Saved by Zines

 

image by moirabot 

Just lately it's felt like my life has been crumbling away from around me.

January is never a great month, it's cold, it's grey and the thought of a whole new year ahead of me tends to terrify me rather than inspire me (at least in January anyway, all January makes me want to do is sleep). I usually just try and see it through until the 27th which my birthday and then it's February. For me it feels that when I've had my birthday the year begins, I always make a new years resolution list on 1st February.


But this year, by the second week of January I had been evicted and I no longer had a room to hibernate in. I was given a weeks notice by my landlord to move out, so by the time I had realised what was happening I was unpacking my bag of things in Dan's room.

I don't really know why, but where I live, and having somewhere I like living and feel comfortable has been a really important thing for me my whole life. I've always felt if I have a place I can feel safe and have my things around me I can use it as a base to do anything I want to do. And when it all gets too much I can hide myself away in there.

I really enjoy living with Dan and being able to see him everyday, and I am really grateful to Les and Crissi (who own the house) to let me stay there. But that's the thing, I'm staying there rather than living there. And I guess it makes me sound a bit precious, but not having somewhere that I can call my own really started to get to me. Mixed in with what feels like the utter hopelessness of trying to find a new place, I felt like the year was never going to really get started for me.

On the 13th of February it was the alternative press fair and I went along and picked up a few zines from Tukru. When I got home I devoured them all in minutes, just reading words that echoed my own feelings and thoughts written by girls just like me made me feel so much better. It made me so much happier to know that other people were feeling the way I was, and were managing to do something productive and creative with it.

I've been working on the second issue of Pillow Talk for about three years. Yeah, three years. I've finished it about 10 times, but everytime just ripped it up. But suddenly after reading all these amazing zines I was finally inspired enough to finish and feel I had said something worthwhile. And my sudden need for anything zine related has spurred on a few other things, like me and Lydia are making a women and tattoo contribution zine and I travelled down to Brighton to go to the Zine fest there.

So this year will be the year of the zine!

image by sarah mcneil