I’ve spent so many hours in recent months trying to tell the perfect story on here; trying to come up with something that is equal parts insightful and entertaining, and I just haven’t managed to crack the code. I started sharing my wordy streams of consciousness on here about three years ago, when we were all in lockdown. Back then I felt like I had a plethora of things to share. I was writing about my personal experiences in the hope of helping others feel less isolated in their own feelings, and that’s still something I strive to achieve with everything I write. But in the last six months I’ve experienced the unthinkable: writer’s block.

I used to sit down with an idea of how my writing would begin and end, and enjoyed the process of drawing out the journey in the middle. More recently, the ideas have been frequent, but possessing the ability to coherently capture them is something I’ve struggled with. Despite the abstract scribbling in my notes app – an activity that often occurs while I’m sitting on the number 52 bus that runs across the bottom of Hyde Park – when it comes to building the bigger picture, I always give up about two paragraphs in.

Paragraph 3: well I guess we made it here?

When I actually sit down and think about it, it’s pretty obvious why I have 23 unfinished drafts sitting in my WordPress account: I’m busy, I’m happy, and life in London moves at a speed far greater than the gentle bubbling of Surrey. So, whilst I’m resenting myself for it, I can also understand why sometimes the hobbies we love can take a backseat. Because they are also the things we lose ourselves in when we feel less in control of everything else. It’s the same reason I pick up the guitar when I’m feeling a bit anxious, or rewatch an old film at the end of a long day. We find solace in the things we love.

I’m hoping that last sentence has provided a segue onto the purpose of this particular story, and the reason for its title. SPRING. AT LAST. Solace in the hope of months to come.

Just when the unrelenting cold of winter had made all of us forget what it truly felt to be warm, spring has come in, as it always does, to prove that nothing lasts forever. I’m sitting by my window, watching tourists (who really are unrelenting in Notting Hill…), and residents walk in and out of my little, but perfect, snapshot of this world. Some of them are still bundled up in hats and scarves, whilst others have taken the sunshine as permission to switch their wardrobes over completely. There is a buzz in the air of Portobello Road, where the days will only draw longer and the Saturday crowds will surely increase tenfold, much to the delight of the stall-owners who stood steadfast in the rain and ice.

Some of us are newcomers, having not yet experienced the hum of a sweltering London on a long Saturday afternoon. Others have tried and tested it, and have proof that the best times of the year are just around the corner. That’s what I love about spring; in the same way that autumn warns of the approaching winter, spring is a promise of the upcoming summer. A promise that writer’s block doesn’t grip you forever, that the trees will be thick and green again, that an Aperol Spritz is the only appropriate option, that darkness will be replaced with light, and early mornings with late evenings. All of that, with all of this.

In January, Isabelle (flatmate, best friend, voice of an angel) perfected her rendition of Passenger’s London in the Spring, and we never quite believed there would come a time that she would actually be able to sing the song in London, in the spring. In February, my company gave its staff the day off on Valentine’s Day, which resulted in one of my favourite ever days in this city. In March, Georgia (flatmate, best friend, Master of Science) decided to wow us all with an acute case of appendicitis, only to be back in the office (much to the shock of her colleagues) the following week.

I guess the only thing to say to that is: life comes at you fast. And here I am, happy to exist in this moment, relishing in the hope of spring.