Loop

The other night I went to Edge Hill again. Monday heralded the beginning of my MA course in Creative Writing there, and though I know there's a lot of hard work ahead of me, it was great to be back. There were a few 'old faces' there from my time on the BA in English and Creative Writing, and it was a pleasure to see them, but it was also an invigorating experience to meet the 'new faces' too (all of whose faces were actually older than the 'old faces', what with them being more mature students). After some initial introductions and feet-finding, we got onto talking about methodologies, which is a very cerebral topic and the harbinger of tough (but no doubt enjoyable) times ahead.

When the seminar was over though, and I had chatted a bit to a good friend and fellow blogger (check out his 'Utterances of a Heathen'), I walked back through Edge Hill's lovely 160-acre campus and it brought back to mind the day I first moved there three years ago. I was pretty hungover, thanks to nice night of farewell drinks with my Lancaster pals, and was sleeping a fair bit during the journey down. I was wearing my Liverpool shirt (I thought it important to let people know my football standing and probably have some banter over it) and some classic sensitive-eye sunnies and I remember actually that I wasn't clean shaven (I was a bit annoyed I wasn't because I had to have a picture taken for my new unicard and looked a bit scruffy).

I'm not going to go into the whole day, suffice to say that being back in education at Edge Hill transported me all but bodily into the past. I swam in the - probably compromised - memories: sharing drinks with new hall mates, mum crying as she said goodbye to her smelly son for a while and, something which continued for a long time, not unpacking.

So I'm back where I began. Or am I? The shirt's different, though it still bears the same badge. I've put on a bit of weight. I guess the core of me is very similar, but here I go again into the unfamiliar.