Something strange happened to me last year. On five or six occasions, I needed the money for something – a plane ticket to see someone I love, a daunting credit card bill, a vital item that needed replacing – and I’d think, “If only I could afford this, everything would work out.” Then, within a day or two, I’d be offered a piece of work that would pay that exact amount to the pound, or I’d be able to travel with work to exactly the place I wanted to go. It was a lucky and auspicious 12 months.
Fast forward to this cold, hard January, and nothing is unbearably bad, but I wouldn’t quite say anything is going especially “well” either. Living and working alone, when your major social interaction of the day is bitching about your problems with the nicest man at the coffee shop who always gives you extra stamps on your loyalty card, disappointments can begin to cut rather than scratch.
