My extended CV is borderline ridiculous.

My extended CV is borderline ridiculous.

You’ve got the creative one — all tidy and relevant.

...and then there’s that one.

The “everything I did before I figured out what I was doing” version.

Please tell me I’m not the only one with both?

Surely someone else out there has worn a bizarre uniform, run around a bar on no sleep, or been paid in free lunch and called an excellent ice-cream lady?

This photo?

Yes, I look like a 90s toilet roll cover doll.

But no — I was actually working as Cinderella at Longleat House.

(Just another day in the freelance chronicles.)

So how does that link to what I do now — curating, creating, connecting?

Simple. My extended CV taught me people skills.

It taught me adaptability, how to read a room, how to keep going when it’s raining and your wig is sliding off — or how fun (and slightly hazardous) it is to dress up as a ghost and jump out at people, only to run straight into a wall and still, carry on.

It taught me how to connect.

And that’s still at the heart of everything I do.

Odd jobs.

Strange starts.

Wild pivots.

They all count.