★ Lilly Ashton ★: April 2012

"I need to work on getting my life started! In the meantime I am listening to Destiny's Child."

Here are my diary entries from the past 12 days:

Metronomy & memories

Poetry and printed shorts

Writing about the internet and then posting scans of that writing to the internet

I liberated some clearance stickers

Opting out

Knackered and enjoying the Metro

Evidence of my balanced diet

And here are some future pages I've already prepared with backgrounds:

What a wonderful mode of expression. A diary can end up being a bit like a friend, oddly.
Please enjoy this song and your day/life/trip to the park/sordid affair with Dappy from N-Dubz.

Seems like it's going to become a habit to put mini-mes at the end of these posts

Remember this every day

Dear people,

Don't forget why you started taking pictures/writing poems/drawing butterflies/collecting teabags/etc. You did it for fun. You still do it because it makes you feel full and content and like you are being yourself in the utmost. Don't think too much, but do it. Replenish yourself.

Love from,

Lil

P.S. If you're into perpetually aroused Germans expressing said arousal via firmly undulating synthpop overlayed with whispery, panting vocals (I am and everyone knows it), listen to Deutsch Amerikanische Freundschaft.

I took these pictures on my way to and from the shop from which I purchased some mushrooms and other enjoyable items. It was a little bit rainy, lots of puddles. The sun shone really brightly when I was coming back. The sky was very blue. Someone had left their scooter propped up against Blockbuster's window. Most places were closed as it's Sunday (more commonly called "the day everywhere's closed and then you realise you're out of food at 7:48pm and you can't do anything about it"). I like puddles, I like reflections, I like cracks in the road. I like leaves, windows, and strangers. These things are everywhere. Let yourself enjoy them.

"What were you doing last night?" "Drawing on my face."

The quickest and easiest makeover can be achieved with some felt tips. Much like the characters in 90s post-apocalyptic teen gang show The Tribe (arguably Channel 5's best output), I have put a load of mess on my face which allows me to be clearly identified as part of a group. In this case the group is "people who turn custard creams blue when eating them" and I am its only member.

Here's an elbow bruise I have

Elbow is quite a nice word and quite a nice thing. I like elbows. I would like to take pictures of everyone's elbows.

Blue

I painted a little bit yesterday, with a lovely brush I found that I'd forgotten about. I'm running out of acrylic paint and have more blue than any other colour (I have a dark blue tube and a light blue tube and they still have a substantial amount of paint in them), so have ended up using a lot of blue. It's so relaxing and pleasing and flowing and textural and I love it so much.

Teen memories

I have a box full of old notes and school things that I like to sift through every so often and shake my head at. I'm going to stay with my friend Lucy tonight, who I've known since we were about 11, so in honour of that, please enjoy some of my favourite things from my box of memories. I miss the group dynamic that school necessarily fosters, and the closeness that comes with being that age and seeing the same people every day and being each other's Get Out Of Boredom Free cards. It's interesting to contrast these old scraps with the diary I've recently started. It's always a delight to find old memories you've kept safe in a physical form, and having all these things has definitely made me want to keep collecting and recording things and moments like this. Blogging, as well, has made me increasingly obsessed with recording details of my life, and it's nice to have digital records of things, because blog posts can't get ruined in the rain and don't take up space in your bedroom.