‘Should I stay or should I go?’

Three weeks ago I finished my degree. Two exams completed with barely any tears shed (success?) and my 18 long years spent in education were officially over and done with. But do you know what my parents’ first response was?  

“What next?”

Well, I mean, good question. Great, in fact. But what about, “congrats Jords, well done?!” I barely had time to open my classy £6.50 bottle of prosecco before I was bombarded with questions like: 

“Are you going to do a master’s?”

“How about a graduate scheme?”

“Where are you to moving next?”

Of course, when you finish university you need a plan. But that doesn’t necessarily mean said plan has to be ready to be deployed exactly two minutes after your last exam has just been shipped off to your tutor to rip apart, mum. 

Most of these questions I shrugged off or mumbled a response to but now, as the haze of post-exam celebrations starts to clear, they have got me thinking.

A lot of people have asked if I’m going to stay in Bristol after graduation. Apparently it’s the done thing here and the city does seem to have some of the highest amounts of graduates outside of London. But is it actually a viable option? 

Well, let’s think about accommodation. Bristol housing, at least in the student world, is renowned for being expensive and problematic. 

I’ve had my fair share of questionable houses. My place in second year sometimes played up to this stereotype (at one point we had our own mushroom and ladybird colony), but my current flat really takes the biscuit.  

At the start of my tenancy, thanks to a leaky roof and the subsequent damp that came with it, my room was more like a rock pool than a habitable dwelling. This lovely, homely environment led to seven weeks of coughing, two trips to the doctors and one broken rib. Who needs to go to the gym to get abs when you can cough for that long and hard, eh? 

Oh, and did I mention that our landlords refused to fix it for six months and only got a move on after we got the council involved? Yeah, that happened.

For the privilege of £440 a month (not including bills), my flatmates and I have also almost been gassed out by our boiler, twice, and our toilet leaked for a good two weeks until the landlords eventually sent around a painter and decorator to fix it. (Notice the a painter and decorator bit.) 

I’m not the only student who’s had to deal with stuff like this either, but as you can probably tell I’m a little sick of the Bristol rental market. In reality though, houses like these are all I’m ever going to be able to afford for a good few years. So if I was going to tough it up and stick around after graduation I’d have to have a really good reason to.

But you see, I don’t know what I want to do with my life. After spending the last three years learning about Chaucer and Swift, contemplating whether time really exists and asking questions like, “Why do we like to make films about Pompeii so much?” I’m bored of education.

So that rules a master’s out. Then there’s grads schemes but I’m wary of signing three years of my life a way to something that I’m not even sure I’ll like. 

So accommodation, master’s, and most grad schemes ruled out that leaves my mates, but then they’re all leaving too so that’s not really an option. 

I love Bristol, I really do, but I can’t think of a reason to stick around. Maybe I’ll take a break and return a little older and wiser (and probably even poorer…) but for now, take me back to the North.

Read more: ‘I will really miss dancing in Queen Square’