Happy New Year, everybody! I haven’t shared my blog posts here in a while but I couldn’t leave this one – here’s a list of my favourite dramas of the year:

https://crabbyfordramas.wordpress.com/2024/01/01/my-favourite-dramas-of-2023/

When you think of Healer, what do you remember? A group watch with @turtuallysarcastic @saturtledaisy and @ayaan inspired this blog post about Healer and its staying power!

https://crabbyfordramas.wordpress.com/2023/05/27/a-healer-retrospective/

The reign of the Hot Shower Scene is over! Long live the Awkwardly Shot Depressing Shower Scene!

Hey guys! I wrote a quick thing about what it was like to see the Someday or One Day film at the cinema! Basically, I loved it. Tread carefully though, I spoil everything 😂

https://wordpress.com/post/crabbyfordramas.wordpress.com/2367

I’m impressed I’ve gotten this far with Love February, to be honest. When I was little, I always wanted to be one of those people who keeps a diary; a lovingly crafted diary, with sketches and collages and sentiments written in beautiful cursive writing with shimmering gel pens. Unfortunately, though, I’m not that person – I’ve never been able to consistently keep a diary, not for a long time at least. And I’ve tried many times.
I’m glad to have at least attempted it though – it’s crazy going back to old diaries and seeing the cringey things your past-self wrote. For instance, I found one from 2015 the other day. I was challenging myself to watch as many dramas as possible over the summer holidays, one of which being Shining Inheritance, a show I didn’t think much about then but is now my ultimate favourite drama. Funny how things change?
Anyway, it’s been a challenge to consistently post things for Love February, even though it’s only been two weeks. There have been a few lazy days, that’s for sure. But I chose to do this this time around because I thought it would be good for my brain, and I was right. It wasn’t just the checking back in everyday, or the consciously holding on to nice little things that happened so I could write about them. It was that it brought me back here, every day, pouring through the fanwall (which I didn’t even do when I was here every day, I usually forget about it) and seeing all of you guys again! I still see a lot of you (since I mostly live on the Discord server now) but with everyone I don’t, it kind of feels like a funny school reunion. I get to see where everyone’s lives are these days.
And maybe years from now we can look back on the things we’ve written and see them like funny little diaries, time capsules preserving versions of ourselves that no longer exist.
This is all to say, Cocoa created something really special here, and I’m so glad I joined this time.
I’ve got something a bit personal planned for tomorrow, so until then,

Love, February

This evening, I went out for drinks with the owner of an art gallery I started volunteering at recently to talk over some work things. I was telling her about all my apprehensions towards my new job, and she essentially said to me, “You’re good with people, and they need that, so you’ll do great.” That lovely sentiment kind of stopped my brain for a moment because I never expected that she might think I’m good with people.
I don’t think I’m good with people in the slightest. I never say anything smart or interesting in most social situations because I’m better when I have time to reflect and collect my thoughts. I retreat into myself when I meet new people. I’m a smiling robot with three pre-programmed phrases. Eye contact with strangers and people I’m uncomfortable with is unbearable, and in evading it, I can’t help but start to track my eye movements. I try to create a natural pattern. I’ll look at the floor, across the table, over their shoulder, at their face, rinse and repeat.
I’m a censored, measured, jittery version of myself with 95% of people – only the few remaining get to see the real me. And it’s not even my choice! It’s like my brain goes through an instantaneous interview selection process and refuses to inform me on why and how the people I end up myself around have passed.
All this to say, I’m baffled every time I receive a compliment like this and struggle to see it as a good thing. If my mask has gotten convincing enough for me to be told I’m “good with people”, am I ever going to be able to drop it?
But, tonight I was clever. I was creative. I showed her my favourite painting (I’ll add a picture of it), something that’s very personal to me. I tripped over my words a little bit, but for the most part, I articulated myself well. I think I deserved tonight’s compliment, and I refuse to agonize any further on what it means for me.
Love, February

One of the things that has really stuck with me about Thirty But Seventeen over the years is that the heroine Seo-ri described her post-coma existence, where she had no stability or direction, as her life’s “intermission”. Eventually, the intermission would end, and her life would go on again.
I think these last six months were my intermission. It was painful to try and imagine the future – as far as I was concerned, I didn’t have one – so I was convinced I would be stuck in my torturous situation forever. But now that I have a full-time job on the horizon, the future is opening up again, and I can imagine all the wonderful things coming my way, like:
A place to live that’s just mine
Full of all my things, finally in one place
My clothes and books and treasures
Accessible at all times
Money to spend
Going to the cinema and the theatre
Visiting friends around the country
Eating out at my favourite restaurants
Taking holidays
Time that is just mine
To spend finishing my novel
Experimenting with recipes
Watching all the dramas on my list
Exploring my new neighbourhood
Resting, finally
And the possibility of being alone with myself, and liking it

Love, February

I think my creative juices flow faster when I should be doing anything else – for instance, I should be doing my volunteer work and prepping for my new job, but all I can think about is the things I want to write!
My brain is best when I\’m writing for pleasure, and I have so many ideas on the go at the moment. Would people want to read a retrospective on Ma Boy and its surprisingly toxic message? A passionate defence of the amnesia trope? A dissection of all the weirdness that was Jealousy Incarnate? Another mega-essay recapping and analysing The Interest of Love?
Whether they want it or not, I\’m writing it!
Love, February

The best thing happened just now! I work at a chip shop at the moment (only two weeks left!) and was told I could go early. I ordered some food to take away with me, and while I was waiting I realised I should check the bus timetables. I had just missed one, and the other was coming in five minutes (which is how long it takes to get to that bus stop).
I assumed I would never make it and trudged to the bus stop, annoyed that I would have to wait 40 minutes for the next one. It takes an hour to get home, so it really makes a difference! But not long after I sat down, it came! I’ve never been so grateful for a bus to be late before!
The littlest things can totally flip how your day is going!
Love, February

I was going to write something silly today, but I found out a few hours ago that someone I\’ve known most of my life has died. My sisters have been distracting me and making me laugh, but now that I\’m alone, I\’m just going to let myself be sad about it.

Love, February

I really suffer with the Sunday Blues. Friday and Saturday are limitless, but Sunday is always tainted by the shadow of the impending Monday. So let’s just embrace the melancholy! Why fight it? Blues have a beauty of their own – I’ll listen to some Jannabi, curl up in bed, and finish the blog post I’ve been working on. I refuse to feel like I’m wasting the day away!
Love, February

I didn’t like animals before. I could passively appreciate their cuteness, but I didn’t fall at my feet for them the way the people around me did. I was unaffected.
And then almost two years ago, my sister asked for my help – she was adopting a dog, a stray from Serbia, and she needed me to drive her to the motorway services just outside the city to collect him. I was happy to help, but I didn’t expect to feel much for the dog. I was also worried – this puppy had probably been through unspeakable things, would he be aggressive? Standoffish? Impossible to train?
Leo, however, was none of those things.
Leo, perhaps because of what he had been through, immediately cuddled up to all of us, ready for everyone’s love. He was unspeakably lovable from the moment I laid eyes on him, and has become even more so as the layers of his personality have unfolded.
This little puddle of fur, this snuffley truffley piglet, this furry seal cub, has singlehandedly changed how my brain works. I get it now. I get why people treasure their pets, what a comfort they are, how strong the compulsion is to protect them.
And I never want to go back to how it was before!

Love, February

I’ve always been unashamed of the fact that I still rewatch the shows I watched as a child. If I can still tolerate them as an adult, isn’t that just a testament to how good they are?
Charlie and Lola heals my inner child, the little girl who refused to be anything other than herself. The Raggy Dolls makes me feel better about my body. Towser has no right being so funny decades and decades after it was released, but it still makes me laugh. The list goes on.
And then there’s Mumfie.
Funny story, 2020 was the worst year of my life (no big surprise there, but it wasn’t directly because of the Big Terrible Thing). I remember all the times I was happy that year because they struck me by surprise.
Here’s when I was happy:
1. When it was revealed that Masaki Suda (my favourite actor) was playing the villain in MIU 404, which I hadn’t even known he was going to be in.
2. When, about fifteen years after being introduced to it, I finally got to know how Mumfie ended.
You see, we only had two out of three of the video releases, so for my entire life, Mumfie ended on a horrible cliffhanger. I looked for that final video for years, to no avail, and had basically given up on ever finding the last few episodes. But in 2020, someone uploaded the whole series on YouTube, and I finally got my happy ending.
Mumfie is a short and sweet adventure series about a lonely little elephant looking for adventure, who inadvertently befriends lonely people everywhere he goes. Seeing it complete closed a hole in my heart I didn’t know I had, at a time when I had forgotten what happiness feels like.
And today, I gift it to you. If you want it, of course.

Love, February

I graduated university last July with an unfounded amount of confidence in life’s ability to make the pieces fall into place. Aside from a six-week internship, I had nothing in place and was in no rush to find a full-time job. It’ll work itself out, I thought.
In hindsight, it’s very obvious that I was setting myself up for months of unemployment and crushing disillusionment. Nothing could have prepared me for how depressing, shameful and soul-destroying it is to be a jobseeker, especially when your friends are already assimilating into the adult world in roles you can only envy.
It’s been the second-hardest winter of my life, and by far the loneliest.
But today, strangely and almost comically, everything has worked itself out.
This morning I secured a job that pays very well, that will allow me to do things I’m passionate about inside and outside the office, and that can propel me out of my sister’s house and into the independent life I’ve been desperate to lead. It’s too good to be true, honestly, and I can’t fathom how someone who has only met me once has so much confidence in my abilities. I am humbled, and I am so, so grateful.
So today I’m feeling like I really do
Love,
February.

I’ve decided to do Love February this year because I think it will be good for my brain. Do you know what isn’t? TikTok. So as an act of love towards myself, today I’m deleting it.

Love, February