RAYE (2017)
I WILL PREVIVE [The Book Of Baps] diary extract, 3 June 2017
HOMEGIRL HOUSE PARTY series (2017)
“It is really, really nice to have someone you trust take photos of your new breasts which have taken 10 months to make. Yes, can you believe it? (Yes, you can.) I have been talking about how to get new ones that don’t kill you since 10 August 2016! I must be insane in the membrane to still be chit-chatting. There is the smallest amount of bruising on the right one but essentially today I can conclude: JOB DONE! JUMP AROUND! Or maybe JOB DONE! SLEEP ON YOUR TUMMY EVERY NIGHT!
I was scrolling through the photos just before dinner out with my homegirls and the penny dropped in that moment of looking as I realised just how far I’d come. And I realised that no matter how much I’ve talked out loud, there would still always be very few people who would fully understand what lies beneath those images of those baps. This was no ‘boob job’ fo’ shizzle and I was straight back to ways of seeing.
There are always going to be different perceptions of the same thing no matter how well you tell or show the thing. My photographer lady was looking at the light play and the interesting shadows, shapes and negative space it was creating. I was obsessing. Do I look normal? Do I look normal? Do I look normal? All I was looking for was qualification: yes you look normal, love. Calm the hell down! I think I do. There is a 5cm (I measured) needle scar which runs out horizontally to the side of each nip. I am quite glad to have these scars because when I look in the mirror every day they will gently remind me of what it took to get to this point in the here and now, long after my obsession has calmed the hell down.
Needless to say I drank too much wine and did too much effing and blinding over dinner (tummy behaved) but I think that’s a given. Pressure cooker was letting off steam. So here my homegirl. It’s Raye. She say we could throw shapes together but it doesn’t mean you’re in my circle.”