At the beginning of September, I turned off my phone.
A couple hours later I turned it back on again. I didn’t realise just how reliant my every day life was on that little sheet of glass and steel. I switched it to airplane mode instead, so I could still access the important stuff - the alarm, my to-do list, the sixth meditation app I was trying out. I flicked to wifi if I needed access to my bank. But for all intents and purposes I was offline, fully, for 25 days. The longest break I have taken from the internet since I started being an Online Person while I was “revising” for my GCSEs. Which was only five years ago! Ahem, anyways…
When your life and work rely on staying connected, being offline is the closest you can get to dying without killing yourself. I made a clumsy exit. The day I had intended to set my affairs in order was the Sunday after Mighty Hoopla, but news of Sarah Harding’s death derailed my plans entirely. I spent the afternoon grieving on the timeline with the rest of the Girls Aloud fandom and when I woke up on the Monday it was a scrabble to make sure the important people knew I was disappearing and how to contact me if they absolutely needed to. I didn’t manage to message everybody I wanted to. I forgot to set up an out of office on my email inbox. I had to go out and replace a cheap bike pump I got from Argos which put my deadline back a couple hours. By 8pm, though, I was gone.
At first, the disconnect was weird, and not in the way I was expecting. I didn’t itch and twitch for the comfort of my phone, like I thought I would struggle, I just felt at a loss. It was like a thick, soundproof curtain had been drawn around me and the rest of the world. For a large portion of my life I have consumed the thoughts and feelings of the people in the world around me almost constantly. Damming that noisy stream left my in silence. Just me and my thoughts. What did I do before THE INTERNET!?!
Once I got into the swing of myself, that just under four weeks I spent off the grid ended up being the happiest, most relaxed weeks of my entire adult life. Not being on social media was a doddle, honestly. I didn’t open Instagram or Twitter or TikTok even once. The group chat messages stacked up, unread. My social calendar was reduced to just the things that I already had planned: a premiere, a couple of theatre trips, the first Bree Runway live shows.
Left entirely to my own devices, with no obligations to others, without feeling pressured to compromise my own wants and needs for the sake of convenience (or money), I thrived, both physically and mentally. I did things for myself, uninfluenced and undistracted: read books I wanted to read, watched television and film that I wanted to see, worked out, went skating, smoked weed. My mind cleared and I made more progress on my creative projects in two weeks than I had in two years. I started thinking of myself as A Writer, and not as someone who writes for money, or as a fun hobby. I realised that writing makes me happy. I realised that I want to do it all the time.
After my steady paid gig ended with 2020, I have supplemented my income with my savings this year, and by that I mean, I have rinsed my savings to give myself the freedom to reject work that I don’t want to do, but still pay my bills. Not the best decision for my finances, but good for my mental health. As the year, and my reserve coin, winds down, I am trying to figure out how to balance the next 12 months so that my time is weighted in favour of working on my creative pursuits without going completely broke and staying off the internet without completely losing contact with a community of people who I truly value and work opportunities I really need.
And so here I am on Substack. I am leaving the internet again in November, returning in the new year. My intention is to publish a free “digest” once a week, on Sunday morning: a little life update or anecdote, some words on the music I’m listening to, good articles I’ve read, maybe a little sprinkle of discourse to keep it spicy. In addition, paid subscribers will also be able to access at least one (1) essay every week, and maybe more if I’m feeling particularly gobby. Topics can, and certainly will, vary.
I thought long and hard about what this newsletter, in its new form, would be focused on, and ultimately decided that if it was going to have any fighting chance at longevity, it would have to be about anything I get the urge to write about. I want to review books I’m reading. I want to rank all the episodes of Bob’s Burgers. I want to argue that the Pussycat Dolls - PCD is one of the most feminist albums ever made. I want to talk about how Mariah Carey would make an excellent battle rapper. I want to forensically investigate what’s going on with Katy Perry’s career. I want to interview people who interest me for no reason other than they interest me. I want to share the random things I learn after getting lost in a Wikipedia hole, or the weird things I think about after a YouTube binge. I want to experiment stylistically and I want to write freely and spontaneously - for my own enjoyment, and hopefully yours too.
Most of all I want to invest my time and my talent in myself and my own goals, rather than leasing them out to others for less than they are worth. I don’t want to have to sell my “outrage” for less than 20p a word because otherwise I’m not going to make rent this month. I’d like the opportunity to explore the dimensions of my character that aren’t just “woman” and/or “of colour”. I want to to sprawl out and say all my piece without being curbed by a word count. I want money to follow my passions, rather than my passions having to chase money. If you enjoy my writing, and would like to support it, and can afford to, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. Thank you.
Looking forward to reading! x