7. I never told you this, but..

I have such problems with jealousy and comparing myself to other people. In the past it would totally consume me, eat me up, spit me all over the floor in pieces I couldn't muster the strength to put back together. Nowadays it is much more contained, like most of my issues. A way that I've learnt to cope is to show kindness to the people I envy or feel inferior to. It helps me diffuse my feeling of inability to give praise, genuine praise, and support to people I am jealous of, I try to admire them instead. It's my only way to turn bad feelings into good. I suppose that's why sometimes I come across as too gushy or touchy feely. I have to feel like I can learn from and be inspired by these creative, beautiful, calm, productive folks, instead of use their talents to be cruel to myself.

And to know that you and I have something that is precious and something to be very jealous of: true love.

6. I've never told you this, but...

I have suffered sadness since I was about 10 too.....

But now it's lifting

5. I never told you this, but..

It felt like karma that half of the guests didn't show up yesterday.

My new birth year resolution is to be more realistic and honest to my energy levels when I accept invitations, honour my commitments and stick to ones that I do accept, not call off sick if I feel I can't handle the social situation, and to definately text ahead of time when I can't make it.




This resolution will prevent me feeling that perhaps I was being taught a lesson in politeness. The taste of my own medicine sure wasn't very sweet.

4. I never told you this, but....

Let go... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SS7RO8vt9c

drink up, baby down,
mmm are you in or are you out
leave your things behind'
cause it's all going off without you
excuse me, too busy
you're writing your tragedy
these mishaps
you bubble wrap
when you've no idea what you're like

so let go, jump in
oh well, whatcha waiting for
it's alright'
cause there's beauty in the breakdown
so let go, just get in
oh, it's so amazing
here it's alright'
cause there's beauty in the breakdown

it gains the more it gives
and then it rises with the fall
so hand me that remote
can't you see that all that stuff's a sideshow

such boundless pleasure
we've no time for later now
you can't await your own arrival
you've 20 seconds to comply

so let go, jump in
oh well, whatcha waiting for
it's alright'
cause there's beauty in the breakdown

so let go, just get in
oh, it's so amazing here
it's alright'
cause there's beauty in the breakdown

3. I never told you this, but..

When you are anxious, you clean.. When I’m anxious, I need cook the hell out of something.

Baking, chopping, grilling, roasting.. the more elaborate and complicated the better. Even going out in the dark or cold to get an obscure ingredient for a first time recipe. I'd go great distances in this mood. Once I have lost a couple of hours in the kitchen with my hands in a mixing bowl and mixture on my face, I feel accomplished and my angry, nervous energy has been spent. The physical exhaustion outweighs the mental, and I can then rest.

Now all we need now is someone who wants to fix things when they feel low, and we have a dreamteam household.

2. I never told you this, but..

I ended up in love with Japan because of Mariko Mori.





She is a Japanese video and installation artist born in the 1960s. I went to the Serpentine Gallery in Hyde Park with my Granny and my brothers to her exhibition in 1998 during our school holidays aged 15 and it made this massive impression on me. her work was very sci-fi and kitsch at the same time. It was mysterious and wacky and I thought that anyone who was capable of imagining things like that must be genius. Because of that one exhibition, I applied to study a language at University of a country I hadn't been to. Makes you wonder what different paths one might end up taking just on account of such small influences; what if the gallery had been closed that day, and we went to something about space instead? Would I have become interested in physics and the moon? There is no way to plan or predict what we are going to come into contact with, what will stick and what we'll forget.

1. I never told you this, but..

I have always wanted to start a project with you.

Only recently did we first discuss the possibility of it happening, but already it has blossomed into a realisation. I know what we said about it being by post, and while that is very romantic and old fashioned, and letters are treasures, I think that we are far more likely to contribute and create in this format. We are co-authors, and although to take it in turns, to reply back and forth like a dialogue would make a sensible framework, it is perhaps more realistic to say that we write here, in the private space, when and if we can. When forced, we can never write the most heartfelt, sincere, creative things.

I am very interested by the idea of secret honesty. The idea of something being unknown to all others but one; this can still be honest, yet it remains hidden from public view. That being so, can dishonesty not be public? Can personal secrecy be dishonest if you're honest to yourself? Can privacy only be secret? These questions stimulate the dusty out of practise parts of my brain, and that is a nice feeling.

I feel like our relationship has become intrinsically linked to the idea of honesty and truth, in a way we can never return from. This is a powerful but of course beautiful thought; that you and I are from now on bound to being open and true. While this blog has a sentimental and in some ways serious backdrop, I think that within 'Things I Never Told You' there is definitely room for the sweet, and the silly, and the nostalgic. I have a huge store up of things you don't yet know. Opinions I have now or have had. Events that shaped my life, or daydreams of events I hope will one day. Encounters, Dreams, Dislikes, Ideas Likes, Loves.

It can be just a photo. It could be a song, or a written ramble. It could be a scanned in image, a drawing, as many or as few words are you like. The first line of the entry should be the 'thing' that you haven't told me, and the number of the event should be numbered, just like this is number 1.

I hope this writing place makes you feel as happy as it does me.

Alice