change comes new responsibilities, and sadly it will no longer be my responsibility as a true university student to fulfil the expectations of drinking ungodly amounts and doing ridiculous things that I will have completely forgotten about the next day. I think my dignity is thankful for these new responsibilities.

So that is where I am at. Currently rolling around in bed doing absolutely nothing, enjoying the last ounce of freedom I have for the next few weeks, and loving every second of it.

xoxo

So something pretty insane happened this week…

This week I received an offer to train to be a teacher. I cannot even begin to tell you how hard I sobbed after I got the phone call- two hours after the interview as well!

For many it’d seem like a pretty ridiculous dream to become a primary school teacher. The usual things to dream about becoming are singers, actors, doctors. I guess teaching just seems a bit… meh. But when I got asked what I wanted to be when I grew up, my answer was always teacher (well, I probably threw princess in there at some point… a girl can dream right?!), and being in my final year of university (sob), the time to think about taking the plunge and actually doing something about achieving this dream came around quickly.

After a string of pretty stressful and somewhat shocking interviews, that phone call was something I’d tried my hardest not to imagine. I guess one thing I’ve learnt to do is not build things up, because it often only ends in disappointment. This is probably why this whole thing means so much more to me, because I never actually imagined it being remotely within my grasp.

This is a bit of a random post, but this is something that I’m still absolutely buzzing about, days later after getting the offer. I like the idea of looking back on my posts in months to come, and remembering the week that my dream came true.

(Considered going down a don’t be afraid to dream route with this post but let’s be honest that would’ve been massively cringey for all those involved)

xoxo

Day in the life… Final Year Uni Student, Part Time Procrastinator

The new university year has finally hit with full force. Deadlines are starting to flood in, dissertation research is looming, my diet has deteriorated considerably, and I’m of course ignoring all of these things and instead spending my time sat here writing a blog post. Standard life of a student, right? Who really needs a degree anyway…..

My days naturally start with my alarm, which gets snoozed 3 times every. Single. Day (my new phone only lets me snooze it 3 times, I can assure you that there was naturally absolute pandemonium when I found this out half asleep on a Monday morning). I’ve had to get up super early this year to get a bus into uni, which has been piles of fun. I live in a town about a 20 minute bus ride from campus, but here at Warwick buses have now gained a new reputation for being absolutely shocking at actually turning up, and getting you anywhere on time. Standing out in the cold under the never ending rain for half an hour really puts you in a chirpy mood for the day ahead.

My timetable is shameful. 6 hours a week kind of shameful. I’ve spent about 25% of my time at uni arguing to friends that Sociology is a ‘proper degree’, but these kind of contact hours are just something I can’t bring myself to even attempt to justify. Today I had 2 seminars, nicely sat across the middle of the day so lunch was a bit of a struggle to squeeze in, but I had my favourite seminar Sociology of Education today, and as an aspiring primary school teacher, I can finally say I’ve found an aspect of my degree which isn’t boring to me. It’s only taken 3 years.

     
                               (what I should be doing vs what I actually end up doing…)

Time at home is spent doing hours of readings for my seminars which make zero sense to me, no matter how many times I read them again and again. I’ve come to the conclusion that sociologists just cannot bring themselves to write in nice coherent, simple English, and all of them have set out on a mission to make studying for a degree in Sociology one of the most boring and painful things known to man. But still I persevere. I say that like I’m some sort of trooper, I only persevere purely because I really have to. I also say that like I’m a great student who uses all their time in the most effective way, doing all of my readings. I’d say about 75% of my time at home is spent sat in my lovely warm bed, or on my laptop avoiding readings through hours endlessly refreshing Facebook in the hope that something exciting will pop up (it doesn’t), or on Youtube watching way too many videos and vlogs by those horribly addictive British Youtubers.

And as a uni student who clearly has a fair bit of time on their hands, you’d think I’d have the opportunity and energy to cook myself a nice, healthy dinner to end the day nicely. Vegetable soup counts as one of your 5 a day right..? Chocolate biscuits are also my worst enemy but we’re just not going to talk about that right now because I definitely don’t currently have the biggest chocolate biscuit shaped food baby going on…

Being a finalist is a pretty enjoyably boring business.

xoxo

Back to University. And I’m a Finalist. Help!

So today marks the last day of being at home before I head off and move back into uni for the final time. That thought is literally so scary to me, that I can’t even bring myself to fully think about it. Only a matter of months ago when I was half way through my second year I faced what I liked to call my ‘mid-degree crisis’ when I had the BIGGEST meltdown over the fear of the end of my time at university and actually having to become a fully-fledged adult and do something productive with my life.

But this last day that has become an annual occasion is also known to me as the day of panic. I’m the kind of person who will be dying to pack all of my stuff weeks before I actually leave, but then put it off for as long as possible because ‘I don’t want to pack anything I might still need’. Turns out I’ve apparently needed literally everything that should be packed away ready to stick in the car tomorrow. Chances are I probably haven’t touched any of it for weeks. I hate myself sometimes…

It is impossible to sift stuff for university down to a minimum. The number of times I get nagged by my parents for taking too much stuff away I probably couldn’t count on my hand, but they don’t understand, I’m literally moving there and living there. Of course I need all of my belongings with me. I go to university pretty much half way across the country from where I actually live, and I’m sure anyone else in this same situation will understand the trauma that comes with only being able to take a single car load of stuff with you because the drive is too long to repeat more than once.

I guess this is where my hatred of packing stems from. It’s all rainbows and sunshine until you put it all together and realise the sheer volume of stuff you’re planning on taking with you. This is the point where my mum usually walks into the room, looks at the amount of stuff I’ve accumulated, says a swear word that I’m not going to repeat, then walks out. I’m going to need some sort of miracle to fit all of this in the car tomorrow. Can’t wait for the arguments that come with this to ensue…

Anyone else simply hate packing?!

xoxo