Revving at Full Throttle

Ready for 2025?

Dec 30, 2024

Hello!

It’s been a glorious year. The white grows like mould in my beard and in these last few days of the year, I feel like I’ve shrugged off an old skin to emerge anew.

It doesn’t feel glorious when you’re swimming through the muck of the present, though. Time feels like a quicksand, easy to get stuck in. Unwilling to move—unable to, often—yet time, inexorably moves forward and you’re sinking, sinking, sinking. When you look back, it doesn’t seem so bad. The brain has its wiring crossed to show you the highlights and nostalgia, that device of revisiting time with a filter to make things look better than they were, always helps. You wade through knee high muck, and maybe in retrospect it was only ankle high. Or maybe, hopefully, you’ve grown larger than what the year could throw at you and time is just a slick ground you have to be careful where to keep your feet but isn’t tough anymore.

For me, this year has been all of that and more. It’s been one the biggest years of my life.

Here is a final list to end things.

Life

Wins

I GOT MARRIED. Yup, some days, I turn to see my wife’s face and I don’t believe it. How could this human being exist? How did she ever reach a mental place, a decision to spend her life beside mine? I never understand other than in the moments our eyes meet.

Our wedding is a huge story in itself (some say I willed it into happening this way just so I could write about it. They are not half wrong). You can read about it here and view the fabulous pictures Ben took of the wedding as well. See a little bit of magic here.

Losses

I lost much muscle this year as I haven’t been working out as much as I like. Come 2025, I’m going to change this. Gotta get myself back in shape. This is not a resolution. Just something I need to do to feel like myself again.
I lost my nerve, my confidence while applying for jobs through the middle of the year. It’s tough out there and it’s so easy to fall prey to your inner narratives. But I’ve ever since recovered my confidence, many thanks to my wife for sticking with me through it. As an episode title of my favourite story (FullMetal Alchemist: Brotherhood) reads I’m ‘Revving at Full Throttle.’

Writing

My essay Engineering Myself was published in Human Parts at the beginning of 2024. It is the first essay I wrote during my MA in Creative Writing, acting like a dam between me and my inner self, one I didn’t know existed. Now it’s out and the flow is that much thicker. I’m forever grateful to the MA for creating a safe space for me to be able to write this.
I started performing at The Moth Story Slams. I’ve done 3 this year and I’m hoping to do many many many more next year. It really helped rebuild my confidence—nothing quite like going on stage and baring your soul to complete strangers.
I debuted a new story titled Bigger on the Inside with The Story Collider here in London. This one is special and lovely and I can’t wait to tell it again!

Being back on stage is a privilege and a blessing

My essay On Time is published in Tamarind Literary Magazine Issue 7. I’m extremely proud of this one—it took a lot out of me to write and I’m so glad that I did. It’s the craziest piece I’ve done and the closest I’ve come to writing about the things I really want to keep writing about. Get the issue here.

So humbled to share pagespace with such amazing writers.

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Recommendations

The Will of the Many by James Islington — best book I read all year (Can’t wait for its sequel).
The Stranger Things: The First Shadow is hands down the best production and story I’ve seen played out live before me. Fabulous.
Moon Music by Coldplay — the entire album is great but the title track is 🤌🏼
So Long, Marianne — a limited series. If you are a Leonard Cohen fan, this is a show you must not miss.

What is some art that inspired you this year?

Missives From An Island