Panic

What can I wear? What can I wear? I survey my battered old wardrobe, stuffed, jam packed with clothing. The shelves heave under the piled weight of garments. The rubble of bags and shoes accumulated at the bottom threatens to spill out. I have so much junk that piles of clothes are looped over the back of my chair, heaped on my desk. Dresses are precariously hung on the back of the door, accumulating dust. Ohhhh, I have NOTHING to wear! This dress? No, it makes me look like I’ve gained ten pounds. What about this cute striped top? Too winterish. What about your summer wardrobe staple, the hot pink flared skirt? No, no, no, it’s all wrong. I finally settle for casual black trousers, a striped roll neck with a dress layered over the top and some funky jewellery. I make it as far as downstairs, when my mother’s grimace says it all. Trying too hard. Ok, back to the drawing board, I inwardly sigh. I carefully extract my favourite brown jacket from a bulging shelf. Right. What goes with dark brown? Pink? The orange top? Oh I know-

“OctoberPoppy!” Mum calls up the stairs. (Except she uses my real name, of course.) “What on EARTH are you doing? Come on! You’ve got five minutes and then we’re going without you!” she threatens. I panic, jolted into action. So I throw on whatever’s close to hand- comfort wins the day and it’s a pair of worn jeans and a comfortable hooded top. I am obviously inept when it comes to being a glamour puss.


It’s a month to go. I’m starting to panic. Those sly, insidious thoughts, “Oh my God, what have I let myself in for?” are starting to filter into my brain. They are snickering, horned, devilish thoughts, the type that slowly erode your confidence until it is well and truly in shreds. This all began when, idly, I thumbed through a dusty volume from my bookshelf. “Oh! It’s my trusty French Grammar Book!” The surprised delight I felt (yeah, I’m a weirdo, I know- getting excited over French Grammar…honestly…) didn’t last long. “Hmm don’t know that. Hmm, don’t know that either…(turns page)…nor that…oh, or that!” Then, the subvertive little thought: “Well, what do you know, OctoberPoppy?” Apparently not much. It gets worse. This book is aimed at GCSE. GCSE!!! Been there, got the t-shirt (strangely I don’t feel so proud now). I’m supposedly an A standard A-Level candidate. The funny thing is, when it comes to higher level stuff I’m not too bad. Seems like all that subjunctive jargon has caused my basic structures to become more than a little rusty.

I’m going to be absolutely shamed at uni.