The Story of the Instagram Stories
If you’ve followed me on Instagram for a while, you’ll know about the infamous Insta stories. I share daily tales of my ups and downs, musings, mishaps and jokes. These are usually in uncomfortably close selfie mode and take a confessional, self-deprecating tone. Homemade memes feature heavily as do caffeine crashes, cat encounters, and dating app disasters. They’ve been described as ‘hilarious’, ‘SO funny’, ‘very entertaining’ and ‘really fucking weird’. (Eh. Can’t win ‘em all.)
People often tell me to take these stories forward, somehow. To ‘do something with’ them. People have suggested stand-up, sit com writing, self-publishing. People who don’t know what TikTok is suggest TikTok and I’ve wondered about adapting them for art. I’ve never settled on a solution but I agree that it’s time to try some things out. I recently quit my latest social media job in a bid to take a break, then start experimenting.
I never saw myself going into anything like this. I’ve always had too many thoughts and feelings and I’ve always written, but nothing in the realm of Comedy ever crossed my mind. I wasn’t exposed to the workings of TV, Radio and Theatre, growing up, Arts degrees were for idiots and careers in Entertainment were mythical fiction. Where I did have examples of anyone in the public eye they didn’t match me at all - extroverts with bags of confidence have always felt like a far, loud, cry from anxious, sensitive, me.
Honestly, this all started by accident, one day, seven years ago. My first ever story was about revising for a Philosophy exam and some of my pens falling down a radiator grate. People responded well, it felt fun, and I carried on. They became a habit and developed into a daily practice, with increasingly complex storylines, developed personas, bolder admissions. I never became big, I never got anywhere close to Influencer status, but people started to say some really lovely things.
Since graduating, I’ve cut it back. I made a smaller account and started only sharing to a Close Friends list. I’ve been conscious of colleagues following me and I struggle more for time. Mainly, though, I’m just in a different place. Whatever I do take forward, now, will be for different reasons and approached in a different way.
I started the stories from a place of real loneliness, at a time when I badly needed connection, and felt I had no one to talk to. It was my first year of uni and my first time away from home. I had just broken up with my long-term boyfriend and finished three years of therapy for anorexia, with a psychologist I really loved. I had been used to having someone to talk to, 24/7, on such a personal level. I had been in constant, honest, conversation and I had felt deeply understood. Overnight, this all evaporated. I just woke up in Scotland, on my own. No texts, no calls. ‘Silent’ became the only mode on my phone.
At the time, I thought recovering from losing these people was about proving my strength. I took it like a challenge to show how resilient, how independent, I could be. I coped like such a cliché - girl power break-up pop blasting in my headphones as I ran 10Ks uphill, blaring ‘I don’t need you, I don’t need anyone’ tunes like a mad mantra. I distanced everyone. I never went home. I hardly replied to school friends, I went nowhere near anything that would remind me of the past. I ploughed forward, unflinching, determined to show everyone how fine I was without them.
Believe it or not, this did not work. When you’ve grown used to sharing everything you can’t just suddenly stop. You can’t just turn the tap tightly shut, despite what conventions encourage. I seemed to think I had to just swallow my love, and I couldn’t. Love is an indestructible substance, it’s like Dr Seuss’s pink snow: melt it, it rises up, boil it, it precipitates and pours back down. Try to quash it and it’ll only spill out of you in increasingly embarrassing ways - a bizarre comment when you’re far too drunk, a degrading one night stand. All anguished attempts at recreating a connection you can no longer find.
The gospel (Fleabag) recycles that old maxim well, ‘grief is love with nowhere to go’. I slowly realised I’d gotten it wrong. I didn’t need to shut down and run away, I needed to open up and let new people in. I needed a new outlet, a new channel, for the parts of myself I’d grown used to sharing. When I started talking to myself on my Instagram story, one day, I think the healing unconsciously began.
I know it sounds like I’m overblowing the importance, here. These are just silly stories, odd anecdotes, stupid jokes. I talk about using too much garlic, being late for a doctor’s appointment, cracking my phone. The thing is, though, that’s what real love is like. And when you lose it, it’s not the big, romantic moments you miss. It’s the everyday stuff.
In all of my favourite memories of my first boyfriend, we were just talking. He was my best friend. When I missed him most I’d revisit the times we sat opposite each other in our favourite coffee shop in Cambridge, him listening intently as I recounted a tale, filled him in on the latest happenings, cried about a bad essay grade. All the times we made each other weep with laughter in the school piano rooms we used to hide away in, in on a stupid joke only we found funny, or all the things I learnt laying beneath the world map on his bedroom wall - he was much better read than me, I’d point to countries and he’d tell me about them with wisdom, warmth and wit. When we broke up, what I missed, more than anything, was having someone to talk to, even on the most banal subjects: someone to send a silly meme, to alert of a common cat sighting, to tell about my day.
So, here we are. I’m going through the archives now, and it seems so clear: here are all the conversations I didn’t get to have. Here are my updates, anecdotes, and observations, my weird thoughts, an idea I just had, a funny thing that happened at work today, a quote from a book I’ve found. Here’s a joke I know you’ll get, a qualm I need some guidance on, a ginger cat I saw on my way to the station, because I know you love ginger cats. Here’s a story I can’t wait to tell you, a character you have got to meet, a dress I feel cute in, a picture of how the sky looks right now… from ever since they had nowhere to go. Here is where, it would seem, I redirected all the messages I had to stop sending, one day, in 2017.
This was all a long time ago, now, and a new life has grown. I don’t need the stories, lately, in quite the same way. I’ve made new friends. I’m in new group chats. I have new people to talk to, to catch up with over a drink, to entertain with my latest antics or beg for earnest advice. I am so grateful to have discovered a love for storytelling, though, and for making people laugh. I never saw this coming and I can’t wait to see where I can take it next.
If you’ve been watching the stories, replying, reacting, thank you so much. I know it doesn’t seem like a big deal, but for me they were a crucial part of moving on. I used to think the only place I could be myself was in one or two private relationships, and I thought that when those died, all authentic connection died with them. What a relief to learn I was wrong.
I took the risk of sharing my honest inner monologue online, and not only do people like it, they tell me, all the time, that they feel like this too. That they relate. If that’s not real connection, I don’t know what is. I lost one or two people close to me but I got to bring what I learnt from them into a much wider sphere, with many more confidantes, many more listeners, many more conversationalists, than ever before. I didn’t need to quash or stunt or destroy all that love, after all. I found a space to expand it. I get to share it more.
It’s time to move forward and take the stories beyond the screen. I’ve created a tab on here to post updates of the project. Thank you for being part of the journey so far :) And follow me on Insta if you don’t already ;)
@clairecantsleep / @foggystoriesss
Beautifully written Claire, your fun weirdo energy and darkly funny stories are much missed at 'the depot'. Tho I'm happy that you got out when you did! Keep up this stuff xx