Yesterday was a very special day for my uni study journey. It was the first time I had been to a face-to-face tutorial. There was an opportunity to attend one last year when this current module I’m on was under way – but, if you may remember (not sure I mentioned it), it was taking place on the same day as the Direction Of The Heart album signing. It had to be one or the other. There was no way I could have headed to Edinburgh for the school day and then made it back to Glasgow for the album signing.
I was a very bad girl and let my desire to see Jim override what I SHOULD have done and gone to the school day. I knew there would be online tutorials I could take instead and I was also aware of this one that happened yesterday taking place as well.
It feels like those six months have passed in the blink of an eye!
As for yesterday’s school day, it all went very well. There wasn’t too much focus on the Creative Writing section of the module and it focused mostly on writing academic essays – which is all still very helpful knowledge. There were still some tips and pointers I took from the day. I also met my former tutor, which was really lovely.
I couldn’t even contemplate worrying about Record Store Day. Last time I let music *cough* Jim Kerr *cough* get in the way of me attending a uni school day, I was not going to let that happen again! I don’t really fancy the whole queuing up outside a record shop through the wee hours of the morning. I like my bed WAAAAY too much. I think those that line up like that are dafties. Record Store Day is a great thing in conception – but in practice…urgh! The frenzy surrounding one day a year is absurd. I mean…what happens with these shops the other 364 days of the year? Anyway…enough of the politics of the bloody thing. I had to leave home just after 9am to get to Glasgow Caledonian University anyway so there was no way I was spending hours before that queuing at a record store. Money was another factor.
Uni was a full day. I was on campus from 9.30am (school starting at 10am) until 4.20pm (around 45 mins spent talking to various tutors after the 3.30pm end of school) and then I just wanted to head straight home. I was starving. We didn’t get much break time during the day and all I’d had since breakfast was a blueberry muffin. I knew a train was due so I beelined to Queen Street dreading having to wait another hour until the next train. The whole RDS thing really wasn’t on my mind at that point.
I was home before 5pm, thirsty and starving.
Birdy appeared downstairs around 6pm. I asked her had she ended up going into the city as she’d planned. Yes, she said. Then got up off her chair and said “follow me.” “Ooh, this is all rather ominous,” I said to her. I quickly followed with, “Oh, you’re not gonna rub it in and show me your shiny new copy of Neapolis, are you?” She stayed silent. (Rare for Birdy!) She popped into her room as I stood on the landing. Back out again she held out a bag towards me, “Here. That’s yours.” Bloody hell! She’d only got me a copy of it!
It is a rather lovely thing, I have to say. Just look at it! I won’t lie. When I got home and was looking through Facebook, it was festooned with images of people showing off their lovely copies of Neapolis and I was feeling a little sorry for myself. After Birdy’s surprise, I was a happy little vegemite.
Today, my story for my final assignment of this academic year is progressing well. We have about 3.5 weeks left. My story arc is strong. I’m developing a strong plot. I feel really hopeful about it. Having faced a crisis with it at the beginning of last week in which I thought I should ditch it and started writing another story (one based on Special View – see the Minds Music Monday post) – the original story is back on track and I am feeling really positive about it once more.
Back to yesterday. As I left the house to make my way up to Ashfield station for the train, the thing that was foremost on my mind was not RSD but another reason the day was significant – to me. It would have been my brother David’s 62nd birthday. There is never a day that I don’t miss him. I like to think he’d have been proud of me making my way (as I was) to a university tutorial. “Better late than never, Punk.” Maybe that’s what he would have said? Who knows? I’d like to think so.
