Freya-Onions-report

My fingers are cold on the keys, it’s a cold snap, an ‘arctic freeze’. On Thursday, I bought new thermals to wear under my thin autumn dresses. 

I’m 26 years old now, and over three years on hormones. The longer I’m on them, the less I have to say about them. Like many other things in life, it just is. 

My birthday was a lot of fun. A few highlights:

• Seeing pianist Illia Ovcharenko play at Wigmore Hall on my birthday. I’d had a slightly shitty grey morning in my flat, but was invigorated by a chilli chicken ramen at Wagamamas and a glass of coke. The piano was incredible. I was brought to tears by his playing of Liszt’s Piano Sonata in B Minor— which I already knew well from the ballet Marguerite and Armand. I spent the entire duration transfixed, eyes glued to his performance, alight with emotion.
• The Saturday afterward. Molly and I went to Liberation, a latex clothing shop near Covent Garden. We tried a few things on, I was terrified of ripping the material, even slathered in talc. Then we saw La Fille Mal Gardee at the Royal Opera House for a matinee. I wore my new fancy navy dress. We sat in our seats, smelling like balloons. 
• That evening, drinks with friends in Camberwell, before gin and vodka martinis back at mine listening to ‘through’ by 800 cherries on a loop. That song sounds like memory.

It feels like only a month ago that it was so hot in my flat I needed to have the fan pointing directly at my face, to move as little as possible.

I can’t describe how I feel when I’m writing this. There is a hollowness in the centre of my brain, and the clouds are pressed flat and white against the windows. 

Molly and I spent the day in Cambridge in early November. In the daytime, we went round the women’s art collection at Murray Edward’s college, which is the largest in Europe. While at uni, we had generally only been to Medwards for pissups, so it was a real treat to take a proper look at the art and architecture of the college.

In the evening, we had a wonderful dinner in the formal hall. We were stunned to find that double gin and tonics in the college bar are still only £5.40. It’s feeling really tempting to buy a MA gown so we can wear our gowns to hall again. We felt naked eating in hall without them.

I sewed a button on my dress today, which was more difficult than anticipated: the little sewing kit I’d bought was so astonishingly low quality that the scissors bent in my hand when cutting thread and the needle pot exploded, showing my bed with needles. After, I called grandma to tell her of my sewing achievements and wish her a happy birthday.

Last weekend was lovely. On the Friday evening I went to the ballet with Lou and saw Serenade again, which was unbelievably beautiful. We had incredible seats. We also saw a new ballet by Cathy Marston, set to music by Britten, and an American ballet called Everywhere We Go by Justin Peck, one of the major contemporary choreographers of the New York ballet started by Balanchine almost 100 years ago. 

Alongside Serenade, you could really see the throughlines, and how such an energetic, creative and brash piece of choreography could come about. It was his debut in London too, which was especially exciting. 

On the Saturday, I went to the Lee Miller exhibition with my mother, before having dinner at a French brasserie next to the Royal Court theatre, which was very delicious. Afterwards, we saw ‘The Unbelievers’ at the theatre, which was hilariously funny, and so well acted. Nicola Walker especially, which was probably the best single performance I’ve ever seen on stage. We got the bus home via Battersea, and had a few pints of Orbit lager in Stormbird. What could be better?

My nails are dark brown this time, which feels apt for winter, and goes with my dresses.

I sent off my GRC application online the other week. They said they should respond in 30 weeks. Which is insane, obviously. 

When I sent it in I got an automated email telling me to send in my birth certificate to a specific PO Box as soon as possible, which I do. The next day: another email, which a different PO Box. I ask if it’s okay that I sent it to the first one they told me to. They say no, please repost. Brilliant. 

I’ve been thinking more about religion recently, and about the intense spiritual experiences I used to have with psychedelics.  I mentioned the Devīmāhātmyam in Reading 17, and I’ve been reading more of it this week ( I’m reading Devadatta Kali’s translation and commentary ). As I explained there, the Devīmāhātmyam is a Hindu text praising the supreme goddess of Hinduism, Mahamaya and calling her superior over all other Hindu gods. She is referred to by many names, but I like Mahamaya in particular as it means ‘beyond Maya’ – with Maya referring to the perceptible world, the illusion that is our reality. 

The story of the text goes like this: there is a king, a merchant and a seer. The king is a just ruler, but is overthrown and falls into ruin. Leaving his old kingdom, he rides off alone into the dense forest. The merchant is betrayed by his family, but still cannot help but feel love and affection for those very people who betrayed him:

“Destitute of riches, wife and children, my wealth taken from me, I have arrived in the first, distressed and forsaken by trusted kingsmen.”

Down on their luck, cast out of society, both men still feel possessive over what they have lost, both are all too tangled up in the machinations of the perceptible world. 

The seer listens to both of their stories, and responds by telling them about Mahamaya, the supreme reality that underpins their attachments: 

She, the blessed goddess Mahamaya, seizes the minds of even the wise and draws them into delusion.
She creates all this universe, moving and unmoving, and it is she who graciously bestows liberation on humanity.
She is the supreme knowledge and the eternal cause of liberation,
Even as she is the cause of bondage to this transitory existence. She is the sovereign of all lords.”

The king and the merchant listen as the sage continues, describing how she is both immanent in and transcendent to all existence:

“She is eternal, having the world as her form. She pervades all this. Yet she emerges in various ways. Hear it from me.”

I think what interests me most about the Devīmāhātmyam is the way in which the supreme goddess is described as being not only the underlying reality- a force of pure immanence- but also the cause of all illusion: 

You are the great knowledge and the great illusion, the great intelligence, the great memory and the great delusion, the great goddess and the great demoness.

You are primordial matter, differentiating into the threefold qualities of everything. You are the dark night of periodic dissolution, the great night of final dissolution, and the terrifying night of delusion.

You are radiant splendour; you reign supreme yet are unassuming; you are the light of understanding.”

It’s the doubled, contradictory quality to the Mahamaya that I find so convincing: even as I’ve been interested Eastern religion for years, it’s always been a sticking point for me that many texts suggest that Maya, the perceptible world, should seemingly be rejected entirely for what is beyond.

Maybe this is just a terrible misreading of these texts from me, but I’ve never been able to square this understanding of them off with my own experiences of life. The problem is solved by the great goddess who is both the ‘great knowledge and the great illusion’ – she is what transfixes us and catches us up in life. The moments when we often feel most alive, caught up in the majesty of the great illusion, these are moments in which she makes her power known. She is the sticking point, the moment that draws us in, and she is beyond that too. As described elsewhere, she is ‘unconditional bliss’.

I’m going to continue reading more, as I’ve found there to be a lot of truth and a lot that makes sense in what I’ve read so far.

It’s difficult to see a lot of the time, especially in the current climate, but I think there is a lot of love in this world. 

This is the first blog post I’ve written in bed. I don’t know if that was already apparent. Maybe you already knew. 

22/11/25