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Usually attached to good news, from home in Northern Ireland I've been seeing much bemoaning of the lack of critical engagement with the arts and how voiceless and unseen artists feel due to this. In response I find myself torn, initially internally screaming: I'm right here and yous have been actively ignoring me for twelve years! And the platforms where people like me used to discuss your work spluttered to closure in the years following the 2008 economic crash and *I can't live off air and good will!* Ahem. Then I gather myself and completely agree, but remain frustrated that those economic circumstances are not taken into account, that when I turned up to events at the Ulster University Art College during my PhD (2008-11) I was made to feel like an outsider by some because I was attached to Queen's and I kept turning up regardless, that there wasn't enough support for publications like Circa or Fortnight to keep them going and they didn't pay for contributi...

I recently received a piece of unsolicited gentle criticism and advice that was really well-intentioned, and you know what? The person was absolutely right and it geed me up to do something I'd been putting off for ages. Their words were thoughtful and sent with the sole purpose of helping me because the person - whom I hardly know - believes in me and in what I'm doing. I wish I could send this to every editor or senior academic who ever tore my work to shreds and made it personal while framing it as 'constructive criticism' for which I should be grateful to receive. To be constructive is to build up, not tear down. I know it will be controversial to say that I am having a relatively good pandemic thus far. Being faced with existential dread writ large has prompted me to confront the things that hold me back. One of those is absolute intolerance for any kind of toxic behaviour. Just no. No more. Life is too precious and short. One of the things that holds me back from ...