My True Education

I didn’t learn a lot at school. Sure, I learnt the function of the aldehyde groups and how they react with oxygen to form carboxylic acids. Sure, I learnt formulas to work out areas of increasingly complex 2D shapes. Sure, I learnt that an oxbow lake is formed by a river carving out the easiest possible way through a landscape. 

None of that shit applies to real life though, does it?

School only taught me what they think I should know to reach the next stage of education. And by that I mean the patriarchy. You learn what the government wants you to learn. I distinctly remember sitting in that citizenship lesson aged about 14 where the teacher went on a tirade of ‘all drugs are bad’. The same teacher was so addicted to nicotine they struggled to teach for an hour without a cigarette. 

Now that I'm older, I realise the economy runs on a combination of caffeine and cocaine. Walk through any town centre and you’re never two minutes away from somewhere that sells the former, usually in the shape of a mug of tea or coffee, but not forgetting the caffeine-laced energy drinks that give you wings. And tachycardia. Up and down the country, friends meet over caffeine, commuters catch trains with their caffeine dose clearly visible, office workers congregate around the caffeine dispenser unable to function without it. Coffee manufacturers have got a whole nation hooked on caffeine in the same way that Phillip Morris got everyone addicted to cigarettes in the 1960s. And look how that turned out. But the government doesn’t care because without it nothing would get done and the whole economy would be fucked. 

Now compare that to cocaine. Its use is so widespread that there’s traces of it on every banknote, and in pretty much every water supply. It fuels house parties, late-night raves and even the Palace of Westminster. But yet you wouldn’t go into a newsagents and buy a gram off the guy behind the counter. You wouldn’t get on the 07:49 to Waterloo clutching a bag. You wouldn’t stand around at work taking it in turns to have a bump. Society is set up so no one bats an eye when you neck an espresso in a restaurant after dinner, yet if you’re caught doing lines in public you get arrested. 

Society is a fucking hypocrite.

That’s the main thing I’ve learnt during the many years I’ve been on this planet. I’ve learnt it by carefully observing people going about their day to day lives, people who don’t know they’re being watched. I’ve learnt it by reading newspapers, reading books, reading anything I can get my hands on. I’ve learnt it through conversations with strangers, with friends, with family. I’ve learnt it through experiencing the world around me, getting out and seeing it through my own two eyes. 

School didn’t teach me any of this. My education - my true education - is life.

The Wedding Present

This trip was their last remaining wedding present, a gift from Jack’s mum to her favourite hotel. The voucher wasn’t valid on Saturdays, and so he and Ellie had each taken a Friday off work and made the journey to the Suffolk coast. They knew the town well, almost too well, having made many trips when they first learnt how to drive - far enough to feel a sense of achievement, short enough to manage in a day. Their lives had since got much busier, with old friends returning home and weekends spent in a drunken haze. Before they knew it, several years had passed since they last set foot in the seaside town. 

Until today. Jack put the key in the lock and entered the room, Ellie following close behind. Three things immediately hit him. Firstly, the bed was covered in deep red rose petals arranged in a heart. Someone must have let the cat out the bag as to the purpose of this trip. The second thing was the heat. The room was hot. Too hot. His whole body was engulfed in this stifling heat, as if he was at the heart of Sizewell C, the strongly opposed nuclear reactor a few miles down the coast. Finally, his nostrils were whacked with a weird musky odour, one he associated with his late-Grandpa’s nursing home, as he succumbed to the effects of dementia. The heat and the smell completely destroyed the intentions of the rose petal display. Nonetheless, the trip was essentially free for them, so he vowed to make the most of it.

Ellie had sensed this all too, and pushed past him to open the window. The February sea breeze wafted into the room, the cooling effect almost immediate. Ellie answered his unspoken question:

“Maybe the previous occupiers had body temperature control issues”

“Given the age of the clientele, I’d say that’s almost certainly a given”

Earlier that afternoon, they’d sat in the hotel lounge, and claimed the cream tea included in their voucher. The lounge was full, with wealthy retirees enjoying an afternoon in the light airy space, either chatting to their companions or reading the Daily Telegraph in amicable silence. Ellie and Jack sat awkwardly in one corner of the lounge, acutely aware that their presence lowered the average age by at least two decades. Their room had most likely been previously used by octogenarians enjoying an off-season seaside break.

The next morning, Jack woke up dripping in sweat. Annoyingly, they hadn’t found a way to switch off the heated towel rail in the bathroom, which continuously warmed the air around them. In his sleep, he’d managed to kick off the duvet, which lay in a heap at the end of the super king size bed. He turned to stretch out towards his wife, finding her side of the bed empty. In over 11 years of travelling together, he had never woken up in a hotel bed alone. He vaguely remembered he’d heard her moving around in the night, trying to get comfortable against the stifling heat. Maybe she’d found a different place to sleep?

He got up to find her, the morning sun providing just enough light to see. Jack followed his intuition, heading for the window at the far end of the room. They’d left it open all night to attempt to manage the heat. His suspicions were confirmed by the sight of her sound asleep on the floor, underneath the open window, the early morning sea air providing some much needed relief over her naked body.

Colour Makes People Happy

‘Colour makes people happy’. It was printed on one side of her tote bag. The tote bag she took everywhere with her. Today, the tote bag was stuffed with her everyday essentials: her purse, keys, book, and a bar of quality dark chocolate.

Colour made Callie happy. She tried to incorporate some colour into what she wore daily. Her bright orange jumper, her red and white printed flares. And of course, her yellow coat. Callie had always wanted a yellow coat, especially during the cold winter months. The coat she’d had before this one was black. Black as in the absence of colour. 

When the temperatures had dropped one year, she’d retrieved the black coat from the wardrobe and noticed it was just a little bit too snug around her middle. So, she’d spent an afternoon wandering from shop to shop for hours, looking at various coats. None had been quite right: too short, too long, wrong colour, not waterproof. The latter was essential, given she cycled to work in all weathers. Just as she was about to give up, she saw a yellow coat nestled amongst the rails at the back of an independent women’s boutique, and was immediately drawn to it.

It was exactly the right shade of yellow. A sunshine yellow. The other coats she’d seen were more mustard in colour. Not that there was anything wrong with mustard yellow. She owned several items in mustard yellow. It just wasn’t the right shade for her. It looked waterproof too, with a durable outer shell. One glance at the label confirmed that it was indeed waterproof, having been tested in the horizontal Cornish rain. 

She took it off the hanger, feeling the weight of it in her hands. Then, she slipped off her old black coat and tried it on, right there on the shop floor. 

The effect on her mood was instant. She suddenly felt brighter, more excited, euphoric even. She didn’t realise that something as simple as wearing a different colour could have that effect on her. She loved the way it made her feel; the happiness that radiated off her just from this one yellow coat.

She looked around for a mirror, and saw one just over to her right. She moved towards it, enjoying how she looked in this coat, and the way it hugged her body in all the right places. It was just the right length for her too, the hem reaching halfway between her hips and knees. Long enough to keep her warm, short enough to cycle in. Almost as if it had been made for her.

She looked at the price tag. It was a little over her budget. But she had to have it. She slipped it off, and took it to the cashier. After handing over the correct amount of cash, it officially became hers. The yellow coat.