Listen to me carefully because this is serious- we have completely lost the plot.
People no longer know how to let themselves have fun.
And I don’t mean “fun” in the LinkedIn wellness retreat sense. I mean actual joy.
Real human chaos. Dancing badly. Oversharing. Falling in love with strangers in smoking areas. Getting chips at 3am with somebody you’ll never see again.
Life is stressful. Obviously.
The world is bizarre.
Rent is extortionate.
Everybody’s anxious.
Half the population speaks exclusively in therapy terminology while the other half podcasts about civilisational collapse.
I get it.
But people were Lindy Hopping their way through the Second World War.
“Everybody’s anxious”
Despite what your nervous system tells you, “having the fear” is not the same as being held at gunpoint.
And somewhere along the line we have started treating joy as embarrassing.
People arrive on nights out already pre-cringing at themselves.
Everything is documented.
Everything is judged.
Everything is uploaded.
Everybody is terrified of looking:
cringe,
problematic,
desperate,
ugly,
too much.
Meanwhile the clubs are emptying.
And honestly? I think that’s really sad.
Because nightlife has never just been about drinking.
It’s about release.
It’s one of the last places where human beings are still allowed to become temporarily irrational together.
Where else are you supposed to go now?
The pub closes.
The club shuts.
The smoking area gets noise complaints.
The parks are monitored.
The internet tracks your every thought.
Even house parties feel like people are networking now.
The world is grinding away at every little space we once had to be messy and alive.
And I actually think people need those spaces more than ever.
I like to think I’ve developed a healthy relationship with “the fear.”
Firstly:
you cannot have the fear with friends.
Before the night even begins, there is a silent agreement made between you all.
Whoever appears tonight is the result of the night and not a permanent reflection of your moral character.
That’s civilisation.
Get messy.
Kiss someone.
Kiss no one.
Cry in the bathroom.
Fall over.
Dance terribly.
Start an argument outside the kebab shop.
Steal a pint glass.
I genuinely do not care.
Just find your people.
Some of my favourite memories since moving to university have happened on nights out.
And many of them involved absolutely no alcohol at all.
But the funniest stories?
Please.
Those always survive.
I would be terrified if I became a public figure because there will absolutely be videos of me behaving like somebody whose frontal lobe had briefly left the building.
But honestly?
Good.
We owe each other stories.
Lately everybody wants to be morally pristine all the time. A Puritan god floating six inches above ordinary human behaviour.
Well fuck that.
I want to hear about the time you and your friends K-holed at a Taylor Swift concert.
I want to hear about the stranger who held your hair back in a club toilet while telling you that you deserve better.
I want to hear about the time you danced for six hours because you wouldn’t let that bastard man take your night out too.
These places matter because people matter.
And people need spaces where they are allowed to become something beyond productive little machines constantly optimising themselves for public consumption.
Nightlife is humanity at its messiest.
But also sometimes at its most honest.
“I want to hear about the time you and your friends K-holed at a Taylor Swift concert.”
Because underneath the flashing lights, the spilled drinks, the regrettable outfits and the catastrophic hangovers, what people are really searching for is connection.
For freedom.
For each other.
So go outside.
Dance.
Stay out too late.
Talk to strangers.
Tell your friends you love them.
Embarrass yourself slightly.
And for the love of God give us something to talk about…
Notes From The Smoking Area 
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