The stop gap years- part one- doing things...

Doing things.

Buying things.

Spending money on who knows what.

Animals.

These are the four ways we coped. The four ways that we filled the gap. It is like making yourself feel better with food or alcohol. Filling our time was like an addiction.

Doing things

And boy didn't we do things! We have led very full lives.

We have involved ourselves in several sub genres and alt scenes. We stared with the goth scene. It fit us very well in our late 20s and early 30s. We both love dressing differently and have never been a 'down the boozer on a Saturday night' type of couple- discussing the footie and latest celebrity gossip and soaps leaves us cold. This, of course, is a huge generalisation and stereotype, I know, nothing wrong if that is your thing, it just isn't ours. we went to festivals and club nights and met a few people, one who remains a dear, close friend of mine. 

We found that we can never just be spectators with anything and within a year I had a small side business making hair extension pieces (called hair falls/ dreads/ pony falls). These were made from various wools, braided, twisted, crocheted, hand felted into dreads to tie into your hair. Potentially alien to many but very popular in Alt scenes. I was good at it too! At my height I was selling wholesale to shop in America, Paris and several in the U.K. as well as trading online and at markets at events. I also became an admin on a huge forum for alternative hair. For a while, I had quite a name for myself. We threw ourselves into the scene and trading and making. Karl would often help me and our living room was full of baskets of wool.

I gave this up for a while and discovered various other interests, but largely I changed careers and changed to be a teacher. In 2004 I was made redundant (I talked myself into it as I had a place to train as a teacher). This was the best decision I made and had support from Karl as my current job was awful, I was crying each morning before going in, I was being bullied by my boss and persecuted for looking different (even though we were not a customer facing office). I had wanted to be a teacher whilst I was at University but the lure of jobs and money took over. I was good at my job as a manger in a call centre but it was soulless.

That year was tough- I had a hugely inadequate mentor who was supposed to support me but I got though by sheer bloody mindedness. I landed a job and have been there ever since. I have had some work disappointments but in general I enjoy what I do despite it being a hard and demanding job.

Teaching put a huge financial strain on us and it took us ears to recover the loss of wages in my one year of training.

We moved from the Goth culture towards Steampunk and re-enactment at the same time (why take on one interest at a time- how restricting!).  We joined a Medieval re-enactment group (up The Stanelys!) and we loved our time with them. We met some wonderful people and spent far too much money on kit, tents, armor, weapons...I learnt to cook on an open fire (hated that bit) and sewed clothing by hand, marveled the public with stick weaving (must take that up again) and generally loved sleeping in an authentic looking tent, in beautiful historic grounds (there is nothing like the privilege of staying at historic castles after the public go home). Ultimately, there was just not enough for me to do and Karl was not a natural fighter in battle and we fell away from this and fell into Victorian and Edwardian/ WW1 re-eanctment- via our other growing love, the steampunk sub-culture.

Karl persuaded me to go to a new event 'The Asylum', as it is now known. he had heard of the sub culture of Steampunk online and through role play books and fiction novels. I was unsure as I didn't really understand it (ask anyone into the culture and you will get a different answer from each one- broadly speaking it is neo-victorian imaginings of the future). This sub culture was fun in a way Goth never was- people were very friendly, welcoming and we made many friends at just one event. More than this, we found a link to the organisers through a chap we knew in our home town and a couple that another friend knew through re-enactment. Not only has this led to a friendship but also to us moving from medieval to our current re-enactment interests.

Of course, we filled our time. within a year I was performing with Karl as a music hall entertainment act- 7 years on, going strong (though have had to curtail gigs as we cannot commit whilst we are waiting to be matched with a child/ children and who knows if we will ever have time again? And we are fine with that given why our lives will have changed!). We love being this comedy musichall duo. We write songs, poems and scripts and still enjoy what we do. I also started trading again and learnt millinery. I learnt how to construct hats in various traditional methods and Karl learnt how to make jewellery for men and women. Remember I said we throw ourselves into things? Alongside this we attend re-enactment gigs (even organised a few!).

Taking a step back from it all this year has been strange, refreshing in a way and little bit heartbreaking but with a beautiful reason to not commit this year!

Our life hasn't been awful, we have enjoyed our busy and hectic times, sometimes taken on too much but generally had a lot of fun. There is no doubt, however, that we are filling that un-fillable gap of no family. I have great respect for those that choose together not to have children but it always hurt that we were considered the same. We hadn't made that choice.

At an event, I remember a good friend with their grandchild, interacting with us all and saying to me 'you don't do babies do you?' almost as an apology as the child was near us. I never said anything (until now!) but that hurt more than I can describe.