boredawn

I'm sorry but that is the second time I have heard this word in short succession and I have no idea what it means. Never heard the likes!?! Guess my English degree is paying off then, isn't it?

I've done various festivals from 05 - 16. The aforementioned two being the only ones I had any issue. 2005 was glorious until the festival started on friday morning and then there was a bout 3 weeks rainfall in the morning. The site did not hold up and I distinctly remember seeing canoe's on the campsite! However 2016 was the worst. It rained almost non stop bar a decent spell now and again that only served to dry up the mud enough to be horrendous to move through, but never enough to sit down! Glasto is my happy place, but even for me not being able to sit down for almost a week was heavy going, plus every step felt like at least 3 because it was so hard to move through the constantly muddy conditions.

Yep, and hats will likely be the answer most of the time, but if its sunny id like to be able to go without hat for event a day or two. Because of how much more thin my hair has been I have to wash it everyday, so by day 3 of no hair washing I easily appear to be on day 9 of no hair washing.... its, not pleasant

Hello all, So, I dont normally bother with hair washing at the festival as much as this year, but I suffer from alopecia. Its been under control for a while, but i've lost a lot of hair towards the back of my head over the last year or so since my mum died. Its soooo much harder to keep this hidden when my hair is dirty, so I'm kinda resigned to having to grin and bare whatever facilities I can get this year for hair washing. I try not to let it bother me, but sometimes it gets the better of me and kicks into gear with some anxiety symptoms. As manky as it sounds I dont mind going for a wet wipe shower, its really just my hair. Would people say its worth hitting the showers or perhaps just get a solar shower and use it at the campsite? any advice welcome.

Wow, I have almost a carbon copy of your experience literally one year later. Dad was diagnosed with a brain tumour in January ( although turned out this was secondary cancer caused by stage 4 lung cancer) and he died in April, with me going to the festival in June with instructions to pour out a malt for him. I hope I'm not projecting onto your experience, but one of the things I've found most comforting about this is that grief and trauma are such lonely emotions. You feel like you are caught up in a world of your own hurt and dismay so much of the time, so I'm finding that there is a real beauty in sharing here and realising that we're not alone in all of this, and we're all really in the same boat tying to muddle on by until the grief subsides enough for us to feel something other than hurt. I'm sure your Dad would have been delighted that you followed through with his wishes. Hopefully on a slightly lighter note about following through on a loved ones wishes, I'm Scottish, and my dad died before he got a chance to vote Yes in the independence referendum. I came into the hospice one day to find him having a heated discussion with someone on God knows what phone-line in the Scottish government having a very heated debate about how he couldn't pre-lodge his vote since he 'would most definitely be pan - breed (Scottish slang for dead) kicking the arse of thatcher' (his words) by the time of the referendum. He was a bit downtrodden by this so he made me promise to find the biggest 'Yes' sticker to go on his coffin I could find, so I literally spent the day after his death chasing round all the SNP constituent offices to find him a bloody suitable sticker! It went front and center on the coffin and my mum was suitably horrified. 🙂 you have to find the joy where you can in such times eh?

I once read a proverb that's 'my sore finger is worse thank your broken leg' and it highlights that pain is subjective, rather than objective. We all have our struggles that fit into a glass, but the capacity for liquid in that glass is different for each person and all our troubles are very real and personal to each of us. I wish I was a person who practice what they preached more, but your future isn't limited by your present. You should always 100% believe in your capacity to change and improve your life, because you ( us all I guess) deserve happiness. Keep the faith that the very fact you recognise that the present isn't keeping you satisfied will spur you on to a better tomorrow. I definitely remember that stage of my career where I had just graduated with and English degree during the crash of 2008, and suddenly the advice of 'go get a degree, any degree, just get one' was useless and had turned to 'why did you study English if you don't want to be an English teacher'. All of a sudden I went from working in Sainsburys to... working in Sainsburys with a useless degree . It took a post graduate course and a lot of volunteering/sessional work, but I now have a job I love in criminal justice working. It's not the dizzy heights of some other careers, but I enjoy getting to see both side of the justice system from the inside/out, and I'm fortunate that my post is mostly about rehabilitation and helping people to overcome their past and strive for a better future. Best employability advice I can give anyone is if you are going to train, pick someone vocational and tied directly to an industry rather than something abstract like English or geography etc. Things like a trade, programming, social work, teaching etc line you up for an actual post when you finish... from my humble experience of giving careers advice.

Can I just really quickly say a very heartfelt thank you to the replies so far, as well as any after this. I can't express how much of a comfort I have found it. Reading your stories has genuinely brought a tear to my eye, and has somehow distilled a little of the essence of just why the festival has this very healing power we speak of. Someone said they are very pragmatic, and I am much the same - I wish I could be more spiritual but the world presents to me are very chaotic and unfeeling at times. However, what adds value to that chaos is the people and places we find ourselves in during the crazy times. I think the healing of Glastonbury probably routes most firmly in its ethos and the good nature of the people who attend - likeminded people such as those of you who have been kind enough to spend a bit of time sharing on my daft wee post. Like many I will shed a few tears at the festival ( bringing some of my mums ashes so she can finally be there with me) as I do every year when I step through those gates and get overwhelmed by a sense of wellbeing and safety that I can't find anywhere else. For those that shared their journey I wholeheartedly wish you all the best and good health my will can muster. You deserve these days of respite. Its so hard to explain to outsiders how special it is to walk through those gates, and i can agree with a fellow poster when they say it was life changing. Mostly, I'm just greatful such a place exists and I get to share it with you kind people.

Sorry if this is a bit of a downer, but does anyone else use Glastonbury of a place of almost 'healing' the wounds of the previous year? I haven't been since 2016 (which, despite surviving other 'wet' years like 2005 was actually really difficult, because the rain didnt halt from start to finish with no respite in 2016) and unfortunately the years in between haven't been that kind to me. We've all been through a rough time with lockdown and so forth, but this year the Sunday will be the 2nd year anniversary of my mum dying. The two years prior to that were filled with a lot of stress caring for someone against an illness that you just cant fight, as you watch it steal a person you love from you, and I can't say that i've had many moments of joy in between. I remember going to the festival in 2014 when I was 27, and my Dad had died two months before and somehow I managed to have one of the best years every. There was something genuinely cathartic and healing about having the festival to care for my emotional wounds, and I am so greatful that I have this years festival to hopefully do the same. I think this year is probably going to be my most important year at the festival for purely having a space for five days to forget all the drama and heartache, and just exist in the moment. I'm normally fleeing with excitement by now, but my wee brain almost cant compute that it's actually happening! I hope this wasn't too depressing, and I hope for anyone else that's had some heartache that the festival can fill a similar function for you. Its well needed for me this year, and I'm so very happy that the ticket gods were kind to me this year. All i ask is please dont rain every day again like 2016, please weather gods!

I went to the see her during the anniversary tour earlier this year, and I cried tears of joy from the very first note played to the last. She has always been a hero of mine, but never managed to see her. I had tickets for a much smaller venue for her show in 2008, but I ended up getting the opportunity to go on an all expenses paid trip to Ghana for 3 months, and I had to give the tickets to my sister. Even tho I was away on this amazing trip I was devastated at not being able to go. I waited from 2008 to 2022 to finally catch her live and it was one of the best experiences of my life, I was so giddy and light headed with joy that I honestly felt like my head might just float off from my neck into orbit, and I would have been totally fine with that. I took three packets of hankies because I knew I would be a snotty emotional wreck, and still ran out before the encore.

So, it was the 25th anniversary of Jagged Little Pill earlier this year, so would Alanis Morrisettè fit the bill? Proper 90's legend and seems to be doing the odd festival this year.

What about Simply Red? Bonnie Tyler would be amazing too, but I don't think she has enough bangers for the slot.

Killing me softly. Sorry in advance for the really depressing post... but it's hitting me hard this year. I always really struggle when I miss out on tickets, but fate decided to reaaaaaaaallly put the boot in. My mum died last year on what would have been the first day of the festival. So, not only am I my usual hopelessly depressed self during the festival period, but this year I also need to contend with it being the first anniversary of my mum dying. Like, I don't think I could feel more sad than I do right now. At least missing the festival is only the second most upsetting thing on my mind this weekend. Apologies on being a buzzkill.