Dear Diary, I'm going to learn to play 'Cardigan' on the keyboard

At one point on New Year’s Eve, I found myself in the public toilet of the village community centre, where we’d gathered for a full-village Hogmanay bash (We’d gathered in the community centre, I mean, not in its toilet; that would’ve been weird even by Village standards…), along with a group of teen and pre-teen girls, who were rehearsing a complicated dance routine, which they would deliver later, to rapturous applause.

“My New Year’s Resolution is to stop caring what people think of me,” said one girl, during a break in proceedings.

Everyone nodded, impressed.

“Mine is to get abs,” said another.

Silence.

I paused in the act of removing my lipstick from the corners of my mouth, where it had already migrated, making me look a lot like The Joker, even though it was still only 8pm, and I’d only been wearing it for about 30 minutes.

As the only adult (well, sort of…) in the room at the time, I felt like I should maybe step up here to explain to these girls that no 11-year-old (or 12, or 13, or ANY year-old, really) needs to “get abs”. Like, I could deliver a rousing speech, a bit like Robin Williams in Dead Poets Society — or maybe more like America Ferrera in the Barbie movie? — and, in years to come, they’d all look back fondly on the time a random woman who looked a bit like The Joker changed the course of their young lives in a public bathroom by pointing out that not caring what people think of you is, perhaps, a loftier goal than that of getting abs.

Fortunately for me, though, before I could work up the courage to speak in front of teenagers, the girls all launched into another dance routine, and the moment was lost. It was probably for the best, too, because not only could I not decide whether I was America Ferrera or Robin Williams in this scenario, as much as I’d love to be able to tell you that I am the Girl Who Doesn’t Care What People Think of Her in any given friendship group, I think it’s probably obvious to everyone reading this by now that I am, in fact, very much The Girl Who Wants Abs — and who secretly still believes that the start of a brand new year is the perfect time to get them.

As proof of this, here’s a photo of me on January 3rd 2023, three days into my ill-fated bid to learn to do the splits: