“ Whenever I hear Edith Piaf sing ‘Non, je ne regrette rien’ - which is more often than I’d like, now that I’m at university - I can’t help thinking, ‘what the hell is she talking about?’ I regret pretty much everything. I’m aware the transition into adulthood is a difficult and sometimes painful one. I’m familiar with the conventions of rights of passage, I know what the literary term bildungsroman means, I realise that it’s inevitable that I’ll look back at things in my youth and give a wry, knowing smile. But surely there’s no reason why I should be embarrassed and ashamed about things that happened thirty seconds ago? No reason why life just should be this endless rolling panorama of bodged friendships, fumbled opportunities, fatuous conversations, wasted days, idiotic remarks and ill-judged, unfunny jokes that just lie on the floor in front of me, flipping about like dying fish?
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david nicholls
starter for ten
— from ‘Starter for Ten’ by David Nicholls
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