Start Your Engines

When the pandemic first hit I was in my third semester at UAL's London College of Fashion. The first two semesters were challenging and stressful, yet some of the most rewarding work I'd ever done in all my life. The third and last semester of my program was a completely different story...

THE BEGINNING OF THE END

I was a wreck, to put it lightly.

When I first came to study at LCF my stress, though it was at a level 1,000 100% of the time, drove me to do some of my best work. There was so much pressure to produce the best work and create a portfolio that shouted PICK ME!! Please love my work so much that you NEED to give me those recommendations that we're all competing for to help me move forward in this industry!! Now add to that a worldwide pandemic that shuts down the entire University and cuts you off from a plethora of resources needed to help give you an edge. My stress-ometer broke.

I had just about given up on everything, my dreams, ambitions, assignments and just life in general. At this point I welcomed Death and decided that I would just as soon greet him in sweats that I had worn for 2 weeks straight, a baggy shirt that would certainly smell familiar to Death, and a makeup-less face that hopefully he would not mistake for a mirror.

I became paralysed by my anxiety for the future. I couldn't complete my assignments. I couldn't figure what to eat. I couldn't sleep and when I did, I couldn't make myself wake up in the morning. All I could do was lay on the couch and watch Ru Paul's Drag Race.

I ended up quitting my program and feeling like I had let everyone down, again, for the umpteenth time in my life. Now I was faced with the question, what on God's green earth was I going to do? Start that business I've always dreamed of? Try and get a job without that oh-so-important college degree? To be honest with you, I still have no idea. And I became so overwhelmed by it all that I just couldn't do anything and I became depressed.

So what do you do when you become so overwhelmingly anxious and depressed that you've stopped eating? That's right. You put on a drag show.

I'd become inspired by the ladies on Ru Paul's Drag Race. They all have such tenacity and drive, a will to make it even when they fell short. I wanted to be like that. I wanted to be a fierce queen with a sickening wardrobe that could walk down the runway like a drag superstar.

So one night me and a couple friends decided that we would do just that from the comfort of our home. We drew new features on each other's faces and donned our most lavish pieces with big sparkling jewellery. We pranced around the living room living our fantasies and listened to the judges panel critiquing contestants as if they were us. It was one of the best most memorable nights of my pandemic life.

Now, we had all hoped against hope that when 2020 ended we would get to say goodbye to our face masks and all the troubles that have changed everything. But, it's not quite over yet. However, with the new season of Drag Race coming out, I very much look forward to saying goodbye to my 2020 frumpy sweats and hello to my 2021 cocktail dress sparkles. Because even if no one will see me in it for a little while longer, there is something so healing about dressing up for absolutely no one but yourself. After all, if you can't love yourself, how in the hell are you gonna love somebody else? Can I get an amen?

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