By Ben Conway 

This is my four-day countdown (or less depending if/when this SCAB gets posted) until I ditch my teenage years forever, embracing adulthood in its fullest – through a number.

I want to use this time to reflect on something my best friend said to me today:

“Some people go through life and are here to absorb, watch and be entertained. There is no problem with that. On the other hand, there are people who want to create and be those entertainers”.

We are lucky to have found our calling, or think we have – everyone has his or her own perspective and ideation, we all have our own character. Correct me if I’m wrong or off the mark but I’m sure Pietro said he doesn’t want to be branded as the ‘Italian’. I often think I brand myself as the funny gay (egotism eye roll). Within two weeks I somehow conditioned Steve into dry hugging me from behind at the pub (I’m sure having a few bevs helped him do that) and people saying “yaaaas” and “girl” to me in conversation (although I’m pretty sure the fagetry inside of me spews that out all the time). So what the hell am I on about?

Last night, Holly said to me “You came in those shoes and it was indefinitely you, there was no effort to be something. You could just see that it is a piece of clothing and you were being nothing but yourself”. I had a bit of a moment because she understood! Not everyone might understand.

Another divergent in this story was when I became a living coat hanger and not in one of my many cross-dressing escapades. I was holding my Mum’s bag in an Exeter layby teahouse and some bloke said to her “your son needs to butch up a bit”. What a twat, I was holding a handbag.

I embrace the gay, and it’s me, this isn’t a protest on sexuality – although if you want an actual conversation on that, I can talk with you for ages about blood donation discrimination! But I want to be able to go into my twenties with a sure footing of knowing who I am, and what I want from myself. Which takes me back to the entertainers quote from my bestie, there is a WANT I have for making content that is indefinitely me – I want to say there is a line of who I am as a person and what sort of work I want to make but that is utter bollocks (refer back to utter bollocks by looking at the rest of this SCAB).

So soak it up and don’t get overexposed to the thang that is me, because there’s plenty more sun where that came from. End SCAB with jazz hands, upset stomach resulting in awkward fart noise (moves foot across the floor to pretend it was my shoe that made the noise instead) and high heart rant panting because I LOVE BREAD!

Ben xox