I'm an Australian living in London.

I've worked in advertising, book publishing, marketing and PR.

I post about working in publishing, working in advertising, marketing, editing, copywriting, book publishing news, cities, reading, education, art and pop culture.

Any views expressed on this blog are my own, usually on whim, and do not reflect the views of my employer, clients or customers.

email me. I love hearing from you. fluffynotes@gmail.com

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Vanity Fair

National Geographic

New Yorker

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• Photo Post

clembastow: Lately, I’m trying to like myself, the real me, and I feel like this photo’s pretty representative. Let’s backtrack for a moment, though. Ordinarily when people spout empty platitudes like “LOVE YOURSELF!” or “YOU ARE GREAT THE WAY YOU ARE!” I want to punch myself in the face; too often phrases like that are slapped down to silence people’s thoughts about their own bodies; it’s always been my stance that it’s okay to feel disappointed with what your body (or face, or mind) can and can’t do at any time, even if those feelings could be - and usually are - seen as “irrational”. It doesn’t mean you hate yourself, it doesn’t indicate bottomless wells of self-loathing, just a healthy and ongoing dialogue with your body. The past few months, though, I’ve been trying to work with some of those self-help phrases, specifically with reference to who I am (not what I look like). I’ve always had pretty a pretty strong sense of confidence in my physical self, despite regular dysmorphic thoughts and whatever injurious fretting depression and anxiety can bring on. I know I can make this body do what I want it to, more or less. But if there’s one thing I’ve never liked about myself - or, rather, been disappointed in - it’s that I’m never that sexy, mysterious girl. Never have been, never will. You know: the one with the chic photos, the knack for liking precisely the right songs and films to make smoking dinner party conversations about, the impressive book collection, the glamorous insouciance that draws men to her like moths to a flame. She dances casually yet seductively; her laugh is husky and sexy or clear and bell-like. I look like a dork in photos, I like the “right” stuff but I also like Slayer and Nikki Webster and Stephen Sondheim, my book and DVD shelves are populist nightmares (I couldn’t tell you the difference between Salinger and Hemmingway), I’m nervy and anxious and frequently aim for “cool” and instead get “rude”. I dance like Elaine Benes; my laugh is honking and abrasive. I am the sort of person who might have once, in that particularly Australian parlance, been described as “a spastic”. (Which I have been, many times.) The thing is, because of my body confidence, I can dress me up to look like one of those girls. I can swan into a restaurant in a cloud of perfume with the right foundation garments on; I can walk, run and skip in high heels - then I open my mouth, and out comes the “Gozer The Traveller” speech from Ghostbusters. All this goes a long way toward explaining, I think, why I was so fascinated by - and actively involved in - bikini comps/”sports modelling” for a while in my early 20s. When you strut out on a catwalk to Warrant’s Cherry Pie wearing a tiny banana yellow bikini and high heels, the crowd goes berserk. It doesn’t matter if you’re a dork off the catwalk - in fact, with scant exceptions, most of the girls I met and became friends with on the bikini circuit were dorks. Those days are long gone, though, and I can’t rely on a rabid venue full of bogans to cheerlead me through life anymore. I don’t know what it is that’s made me cast myself as second best to those sexy and mysterious girls; after all, they probably get home and put on Nikki Webster, too. (Well, something like it, anyway.) But I feel it, intensely. Sometimes the perceived contrast is enough for me to make my excuses and go home to cry. And I’m trying, really trying, to love myself: frizzy hair, honking laugh, stupid facial expressions, depression and anxiety, endless reams of pop culture references and all. And accepting this photo of me - hair frizzy, confuzzled, moments after taking off the head of my Nazgul costume at Supanova - is going to be the first step. This didn’t come out quite the way I’d hoped. Thank you for listening anyway.

clembastow:

Lately, I’m trying to like myself, the real me, and I feel like this photo’s pretty representative.

Let’s backtrack for a moment, though.

Ordinarily when people spout empty platitudes like “LOVE YOURSELF!” or “YOU ARE GREAT THE WAY YOU ARE!” I want to punch myself in the face; too often phrases like that are slapped down to silence people’s thoughts about their own bodies; it’s always been my stance that it’s okay to feel disappointed with what your body (or face, or mind) can and can’t do at any time, even if those feelings could be - and usually are - seen as “irrational”. It doesn’t mean you hate yourself, it doesn’t indicate bottomless wells of self-loathing, just a healthy and ongoing dialogue with your body.

The past few months, though, I’ve been trying to work with some of those self-help phrases, specifically with reference to who I am (not what I look like).

I’ve always had pretty a pretty strong sense of confidence in my physical self, despite regular dysmorphic thoughts and whatever injurious fretting depression and anxiety can bring on. I know I can make this body do what I want it to, more or less.

But if there’s one thing I’ve never liked about myself - or, rather, been disappointed in - it’s that I’m never that sexy, mysterious girl. Never have been, never will.

You know: the one with the chic photos, the knack for liking precisely the right songs and films to make smoking dinner party conversations about, the impressive book collection, the glamorous insouciance that draws men to her like moths to a flame. She dances casually yet seductively; her laugh is husky and sexy or clear and bell-like.

I look like a dork in photos, I like the “right” stuff but I also like Slayer and Nikki Webster and Stephen Sondheim, my book and DVD shelves are populist nightmares (I couldn’t tell you the difference between Salinger and Hemmingway), I’m nervy and anxious and frequently aim for “cool” and instead get “rude”. I dance like Elaine Benes; my laugh is honking and abrasive.

I am the sort of person who might have once, in that particularly Australian parlance, been described as “a spastic”. (Which I have been, many times.)

The thing is, because of my body confidence, I can dress me up to look like one of those girls. I can swan into a restaurant in a cloud of perfume with the right foundation garments on; I can walk, run and skip in high heels - then I open my mouth, and out comes the “Gozer The Traveller” speech from Ghostbusters.

All this goes a long way toward explaining, I think, why I was so fascinated by - and actively involved in - bikini comps/”sports modelling” for a while in my early 20s. When you strut out on a catwalk to Warrant’s Cherry Pie wearing a tiny banana yellow bikini and high heels, the crowd goes berserk. It doesn’t matter if you’re a dork off the catwalk - in fact, with scant exceptions, most of the girls I met and became friends with on the bikini circuit were dorks.

Those days are long gone, though, and I can’t rely on a rabid venue full of bogans to cheerlead me through life anymore.

I don’t know what it is that’s made me cast myself as second best to those sexy and mysterious girls; after all, they probably get home and put on Nikki Webster, too. (Well, something like it, anyway.) But I feel it, intensely. Sometimes the perceived contrast is enough for me to make my excuses and go home to cry.

And I’m trying, really trying, to love myself: frizzy hair, honking laugh, stupid facial expressions, depression and anxiety, endless reams of pop culture references and all.

And accepting this photo of me - hair frizzy, confuzzled, moments after taking off the head of my Nazgul costume at Supanova - is going to be the first step.

This didn’t come out quite the way I’d hoped. Thank you for listening anyway.

(Source: clambistro)

Notes

  1. smashedbear reblogged this from clambistro
  2. gypsyfeet reblogged this from clambistro and added:
    yet, grab some chair and read this. Twice.
  3. erinmargrethe said: I get it. If there was a movie version of me, she would be the fat, funny, sarcastic friend. I know that I’m conventionally attractive, but I’m proud of the fact that friends never talk about my looks. It’s that I’m funny, or shocking, or mental.
  4. fluffynotes reblogged this from clambistro
  5. lanipauli reblogged this from clambistro and added:
    your eyes let alone write...feeling. For this reason...Clem...
  6. hollysocks said: Much empathy. I am too much of a scatter brained, neurotic blonde to be able to be that suave, witty and charismatic woman that I sometimes wish I could; heck, I can’t even wink without looking like something flew into my face. Alone, you are not.
  7. isayshewashighonexcitement reblogged this from clambistro
  8. numb-as-hell reblogged this from clambistro
  9. indefensible said: It probably doesn’t mean much, but this is a really nice piece. I hope you realise that this is how *everyone* feels. Or at least everyone worth knowing.
  10. strugglingwiththis said: Ironically, I look at you and think you ARE the cool girl. And not just because I appreciate Ghostbusters references immensely.
  11. earsinyrheadphones said: I really hope that you’ll find a way to love/accept yourself, the way those who care about you do.
  12. idiot-legs reblogged this from clambistro
  13. shorterexcerpts said: Tell me the Gozer speech is done in the Gozer voice too.
  14. clambistro posted this