What Do You Want?

Trying to figure it out...

Lately I’ve been peering into my fridge, perplexed at what to eat. I go to the store to pick up supplies, and I aimlessly wander up and down the aisles, hoping the glimpse of something will light a spark and help me make a decision. I can’t seem to settle on something that I want, so instead I opt for something easy. Dips. Deli items. Bread. Salad. Anything I can assemble without turning on the cooker. This is both practical (on account of the heat) but also indicative of my lacklustre state. I am clearly not myself. I blame the heat. It seems like a lame excuse, but it seems like the only logical reason that I’ve felt so strange. Like I’m in a dream, watching myself from above instead of living in my own body. I’ve spent the past few days locked in my flat, feeling exhausted, trying to sleep but not doing a good job of it.

On more than one occasion, I’ve found myself scrolling through @rudyjude’s Instagram feed. Here I daydream about living her life. Her scorched wood cabin and the outdoor bath, where a projector plays old films. The retro trailer she renovated in homespun fabrics. I imagine the plot of land I’d grow vegetables on. The Sunday ritual of grabbing whatever’s in the garden and deciding what to cook. A walk through the woods and a solo swim. Grabbing coffee in town, bumping into friends and inviting them back for dinner. I daydream about sitting out on the deck as the sun is setting, the pink sky, the full moon hanging between the trees, a glass of something strong. 

Julie O’Rourke’s woodland paradise

Food doesn’t taste as good after this daydream. The kitchen feels smaller. The noises are louder. The air more stifling. The city less enticing. I forget why I fell in love with the place, and I spend hours wondering where I belong. I eat out, endlessly tapping my card for unmemorable meals. A few memorable ones, too. Am I tired of the city? Is it the heat? For some reason I want to cry and it’s not because I feel lonely or because I don’t know what I’m doing, but because I hate when the food doesn’t taste as good, when I don’t care about what I’m eating, when I don’t want to cook in my kitchen, when the answer isn’t a plate of pasta or a bowl of rice. Ok. Maybe I am a little lonely. Missing sharing a life with someone. Missing that someone. Missing past lives. Wanting more, but not quite knowing what more is.

The irony is that there was a time I lived a life not too dissimilar to the one I spend time scrolling through on my phone. Although, back then, I was too sad to appreciate it; too caught up in how others perceived me, my lack of purpose, my lack of ambition. I was at my peak of Cool Girl fever – where I was faced with them in real life – the girls who I longed to be. It’s been six years, and sometimes I still feel this. Beholden to the cool girl complex – one which elevates normal people into flawless idols, intimidating us mere mortals even though we’re the ones projecting godliness onto them.

I suppose it comes down to the question: what do you want? I’ve suddenly found myself without an answer, when not too long ago I was so sure.