2011: Part 4 - A true test

Part 4, proof that while life was going to change, things were going to be pushed and tested, a new life had to be earned and not gifted.

Temporarily New Life
Susannah came over in April, while the first trips had been pure fun, drama ensued which meant that we were going to be having quite an uphill battle while we were here in Perth.  To make matter worse I was still adjusting to a brutal schedule which saw a full time work load balanced with day work on my days off and working every weeknight for a few hours. Somewhere in there was squeezing in Susannah and all the study away from uni as well.

So there was drama and things were only half fixed by the time Susannah was about to leave, she made the decision to stay, despite a lot of her time spent sitting on my bed waiting for me to return home from days where I would be out for over 12 hours and feeling dead or about to crash on the way home.  While there was a lot of young love and amazing times, this was what reality was going to be like.

The Struggle
Despite ditching Hairlucination, university was still proving to be a nightmare and a challenge and a half, I faced an assignment that I honestly thought was proving to be near impossible and something I couldn't completely understand.  My grades were slipping and I was struggling to keep up, it was scary, 2009 I was worshipped as the top student in my class, 2010 saw me lead the way even though my gap was reduced to many other students, while this year, I was in the midfield for once which was very scary for me to deal with.  Dealing with tests especially after returning from Adelaide was a nightmare and somehow I just kept holding on even though my commitment was obviously reducing and reducing with more and more on my plate.

Rockstars

Despite how dull my life had been, I did my best to at least have a night free so we could party and my god did we party like rockstars, ok, less the excessive hard drug usage or anything illegal but we had a lot of crazy dress-ups and stories from our time in Perth.  There's a lot of NSFW stuff that's best to leave out here but it was the last month we really partied hard, made some pretty insane and crazy outfits for some pretty amazing nights.

The Forest of Dreams
At one point me and Susannah decided to walk through a peaceful forest near a lake around Perth.  We talked about Susannah's need to move onto the next project and her wanting to find a new business as while Saccharine Desolation just wasn't doing it for her.  We discussed that Susannah would be good at running a clothing store but she wanted to do something unique, it was there that lolita was mentioned and Tokyo Hardcore was born, well albeit 6 months later.