PART 25: VIOLET

December 2020, Sydney

Well, one year later, I'm back.

I know that the first crop of diaries have been released. It was super interesting to listen to, not only myself, but all the other girls as well. Retrospectively, I realise what an absolute bummer I was to listen to a year ago. And I feel like I have to apologise for that straight up. Half the time, I couldn't stand myself. So I can't imagine how everyone else felt.

What has happened in the past year? So obviously the landscape of my working life changed really dramatically when COVID hit. I remember the first I heard of it was actually at work. That would have been maybe back in February 2020, or even a little earlier, maybe late January.  

One of the girls at work said, “Hey, have you heard of this thing that's happening? It sounds pretty serious. Like it seems like it's spreading”. And I was like, whatever, surely it's not going to come here. More fool me. It obviously did end up coming here and we just saw such a dramatic and immediate decrease in clients.

Going to work basically just became a hang-out with the girls. We were getting less than five clients walk through the door a day. We had completely run out of toilet paper and Glen 20. So the owner or one of the managers would go on the hunt  at a regular supermarket or a convenience store trying to find like a few rolls of toilet paper. Which was something, I guess, we never foresaw ourselves doing.

 So yeah, we would go and sit and do absolutely nothing. Then, often, we would just go home at 2pm when the shift normally ends at 5pm. It got to the point, it was March 24th, and I was meant to be working the next day and I couldn't even be bothered catching the bus into work. I was just like I’m going to text in and cancel my shift. So I said, Hey, can you take me off tomorrow? They said, Yeah, that's fine. Then that next day, I got a text and they said, Hey, we’re closing until further notice.

It made me realise how much I relied on work for my socialisation and a sense of normality my life because I, very unexpectedly, read the text and started crying. I've been in the industry for nine years now, and it's been such a constant, you know? Most places only close on Christmas day and that's it. So I just never thought I would see the day where we shut. Looking on the website, instead of seeing a list of girls on the day and the night shift, it was just nothing. It just said closed. It evoked quite a strong reaction in me.

 I was really lucky in that I did have my private client, who I mentioned last year. I did have him. He was only seeing me fortnightly but because he knew that, you know, my financial situation was in dire straits, he started seeing me every week. So he played such a huge role in keeping me afloat. I turned to doing OnlyFans, which I know is very trite and very much a cliche and has almost has become like a meme at this point. I was lucky though, in that, I had already been doing OnlyFans since May 2019. So I had a bit of a following. I had a bit of traction already on my Instagram. So I could advertise. That helped heaps.

But I found with nothing to do and, this is a bit grim, I found with nothing to do I got quite into rack, I was doing a lot of coke. It got to a point where I would say that I was flirting with addiction. I was single. So I wasn't spending time, with anyone except the person that I was, you know, seshing with. Harry and I split and I told him, “Look, I don't want to talk to you at all. Maybe one day, I'll reach out to you, and we can be friends. But right now I just need space”. So I didn't have that kind of support.

It got pretty bad.

I've got to the point now where I am sober. I have been going to meetings, I've been trying really hard to get back on track in terms of that, and it's going really well. It's going really well. It was easier than what I thought it would be. Unfortunately, it has kind of impacted a few relationships in my life. But I also think like it's not the worst thing if it's going to keep me on the path of sobriety. It was basically all I was doing during lockdown.

It was really disappointing because I should have been overseas. I have a really good friend in America who I lived with when I was over there. We were going to see each other for the first time in over a year. We were going to meet in Europe and spend time in Eastern Europe together. We were days away from booking our tickets when all the news of the airlines stopping all their flights came out and we were like “holy shit”. Luckily we didn't book them. So that yeah, that was a big bummer. Sitting at home every day and thinking I could be dancing to Polish hardstyle right now. The lash place closed, the nail place closed. My forehead lines were absolutely appalling. So yeah, I just sat in in stasis for months.

It was my birthday in May so I had my 29th birthday in lockdown. Speaking of Harry, after two months of not talking at all, he messaged me and said that he had something for me. I'd been thinking about him and couldn't get him out of my mind. And as soon as he texts me, I responded immediately and was like, Yeah, come over. He bought me a birthday gift and he came in and I looked at him and I was like, “I love you so much. I still love you”. So we've been back together. We've been back together for eight months now, and things are really good and I don't want to break up with him again. Not the turn I was expecting it to take, but I think we almost needed that bit of space to be like okay, we're definitely supposed to be together. So it's been a cakewalk since then, you'll be pleased to know.

Work reopened in July. We had a false start for a couple of weeks previous to that, where the laws were really hazy. Brad Hazzard wasn't giving the owner a straight answer with regards to whether we could open up or not. We decided that it was safest for us not to and to try again on the first of July. So we did, I was back on the first shift, on the first day because I realised, I really like it. I like my job. I missed it heaps. I think I needed that wake-up call of not having it and realising that I still really want it.

We've been absolutely run off our feet for the first couple of months. It reminded me of being 20, when I first started and was super busy. I was like this feels really good, I missed this heaps. My body was aching and it was kind of a nice feeling to know that I'd worked hard, but I was also like, oh my god, am I really this unfit. But she’s back into it. We've been open since then. It's tapered off a little bit. But it's still not bad. We're entering the Christmas period again. So I think it should pick up a little bit. I am there two or three shifts a week now. Not leaving early. But getting there early. Still seeing my private regular. So yeah, things work-wise are going pretty well.

I am going home for Christmas again in a couple of weeks to see my sister and her two kids and the one that is currently in utero. I’m really looking forward to that. I’m not looking forward to the 8-hour train trip but I’m looking forward to being there. So I’m going to keep working probably up until the 18th and I’ll give myself a little break. Harry, my boyfriend, is off work so we are getting to spend a little bit of time together, which is nice. So yeah, something nice and positive for a change. This is Violet 2020. Things are looking good.