My experience of choosing a university wasn’t exactly easy. Having gone into my first year of sixth form with an odd goal of studying medical science – only odd, since this doesn’t suit my character at all – I was studying vastly different courses with no sense of direction at all.

In my desperation to find a university, I visited the bio-labs of at least five universities. I even considered an eight-hour trek to Bath Spa to study a course that had a title I didn’t really understand.

It was very close to my Personal Statement deadline that I realised I wanted to study English Literature and Creative Writing. I had been writing my whole life, and studying the creative writing A Level taught me to really love learning, too.

I scoured for a long time over the universities I had already visited for a creative writing course, although none had struck me as a perfect match. The moment I set foot in York St John’s grounds, I knew that this was where my future would play out.

The campus alone is beautiful. The tutors were kind and welcoming on my open day. The students who shared their experiences in accommodation were all genuinely impassioned about the uni. The uni isn’t huge, and that’s a perfect match for me – everything is close together, in a friendly and vibrant community.

The most important thing about finding your course and university is that it suits you well. When you find the right place for you, you will feel it.

Appearance hermit

Let’s get right into it shall we? I bought the wrong strips and waxed a pretty big percentage of my own SKIN off my face yesterday. It looks pretty comical; it feels pretty grim. ‘Why are you broadcasting your skill for facial abrasion when you could be hiding your peely mug under a Primark bag?’ you might ask. Because I don’t want to live my life like a child labour produced t-shirt, my sweet friend.

This blog post does have more to it than my pain, which although amusing isn’t really worth dwelling on much. More significantly, I will dwell on my problematic reaction to this new facial injury.

The reaction, if you’re wondering, was: I cannot leave this flat. I will never, ever leave this flat.

Whilst I do have enough food in my fridge to last me until this mess heals, and no dire need to go outside, why was my first response to put myself under house arrest for a red top lip? If anything, I’ve proved Veet can do a pretty solid job, it managed to rid me of my moustachal twigs and that pesky skin that seems to, well y’know, make up my entire fucking face.

In my (not-so) blissful days of youth a spot was enough to deter me from getting on the school bus. Then when cystic acne hit it was enough to deter me from leaving the house at all. This experience applies to a lot of adolescents – something weird on your face means you stay in one place. There’s a pretty big pressure on teenagers to sort their skin right out. Freederm’s adverts haven’t been too subtle in suggesting that your social life will blossom once you get rid of those blackheads, or at least, once you’ve got rid of the feeling of inadequacy that comes along with them. This Neutrogena ad is a bit less obvious, shows a girl hiding her face with her clothes, because why have a spotty face when you can cosplay red riding hood every day.

If you’re dismissing this as a feminazi piece on how Boots is conspiring against women, then you’re probably not much fun at parties. The reclusive reaction to skin troubles is not gender specific. Whilst female targeted Glamour Magazine supplies articles on how to deal with ‘adult acne’, Men’s Health Magazine runs the unpleasant headline ‘5 Reasons You Still Get Zits as a Grown-Ass Man’ – as if hyperbole and hyper-masculine ‘grown ass m[e]n’ are impenetrable to spots.

Whilst skincare products are designed to make you feel more confident, these advertisements work by creating self-consciousness. If Clearasil launched a campaign saying you looked completely fine despite your blemishes, there would be no demand for their products. The ‘you’re not good enough unless your skin is clearer than an A4 sheet of paper’ method of advertising accommodates room in the market for hilariously unnecessary products. One even serves to electronically brush your skin – thanks Clarisonic? This sketch about toothbrush marketing from the Mitchell and Webb look  sums up advertising anxiety more eloquently than I can.

Selfie culture contributes to feelings of inadequacy as a double edged sword. Whilst promoting body confidence Instagram also offers some deceptive filters. Although I think the ability to make yourself look fab using Valencia is a really positive self-esteem booster, I’ve recently caught myself judging the severity of a skin imperfection by whether its visible on my front camera – whether I still feel comfortable taking photos of myself. The insanely powerful Youtube video ‘YOU LOOK DISGUSTING’ shows user Em Ford (MyPaleSkin) comparing hate comments she received once she started posting photos of her face without makeup versus the kind comments she receives whilst in full makeup –  despite this kindness, she is accused of ‘false advertising’ and ‘misleading’. Whether natural or living up to beauty standards, according to public opinion she is in the wrong.

So what do you do if you’ve fucked up waxing, or got eyelash extensions from a dodgy salon that have messed up your eyelids, or given yourself a chemical burn with a cleansing treatment? (all, coincidentally, things I’ve put my poor face through).

Well, social media and skincare advertisements suggest that you must sacrifice your soul to the appearance overlord – you are now worth nothing. Your face is stupid and blotchy, you will have spoiled cabbages tossed at you as you walk the streets to reach your dermatologist, who will laugh in your pepperoni pizza visage and tell you that you may as well wax off the rest of your skin – at least you could land a pretty good gig as a membraneless glob in the new season of x-files.

Or, you could quit doing weird shit to your face. Let the world know that you made a twat move, but you’ve still got to work, you’ve still got to live. I’ll be damned if I can’t buy a coffee because my reflection in its dark, milkless depths is a bit flakier than normal.

This form of thought wasn’t chosen by me,

My internal narrator enjoys poetry

More than I. I tire of these rhymes,

But the words don’t seem to stagger out of my mind

unless in pairs. Noah’s elephants holding trunks.

Self-aware. I speak in stories within stories.

Shedding light on past glories

masked by alliterative allegories.

My wisdom is garnered from memories,

perhaps that’s why

“I’m breaking up

With you”

Fast forward: Train platform, sounds blurred.

Toes folded over the ledge

like this dog-eared page edge.

‘Did he jump?’ You wonder.

Crowds gasp, on we plunder.

But back, back some time,

We’ll steer these train lines

Through the Misery Years

Onto Joy, via Fears.

And please

Stop

Rhyming.

We’re climbing now,

Through unstable fables.

Fiction hides the pain I’ve gained,

Mistakes I’ve made, truths mislaid.

I can sing my life in ciphers

But I can’t write the final chapters,

Or spit out the closing stanzas

Whilst fighting the urge to fall into

Cynicism, vague symbolism.

But these crumpled notes scrawl their way out of a violin’s interior,

With strings pulled taut

like a ventricular chamber choir’s.

Tell me,

how much longer can you listen

To a bow without resin

Drawing a single, solitary song

From the wooden frame of a man,

A boy, who once learnt to feel in rhymes

But never learnt how to

Stop.

What it means to get out of bed – Zoe Buckton (for #timetotalk day)

You’ve hit snooze five times, rolled over.

Had your first coffee/pill/smoke, whatever you’re into.

Your feet are touching the ground,

But they’d rather rest on mattress springs.

The world isn’t as warm as the sheets,

neither are the people.

Your eyelids sting. They’d rather be shut

than to see todays to do list, today’s lunch.

Maybe it’s not worth going.

Maybe I should just stay.

Maybe you’re right, It is much easier to waste away

when your mind says outside isn’t safe.

No pain ever came to you in bed, right?

Yet it’s there you stay when the sickness bugs bite,

With a bowl, some blankets, no sign of light.

It’s where you’ve spent heartbreak and grief.

It’s where you’ve spent most of your days asleep.

No pain ever came to you in bed,

but it didn’t leave, either.

You have to wake,

for work, for uni, for friends, for life.

You’re stood, your breathing.

You’re alive.