hollyscout

My queerness is a fundamental part of who I am and how I see myself, and this Pride Month is the first in many years that I’ve been questioning my identity. That is not to say that I’ve been questioning my sexuality, but rather how my sexuality is no longer one of the most obvious or loudest parts of my personality to other people. I’m not alone in this situation, as it has been found that 84% of bisexual people can find themselves in straight-passing relationships.

When I was in sixth form, my friend group was made up of an array of people with different sexualities and genders. Being queer, in any way, was the norm, and we all celebrated our identities with, well, pride. We were almost stereotypical: pixie cuts, undercuts, colourful hair, denim jackets, and rainbow patches. If a straight person was asked to draw the gayest group of seventeen-year-olds they could think of, we were it. We had rainbow flags in our room, and our Facebooks were plastered with pictures from Pride. My first experience of young adulthood was completely interwoven with not being straight.

During my first year, in Drawing Board no less, I ended up chatting to a guy who has since become my long-term boyfriend. Dating a man hasn’t changed my sexuality or my identity, but at some point, it changed the perception that strangers and new people have of me. I don’t still wear my teenage denim jacket of pins and badges, and I’ve grown out my bleached pixie cut into long natural hair. I didn’t stop to think until recently that my appearance didn’t outwardly scream queer anymore, and if I didn’t tell people my identity in some way, they would nearly always assume I was straight, because, well, I didn’t “present as queer”. It was only when talking about a trip with an ex-girlfriend that a bisexual uni friend of mine was shocked as he’d “always presumed I was straight”. Please cue the identity crisis now.

Despite being the same person, my experience as a queer person has changed since being in a straight-passing relationship. Despite my sexuality, participating in queer events somehow feels wrong due to my straight-passing privilege. Unlike before, where Pride events were where I felt most open and comfortable in my identity, I worry now that as I face fewer challenges when in public with my boyfriend than with an ex-girlfriend that I am somehow less deserving to attend Pride, or that I may be less welcome. I know logically that this is ridiculous, but in cases of large-scale Pride events that are ticketed and logistically limited to the number of attendees, I fear that my attendance would take the opportunity away from someone who needs that community and support more than I would. If a friend of mine were to come to me with these worries, I would be the first to push how every LGBTQ+ person is welcome at Pride, and dating a cis person of the opposite gender does not disqualify anyone from Pride. Yet I still worry. I think it is primarily due to the fact that my experience of Pride was always celebrating overcoming adversity, showing our love for our partners, our friends, and our community. Whereas now, I am aware of my straight-passing privilege and I am safe to celebrate my relationship and my friends all the time, as we have not faced adversity to be who we are.

During my current relationship, homophobia has become more visible to me. Somehow, as I haven’t been a target for homophobia for a while, I notice how common and horrific incidents of homophobia were in my last relationship as well as how we dismissed it as ordinary and unavoidable. I am able now to walk in town with my boyfriend without being stared at or having homophobic slurs screamed at us, or literally being spat on (which actually happened more than once), which made me notice the privilege that I have gained by dating a man. Especially since nothing has changed about me except the person I was holding hands with, but my day to day experience has changed vastly when looking at safety and respect from strangers.

Unfortunately, homophobia has become more visible in another way for me too. I have found myself in conversations with people who didn’t know my sexuality and freely used slurs and homophobic language to talk about people or LGBTQ+ issues, because they thought it was “safe and okay” to do so if everyone there was straight. This was an entirely new concept that I had not experienced in an almost entirely non-straight friend group before university, and I was genuinely baffled by the apparent normalcy of homophobia if it was believed that there was no one around who would be offended. I’ve been put in a position to speak out and point out homophobia in conversations and express that even if you’re not talking to someone who you know isn’t straight, it isn’t okay and shouldn’t be normalised.

Because of this, I, like many other queer people, have to “come out” over and over again, in conversation, when telling stories that involve exes, when talking about my personal views or experiences, and many other times. There is a persistent assumption that people are straight until they choose to reveal otherwise, and this is not even questioned if you are a cis female dating a cis man, even though there are multiple sexualities that cover being attracted to more than one gender. When coming out to new people, again and again, I’ve found that sometimes my identity can be trivialised or disregarded. When talking about my ex-girlfriend I’ve had our relationship dismissed as experimentation or as an attempt to come across as “quirky” (yes, actually a quote), rather than as a significant past relationship with a person who is important to me. In addition, people have told me that calling myself queer or insinuating that I’m not straight whilst dating a man is rude or offensive to my partner. I can understand why it has been found that bisexual people face unique pressures in the LGBTQ+ community including increased risk of anxiety, depression, substance abuse, and even self-harm and suicide.

Being queer in a straight-passing relationship has offered me privilege and safety from directed homophobia, but unfortunately, this “privilege” has become invisibility, or a method that erases my identity from people’s immediate perception of me which makes me feel like I have to consistently make an effort to just be myself.

Featured Image | Peter Salanki

Author: Holly Palmer

Written for York Vision, a student newspaper at the University of York in July 2020.

Quarantine came as a surprise for the most part, and many of us are away from friends, family or significant others.

Here are a few tips for maintaining a healthy relationship if you’re quarantined together, or if you’re quarantined apart.

If you’re together:

Take some time apart: Spend some time in different rooms, if you have multiple bedrooms or split between one bedroom and the social space. Have some time to get on with deadlines, pick up a hobby if you want, play video games or just relax. You’re your own person, it is important to take time for yourself on your own, even if you’re in a small space with someone 24/7. Taking some time alone ensures you can actually get on with uni work and that you don’t end up driving each other up the walls by being in each other’s pockets.

Set aside time to do something together: If you spend the afternoon alone in your room doing essay work, you can then have dinner together and watch some Netflix. Or going for a run together, or watching a film. Having time together and apart means that despite being in the same house you can still talk about the various things you’ve both been up to without knowing it all already. Having time to spend together just the two of you will help you develop a healthy relationship, whether you live with housemates or just the two of you.

Speak to your friends: Make time to spend time with your individual friend groups as well as mutual friends. Be mindful that your partner will be spending time online with their friends, maybe playing a game online. You can use time to socialise with friends you might not share with your partner as well as together socialising online with mutual friends, this will also help with the healthy balance between time alone and time together. You could call your friends one night or maybe organise a large hangout with you, your mutual friends and your partner, virtual pub quiz anyone?

If you’re apart:

Make time for each other: Facetime, Hangouts, Skype, Discord, whatever – but do it. You can balance your time between your quarantine household whether it be friends or family, as well as time alone and time with your other half. Talk to your household and your partner about this so everyone can support a good balance of time. The stress of being apart might be lessened if you can look forward to a Facetime call that evening. Even little texts throughout the day might help as well.

Do some activities: People in long distance relationships figured this all out long before quarantine, but you can watch films together on Kast (formerly rabb.it), play video games together and chat using Discord or play board games together on Tabletop Simulator. Chatting for a few hours is lovely but having some activities to do every now and then might make the quarantine distance a bit more enjoyable.

Sex (if you want to): Okay, this article wouldn’t have been complete without it. Being away from a partner can be difficult in a certain type of way if you’re in a sexual relationship. Phone sex is a classic but maybe a bit awkward or old school. Masturbation is a tried and tested method of satisfaction when there is no one else around. But if you want to branch out there are other methods of long-distance sex that maybe you hadn’t thought of, using your standard sex toys for a different/better feel or, if you’re willing to splash out, there’s a range of ‘long-distance sex toys’ where a user can control the toy from very far away on Lovehoney. However, when they’re not on sale they’re almost an investment – but I’d imagine it’s very worth it. Plus, Lovehoney has a 20% student discount and regular sales!

Hope you’re all staying safe in quarantine, look after yourselves and each other!

Author: Holly Palmer

Written for York Vision, a student newspaper at the University of York in May 2020.

Valentine’s always makes me think of red roses, boxes of chocolate and cheesy romance films. Although the origins of Valentine’s Day are found in a Roman festival, cheering on the winning of women by lottery to celebrate fertility (I know, right?), our modern day has marketised it into a day for expensive set menus, chocolate covered strawberries and a free Pornhub subscription on the 14th february only.

For students, however, spare cash isn’t easy to find – those of us wanting to celebrate Love Day have limited options. I’m going to straight up exclude a meal out, because set menus are the bane of my existence and we all know that paying over £5 for a glass of prosecco just because of the date is an absolute rip-off. As alternatives, there’s the classic dine-in-for-two meal from a supermarket, even with a bottle of wine, or for the classier folks there’s restaurant food delivery. Or you could go old school and cook for each other, as long as your flatmates don’t hog the kitchen. I won’t even bother suggesting on campus venues, because the music in Courtyard doesn’t exactly set a romantic scene, does it? Personally, there’s nothing that screams ‘Valentines day’ more than pizza delivery you can only afford with a 241 offer, but I guess I’m just cheap.

Menu’s sorted, but what are we going to do about the gift? I think personal gifts are the way to go, and small ones at that. A book, a cuddly toy, and chocolate are all classic options, but so are little treats like a trip to the cinemas, paying for a treatment (manicure anyone?) or choosing to go for a meal in a week or so, when the surcharge isn’t so high. Doing something together is much more productive and enjoyable than a random gift you panic bought in the queue at the card shop.

On the subject of spending time together, we’re getting to the real importance of Valentine’s Day. All in all, it doesn’t matter if you’re a broke student who can only offer nisa discounted chocolates and a 99p card, as long as you can use the 14th February as an excuse to spend time with your loved ones! That includes your pals too. University life can often put pressure on finding a significant other, making Valentine’s look like a bullshit arbitrary holiday (which, okay, it kind of is), but since it lands in the middle of a stressful term, it’s the perfect excuse to take a little break and spread the love. Whether that’s a takeaway and cheesy films night with your mates, a romantic dinner for two, or a messy night-out, have a great Valentine’s Day.

Author: Holly Palmer

Written for York Vision, a student newspaper at the University of York in February 2020.

“I thought it was a sex-fuelled, alcohol-fuelled year of doing God knows what.”

Freshers’ certainly has a reputation as a week for excessive drinking, night after night of partying, and lots of casual sex. In my experience of Freshers’ Week, I found that participating in the club nights was the best way to make friends with flatmates; but these nights include much more than just a couple pints and the necessary Freshers’ wristband. We’ve all heard about the epidemic of student binge drinking, but less attention is drawn to how casual sex in many cases is the basis of fresher social groups.

To find out how students who don’t necessarily want to participate in the infamous hook-up culture at university feel about this, I had a chat with two asexual students about their experiences. Matthew* (male, Alcuin) and Amy* (female, Constantine) both lived on campus during their first year.  

Freshers’ is a time where students are trying to make friends with their flatmates, and “pulling” is a way to establish oneself in a social group. Matthew explained that in his flat, pulling was “seen as an achievement” and hooking up with girls “earnt [him] respect from [his] flatmates” even though he didn’t enjoy the experiences. Amy came into university with the perception that she “would have to have sex in order to not come across as weird”. It seems that being a person who has an active sex life makes you more likely to make friends, and gives you a better social standing. These are both things that freshers are often worried about when coming to uni. Hook-up culture can have significant negative impacts when applied to the social pressure to have sex even if you don’t particularly want to.

When Matthew discussed his disinterest towards sex his friends told him to “try it again … it’s weird to dislike sex”. This toxic behaviour is surprisingly common, and runs contrary to the freedom for self-discovery that university is supposed to provide. Due to the focus and idealisation of sex, especially by young men, any disinterest or lack of enjoyment around sex can be seen as “emasculating”. We, as part of our student community, need to ensure that those around us don’t feel pressured into having sex in order to be part of functioning friend groups or merely to gain ”bravado”. The University can certainly take a better role in ensuring asexual students feel more comfortable. When I asked about what resources the University currently provides to support students who are asexual, or think they might be, Matthew pointed out that “that kind of support would probably come through the LGBTQ+ Officers”. However he also clarified that “although some ace people do, I personally don’t identify as LGBTQ+, so those networks can’t really support me in the same way”.

Amy suggested that in the consent talks ran by colleges in Freshers’ Week, she felt like she would have greatly benefitted from “even a short line, on how you don’t have to have sex at all if you don’t want to, and how not being interested in sex is valid and normal” rather than just “don’t feel pressured to have sex by one specific person if you’re not interested in that person or at that specific time”. So, colleges could ensure that they don’t assume everyone will be having sex as the basis for their advice.

Both students brought up how sex and relationships are often intrinsically linked. Amy suggested that “for some people, sex is vital to a relationship”. Many asexual people find it difficult to find a partner who can accept having a romantic but not sexual relationship. Matthew explained how in his first year, he “certainly found it as a trade off, like [he] had to have sex in order to be in a relationship”. This is even further complicated by university hook-up culture, where many relationships actually begin with a one night stand. So, it can be even more difficult to build a relationship where an asexual partner doesn’t feel pressured to add a sexual dynamic when they don’t want to.

Unfortunately, the stigma towards asexual students, or people who aren’t interested in or ready to engage in sexual relationships is commonplace in university. This is even more significant towards men, who find that “having an active sex life” is a major element of masculinity, and guides social standing. Hook-up culture currently forms the basis of social groups in university, especially when making friends with flatmates in freshers’ week. Students shouldn’t feel pressured into having sex when they don’t want to, in any circumstance.

The student community needs to recognise that this isn’t only related to sexual harassment, but is integrated into the very basics of student life: drinking games, shag charts, club nights, and friendship groups. We need recognition, and we need to change our attitudes. Wanting to engage in casual sex is valid, not wanting to is equally valid. Every student has the right to make their own decisions on this matter, and such decisions should not influence their friendships or social standing.

*Names have been changed.

Featured Image by Barcex

Author: Holly Palmer

Written for York Vision, a student newspaper at the University of York in November 2019.

thanks for popping by to my website. I use this place to compile my book reviews and bits I've written for student magazines.

I'm a twenty-year-old history and politics student who spends her spare time reading. I have recently made more of an effort to document my reviews of books, instead of relying on the notes I've left scribbled on the last few pages

feel free to contact me on [email protected]

Profile.

editor-in-chief @ the york historian

sex & relationships editor @ york vision

illustrator @ the lemon press

Selling Your Student Experience

Most university students deal with the same two issues when it comes to figuring out what you want to do when you graduate. First, what job do you want, in what sector, in what city, in what role. Second, how you’re even going to get that job. I found student societies incredibly formative in this process; this article outlines why this is the case and how to utilise societies to find out your interests and to apply for graduate jobs.

Finding what you’re interested in

The best thing about societies is that there is something for everyone! You can continue activities you did in school like football, debating or orchestra or you can try something you’ve never heard of or done before like swing dance, Model United Nations or student cinema.

Societies are the perfect place to try new things and develop interests. If you have an idea as to what sector you want to work in, you can pursue that through relevant student societies. There are groups with entrepreneur grants or student think tanks or even opportunities to volunteer as a teaching assistant. Even if you don’t have a clue what to pursue, societies can still help you figure it out, by allowing you to try out different sectors like media, politics, or charity within your university you can see if this is what you want to do after graduation.  Importantly, this isn’t limited to societies that are career-focused, the skills you gain from your sports team, or writing club, or pantomime group can make you a more appealing applicant for jobs as well as allow you to find new passions and interests.

When I started my degree I was focused on a future law conversion course and pursuing a legal career. However, because of my involvement with societies, I discovered that I thoroughly enjoy writing for student publications and am considering journalism as a possible career choice due to my participation in different student publications. I was able to not only write for student newspapers but also take on an editorial role. I discovered that media wasn’t all about serious news and political discussion but could enable creativity and discuss issues that were more interesting to me like sex and relationships and books. My commitment to Model United Nations has significantly developed my interests in foreign policy and diplomacy so much so that my dissertation follows this theme and I am planning on studying International Relations for a Master’s Degree. What you can discover through your extra-curricular activities can be just as valuable as the content of your degree, if not more so, as it is based purely on your interests.

How societies will help you get a job

A major obstacle to getting the job you want is not having previous experience, how can you get a job after uni if you need to have years of experience behind you to even get through the door? A little known secret is that you just have to sell your skills right. During your time at university, you have learnt new skills, and grown as a person just because you did this on your campus in a society doesn’t mean it has less value than those who’ve learnt it elsewhere. A mistake university students tend to make is underselling their assets; your week-long work placement may seem the strongest attribute on your CV but that doesn’t mean that your university experience, especially the elements we see as ‘the fun bits’ aren’t valuable too. Make sure you include your participation as a member of activities and certainly as a committee member on your CV. If you took on a committee role in your society you may have learnt administrative skills like organising trips or events as social secretary, or demonstrated excellent written command in weekly emails as secretary, you might have exercised strong leadership as president or excellent recruitment skills as brand ambassador or recruitment officer, or reached out to interesting guest speakers as campaigns and speakers officer, the list truly goes on.

Model United Nations

As a fresher, I vaguely knew what the United Nations was, but didn’t have a clue about Model United Nations. I went to the first session and was horrified to find out that every week these people gathered together to simulate the UN through debating foreign policy as a representative of a country. Public speaking to me was more a daunting compulsory presentation to be forced into, not a hobby. Somehow, I stuck to it, returning every Wednesday to face my fear, taking only three weeks to actually get up and speak. By the end of my first term, I went to my first conference in Germany to do it competitively and managed to spend a whole weekend speaking in a room of almost 100 people, in one of the largest MUN committees I’ve been a part of. I still dislike group presentations, but I’m able to public speak to my heart's desire, confidently and (if I must say so myself) at a high standard.

Developing my public speaking has certainly helped me in interviews but more importantly, it has also increased my confidence to apply for more opportunities, attend networking events and utilise them as well as widen my horizons to benefit my future. Graduate schemes appreciate the skills that MUN nurtures; leadership, organisation, and communication are all vital elements to the perfect candidate for a job, and the best way to learn these is through activities and societies. Employees think that MUN is very impressive, which it is! It not only gives you a long list of skills, but also a strong awareness of global issues. You can use your experience and skills from societies in applications, if a job requires event planning or organisational skills, you can back up your abilities with conference organisation, or duties from a committee role. If you can successfully get the delegate for Saudi Arabia to sign your women’s rights resolution then you can probably handle team meetings! My participation in student societies has certainly been the cause of the majority of my personal growth, my belief in myself and my confidence that I will achieve the goals I set for myself, and I urge any university student to get involved!

Written for The Zig Zag, a career advice platform run by Women In Foreign Policy (WIFP) focussing on the experiences of womxn in the foreign policy sector.

The exhibition is a rolling projection, lasting around 35 minutes. You can walk in at any time and wait until it repeats itself or just stay for as long as you’d like. I’ll be discussing the experience from a ‘start’ and ‘end’ to the projection but this might not be the point you walk in at.

The exhibition starts by taking us through a journey, quotes from van Gogh structure our way through. ‘What would life be if we had no courage to do anything’ frames the walls. On the main wall, a portrait of a young van Gogh looks over us, whilst the other three walls are filled with his sketches, his handwriting scrawls his letters down from the ceiling and across the floor. We see initial sketches of famous paintings and a glimpse of the tree from Starry Night. This is a great beginning to the exhibition as we are looking at the man himself, and the unfinished, most personal aspects of his artistic process as well as his most sincere thoughts and feelings from his letters. It feels like this opening emphasises that we are here to experience not only his artwork but Vincent himself.

The walls transition now into portraits. ‘I’ll pick up my pencil that I put down in my great discouragement and I’ll get back to drawing’. Now his sketches are coming to life as if he is drawing them straight onto the walls. These sketches are overlooked by his self-portraits on the main wall, as they blossom into the next, he ages and his colouring changes. Frames now appear on the walls with moving images; people, plants, boats, blossoms, trees, windmills and waves all moving slightly. The exhibition emphasises the uniqueness and individuality of his brushstrokes and the movement that he creates in his paintings. Seeing them move and transform allows the audience to see the paintings in a way that can never be experienced in a gallery with the real painting. ‘I dream of painting, then I paint my dream’ A rather fitting quote, as the paintings themselves are presented in such a dreamlike manner in the exhibition, and the audience can feel so connected to them, in a way rarely experienced when seeing paintings through a screen, or even in real life. I do believe the exhibition is better experienced by those who have seen some of the paintings in galleries before, as it not only unites your feelings and previous experience with the actual paintings with this new presentation but also emotes a new understanding of them.

The paintings in frames transform into portraits. Interestingly, we see them morph not only into other paintings but many of them morph into other portraits of the same people. Well-known characters such as the Postman appear and we can watch how not only the characters develop through the different portraits but also how Van Gogh’s style does too. Like the baby, who morphs through infancy to being a toddler and young bo, his style and colour evolve which truly makes this an immersive experience. It is rare that so many of his paintings of similar or identical subject matter are displayed together in order for the audience to truly compare them, but here in this exhibition the audience can truly compare and see small differences between such paintings. All whilst, Van Gogh is projected centre stage, morphing through his self-portraits, almost looking down at the audience and his work. Not only are the paintings changing in the frames, but they switch to other collections of like paintings, so you can sit in your deck chair and look wherever you’d like as each frame does show all the different portraits one after another just in a different order, so you are not constantly turning to try and see everything.

Next, the exhibition takes a turn, Almond Blossom fills each frame and then spread across the walls until the frames disappear. The illusion of the moving gallery is now over, and the audience is now immersed in the painting. Once the walls are completely taken over the painting truly comes to life, petals fall around projected onto the arches, the floor, the empty deck chairs and our laps. It is at times hard to remember that this is a projection. The walls fade into fields and we see carts moving, swallows are circling us at the tops of the church walls. A horse pulls a cart along the far lanes of the painting around the entire room. It feels like the hay is blowing through the air, despite it only being projected onto the floor. Your mind truly fills the gaps between this projection and what it must feel like to have been there, while he was painting. It is a wholly sensory experience where they give us the visual and small auditory clues and the brain fills in the rest of the story until you have the entire picture. ‘I know for sure that I have an instinct for colour and that it will come to me more and more, that painting is in the very marrow of my bones’ the audible and visual quotes guide us, as if Vincent himself is taking us by the hand.

The exhibition is truly a delight for fans of Van Gogh, especially when you see elements of recognisable or favourite paintings begin to show through others. The arches and architecture of the church only enhance the experience, in some cases, they fade into the background and others they become part of it. Starry Night envelops the room, the lights flicker on in the houses as the sky gets darker. The large tree is curved around the base of one of the large arches, making it three-dimensional. The experience is truly immersive as the audience becomes part of the painting, not only is the movement of Van Gogh’s brush strokes animated across the walls but the stars spin projected onto the floor so that it feels more like you are in the painting itself than seeing it as in a gallery.  This section of the exhibition, where the room becomes the painting is certainly the most incredible part. It is where the projection can shine as an incredible, mesmerising and worthwhile experience rather than just a showing of paintings that aren’t there.

The room is then enveloped in golden, heartwarming yellow that engulfs the walls like fire as the image transitions to Starry Night Over The Rhône. This is one of the most ‘immersive’ parts of the exhibition as while some boats sway, one sails the perimeter of the room. ‘I often think that the night is more alive and more richly coloured than the day’, that it certainly is in this exhibition. Where you can almost feel the evening breeze on your skin, and a church becomes cold water and night sky without you even remembering where you are.

Unfortunately, the worst section of the exhibition follows. In the most intense and unnecessary use of creative freedom I’ve witnessed in any exhibition in homage to an artist, Van Gogh’s struggles with his mental health are expressed by a mannequin-esque statued form being circled and chained by paintings. The exhibition would as a whole, been much stronger and much better off without this scene. Thankfully, this weird experience ends with rain, and transitions into more sombre, grey and more industrial paintings, with music that sets this tone. ‘Sadness will last forever’. The experience ‘ends’ as we, the audience, sit in the fields with crows circling above us. Leaving the audience in a forlorn atmosphere that allows us to truly reflect on his art, his life, his experience and also, the exhibition itself

I’d highly recommend this exhibition to those who perhaps feel like they’re missing the hype when it comes to viewing art, and especially for art fans who have friends who ‘just don’t get’ your interest in art. Instead of taking them to galleries and trying to explain your love for art, take them to this exhibition and let them step into the painting as an enveloping encounter with what is normally scores of paint behind some glass.

Despite my distaste for the short statue section, I truly believe this to be one of the best Van Gogh exhibitions that I have been to, and especially the best in the projection genre. The gallery section where portraits morph into other portraits is significant and of interest, as I believe it brings to light his tendency to painting the same people more than once, as these multiples are often split between galleries and across the globe. I do wish that more of the exhibition was in the format of the whole room being enveloped in one painting, as it is the most emotive and impressive element of the exhibition. I wholeheartedly recommend it as a must-see exhibition.

Written for York Vision, a student newspaper at the University of York

To say that this book is addictive is an understatement. It’s a warm, witty and comfortable read that allowed me to lose an entire afternoon under my duvet as I tore through it, cover to cover.

Dolly Alderton, through her writing, becomes the knowledgeable big sister of every reader. She has a lifetime of experience to advise with. Made up of lessons learnt from drunken mistakes that cost a £200 taxi ride to a party across the country, to true self reflection learnt from hours of therapy. We readers grow with her, from teenage misconceptions to adult breakthroughs on the edge of thirty. This book is thoroughly heart-warming and hilarious.

The stigma around mental health and addiction is broken within her writing. Dolly (I feel like we should be on a first name basis) details the psyche behind the link between disordered eating and a sense of a lack of control in her youth. As well as her unhealthy relationship with drinking and  the general ups and downs of mental health. She allows herself to be vulnerable to the reader, in order to teach us. From her, we can learn to self-reflect and grow as people.

We learn about death and loss, and how they are intrinsically linked with love. We have to come to terms with how our expectations do not often line up with reality, especially those we make up as teens or in our early twenties.

Personally, as a 20-year-old student, I found the time progression of this memoir of special significance. I found myself relating to the most embarrassing and juvenile tales of teenage Dolly, despite our age gap. I could look back on my own MSN messenger days and childish misconceptions about love and sex and their importance. But as the book went on Dolly grew older than me, dealt with more ‘adult’ issues than I have and developed throughout and past the decade that I have only just stepped into. This, I thoroughly enjoyed.

The primary lessons I drew from this book were first, that it takes time, effort and serious work for breakthroughs with your mental health. That getting to the point where you truly believe that you are enough is a tiring uphill journey, but entirely worth it. Second, that love is not just red roses and diamond rings. Love is friendship and trust. Dolly truly writes of how friendships, especially female friendships, have magic in them. I hope that readers of Everything I Know About Love can truly understand the value and significance of their friends and see them, in a way, as some of the great loves of their lives.

On reflection, I do wish Dolly had addressed how love from family members can be just as important and impactful as both platonic and romantic love, but there is always want for things unmentioned in a book. Especially writings reliant so heavily on the author’s personal experiences.

The ending of this modern guide to love is of great importance because it isn’t concluded by Dolly married with 2.5 kids in the suburbs, as some sort of ultimate goal of true love. She is single and newly thirty but most importantly surrounded by love as well as happier and more optimistic for the endless years to come.

I thoroughly recommended Everything I Know About Love, her writing is so enjoyable and informal. I can even forgive her for writing ‘York University’ in lieu of ‘University of York’ twice (p50 and p199). She truly creates the atmosphere that you are talking with a life-long friend or big sister on the couch with a cuppa. Funny stories, mixed with short recipes (that hangover mac and cheese looks amazing), and the iconic ‘everything I know about love as a teen/twenty-five/thirty, the bad date diaries, and lists of her deepest fears make up a fantastic, thoroughly enjoyable and extremely well written realistic memoir that is heart-warming and leads to inspire women and promote the magic of the love we gain through friendships.

Published by York Vision, a student newspaper at The University of York