This is the first installment of my web journal. There's a lot of back story missing but this is the story so far.

In 1975 I was born, this has suprised a lot of people, especially on my new course, who thought I was younger. But I like being 31 I've had a lot of fun getting here and I wouldn't want to lose any of it (even the bad bits)

Bringing it back to the present or at least to the recent past. The course I mentioned is BA Fine Art at Middlesex University, the impetus for this "blog" (Ugh I hate that word which is why I refer to ths as my web journal). Anyway it started 3 weeks ago, and its been a hard start, mostly due to my day job which I have had to fit my course around. Not that they haven't been flexible, I'm lucky I can go part time at all, but having to apply for my own job, writing CVs, application forms, doing psycometric tests, competence test and interviews with managers who don't really understand the intricasies of my job, and then decide I need to do extra qualifications just to keep it- well you can understand why I might find it stressful. I really didn't need all that rubbish when starting a degree.

As a 'mature' student my concerns are different, while I'm stressing with work, most of my new student friends are facing very different forms of stress. The shock of the new, a new course, new city, new responsibilities, new freedoms. I envy them a little, it's an amazing time, but I have been there. Back in 1993 Newcastle University, Richardson Road Student Flats. Unfortunately I was doing the wrong course, (Mechanical Engineering). I had an amazing time, with all the same distractions, but it was socialising and particularly romance that undid me. I can take or leave the drugs and alcohol but when I'm in love I give my 'everything'. I can make that special person feel like the only person on earth.

This all sounds very lovely I'm sure but unfortunately I don't work during this time. You can't do a degree like an ordinary job, just putting in the hours well I can't. My attention span doesn't work like that. I will spend hours thinking, daydreaming, faffing then suddenly I'll have a moment of clarity and tunnel vision. I'll forget to eat(one of my biggest passions), I won't sleep, when painting I'll forget to move my legs until they seize up. It's the same energy.

So before I started Uni, I did something terrible, I cut away a piece of my soul. I swore off love. I was going out with someone I cared for, loved but wasn't lost in. I broke it off, I didn't dump her I told her all the reasons and we parted amicably if sadly, but I swore I wouldn't have another relationship, wouldn't fall in love until after I finish my degree.

It doesn't sound so bad, like giving up smoking or alcohol, people do those all the time. But this is a much higher high an addiction people kill for and I've tasted it, I've been in the sweetest most passionate, intelectual, animalistic love, but I neglected my own development and without a strong self as a base it crumbled .

So if I'm going to have to do without Love, I'm going to have to find something to replace it, may be it should be Art.