It’s 4:40A.M and I miss it.

I miss the rumble of the bus engine as it turns over and over. Humming therapeutically as I’m rocked side to side, swaying back and forth. Filtered air thundering on my face in my too cold, or too hot coffin from the deafening fan above my head.

When I’d decide to leap down from my bunk and manoeuvre myself to the toilet; making an admirable effort to keep my balance. Desperately trying to prevent me from falling into any of my colleagues’ bunks (yes, for those of you who don’t know, we sleep only a few feet away from each other). We learn each other’s sleeping habits. Who’s first to bed and who’s never in bed. Those who tell stories in their sleep. Those who walk around in it and need us to guide them back to their bunk. And who has night terrors and need consoled… sometimes the upstairs bunk aisle is as noisy as the engine, with 16 bodies riding their own waves. And I miss the synchronicity of it.

I miss the bruising on my thighs.

Noticing them in the early hours of the morning in the bus toilet as I slide my pyjama bottoms down to my ankles, and the too bright glare that would reveal every single imperfection known to man. And for a few seconds, the purple and yellow mould would confuse me. Then, I’d realise, they stem from a balancing act between the steel bar that separates me, the edge of my mattress and the bus floor of the bunk aisle. I remember finding rogue bruises all over my body… And I never thought that one day I’d acknowledge the comfort that I found in them.

I miss the sound of the coffee machine as it would clean itself every 30 minutes, and the little dance executed by at least one member of the crew. Bouncing around in time to the monotonous chugs of the machine. Fuck. I even miss being jerked awake by the sound of it at 5A.M as the bus driver changed shifts with their double driver and being able to go downstairs just to shoot the shit with them.

I also miss having to hold in my shit.

I mean this literally; I’ve never really had to hold in my shit figuratively. Those who know me will know that I’m an open book, and for those who don’t tour, then you won’t know that shitting is one of the things that you really need to schedule in. And I really savour my shitting time. It goes like this: no shitting on the bus and if you absolutely have to go then you hop up front and ask the driver if he can pull over to the services temporarily (of course offering a tea or coffee as the perfect bribing device before asking the dreaded question). Nobody wants to do that. It means holding up the crew and having everyone know that you’re going for a shit. Which personally, I don’t mind, but I know a few people who would. I even miss boasting about my “bladder made of steel,” and how I’d definitely have issues when I’m older due to having to hold in my piss every night at the merch table between the hours of doors (approx 7pm) and load out (approx. 11:30pm). If I had to go, too fucking bad, the cottonology life chose me and I did not resist.

Disclaimer: I also must take the opportunity to add that shitting in the band’s dressing room is fucking sacrilege. Don’t do it. Just public domain it, you’ll save everyone the headache and save yourself the embarrassment while we’re at it.

I miss not being able to sleep whilst I’m back in Scotland. And I miss complaining to people about that. I used to sleep with the light on whenever I wasn’t in hotels or on moving buses and it makes me mad that I’ve managed to train myself to sleep with the light off. And even though I’m technically living in a house, the only place I’ve ever felt at home is on the road.

The next day:

I’m finding hotel toiletry miniatures in my rucksack and I’m crying. I miss the feeling of being alone in a barren hotel room and missing home. I miss missing home. Can you believe it? I bend over the bathroom sink, steadying myself by holding on to the cold, hard basin and lean my head against the mirror. I think of how it would feel if I bash my head against it… the fragility of it, and how, if I struck it hard enough at just the right angle, I might not feel it at all.

You might be wondering why this bitch is crying over toiletry miniatures, but it’s not just about that. It’s about having lost a career that I’ve invested eight years of my life to. It’s about losing that feeling of validation and self-worth.

I’ll put it in to more context. In February, I moved all of my possessions into storage because I was supposed to be on tour for the majority of the year, and I was quite frankly fed up of renting a place that I was never in. I think last year I was home for two months maximum… and I’m being generous with that assumption. Any time not spent on tour, I would city-hop and spend my time off travelling. All of a sudden, I was derelict, and forced back to Scotland, rushed in to finding somewhere to live, rejected from any job I applied for, and vacant from any life I understood; bulging with self-loathing and resentment.

I’m frightened of my “too-much-ness.”

Now that I’m alone and very much isolated, I have way more time on my hands than I’ve had in years. You see, a major part of touring is the chaos. And I live for the chaos. I’ve lost a couple of close friends over the last few years, and tour has been a perfect distraction. I’ve not really grieved, and I’ve definitely tried not to think about it. So now that I’m not busy, all of that pain and trauma of those losses has caught up with me. I’ve had moments where I can’t breathe, and weeks where all I think about is death. I place a heavy weight on the importance of timelines and anniversaries and think about the day we met, the day they died, their birthday, my birthday, referencing texts to dates, logging words that were used, thinking of ways that things may have been different. I’ve lost days amongst the blur of it all and now that I have less responsibilities, I’ve signed myself up to obsessing instead.

I care too much about the wrong people (I mean certain living people to clarify), and too little about the right ones. However, when I was on tour, I’d managed to build resilience and almost a form of indifference. I knew that the tour would end so I decided not to allow myself to get attached to anyone. And that’s been my excuse for a while now. I kind of decided a couple of years back that that’s just how my life would go, and that my career would be my number one priority. Without that… I just don’t know what else there is worth keeping myself around for on many days. My career gave me a purpose and the people who understood (and those who I related to most) were my family on the road. Showing up at venues every day, being recognised and feeling worthy gave me a sense of validation that I’d never really felt before. I built confidence that I never thought possible. I was in a strong, defiant position and I was a key player in that next wave of merch supremacy. And I say that after years of building a solid case for myself. I think that’s what I’ve struggled with the most about being in Scotland… the loss of that, and the slippery decline of my confidence. I see so many of my touring friends in the same boat, all of them struggling and having to accept that the life we have built ISlost. A life of urgency and being an essential part of a team, and there’s so much uncertainty over when it will ever return. And the frustration is there too.

“Why didn’t we ever have a plan B?”

Except I did. I figured that if I ever wanted to do something other than merch then I’d try my hand at Production Assistant, or Tour Manager, or Wardrobe… and if I didn’t want to tour anymore then maybe one day, I’d be a Promoter Rep. I hadn’t planned for an entire industry to be wiped out.

I miss our standard day.

The noise of the truck reversing, the beeping as it edges closer into the dock of the venue. The bickering between the truck driver and the promoter. “It will fit // no it won’t // I assure you it will.” And the smug grin from the driver when he edges perfectly into the loading dock. That tiny victory which make us all smile. The coffee run to catering before we get in about the truck and unload. Collecting our radios. Merch boxes falling apart. Gaffa tape. Rachet straps tripping crew up as merch boards always seem to get in the way. (I swear they just don’t watch where they’re going). And generally, just always someone moaning about merch. Always a local crew member assuming a girl has no place in a truck, always me overcompensating to prove my worth in defiance of sexist and misogynistic comments. Smoking indoors, deliveries, stock count, new currency float, emails, catering again, the accusatory daggers from the drivers when they complain that “there’s too much vegan shite,” and me pretending that their remarks aren’t aimed in my direction. The missing rider requests, meeting local production, haggling in favour of a lower venue fee, setting up and displaying stock, sharpie thieves, VIP’s, soundcheck, security brief, washing in the venue showers and never really feeling clean, doors open, sell, the show. The fucking show. Time to get biased and love the band you work for but downplay it and pretend you don’t really care. (You totally care). The out. The load out. Post show pizza. The alcohol. The hangover. The new city and let’s do it all over again.

I miss being coherent. And I miss having a reason to have urgency in anything that I do. Time is passing so quickly during this lockdown period and I have an inbuilt pressure to accomplish something during this time. Let’s see… I bought a keyboard which I’ve hardly played. I purchased a pair of rollerblades and it took me 15 minutes to stand up in them… on a carpet. They now reside in their box, but I still feel them mocking me. I spent more time than I’d have liked applying for shelf stacker jobs to get knocked back from all of them. And I sound-tracked all of my applications by listening to the bands that I’ve worked for over the past eight years, drenched in nostalgia and hopelessness.

I’m moving in with a friend in a week and I’ve never felt at home anywhere other than a bus. For as long as I’ve toured, I’ve made excuses for not entirely moving in anywhere. I’ve kept belongings in boxes, I’ve hoarded posters (never dislaying them) and tour laminates (most of them confined to a drawer), and I keep things as compact as I can, so they’ll be ready for the next time I move on. I’ve perfected my pack in my suitcase and living out of it has become a necessity for my survival. I’ve never made any kind of effort to make a home feel personable in any way and I’ve certainly never decorated. I’ve had flatmates offer to put up shelves/frames and suggest painting to make a space feel more comfortable… but I never take them up on it. I have a suitcase in Iceland at a friend’s boyfriends that I couldn’t bring back with me one time, I have two bin bags of clothes and a printer at my sisters’ house in Essex, I have a cupboard filled with crap at my parents and I have a storage unit in Glasgow. I’m pretty sure a lot of my friends have bits and bobs that belong to me in their homes that I’ve lost track of, and I’ve been living in the country with my touring suitcase and pelican case that I brought back with me in March when our industry disappeared overnight. Oh, and obviously a keyboard and a pair of rollerblades. I’ve been waking up whenever I want (which turns out to be 6A.M. Every. Fucking. Day.) and I’ve actually had the privilege of being able to cook for myself. But still I’d go back to that time I had food poisoning on a thirteen-hour bus ride from Paris to Milan, rather than face the terror of building a permanent nest for myself.

I’ve found a workshop space to try and polish up some old woodwork skills, and to try and invest some time into a new career. It seems a bit daunting and I am fully aware that it will come with its challenges. It’s not like I had to defend my career in music to everyone who didn’t work in it, and now I’m investing my time in becoming a female carpenter.

Failing isn’t a welcome prospect, and I also hate feeling like I’m a disappointment… and that’s exactly how I’ve felt throughout this full lockdown period. But I need a purpose again. I despise sounding like a broken record, and I feel like there’s been too many times that I’ve been sucked into the grips of a depression which leads me to blocking things out and becoming completely susceptible to just doing what everyone else wants because it’s easier. I have a desire to please everyone around me at whatever cost and I lost my fight for a good while there. I think it’s about time that I learn how to fight again and remember that the person I was is still in there somewhere, and she’s a part of who I’ll be next.

After my first tour, things went dry for a while. I’d always been inclined to depend on the kindness of strangers, as Blanche Dubois would say, but in late 2013 I learned the error of my ways. I was assaulted by someone I thought I could trust, and in keeping what happened to myself, I turned into a shadow of the person I was.

I couldn’t talk to my parents and chose to go to the court case on my own. I confided in a select few of my close friends, but even then I worried constantly about how they would treat me. I didn’t want them to think of me as damaged goods, despite that being exactly how I felt. Loneliness swallowed me whole. The pressure of having to act like nothing had happened, laughing at everyones jokes and maintaining what I felt was a fake persona almost killed me. All I wanted to do was to be on my own. You see, since then I’ve learned that every single person is fighting their own private battle, and I don’t think I’ll ever fully get over what happened that November. Maybe it acted as a catalyst for a downhill spiral that was always inevitable, or maybe that event was the sole cause for all of it.

In the following months, I lost a massive amount of weight. In hindsight, I can see that choosing not to eat was my own warped way of regaining control over my life. In the space of 6 months, I lost about 4 stone… taking me down to 7.5 stone, and for the height of 5'8" I began to look seriously unhealthy - but I was hooked. I got a buzz out of feeling hungry and not fulfilling my desire to eat… going to the gym for hours a day. Missing one day wasn’t an option, and if I did, I would punish myself by eating even less than I already was.

I used it as a distraction. I couldn’t sit still. If I was on my own for too long I would become miserably numb, bored, and found myself online for hours researching food recipes. Recipes that deep down I knew I would never use because they contained more carbs than the 30g a day I barely allowed myself, or had more calories than I ever dared to ingest. I would spend full afternoons in Asda, dissecting the ingredients of countless groceries, yet walking out empty handed. Never did it stop me though — it was one of many strange obsessions.

Every morning I’d weight myself; satisfaction washing over me when I was a pound lighter than the day before. Before I knew it, people started to pay more attention to me. Having worked in a bar, it was a rare occasion to wear a strappy top that I’d feel comfortable in. I worked downstairs in the gig venue, and I always felt the cold more easier than others; it engulfed me. On this day in particular I remember taking my cardigan off, revealing my threadlike arms. I can still vividly see the shock in my colleagues face as she took a double glance them and tried to mask her expression. I feel as if I’m contradicting myself by trying to explain, but at the time, I would look at my reflection in the mirror and still feel huge. I knew that I was the tiniest I had ever been but I wasn’t quite where I wanted to be yet. Even after being begged by my best friend to try and gain some weight, it took a lot longer for it to sink in that I had a problem.

I thought after I met someone who cared a lot about me that I was going to get better, and in those first few weeks of excitement my focus on food drifted. I wasn’t as obsessed anymore, but I also wasn’t thinking about food at all to feel hungry. I guess it was just yet another distraction. The weight remained off and I was still going to the gym on a regular basis. The relationship lasted a few months before my old friends anxiety and insecurity returned and all of a sudden my heart was sinking again, faster than it ever had before. I was beginning to feel more and more useless and woke up every morning feeling emptier than the day before.

Nobody can ever anticipate the wreckage an exploding life can cause, and no matter how many times I tried to see things right, I knew that at that moment in time I had to be alone. Avoidance techniques were my specialty and I was a master at disguising the way I truly felt. I had started seeing a counsellor through the NHS to help with my so-called “depression.” I was then sent to a “specialist,” who would apparently combat my eating patterns — dismissed after two sessions. According to the “specialist,” I was a “borderline case,” whatever that means. Her advice was to try and incorporate some potatoes or pasta into my diet (carbs, the one thing I was absolutely terrified of!) and to just come back if I felt things were getting worse. I was mentally unravelling at the seams and it took all I had to eventually seek help at all, nevermind being dismissed in such a patronising way. I felt completely humiliated and ashamed that I had even bothered. Here I was wasting their time, when they had to deal with real people with real problems. I was angry but I couldn’t fight my case, I was emotionally exhausted and pressured by my family into telling them what had gotten in to me. It had been 5 months since the court trial where my assailant had been found guilty and my family still never had a clue about what had happened. All they could see was me diminishing before their eyes and them not knowing what to do or say to help.

I broke. I had to tell them. After their various attempts of trying to help me by threatening to march me down to the doctors to seek support, I revealed I was already seeing a counsellor. Demanding to know why, I just didn’t have the strength to keep the secret any longer. It had been almost 9 months and I was completely drained. They cried, I cried, but I never got any closure from telling them. There was no incredible, immediate remedy to the way I was feeling inside. The only thing that happened afterwards was that they struggled to deal with the idea that I’d kept it a secret from them for so long, that I was then left to console them. In 5 minutes, the quiet solitude of my own problems had now magnified into their problems, and I could no longer ignore the deafening elephant in the room.

I couldn’t really remember a time before that that we as a family had been truly close. I know that they love me but afterwards, they were desperate to “fix me.” I could see it tear my Mum apart especially; she just didn’t know what to say or do around me. None of them did, and that was exactly what I had feared initially. It was a lose/lose situation.

It’s been a year now, and I can admit that physically, I’ve put on a lot more weight. It kills me everyday but I know that I’m in a healthier state now, and I keep telling myself that. If I had continued down that road then it is very possible I might not have been here to talk about it. Its frightening to think that I’m truly not exaggerating when I say that. Since then, I’ve been on five more tours, which I plan on posting about individually. I can say that honestly, they’ve been my saviour. The tours reignited a passion inside me and meeting the most amazing people on the road taught me to be a stronger version of myself.

As I said previously, I don’t want to forget a thing, whether that be good, bad or ugly.

“I had no ingenious revelations, only a huge sadness.” was originally published in Be Yourself on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

I never once imagined my life would turn out the way that it has. These past few years have been more than I ever could have dreamed of… but also the work of nightmares. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting the most wonderful people; who are stark, razor-blade contrasts to the assholes I’m desperate to forget. I’ve experienced truly incredible moments and explored the most picturesque of cities… but these years have also been lined with harrowing snippets of self-destructive behaviour that I’m only just mustering up the courage to publically speak about.

You see, I don’t want to forget any of it; whether that be good, bad or ugly. I’ve documented these moments on paper until now for my own private collections, but I want others to find honesty and credibility in my words. And who knows, maybe one day I might inspire someone. Just like the way another writer inspired me to finally open up about these emotions on such a public platform, and free my mind from the burdens I’ve carried for what seems like an eternity. A problem shared is a problem halved right?

I’ll let you dwelve into my history a little.

I always knew what I wanted to be growing up, and nobody dared planned on questioning my singing aspirations.

• Age five: I would stand at the top of the stairs in my school playground every day, screeching the FRIENDS soundtrack at the top of my lungs, shouting at any kid who wasn’t paying attention. The Rembrandts had nothing on me.
• Age six: I didn’t speak to my uncle for weeks because he stole the microphone from me during a rare family karaoke session.
• Age nine: I was slowly coming to terms with the fact that I just wouldn’t become Britney Spears any time soon.
• Age fourteen: Leona Lewis was my idol. Completely mastering her warble meant that even my renditions of Johnny Cash songs made me sound like an adolescent schoolboy, whose voice had just given way to the evils of puberty.

Leaving High School, it suddenly became apparent that I wasn’t going to be scouted for fame anytime soon and maybe it was time to face reality. Of course, as always, the teachers were pushing for a choice to be made. Pushing us towards university. Pushing us towards a career. At seventeen years old, no wonder I made the wrong decision. I felt forced into doing something… anything! Everyone around me had applied for several courses that they all felt confident to be the right choices for them. I panicked and settled for Fashion Business. Wrong choice. I lasted two years.

When I was 19, a friend of mine asked if I’d be up for covering a merchandise shift for him at ABC in Glasgow for Warpaint (one of my favourite bands at the time). Winging the whole thing, I was lucky enough to be offered a month’s European tour, leaving two days later with a different band. Before then, I’d only ever really worked in bars and retail, dabbling in a music business apprenticeship which led to working for promoters. I was desperate to jump on the “band wagon”. Literally.

I soon realised that to make sensible choices only leads to setting a ticking time-bomb under yourself — waiting for your chance at life. I was done with leading the life that others had planned for me, and fed up of disappointing those closest to me who wanted to wrap me up in a 9–5 career. I was fed up with the exasperated looks when I shared that no, I don’t ever plan on getting married and having kids. Even the idea of this kind of lifestyle made me feel dizzy and nauseous. Don’t get me wrong, it works perfectly well for the majority of the human race, but it just wasn’t for me and it took me a long time to give up trying to convince everyone else that I didn’t have to choose that path.

I still vividly remember the 13 hour drive from Hamburg to Oslo on my first tour. I was sitting in the front lounge of the tour bus, on my own, and the realisation suddenly hit me that I was about 600 miles away from home, doing a job that I never thought I’d have the opportunity to do. I was soaking up the sights and it dawned on me that maybe it was possible that I was in exactly the right place. Self doubt was slowly being filtered out of my mind from the experiences I was having. I began to realise that I would never be comfortable being at home again because I was finding myself more and more in every new city I visited. It was more than that though; when you’re living in such close environments with new people for even a few weeks/ months, it’s difficult not to become attached. Strangers soon become family, and you console each other when they miss their families, or when they can’t be at special occasions back home.

The memories of that first tour still make me lightheaded. Everything was so new and there was a novelty to the smallest things like wearing your AAA lanyard, sleeping in bunks on the bus and being rocked to sleep, fancy hotels on days off in cities that you hadn’t even heard of before, and of course, the catering. After a few years now, I can still say I was lucky enough to have the best caterer, Dags from Popcorn, on that first run. Here’s some photos from when I was a meat-eater:

The sad part for me is leaving a tour and coming home, which always seems bizarre for the rest of the crew. Most of the time, I meet people where the novelty has long since worn off and they look forward to when they can get back to their families and relax until the next run. Some tours are harder than others and I’ve had moments of huge sadness when having to say goodbye. We make promises to see each other again soon, and its always a lovely surprise when you just happen to bump into someone. I know that touring is engrained in my soul and I have no doubts that it is what I want to do for the rest of my life. As you read on about how things have changed in my life since that first tour, it is easy to come to the conclusion that 2013 was probably the most straightforward year of my life to date, and you’d be right. Although I’m still finding myself through all of this, its very easy to lose sight of the person I am/ used to be.

“It is strange how we hold on to the pieces of the past while we wait for our futures.”

Until next time…

X

PROLOGUE was originally published in Be Yourself on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.