This isn’t an apology or a love letter; it’s a FUCK YOU and a THANKYOU.

This isn’t an apology or a love letter.

This time of year I start getting a bit more thankful, thinking deeper and fucking around. 2015 is 

coming to a close and we’re all thinking about the clean, shiny slate of 2016 and all it could behold. Will we achieve success? What will happen in our love life? Is it just going to be another crappy year, eyes rolling at the Instagram captions of ‘NEW YEAR, NEW ME!’ as we tuck into our leftover Christmas sandwich with gusto and self inflated cynicism?

Me? I can’t wait for 2016. I have a really good feeling about it, but this isn’t what this post is about. This post is about looking back on the past 11 months and 27 days, back on everything that’s happened ad everything that hasn’t. Every bad moment and good, every drunken laugh, scream, yell, cry of happiness, moment of glory, the realisations and tribulations, the ‘fuck it’ moments and ‘fuck you’ moments. Each day that’s past me as I’ve stumbled, strided and ran to the end of these crazy, mixed bag and heavenly 365 days. T minus 4 days until Day 365.

I started this year knees on the ground, hands to the sky praying for something, anything to shake me out of the darkest part of my mind. Praying, hands clasped so tight I left bruises for a bit of clarity to a God I didn’t even believe in.

What did I do?

I ran.

I lasted only a few days of waiting for an answer from a God, any God until I gave up and packed my bags for London. 5 days in a city I had romanticised since I first picked up a copy of my cousins Vogue and thought fervently of London, with a longing one could only similarise to water in a drought, doughnuts on a diet or shoes that never seem to go on sale. London was calling me and selfishly, with no care for all I was leaving suddenly and for no reason, I ran to her.

I ran and ran until I thought I was dreaming. I set up a base camp and spent each day riding the tube, exploring the city and spending money frankly I didn’t need to spend. And then I had to leave, coming back to a quiet town with an itch under my skin. It was then I realised, for the first time in my frantically controlled life, I could do whatever I wanted.

Dropping out of uni crossed my mind so much it was as if my mind was paused on one scene of a movie. Instead, I decided if I was to take charge of my life completely, nose turned up at my parents wishes or friends tastes, I had to go and do what I’d always wanted to get. And that was to get inked. In a moment of frivolous independency and stubbornness, I inked my skin thrice. I decorated my skin with the words a stranger had told me and lo and behold, my itch was settled.

2015 has seen me ink my skin, cut my hair off on my 19^th birthday when I thought ‘enough is fucking enough’. I didn’t need long hair to be considered a girl, I didn’t need long hair to be pretty and I definitely didn’t need to keep my long hair because a few boys had told me how much I wouldn’t suit short hair.

Fuck that. It’s MY hair.

My short hair was my independence as a woman, my inked skin was the start of seizing my life away from my parents and grandparents, my rash trip to London was the moment Clarity came and landed on my shoulder, whispering encouragements and pushing me towards things I needed to learn.

2015 has been the year I no longer apologise for who I am. And a year I say both THANK YOU to the shitty people in my life, the terrible summer I sunk into depression and a FUCK YOU to anyone who tried to push me down.

2015 is the year I had enough of the bullshit.

I’ve ran, inked myself, cut my hair, passed first year uni, cut my hair again, ran away again, said goodbye to a shitty ex with relief instead of sadness, inked my skin again, said FUCK YOU to the previous summer of being sexually assaulted, experiencing clarity, being liberated from bullshit ‘friends’, came to understand how strong I am, actually ran 2, 3, 4, 5 miles after a year of refusing to run, survived a dark November and countless essays, gave into temptation and inked again, said a fuck you to social rules of women’s sexuality and finally, came to a place so exciting I’m shaking as I write this.

Because this, this year I have found myself no longer with my knees of the ground desperately praying to an entity I frankly am not 100% sure exists, but standing proudly with my hands to the sky with the words deliciously on of my lips,

“No longer will I try to find solutions for myself in other people”.

Because THAT is what this year has been all about. That is what these past 361 days have amounted to. You don’t need anyone to make you complete, you don’t need anyone to save you and finally, you don’t need ANYONE to give you the green light or a pat on the back and say “okay, you can start doing what you want to do now”.

And I’m not angry as I write this, Lord knows it might seem this way, but I’m not angry. I’m fucking ecstatic that everything is clicking into place for once. After 19 years on this earth, tussling between what I think I should do and what I want to do, I’ve found my drive. I’ve found me again and I’ve found being alone doesn’t suck. Being alone is liberating and powerful, it’s coffees with friends and choosing how to dedicate your time, it’s doing makeup for yourself each day and not giving a damn. It’s waking up and pulling on leggings or joggers and still feeling so fucking powerful and capable than it was at 16. It’s delving deep into your head, figuring what makes you tick, saying no to bad memories and saying no to drinks in clubs. It’s dancing with your friends as sexually arousing or embarrassing 90’s choreography as you want, choosing to go home with someone or not, giving yourself a pep talk and knowing I have got this.

This year has been one big ball of muddled memories, but with a closer look I’ve realised not only does no women owe any man a thing. But we all don’t owe anyone anything. Unless it’s the fiver you borrowed last week. You have to give that back (please).

And as my world of 2015 has cannonballed to this moment, so has the rest of the world. We’re taking feminism more seriously, we’re talking about diets in a way of aiding our body, not manipulating it. We’re (well some of us) are seeing yes Kendall Jenner/Gigi Hadid are pretty but that doesn’t make them supermodels; that makes them good looking girls with a large Instagram following. cha-ching publicity for free. We’re slowly realising FUUUUCK our diets DO have an environmental impact and yes, fat isn’t bad. We’ve seen 1D decide to take a break, Raf Simons say goodbye to Dior, ELLE UK launch a pretty sweet podcast, Ed Sheeran disappear off the online map, teen model Essena O’Neill call bullshit on instagram ads, the world being shaken by waves of terrorism, selfie stitcks being banned from festivals, I could go on for hours.

But Emma Watson cut her hair short again and JK Rowling has shown not every character in Hogwarts is white, Harry Styles has fucked with gender fashion norms and came out this year as probably one of the biggest LGBT icons of our time. More and more girls and guys have found satisfaction with being alone, Casey Neistat launched his own daily vlogging which has made more people seize the day (go watch his vlogs, the guy is a LEGEND).

We’re growing up and learning stuff, even if at times the world can seem like this awful, mixed up place. There’s hope. There’s clarity. There’s a generation who isn’t afraid to get educated and God, how I’m proud to be part of said generation. We’re movers and shakers, we’re raising our voices and saying FUCK YOU to every past generation mistake and rewriting the rules.

Everything might not be perfect now, for you or I, but this year? This crazy year? It’s the foundation of something big.

Lou x