Starting University, Update Schedule, And The Future

Monday was my first day at University smile emoticon I have been ridiculously happy these last two days. The more I hear about the course I am on, the happier I am. A few years ago, studying any part of the field of architecture seemed beyond me; some mysterious technical skills and art that would forever be out of my reach. I didn't think I could go to university, and I didn't think I was good enough to get in as a mature student. Now, I'm actually starting!

 I get to spend the next four years on a subject I have a huge, obsessive passion for. I can get excited about hollow tiles for cladding and their insulation/heat transfer properties, I can get excited about how a three-story atrium works visually like a cathedral nave, I can get excited about weight distribution and support in complex curves, and all these things I get to learn about how they work. All that technical, structural, practical stuff about /how buildings work/ that I find fascinating is something I actually will have as my main focus, hopefully for the rest of my days! It's amazing! I can't believe it's actually happening. I will hopefully finally get to dedicate the rest of my life to stuff that is awesome, and I've got it because I've worked for it. I'm really proud of how far I've got, and I'm fully aware of how much nose-to-the-grindstone work I have ahead of me, but I also know that if I put in the effort I will get what I want. 

A lot of stuff has stood in my way in life, I've had to deal with a pretty bad start and a lot of neurological and mental health issues, and I've had to deal with some truly awful people, but I've got past that. My friends have helped, my Dad and my sister have helped, Raven has helped, and I don't want to ignore their contribution too. There was a time when I didn't have many friends (if any), where I didn't have much at all in the way of support, where it seemed like all I had was problems on every front, and prejudices and hatred surrounded me; but I fought through that, and won my life for myself, and even better I met some super-duper people the other side. I won't be as active as I was before on my blog, but I won't be ignoring you; it's just that now that I have this opportunity, I will need to make the most of it. I didn't think this was something that would ever be accessible to me; I didn't think this would be something I would actually get to do.

 But it's real. 

And now I have to work really hard to keep it, and make everything flourish. I might not be around much for a while, but I haven't forgotten you all!

How I Came To Realise I Was Goth

One of the most frequently asked questions I get is "How did you become a Goth?", but I don't think I became anything, I think I just followed the road marked out by the things I like.

I think my preferences happen to align with the Goth subculture in many ways, but when I decided "I am going to be Goth" it was not really with any understanding of what Goth was, and what I became was a pretentiously 'rebelious' teen for a few months, and then over the next few years discovered more and more of how this subculture I had chosen for all the wrong reasons was actually home for all the right reasons. Usually, when I am asked this, I have to either explain in conversation, or at best get a paragraph or two to write - I wanted to write out the story of this chapter in my life a bit more fully. I've written thousands of words here, I know, but even that has not touched on everything.  

One of the things I have written about in the past was ::this article:: on how Church music, and spending a lot of my childhood in various ecclesiastical buildings has influenced me. I looked at these incredible structures towering over my head, lit by the sun shining through stained glass, interiors often painted white or beautifully decorated with murals, filled with richly carved wooden furniture, the music of the choir and the sound of pipe organs, and to me this was the closest to Heaven you could find in the human world - I always felt the wild was the closest you could get to Heaven while still alive, as far away from the rest of the human race as possible, but the beauty I experienced in church made a close second. I rarely felt spiritually connected by church services, but I felt something close in singing old polyphonic choral songs with the choir, when the harmonies rang out just right and summoned a glimpse of something holy and glorious. If Heaven had cities, in my imagination, they were entirely built of medieval Gothic architecture, like the illustrations in old manuscripts of white shining cities of spires and towers, and filled with music of angels singing. I was never entirely sure there actually was a Heaven or a Hell, but I liked to imagine that there might be, just so there could be somewhere perfect and untainted.

It was never cool amongst those I encountered to have this sort of imagination, especially as a child, not even a teenager. It wasn't something I could share with other children - even my more religious peers seemed to think there was something a bit dorky or strange about my feelings, and very few seemed to have any sort of personal religious experiences. I was starting to have more and more of those sorts of experiences... but outside of Church and the framework of Christianity (but this would diverge into the territory of "how I became Pagan"). 

I definitely became aware at quite an early age that my reaction to this sort of thing was unusual, and as my peers became teenagers, and my spirituality diverge further from Christianity, I felt quite isolated and unique (in a bad way) in my reaction. I don't think I actually am unique, just that during that point in my life, there was nobody I knew who seemed to have the same reaction, to feel the same way and as strongly. Perhaps they did, but those people were probably adults and felt uncomfortable talking to a small child about these sorts of things, or perhaps other children who felt like this had the social understanding to realise that speaking up about these sorts of things wasn't considered normal. I seemed to see jewels in the pictorial windows where others only saw painted glass, and the glory of the Divine glittering in the candle light where others just saw fire, and heard the voices of angels echoed in the practice of the parish church choir where other people just heard accidental dischords and humble harmonies.

This difference between how I felt about Church was one of the many things that taught me the bad habit of not talking about what made me happy because it would often just be something else that set me apart and probably get me into trouble. Being able to openly talk about what I enjoy is probably the greatest blessing of the Gothic subculture. I have this blog, I am a member of online communities, I have Goth and Goth-friendly friends, and I can actually rejoice and talk at length about what I love, openly, freely and with enthusaism, knowing that others feel the way I do about these things and share that passion and interest. 

I didn't feel any connection to the Christian concept of God, but I could see there was something genuinely Divine in truly spiritual art, and the first spiritual art I came across came from a Catholic and Church of England context, so I wasn't aware yet that I would feel the same when I came across Buddhist chants, statuary and artwork, or that I would feel completely humbled by the sky at Stonehenge rather than the stones themselves. I guess in some ways this sort of strong emotional connection to the art, architecture and music of medieval to Victorian Britain and Europe gave me a direct connection to the Gothic in the art historical and literary meanings of the word.

When I was at primary school and the other girls in my class started caring about being pretty and fashionable (or at least wearing the kinds of clothes popular with other girls their own age, rather than fashionable in terms of what grown women would have considered fashionable in the mid 1990s), I was more interested in wearing tomboy clothes and my big black duffle-coat, and a bit later, when I tried experimenting with make-up, I decided I wanted to look scary rather than pretty and drew my eyebrows in arched and pointed, and painted my lips deep red; when other girls wanted to be a Spice Girl, I wanted to be Morticia Addams. Later, in my early teens, I decided that purple and black eye-makeup like a tonally-shifted Cleopatra was what I wanted - not a long distance from the Siouxsie-esque dramatic make-up of Trad-Goths! I think this is when I started to realise that a) what I cared about in regards to my appearance was not really in line with what most other people cared about or thought was the "right" way to look and b) that not looking "normal" was going to get me bullied even more.

For a while after I started boarding school, I decided that as it was a clean start that I would at least try and look normal and fashionable, but I could never quite get the look done 'right'. Like the rest of my attempts to pass as normal and give the impression of normalcy in order to try and fit in, it just added to my fears and anxiety, and left me feeling constantly worried about when I would be "found out" as a "weirdo" and "freak" - something that came about soon enough. My feigned interests in popular culture was always caught out as faked when I just didn't have the shared cultural knowledge base of those genuinely interested, when I couldn't pretend to be enthusiastic convincingly enough, when I made a constant stream of little faux-pas, when I accidentally let slip my genuine interests... 

I eventually gave up the pretence for the sake of my sanity, and it was at this point I used my mistaken idea of Goth and attemptedly Gothic fashion choices as a way to signal that yes I was a "weirdo", a "freak" and "creepy", but that I was PROUD to be those things, and that maybe those who had been bullying me and ostracising me ought to be a bit afraid - of course, with my attempts at Goth being so poorly executed, I think I managed to be more pathetic than intimidating, but at least I felt confident at the time, which is more than I had ever been before. I would imagine that this last paragraph resonates with quite a few of my readers, as this seems to be quite a common experience amongst Goths and other Alternative lifestyle folk.

Of course, I was not really a Goth at that point, or really part of Gothic culture - I had grasped onto something through which I felt I could resist the pressures around me - both by rebelliously trying to appear as the antithesis of what was expected of me and the opposite of what those around me lauded as good and proper, and by doing something that felt very freeing, as I decided to shed all that was conventional and desired of me, and do something outrageous, something that meant I would never again have to pretend to be "normal" by the very narrow standards of those around me. This initial "Goth" phase was short lived, but I had thrown off my shackles through it, and it started me on the path to actually becoming a Goth. 

After that point, I became more interested in actually Gothic things - I had always loved science fiction and fantasy, and had already a tendency towards liking the darker parts of what I'd had access to - the latter Harry Potter books had plenty of rather Gothic themes in them, and out of all the strands in those books, these were probably the aspects I had liked most, and I had loved books like Phillip Pullman's Dark Materials Trilogy. I loved the worlds these authors had crafted, full of magic, Gothic architecture, monsters, villains and people who had to accept that their world wasn't perfect and good, just as ours is not perfect and good, and as I became a teenager and started reading more books aimed at adults, I looked towards more books that would satiate this. I began with Michael Moorcock's Elric novels, with the sadistic Melniboneans, the strange and beautiful worlds, the cursed sword and other elements that while still High Fantasy of an almost surreal nature, were definitely erring towards the darker and more bloody. 

I then got into vampires and started reading the Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice and their lavishly described dances through time and place as the long and fascinating lives of her vampires were recounted just drew me in - even her latter novels, which I now recognise as not necessarily being her best, drew me in as a teenage fangirl. I wanted to live life for the experience, travel the world, and have grand adventures, and long centuries to do so, like one of her vampires, and of course, have some torrid romance with a beautiful creature of the night (oh, how foolish of me!). I was also reading comics at this point, especially things from the Gotham world by DC and also Witchblade, which I initially thought horribly violent, and then thought was actually pretty cool. 

I didn't deliberately choose my reading by "what is Gothic", otherwise I would have probably read far more vampire books at that point! I just read what I found interesting, what fed my imagination, what transported me to worlds far away from the life I currently had, from my depression, from my isolation, from everything that made me unhappy. It was escapism, but at least it was imaginative escapism full of creativity and full of themes that introduced me to stuff that I probably would not otherwise have found to be interesting. I tended towards more traditional high fantasy when miserable, and then darker fantasy when I was more cheerful and thus not liable to end up morose from reading too many novels full of sadness and tragedy. 

Whether it was books (which I read a lot of), comics (which I read a few of), films (which I was rarely able to see), video games (which I think is an anachronistic term, and which I only got to play at friend's houses as we were too poor for such things) or TV (which I hardly watched), the themes, characters, imagery and setting I kept being drawn to was what I would later come to identify as the Gothic in the literary meaning of the term. I don't think that it was that these things influenced me to like more and darker things, it is that I seemed to like dark things anyway and went in search of them; these things connected with me on some inner level. 

Gothic novels are so named after the architecture that often serves as the setting, and which is often a part of the plot, or even almost a 'character' itself (I think of the the great citadel-castle of Gormenghast, for example), and that itself stirred a chord, reminding me of all the cathedrals, churches and castles that I loved (and still love, as a quick look through the 'architecture' tag in the sidebar will show!) and I felt at home there, even if these versions were haunted by monsters and ghosts. A lot of the time, in my social alienation, I felt like I might be the monster doing the haunting, not quite human, never truly acceptable. A bit melodramatic, I know, but as a teenager I think I was prone to melodrama. 

Often times, the horror of the Gothic is brought about through an atmosphere of menace, of the anticipation that something horrible is coming - and that tension drew me in. I felt like the world was closing in on me in real life, and to have fictional characters survive more terrible (and often more supernatural) terrors and live in dread of what was to come was something I could identify with, and as the good overcame the evil through personal strength, I hoped maybe I could overcome the things that were troubling me. I still struggle with anxiety issues, and, often feel like everything in my life is about to go wrong, like I am always on the brink of the next disaster (perhaps because I have gone through so many things that have severely impacted my life in a negative way, and I find it hard to believe that any respite from that is anything but temporary, even after years have passed) and as such, that ominous atmosphere was something that seemed familiar, but at the same time was distanced enough through fantasy to be safe, manageable. 

A lot of Gothic novels address the supernatural, some more realistically than others. Most opt for terrible monsters that are quite fantastical (for example, the traditional werewolves, vampires and zombies), but others are stories of magic, ghosts, spirits, and curses - things that I have experienced in the real world, perhaps not always as they are written about in fiction, but they certainly  seem very real and very much a part of our world. I am, after all, basically a witch (even if I'm not overly fond of that word). I have been having supernatural (or praeternatural) experiences since I was a child, and while modern society in Britain is often very secular, atheist and disbelieving when it comes to such occurrences, I have had too many strange things happen to me to claim they do not exist. I guess some people might think me credulous, gullible or perhaps mentally ill for those experiences, or decide that they are a subconscious expression of childhood trauma or something, but as far as I am concerned, they are as real as any ordinary thing. I am not afraid of them, nor think that experiencing them makes me special, they are just another part of the world, alongside more mundane things like trees or cars or toasters. Reading fiction that actually addressed these things, written sometimes by people whose accuracy in what they present compared to what I have experienced, and what I know about things like the occult and witchcraft lend me to believe that the authors have experienced something similar, let me feel a little less alone. Anyone who has seen The Sixth Sense knows that you can't just tell people that you see ghosts! 

(Nobody can talk of why ghost stories are still relevant quite like Neil Gaiman in ::this:: article for the New York Times)

While ghost stories and vampire novels were giving me an introduction to the Gothic in literature, and to contemporary horror writing, I was still not that much of a Goth yet, and my musical tastes were rather eclectic and I didn't encounter Gothic rock of the post-punk, darkwave, French coldwave and similar varieties until my late teens. The first music that really stirred me, from outside of classical and ecclesiastical music, was the prog rock, folk rock and psychedelia my Dad would occasionally play in the car. I was brought up with Joni Mitchell, Yes (I have my own Yes compilation CD set...) The Moody Blues (before they went commercial), Jefferson Airplane, The Strawbs, Spyrogyra, etc. etc. There are songs from that era that spoke to me, and which I still adore - especially Moody Blues songs about the emptiness of space, the vastness of the universe, melancholia and the transience of life. A turning point was when I heard Melancholy Man by the Moody Blues for the first time, when it goes into the second section, with booming synthesised organ, wailing chorus and dirging guitars - I was transfixed. A song had grabbed hold of something in a way that had not happened since the soaring descant in Allegri's Miserere in church, but this time I felt like a song was singing about someone I could empathise with. I felt like the outsider, who could not see the world like others do, and in my minds eye I was watching something halfway between the rapture and a science-fiction apocalypse as they sang... Sure, it certainly was not Goth rock, and it wasn't even the symphonic metal I started with when it came to attempting 'being a Goth', but it is that same sort of reaction to a song that I have sought after ever since. 

The next song to really change my musical perspective was Severance by Dead Can Dance. I wasn't really into any form of Goth music yet at the point where I encountered Dead Can Dance; I found a CD of theirs that looked atmospheric in the school's archive of music for theatrical performances while working on a production of The Crucible by Arthur Miller (a play about the Salem witch trials, and a metaphor for the McCarthy-era 'witch-hunt' for possible communists). The CD was 'The Serpent's Egg' and the cover and name looked a bit spooky and witchy, so I stuck it in CD player and had a listen. I'd struck shuffle instead of repeat by accident, and I think the second song I heard was Severance - again, I got transfixed by music, my head filled with visions of wide and open spaces, leaden skies, and a solitary tree with its last leaves caught on the wind, birds flying in migration formation high above me... Dead Can Dance became my new favourite band, but I didn't know how they fitted into a musical context, or what bands might be similar, so I unfortunately did not end up getting into Goth via Dead Can Dance as an entry point. 

A few years later I did finally encounter proper Goth rock - in the intermediary years  I did however get into symphonic metal (Nightwish, Within Temptation, etc.) and the kind of music that got labeled 'Goth' by mainstream media that doesn't understand what Goth is (Marilyn Manson, Evanescence, Rammstein).  While I was doing music in my late teens, my teacher/lecturer (I was studying at the local community college) a very classically minded and trained fellow, was also a bit of an ex-punk and knew quite a bit about various rock genres. I think he got a bit fed up with my ignorance on Goth, so when we had to write about an album that marked a changing point in music history, he encouraged me to pick something out of Goth rock history... I ended up listening to a big chunk of the back catalogue of the big-name 'original Goth bands' (Siouxsie Sioux, Joy Division, The Cure, Bauhaus, etc.) and was torn between writing about Unknown Pleasures by Joy Division and Press The Eject And Give Me Tape by Bauhaus... so wrote about JuJu by Siouxsie and the Banshees as I felt it was their first really Gothic album (I tried arguing that in my essay, and now when I look back on it, I'm not sure I was right - but we go to school to learn, right?). I fell in love with this genre of music I hadn't really explored before and I think finally became a proper Goth that understood what Goth actually was, where it came from, and learnt about what the subculture was like beyond the other babybats I had encountered so far. JuJu ended up the first album I bought on vinyl, and my fashion, which went through phases of experimentation with other subculturally affiliated styles but had returned to mostly Goth, fixed itself firmly in black, and my love for all things both Goth and Gothic just grew. 

About a year later I went to a Goth club for the first time, and I started mixing with the Goth scene outside of people who went to college with me or school with me in the past, and suddenly met all these wonderful people and was making new friends - actually making lots of friends rather than having only a small handful of people I talked to. I had a proper social life, I had a community I was part of, and I think I realised that this was where I belonged, and I have never looked back. 

Being Neo-Pagan AND Goth

The problem with being a 'Witch' and vaguely resembling a fantasy witch is that people assume that I'm a witch based on how I look. The problem with that is that their version of 'witch' is often an assumption quite far from what I actually am, and that Goth and 'witch' are not synonyms.

There's several versions of this, and it comes from different mindsets and different assumptions, so I don't want to tackle this as if it is all the same thing. 

The first and most obvious is when non-Pagan strangers ask me if I'm a witch. There are two general versions of this; the one where the asker does not sincerely believe that I am a witch and is asking me it as a mocking question, and the one where the stranger has correlated my outfit with the idea of the fantasy sorceress and genuinely thinks that I might be a practitioner of the occult; and the rarest sort is that some have a vague idea about Wicca and modern Witchcraft and have spotted a pentacle or moon symbol somewhere upon my person, but most of those that ask are of the first two sorts, and of the second sort, they seem to think that I spend my Saturdays sacrificing goats on windswept hillsides or something with the look of fear they give me, and there's a subset of this group who are very intent on saving my soul from the Devil. 

Goth is not a religion, it does not require being a member of any religion, and you get Goths of all religions (Go look at ::Priestly Goth:: and its sister site, ::Priestly Goth Blog:: - the pages of a Pastor, painter of icons, Goth and political blogger. Not the only person who has chosen a Christian religious life that I know that also has a Goth streak!) and of none. I do think that as Goth has a Romantic aspect to it, that it tends to attract people who have a spiritual nature about them, and while yes, there are higher percentage of Goths who are on mystical and occult paths than in the general population (and I include in that Goths who follow the more mystic aspects of mainstream religions, too), it is by no means that all Goths are Pagans. 

I always find it hard to deal with these situations; I usually start with "that's an unusual question" - after all, how many other people has this person asked this question to? Probably not many, if any - and then try and figure things out from there. I don't use the word "witch" very much anyway, as I have explained in ::this:: earlier post, but my answer is going to be very different between someone who says "I noticed your pentacle ring and thought you might be Wiccan" and someone who says "Don't you Gothics (An aside: Gothic is an adjective, not a noun! People need to learn this!) worship the Devil?" I never lie, but I tend to word things carefully to neither confirm nor deny and to steer things away from me, personally. If people are ignorant but genuine curious, then I try to politely explain that they've been misinformed, if they're judgemental and going on a religious tirade, then I extricate myself from the situation. Whatever I do, I'm conscious that it will reflect on Goths as a whole, and therefore try and be as polite (but sometimes firm) as possible and make sure I do not let things devolve into an argument. 

Those who think I am some kind of crazy person and that my clothes and religion are both signs of this probably are not going to listen to any protestations otherwise, so I feel the only answer is to be a calm person and let my actions, and for those who are more than just a judgemental stranger, my life demonstrate that I am not some person wildly disconnected from reality and trying to live some delusion that they are in fact Morgan La Fey or something (there's nothing wrong with the occasional bit of dressing up as long as you're fully aware it is only a costume.) and that I am no crazier or more deluded than any other religious person may be, as there will always be the more militant atheists who try and make an issue of any religion, especially fringe religions. I am of the opinion that as long as a person is not hurting others or themselves through their religious choice, it is of no concern to others and that if you wish to engage in religious debate, it ought to be a polite discourse and not a personal attack. 

Prejudgement from Other Pagans

The Curious Professor Z wrote ::this:: very well-written, researched and thoughtful article on this topic already, and I encourage you to read it.

The most frustrating is probably when other Neo-Pagans think that Goths who are involved in Neo-Pagan spirituality, the Occult and Witchcraft are not sincere about their beliefs or, are coming at it because it is 'spooky' rather than because it connects with them on a deep and spiritual level. I find it frustrating because both Goths and Neo-Pagans are groups who have made choices that have separated them from the mainstream and opened themselves up to the assumptions, prejudice and bigotry of the ignorant, and so I'd hope that from the experience of having been judged and assumed about, that Neo-Pagans who are not Goth would be more inclined to ask questions and judge the sincerity of a person's belief on their actions, not on what subculture they are part of.

I am certainly not into Neo-Paganism as a way to deeper entrench myself in the 'spooky woman' role; this is not some blurring of the lines between everyday life and L.A.R.P. I was pagan before I was Goth, by about three years, although I definitely had Pagan attitudes and ideas that aligned with Neo-Paganism long before that, right from when I was a small child, although I did not know what Neo-Paganism was then.

To be fair, the Neo-Pagans I am currently involved with in my local area seemed pretty open and willing to give me a chance when I joined groups and starting getting involved with the Neo-Pagan community here, and I think that's partly because as the Alternative community in general is small here, people who stand out because they act and dress differently and their thoughts do not align with those of the majority, stick together, whether they're hippies, Neo-Pagans and Witches and other people who practice Alternative spiritualities, Metalheads, Goths, or any combination of the above or people who I haven't mentioned yet. My encounters with Neo-Pagans who have been judgemental have primarily been online. I think the internet is a medium through which some people forget their manners, as there is a distance in typing at a screen that can make people fail to realise there is still another human somewhere reading a different screen at a different keyboard, but not that unlike them.

The other assumption about being a Goth and a Neo-Pagan is that there are other Neo-Pagans who think that we practice curses and magic for evil purposes, that we sacrifice living things and are liable to commit some kind of sacrilegious practice or whatnot, and I think that comes from the same misinformed place as the non-Pagans that think this; they think Goth is somehow linked to 'black magic' (side note: magic does not come in 'black' and 'white'; a growth spell or a love spell can be just as destructive as a diminishment spell or separation spell, and the latter two can actually be used helpfully) and evil practices, and it just is not! It is a common misconception, but it just is not true. Goth does not have any religious affiliation, and does not involve a deliberate desire to be purposefully immoral in any spiritual or more mundane way.

As per usual, I remind people to check their assumptions, or rather, to try and avoid assumptions and to approach things from a place of learning. Goth is a subculture encompassing fashion, art, music and an appreciation for darker things; it is not an anti-moral code, a religion or a cult and has no bearing on what a person choses to be their religious, spiritual or atheist path. 

Romantic Goth and Gothic Lolita: Where I Stand

Recently, I've been getting quite into putting together a Gothic Lolita wardrobe, as an addition to my usual Romantic Goth (or should that be Gothic Romantic in my case?) wardrobe. Thankfully, while the styles are different, there's enough overlap for me not to have to do too much shopping - already have black ruffled blouses, a coffin handbag, a black cat handbag, lots of lacy accessories, fancy tights and ruffled socks,  a selection wigs, a few skirts with enough space for the pouf of petticoats, etc.  This expansion of my style is exactly that - an expansion. I am not "quitting" being a Goth, I'm just adding more variety of black outfits to my selection of black outfits! I don't plan on venturing into Sweet Lolita or Country Lolita or whatnot, just sometimes wearing outfits that adhere to the stylistic 'rules' of Lolita but are very much rooted in my being a Goth. 

Very much still a Romantic Goth
Webcam selfie

Why have I got into the Lolita subculture, then? The emphasis on outfits being well put together, on being co-ordinated is something that appeals to me.  It is a view of fashion where looking good is a skill. The anachronistic stylistic influences are something I was bound to adore - I've always been one to scavenge from various centuries and mix it all together like some kind of vampire that has been adding and altering clothes for hundreds of years with little regard to what is in fashion at any one time, or some kind of time-traveller that has hopped between times and places so often that their wardrobe doesn't really belong to any of them. Lolita provides a framework for these mixed influences, and makes it possible to combine them in a way that is aesthetically pleasing rather than incongruous. 

Finally, a sense of community - there IS definitely a Goth and Alternative community locally, even if it is a small one and even if the Metal community is certainly the predominant local one, and while I certainly do have a circle of friends that share some of my interests, I'm far more likely to have friends who want to go clubbing or to the pub than a tea party or picnic, and I am more inclined to the quieter, more sedate activities of the latter. Don't get me wrong, I do clubbing, but I see that more as an opportunity for some good music and plenty of dancing than socialising, especially as I can hardly hear myself talk, let alone anybody else. Lolitas tend to gather to chat over tea and cake, or perhaps go ice-skating or to the botanical gardens - these are the sorts of group activities that I feel far more comfortable taking part in- even if I might want to go for a stroll around the graveyard or go visiting old buildings too. 

None of this means that I am abandoning my Goth side - this is all in addition to the Goth things I continue to do. I am still going to float around in floor-length skirts and wear fingerless gloves and an over-sized ankh pendant. I'm still going to go visiting graveyards and old buildings and take photographs of ruined castles. I will still be me, and still be Goth, just with a few new dresses. 

Raven Appreciation II: A Year Living Together

♡ A Year Living Together ♡

It has now been a year since Raven and I moved to Scotland together. Our 1 year anniversary of living together was on the 20th of this month.  Nobody's been killed, the apartment building hasn't been suddenly replaced with a crater and there have been no major arguments: I call this a resounding success! I must admit I was really nervous when first moving up to Scotland; it was a new city, a new country, a new job, a new life with the man I love... a new everything! Yes, I was made redundant within a month of taking up my new job, and ended up unemployed for a while, but those are the risks of a recession, and Raven has been hugely supportive of me during that time. On the whole it has been a wonderful, wonderful experience. I have fallen in love with Scotland, and fallen even more in love with Raven. 

Tugging Raven's jacket off him. My old music corner, April '10
Photograph by Raven.

Raven and I have been together as a couple for a few years now, and I still love him as much today as I did when we first got together. It is a cliché, but I love him more each day than I did the previous, and will love him a little more the next. He is worth waxing lyrical about (read ::Raven Appreciation I::), but I'm not very good at that sort of thing and it always seems strange gushing like that in public. 

Oh, here I go anyway... 

Raven is a very kind, thoughtful, loving person; the sort of person that is always considerate of others and who worries about everyone (even though we're all fine, really!). He's hardworking, diligent, and sees "above and beyond" as the standard. He's a romantic (lower-case 'r') who sends flowers, hand-written letters, and adorable notes. He knows when I need chocolate. He is exceedingly patient, and manages to cope with my bouts of irrationality and over-emotionalness (is that even a word?) and my delving into obsession with my topic-of-the-moment. Raven is outdoorsy and adventurous; he thinks ideas like touring Europe on motorbikes and climbing random mountains are good ideas, and doesn't think that foraging for wild food in the autumn is strange. Raven is creative, and supports me in my creativity. He is, altogether, a wonderful human being. 

Dear readers, please extricate yourselves from that mass of sticky sap before I end up glueing you all together.  

Later Note:

I am entering this blog post for Victorian Kitty's monthly theme of "Someone Special" over at Sophistiqué Noir, as Raven is certainly someone very, very special to me. Victorian Kitty's blog is a very interesting fashion blog focusing mostly on her work attire, and is very well put together (as are her outfits, consistently) and she certainly deserves the title of "Corporate Goth Style Icon".  Check out her blog, and those of the other participants in this month's theme. 

Goth, Hate and Ignorance

☠ WARNING: RANT AHEAD ☠

I am in foul mood, and a rant is ahead - you have been warned. 

Amongst the slurs aimed at Goths, I have noticed a trend - I think a lot of the people who hate us have only met those amongst Babybats who are perhaps the least representative of the subculture, not even representative of Babybats, and are more in it for the shock factor and to seek attention than Goth being a true representation of themselves.

The Negative Stereotype

Goths are sullen, moody teenagers. We're white, from a middle-class background, and complain without reason in the face of a privileged life, or are always depressed. We dress the way we do to "rebel", we think we are special snowflakes, unique and individual and soooo non-conformist. We listen to Marilyn Manson, Evanescence and My Chemical Romance. We self-harm, and self-harm for attention. We wear white-face makeup and lots of chains. All male goths are gay, or transvestites, and all female goths are lesbians. Goth girls are promiscuous and all goths are into fetishes. We live with our parents, will either grow into sad, unemployed adults or give up looking weird at college. We're rude, anti-social and cliquish, and we think we're a cut above the rest. Goths are either anorexic or morbidly obese. They're ugly, using their freakish style to try and hide behind, etc. Goths are Nazis, or shoot up schools. Etc. etc. 

This is the view I see come across in various goth-bashing post on the internet; on YouTube, on forums, in the comment sections of various pages. I'm pretty sure if you've seen a Goth video on YouTube you'll have come across some of this sort of nonsense in the comments section. It's also surfaced in real life situations where people have expressed their intolerance towards Goths. You might have noticed the latent homophobia and sexism, and also the fact that it is self-contradictory. The self-contradictory nature is probably because it is coalesced from a variety of hatred spewed forth on the internet and real life (although there are quite probably people who hold these self-contradictory views too). Anyone who has spent any time in the subculture or is friendly with actual Goths will see this as nonsense far removed from the actual nature of the subculture, but this is the stereotype that remains.

Mostly, it is ignorance, closed-mindedness and an intolerance for people who are different, but somewhere in there I think there's people who have had bad experiences with those they think are Goths. Now, I don't doubt that there are few adult Goths who are neither young nor Babybats who give the subculture a bad name and act deplorably - especially as I have met a few - but the majority of these stereotypes reflect the behaviour of the more obnoxious younger pseudo-Goths; not a reflection of Babybats as younger members of the subculture or as those just starting out in the subculture, or even as those meandering through subcultural identities in search of their own, but a reflection of those people who use the subculture as a means to play the rebel or seek attention or who seem so caught up in the false stereotypes of the subculture that they become living embodiments of them. 

Goths are not all depressed, but this is a common stereotype. There is this concept that we are indulging in melodramatic angst when there is nothing really wrong with our lives. Most Goths I know are actually relatively happy people, they have their ups and downs, and I think are more likely to be open about when they are down than those in the mainstream, but are not, on the whole, particularly miserable people. Maybe it exists because Goth music has been dark and a bit depressing since the days of Joy Division, and this has probably been around for as long as the subculture. In recent years this has been worsened by the conflation of Goth with Emo, and the negative portrayal of Emo being all about depression, or worse, affected depression for attention.

Goths and Emos are often conflated in hate comments, and there seems to be a genuine lack of distinction made between the two, although one would think that on looking at a Goth and an Emo that they even look vastly different. This conflation is really annoying me, especially when perpetuated by the media., and so do people conflating Goth and Punk. It's like not being able to tell the difference between deer, sheep and goats. Lots of people have already written about the differences between Goth and Emo and between Goth and Punk and suchlike, so there is no need for me to go into it here.

The stereotype of the sullen teenager writing angsty poetry, acting in a melodramatic manner exists for a reason. Teenage years are complicated, confusing times which make a lot of young people unhappy, especially in a modern world where so much pressure is put on young people to have flourishing social lives, be sexually active, and keep up to date with trends as well as deal with the sorts of issues that come with puberty and with secondary education and whatever may be happening in their family lives. A lot of teenagers seek release in various subcultures, and sometimes do so in less than advisable manners, but that is no fault of the subculture, and while the teenagers who do this do need to be held responsible, there should be full acknowledgement of how even with all modern technology and trained adults, that the teenage years will always include mistakes, mistakes we should learn from to become better adults. That is what being a teenager is about.

The part that does, however, get to me, is the part where people do things for attention. Self-harm is a serious issue, real mental illness is very serious too, but there are people who fein mental illness for attention, and will even go as far as to self-harm for attention, or to emotionally manipulate people, and this causes a lot of problems for people who do have self-harm problems and mental health issues. I had mental health issues as a teenager, and self-harmed, but it was often pushed aside with me merely being an 'attention-seeker' in the eyes of those I was trying to seek help from and my subcultural interests I think did not do anything to sway their opinions in my favour. This sort of behaviour causes real harm to people.

There are also those who use  Goth, among other subcultures as a method of getting attention - these are the people who wear all the "gothiest" things at once regardless of whether or not they clash, that claim that they really are vampires to everyone in their school, threaten to curse people, or even threaten to shoot their fellow pupils, say rude things about "preps" or "chavs", claim to be Satanists while ignorant of actual Satanism, graffiti things with scrawled pentagrams, think Marilyn Manson is shocking, and generally try and act like they are spookiest, most evil thing to ever go to secondary school/high school/college/etc. They want to shock, they want to get attention, and they don't necessarily realise that they are embarrassing themselves and making the subculture look bad, and if they receive negativity for their behaviour, claim it is discrimination on account of their subculture. Attention seekers often think of themselves as special snowflakes, too, and are people who try and gather to themselves labels that set them apart from the majority, to make themselves ever more esoteric, and Goth can be a convenient label.

If someone is seeking attention then they are making a determined effort to be noticed, and it is these attention seekers that are therefore more likely to stick in people's minds. Those who are particularly negative in one way or another are also more likely to be remembered than those who behave politely and decently.

I have explained before how Goth is not an act of rebellion, simply a set of differing tastes, a subculture rather than a counter-culture. We are not trying to be "nonconformist". 

The mental image that many have of a Goth, as someone with white-face makeup, badly done or over-done eye-makeup, lots of chains and the sorts of clothes and accessories that were available in Hot Topic in the early '90s or in Claire's Accessories now (although I admit I have bought gloves, socks and  earrings from Claire's, as there are some nice things in amongst the tat, but my experience has usually been of things of low quality and over-priced), trying very hard to act the spooky part, perhaps being sarcastic and cliquish, or acting with pretension and superiority (such as referring to non-Goths as "mundane mortals" in seriousness) is not a representative of Goths, it is representative of Babybats and Mallgoths, who either are just learning in their subcultural beginnings or are going through a phase. Most people do not think of the many talented artists and musicians in the scene, or the elaborate outfits of Whitby Gothic Weekend or Wave Gotik Treffen, or of anything representative of just how amazing, well-done and classy Goth can be.

The homophobia, sexism, heteronormative bias, and suchlike inherent in the sort of hatred that says "Goth guys are gay because they wear makeup" or "all goth girls are dykes because they wear combats and have piercings and listen to angry music" and similar is a representation of just how inculcated into mainstream Western culture these attitudes have become. I am not here to write about gender and sexuality and society; there are reams of articles already in existence on these topics, and I am not going to paraphrase people who are far more studied and eloquent on the topics than I am. 

A lot of people who have, for one reason or another, felt uncomfortable looking "normal" have found Goth and other alternative-looking subcultures helpful to them. There are certainly Goths with eating disorders of various sorts. There are also Goths who are not traditionally "pretty" or "handsome" and suchlike. Some people find being able to create their own appearance through creativity and artifice a whole new way to be beautiful when not happy with the way they naturally look, and that is a) not necessarily a bad thing and b) not unique to Goth. There are Goths of all shapes, sizes and Goths of all colours, from paler than pale to goths of colour who are more than just black in terms of their clothes. Goths are vastly variant in appearance and body-type. 

A lot of Goths remain so long into their adult years and have successful careers, often in careers that require a significant amount of education and are certainly respectable, and often well-paying. Just look at blogs such ::Siouxsie Law:: or ::Sophistique Noir:: or ::The Dancing Maenad::  (previously ran Le Professeur Gothique) for proof of well-educated and successful adult Goths (as well as really interesting blogs). 

The last three paragraphs are things that members of the subculture already know, but yet somehow elude those outside of it, as do many of the ways in which the stereotype differ wildly from the actuality of the Goth subculture. As to the BDSM community confusion, ::this article:: at The Everyday Goth should be helpful, and as to the "goths are Nazis that shoot up schools", most of the blame can be put on the shoulders of the media coverage of the Columbine massacre. 

I am not blaming Babybats or even Mallgoths for the discrimination Goths face - only the people who discriminate against us are to blame for their actions. Babybats are not bad people, they are not deliberately giving Goth a bad name, and a lot of them are simply new to the subculture and people judging Goth by the efforts of Babybats are as misguided as people judging the whole of archery by the people who do it for an afternoon on an adventure holiday. Even attention seeking pseudo-Goths are not to blame, however annoying they may be, for the actions of others. People are ultimately responsible for their own actions. 

The Babybats a person meets at secondary school, or the Mallgoths lurking in the local shopping-centre may be the only Goths and Goth-like people that a lot of people outside the subculture interact with, partly because they are the most numerous as those for whom Goth is a phase will often have it as a teenage phase, and partly because a lot of older Goths tend to keep their subcultural affiliation fairly quiet. 

I do think, though, that more needs to be done to show the positive side of Goth, to show what the subculture is really about. The resources are there, but somehow both the mainstream and younger Babybats are not getting them, because the stereotypes remain, and even people who are interested in Goth seem to be getting stuck at the level of these stereotypes. I think the answer is for ordinary Goths to stick their heads above the parapet a bit more, for all the beautiful, creative, and wonderful sides of the subculture to be allowed to outshine all of the flawed characters and fringe members and things that just go a bit wrong that come with it being a subculture made of real human people with all of their human strengths and weaknesses, and for the subculture to encourage the best in its members and make it clear what Goth is really about, so that however much the term is abused by people twisting it for their own ends, that such abuses are infinitely outweighed. 

30 Day Goth Challenge, Day 2

Share Photos And Experiences From Your Babybat Days

Well, I was only briefly a babybat, and there weren't any photographs taken, so I can't share photos, but can I can share experiences. I wasn't into babybat music, but was into classical music so did not wear band t-shirts, and took my inspiration from Goths at the mall when I had sneaked off from sanctioned shopping trips. I was not into Satanic imagery, but into looking like a spooky sort of Witch. Yep, I was a fluffy-bunny Wiccan at the same time as a babybat Goth. I avoided those two cliches, but I still fell into lots of others. There were two shops selling both hippie/pagan and goth things in the city, and I used to frequent them both. I remember the smell of incense, hanging around with the people in the shops, and coveting the swords I was too young to buy. My partner and I have an extensive armoury between us now. Coveting attained.

I thought wearing all black was all it took to make an outfit Goth, and terribly mismatched clothes not realising that it took more than two items being the same colour to make them co-ordinate. Consequently, I wore floaty skirts with grungy tops and my black shiny wedge boots with everything, and wore cardigans over t-shirts etc. etc. I believed that only prostitutes wore fishnet, so wore opaque black tights for a while, and then when I realised that real prostitutes haven't worn fishnet in decades, finally let myself wear fishnet. I couldn't afford to buy proper clothes, and my customisation skills needed a lot of work, so all I could buy was charity shop clothes, and as I was on a rather strict allowance, this meant my wardrobe took a long time to grow, which was part of why my clothes were so mismatched - I didn't have enough clothes to put together proper all-black outfits and my choices were based on price rather than style.

I didn't know how to do my own makeup and hadn't heard of foundation, so I looked a mess. I'd been brought up by my Dad and his brothers before boarding school, and these were mainstream men that don't have a clue about makeup. I'd had no mother's dressing table to raid, wasn't allowed fashion magazines, and the other girls who did know about makeup, even if it was only mainstream makeup, didn't talk to me.  So I drew swirls on my face in pencil eye-liner. I'm very happy there are no photos of this and that I didn't often have the courage to look like that in public. Looking back, I must have appeared ridiculous. I also couldn't afford to buy proper make-up and wore halloween face-paint up as goth make-up. I really did look like an abomination. I didn't know how to blend properly, that it is important to line lips before colouring them, or how to apply mascara without making a gunky mess. I didn't have independent internet access, and I'm not sure how many goth makeup tutorials you could find on the internet in those days. There probably were a few, but nowhere near as many as there are now. YouTube wasn't even around back then. So yep, I was a makeup disaster.

My jewellery was worn all-at-once. I still wear a ring on each finger, so that hasn't changed, but I used to wear all my pendants at once, and they clashed, hideously. I also wore an actual dog's collar as a choker.   I had pierced ears, and wore big silver hoops constantly, and they'd get caught in my bird-nest of hair. My hair wasn't back-combed, it wasn't even dyed, it was long, brown and got everywhere. I went back to my bohemian braids in the end because my hair was waist-length and very fine and became natty very quickly otherwise, especially when subjected to the English weather.

Being a Goth was even more frowned upon than being a Witch at my school, but that made little difference. As I was already thoroughly bullied and mistreated, it wasn't any worse after my change in wardrobe because it really couldn't get much worse. I just got called "vampire" instead of "crazy cow". Everybody already thought I was a freak, probably because of my strange behaviour due to my insanity at the time, and partly because I have never had anything in common with the mainstream. Fashionable clothes, music and popular culture has always bored me. Also, I was a scholarship girl and skipped a year, those things got me bullied a lot too. Not to mention being scrawny and very tall, and really, really pale by nature.  One more thing for them to pick on me for really didn't change anything.  If anything, I was smug in my anti-fashion and felt a little stronger facing the bullies.

It was probably a wonderful thing for everyone that I stopped being goth, and didn't come back to the subculture until I'd had several years experience of dressing in an alternative manner. The world didn't have to put up with my bad attempts at Goth, and the local members of the Goth subculture didn't have to put up with a mentally unstable babybat, and I don't have any embarrassing photos. Everybody wins.

30 Day Goth Challenge, Day 1

I am going to take part in the 30 Day Goth Challenge. This is 30 questions theoretically to be answered on consecutive days. I can guarantee these won't be up on consecutive days. These are the questions:

Day 1 – How did you come to the subculture? 

Day 2 – Share photos and experiences from your Baby Bat days. 

Day 3 – When did you come out the Goth closet? (If you didn’t then simply discuss the topic) 

Day 4 – Name a stereotype or cliche you can relate to. 

Day 5 – Is there a local Goth band or group in your area? 

Day 6 – Hand write your favourite lyric and take a picture. 

Day 7 – Ten of your favourite goth bands. 

Day 8 – What’s your worst and best experience with non-Goths? 

Day 9 – What genre of music do you dislike? 

Day 10 – What do you hate and love about the subculture? 

Day 11 – Is Goth a lifestyle for you? 

Day 12 – What’s your gothic inspiration? 

Day 13 – What was your first band t-shirt? 

Day 14 – What was your best and worst DIY disaster. 

Day 15 – Your favourite or most expensive item in your wardrobe. 

Day 16 – What’s the most casual you’ve ever dressed? 

Day 17 – Your favourite Goth brand. 

Day 18 – Worst hair experience. 

Day 19 – Share beauty advise and take a photo of your make up. 

Day 20 – If you could dye your hair any colour what would it be? 

Day 21 – What body mod do you have or have you considered? 

Day 22 – If you could attend any Goth event what would it be? 

Day 23 – Your favourite artist or photographer. 

Day 24 – Name the best websites for Goths. 

Day 25 – Did you ever consider leaving the subculture? 

Day 26 – Show a photo for every year (or month if you’re new) that you’ve being into Goth. 

Day 27 – The worst thing you ever did to a newbie. 

Day 28 – Do you consider yourself an eldergoth? 

Day 29 – What do you think will happen to Goth in the future? 

Day 30 – Make a list of blogs you regularly read and link to them. 


I'm not sure who started it, but I want to take part. 


So, for Day 1! How did I come to the subculture... Well, the very first goth I met was a girl called Rose or Rosie who was a few years older than me and at the first secondary school I attended. This secondary school was a state girls-only day school and we had a navy-blue uniform that was pretty conservative for state school uniforms (long skirts, shirts, ties, blazers), and she used to change into black dresses for the journey too and from school, much to the dismay of the staff, wore a "Vote Satan" t-shirt to P.E and had pentagrams drawn on her bag. I was just getting into Wicca at the time, and asked her if she was a Witch, but I was huge "fluffy-bunny" and I think I annoyed her. A fluffy-bunny is the Wiccan equivalent of a mall-goth or babybat, but they come in all ages, and some never realise stuff like that Wicca has only been around since the 1940's and that sparkly wands are just silly. I confess, I had a sparkly wand... Anyway, I thought she was cool, but at the same time I was terrified of her. There were a lot of rumours about her self-harming, that her and her goth friends slit each others wrists and drank blood, that she was on drugs, etc. etc. Now, I realise that it was a bunch of malicious nonsense, and it was probably the fact that she had to put up with that sort of bullying which made her snap when I asked her if she was a Witch too.  I regret having believed the rumours, and regret being afraid of her, as she was probably really nice. 

While not at school I was a bit of a tomboy, and as I had grown upwards unusually quickly and without much sign of  gaining curves, I ended up looking like a male teenage boy that was vaguely into metal and a bit of a geek. I wore baggy, ripped-by-use jeans and those black t-shirts with pictures of "cool stuff" on. My favourite t-shirts were one that said "I don't do mornings" and one that was all black with a space scene on the front. I'd wear chokers and my hair in a ponytail and wore those silver-looking necklaces that come on black cord. My favourite was a moon necklace, but I also ended up with dragons and swords and suchlike pendant designs. I had a girl ask me out when I was 13 because she thought I was actually a boy! I also ended up with big round glasses and a jaw-brace, completing my geekiness. 

It was a couple of years later when I got interested in Goth for myself. I was sent away to a very conservative Christian girls-only boarding school, where I did not fit in, was disliked by many of the staff and felt very isolated. I had a handful of good friends there, including Dawn who gave me that candle-holder, who I am all still friends with, but most of the girls spread rumours about me, didn't want to talk to me, and bitched about me behind my back. There were a lot of nice people there, don't get me wrong, but my  experience was mostly negative, and I will admit that my memories of this period are also patchy and distorted. While I was there, I was suffering from mental health issues relating back to my childhood, and the oppressive atmosphere and lack of support from my peers, who, admittedly I alienated further as I started acting on delusions and slowly falling further and further into insanity, only made matters worse. At this point I was having violent mood-swings, from deranged hyperactivity where I was gabbling nonsense and dancing about in the corridors, to suicidal depression when the hyperactivity and its associated distance from reality wore off and I was back faced with a life that had been rather painful, and only looked to be getting more painful. I started hallucinating and then became quite delusional, really believing myself to be an elf in a human body, and paranoid, partly because when I wasn't at boarding school I was being stalked by a neighbour and partly because I was also genuinely having bad things done to me by people who had realised that if I complained, nobody would believe me. The staff also used this - when it suited them to use it as an excuse, I was insane, the rest of the time, they said I was acting up for attention. I was seeing mental health professionals at this time, and the school ignored their advice. Needless to say, it ended badly.

My usual mode of dress at this time was rather bohemian, floaty, lots of green. This fitted in with the "elf" delusions, but when I was more myself - and I did end up with some extended periods of clarity - I started dabbling with an all black look, babybat Gothic. Part of me was being rebellious, as it was primarily the "preppy" rich and fashionable girls who mocked me for being at school on scholarship, for being socially awkward, for having no interest in popular culture. So I took on a Punk-inspired anti-fashion "I hate the mainstream" look, not one executed particular;y well, but one that was my sign of defiance. I had a pair of black patent wedge boots that I loved to death and did not know how to do my own makeup, and my spiked collar originally belonged to a neighbour's dog. Of course, this was seen as a sign of my instability or wayward nature, and while my Dad didn't mind, the parents of my friends and the school did. I quickly decided I was going to go back to colours. I had enough problems in my life, I did not need more.

I had begun teaching myself to play the piano in secret, after dark, as I could not afford the school piano lessons, and the school had halted my 'cello lessons as music was being considered a distraction. I would sneak in an out of the music department or the piano room below the dormitories of the younger children, still clad in my long white night-dress and pastel purple kimono/dressing gown, and I would play. I taught myself basic pieces, how to play with both hands independent of each other, how to play scales, and would write songs of my misery and madness because that way I could express all the things in my head without fear of being locked up for being mad or judged for being unorthodox. The piano was inanimate, but it was my confessional, my comfort, my link to sanity. Of course, this was thoroughly against school rules, so I learnt how to open windows from the outside, how to sneak around outside of CCTV view, how to hide and escape whenever some member of staff came to see who was playing piano in the early hours of the morning. I convinced several first-years that the school was haunted by a piano playing ghost, and I, all in pale colours, white as a sheet, with long scraggly dark hair and enough synthetics to spark as I ran, made a very good ghost when necessary. This might seem a tangental anecdote, but later on I will explain the huge impact classical music has had on my life as a Goth. 

After my GCSEs I left that school, and switched to another boarding school, but by that point the psychological damage had been done. I had become painfully shy, depressed and highly distrustful, even if my moods were more level and the delusions and hallucinations were gone. I kept to my bohemian look, and got a bit more hippie. 

At this point I met three wonderful people. Two were day pupils at my school, and one was one of their friends. The two day pupils weren't Goths, but one of them had a definite Gothic streak, with her attic bedroom painted purple, the empty bird-cage, the poetry written on on the door, her beautiful velvet skirts and her taste for the macabre, and the one who didn't go to my school definitely was a goth. I thought my goth friend's clothes were amazing, especially her towering Demonia platform boots. It didn't cause a change in my style right then, but it began something. I was given a purple, black and blue velvet lace-up medieval style blouse that suddenly became my favourite piece of clothing, and then a black peasant blouse got worn a lot... then I bought an all-black cheese-cloth ensemble. It had definitely influenced me. I was still predominantly a colourful bohemian, but a darker edge was beginning to emerge.  The dark one of my school pals steered me in the direction of deliciously dark books and horror movies. There was already a dark edge in my art and poetry, and I was working on the second draft of my post-apocalyptic novel (although it was more dark fantasy at the time).

My music of choice at the time was classical. I especially loved music of the Romantic period and 19thC.  Everything from stormy Beethoven to grand Mahler symphonies. The school did a performance of the Mozart Requiem, it wasn't quite Romantic but it was the most exciting concert I've performed in (and that still stands, years on and many concerts later) and that is when I started getting interested in period dress and historical fashion. I loved the passion, I loved the darkness, the power, the storminess. Liszt and Beethoven became my favourite composers. I read up on the Sturm und Drang movement, and felt I was born in the wrong era. I read Faust. I left school before completing all of my A levels because the pressure of school was starting to take its toll on my fragile mental health, and took a year out of studying at school, and became a bit of a recluse at home, but a very studious recluse. I had not previously had the opportunity to learn much in the way of music because of finances and attitudes from staff who saw my passion for music as a distraction from more academic pursuits.  Now I had time to myself, I threw myself into research on the Romantic era and latter movements such as the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. 

I really wished for the money to learn instruments properly. My then step-brother (my Dad's now ex-partner's son) was off at Trinity College of Music in London, and I was in envy of his skill. The cheapest instrument to learn was the recorder, so I started studying that seriously, and I soon grew to love it and respect it as an instrument. I also ended up playing a lot of baroque music. I must say I still love the Romantic period more in terms of music, but I loved the period clothes on the covers of the music. I bought my first lace-cuffed shirt, and oh, how I adored it. The Baroque period was beautifully decadent, but I longed for the passion of Romantic-era music. I ended up learning a few Romantic-era flute pieces on the recorder for my amusement.

My passion for music had become a passion for history, art history and historical fashion. I discovered steampunk, and my daily dress was blend of bohemian, steampunk and historical influences. I had a pocket-watch, a parasol, and wore long velvet skirts, or dressed as a Victorian or earlier gentleman - not historically accurate, just what I thought looked good - but there was always a tendency towards wearing dark colours, and in looking for Victorian things I found a lot of Romantic Goth clothes. My music had diversified, I was listening to Evanescence, Marilyn Manson, Muse, Nightwish, Within Temptation and lots of other rock with a darker edge, including plenty of songs by mainstream bands that were tinged with a certain level of black. One day I went to a friend's house to play computer games (LAN party... I admit it) and they were playing Rammstein. I was in love with this harsh sound that was less growling than metal, with audible lyrics (albeit in German) and I discovered Industrial. I'd gone from orchestras and pianos to electric guitars and synthesisers, and was looking at rock music with the dissecting eyes of a music student. 

I also dyed my hair purple as purple is my favourite colour and has been for a very, very, very long time. I also went to college.

My first application was to do an art course rather than A Levels, but I was advised to get my A Levels and then apply to do my degree in art by the people at the first college, as they said I'd have got bored, and needed the academic side. I was really upset at the time, sick to death of academic pressures (I had been skipped a year at school, and it was always expected of me to be perfect, anything less than 95% on an exam was as bad as failure) and just wanted to be creative. I already had an AS in Art, though, so went to the local community college, and took my A Levels. My mental health had levelled out by this point, and I was lucid and socially aware enough to make friends, and I became friends with lots of Goths and Metalheads. My outfits were a mix of historically inspired, Bohemian, Steampunk and Goth. I studied English Literature, Classical Civilisations, Music, Art and Geography, all of which fed into my Romantic attitude. The more I studied, the more I absorbed. I started writing poetry profusely, composing my own music, and designing my own outfits. I read and read and read, and joined the literature society at college...

I had a mental health relapse as a consequence of being in a very destructive relationship, and ended up back in the pit of despair. I ended up hallucinating and with a fractured personality. Once again I was on the brink, but this time I was aware of it, and sought help, and eventually got the help of a reasonable psychiatrist after having been moved around the system as they couldn't pin a diagnosis on me, and came to the realisation I was not inherently mentally unstable, there was no neurological fault or chemical imbalance; I was an abuse survivor whose wounds had never been given chance to properly heal because instead of getting productive help, I had been pushed from one stressful and negative scenario to the next. I was also older and wiser, and realised that I was not a child needing the support of adults anymore, I was a grown woman who needed to fix her own life. So I did. I sought out my piano in times of emotional distress instead of cutting, I wrote bad poetry, wrote venting letters to my psychiatrists, and finally cut my mother out of my life like I should have has the strength to ten years previously. I faced my inner demons on my own terms and dealt with them.

A lot of my reading and music in this dark time was what could be considered Gothic. I felt solace in knowing I wasn't alone, that other people suffered, that other people went through this sort of agony. I started listening to Emilie Autumn and The Dresden Dolls a lot, and wrote a few angsty songs of my own. I started searching for beauty in the darkness, rather than fleeing. By this point I had suffered terrible abuses, gone mad and nearly died a couple of times - I had lived in the darkness - and I refused to let it dictate my nature in a negative, broken way. I was determined to use it as fuel to grow into a better and stronger person. My then boyfriend wounded me deeply, but in having to deal with him I found a deeper strength in myself. He also helped me pick my first guitar.

While I was in my final year at college (I spent 3 years there in total, as I took on music in my final year) I was definitely completely Goth. I wasn't a babybat aesthetically, definitely a Romantic Goth this time around, and I was also a modern Romantic, full of Keats, Shelley, Wordsworth, Liszt, and Pre-Raphaelite paintings, going out to seek experience, the awesome power of nature, trying to convey that in my own creative output. I was also into Victorian Gothic Revival art, architecture and design. I spent many hours in books and many hours outdoors being inspired.  Musically, though, I hadn't yet discovered the 1980s. My music tutor changed all that, he made me write an essay on the origins of Goth. In less than a week I'd listened to large chunks of the back catalogue of Siouxsie and The Banshees, Bauhaus, Sisters of Mercy, and on researching the BatCave, Specimen. I learnt about Bowie and about Velvet Underground, I learnt about "Paint it Black" by the Rolling Stones and about Ian Curtis and Kurt Cobain... I ended up writing two more detailed essays pertaining to Goth - one about Siouxsie and the Banshees as a punk band, post-punk band, and how they then kept stylistically changing, and another about multicultural influences in the music of Dead Can Dance (which I rehashed as an answer to a question on multicultural influences on modern music in an exam). With discovering 1980's goth music, I discovered the complete Goth scene, and finally felt like I had found myself in the process.

Years have passed between then and now, and I'm still a Goth, still a Romantic, still with my head in a book or out playing the flute above the creek. I changed, took on a degree in Creative Arts, grew up, moved out, moved country, moved in with my partner... I came to the Goth subculture in stages throughout my adolescence, skirting around the edges, but always being tugged towards it, finally, in writing an essay in my last year of college, I fell into the core, and have absolutely no intentions of ever leaving.