‘Later is a gift, a surprise and sometimes...a lie'

TW: This interview contains references to bereavement and grief

I wasn’t expecting to cry. It was a Monday evening in mid-December, there were delays on the Lizzy Line and by the time I made it from my central London office to the church in the City of London’s Clerkenwell, the only seat I could find was in a pew near the back, the speaker obscured by a pillar. But only getting the audio version did little to diminish the power of Jameela Jamil’s words.

The event had been organised by Substack UK with the goal of bringing together some of the best-loved writers on the platform (Nick Hornby, Dan Jones, India Knight, Hanif Kureishi, Annie Macmanus and Pandora Sykes were speaking along with Jameela) and their subscribers for an evening of mince pies, mulled wine and medicinal words on the theme of togetherness, many of which have since been shared to Substack. (Every piece was impactful in its own way, but I urge you to read Annie Macmanus’ written-for-the-occasion piece on exceptionalism and connection).

When Jameela stepped up to the mic, she did so with the same comedic charm and disarming candour that her 31,000-and-counting subscribers have come to expect from her newsletter launched last October – A Low Desire To Please. There were swears as she struggled to make the mic work; more when it did, echoing her expletives around the decked halls of Saint James. We were laughing, and then we weren’t.

‘In January, a sobbing phone call revealed to me that out of nowhere, my smart, funny and freakishly kind close friend had died,’ she began, before articulating in devastating detail the emotional turmoil that had ensued in the 11 months since; a ‘spectacular personal chaos’ that led her to ‘quiet quit’ her life.

It was one of the most heartbreaking accounts of a bereavement I’ve ever heard; made all the more affecting for the urgency with which the closing call to arms was delivered: ‘Make the calls. Send the texts. Solidify the plans. Now, while you still can.’ When my glassy eyes met those of a stranger in the next pew, she puffed out her cheeks and widened her eyes. The universal sign for: ‘fuck’.

As the evening came to close and we filed out of the church, a throng formed around the speakers – and I thought about joining it. In the end, a fear of intruding on a vulnerability hangover held me back. But it was with a drive to – as one friend and writer puts it - ‘never keep compliments in my own head’ that led me to my DMs. And when I asked Jameela if she was up for continuing the conversation on Substack, she was generous enough to oblige.

Why this interview is reaching you some six weeks later than planned is a mystery I have yet to resolve; the email Jameela returned to me in mid-December (understandably preferring to write her answers rather than speaking them) vanished into the ether. Now that I’ve read her words, I’ve left them exactly as she intended them, festive references and all.

From the expectation that we have a ‘later’ with the people we love to our collective discomfort with having the difficult conversations that lifelong relationships are made of, she makes a powerful case for dismantling the idea that platonic love is anything other than love.

Nikki: Why did you decide to write this piece now? And how have you found the process of writing and publishing?

Jameela: It wasn't a deliberate piece. About a month ago, I couldn't sleep, and this was what was on my mind, so I thought if I wrote it down, and got it out of my head, it might help me go back to sleep. I wrote it in one go at 3am while sobbing and stuffing my face with cake. (I choked twice. I do not recommend this combo.) I normally write comedy, and this felt too personal and painful, so I put it away, and didn't look at it again until Substack asked me to give them a piece about togetherness this week for an event they were doing in a church.

I didn't have anything. And I remembered this essay, so I handed it in unedited, so that it captured the raw pain and disbelief I was in. I felt it could possibly be a helpful message. A warning. A tiny blessing for those who still have time. I'm not at all religious, but I also think, some part of me felt that if I read it in a church...she would hear it.

Nikki: This newsletter is about friendship and expectations. An expectation that you talk about so movingly in this reading - which you’ve since published on your Substack - is the expectation that we have ‘later’. How did you relate to this expectation before Izzy’s death? And how do you relate to it now?

Jameela: Ugh I just hate the word "later" now. It carries such a bitter after-taste when I say it. It inspires complacency and undermines the importance of now. Now is all we have. Now is all we can guarantee. Later is a gift, a surprise, and sometimes...a lie.

I was your cliche, classic, idiot millennial. Conditioned by capitalism to believe that I had to "build a life" first before I had the right to truly live it. What spectacular horse shit. Friends are the life you build. Moments with your dog. Cuddles with your loved ones.

No lease I've signed, award, or promotion I've ever gotten has moved me the way those things do. Friendship has always been by far the most important part of my life, but I have this unspoken feeling of pressure, to earn permission to enjoy the things that are mine for free. A life on ice. Saved for a later that might never come.

I've developed an increased urgency now. An urgency to truly live. To demonstrate my love more fully, and more often. And to really build memories for my death bed. It is no longer morbid to me to think of such a thing, but if anything, it's simply imperative. And I implore everyone to take a second to consider how you will look back on this very moment later.

Nikki: Another theme that runs through your writing is the expectation of what grief will look like, particularly the grief for a dear friend who has died suddenly. Did you have any expectations of how grief would look and feel before Izzy died? And how have those expectations changed in the months since?

Jameela: Grief is such an unreliable emotion. It's so unstraightforward. I'm constantly blindsided by the new, appalling ways it chooses to shape-shift within me. It's not always easy to identify that the cause of your new, destructive or reclusive tendency is just grief in disguise.

I’ve experienced death before. My uncle died in my arms when I was nine years old. I've lost loved ones. But I've always known they were going, and had a chance to say goodbye. It's hideous, but it helps. To have someone ripped away from you, horrifically, with no warning, is so violating. Especially if you didn't get to show them all the love you carried in your heart before they went. Then your goodbye is stolen and replaced with an endless well of guilt.

I say in the piece that there is no sting like words unsaid, and I meant that, because I swear to god I'm going fucking mad, replaying everything I wish I had done or said. Every way I could have shown her more how much she meant to me. It's why I can't sleep anymore. My grief now feels cheap, because she can't see or feel all this love and pain. Who is this for? What is the point? It feels embarrassing.

I've just sort of quiet quit my life to try and take stock and make sense of everything. To carefully trace the steps that got me here, and how to get out of this maze of poor priorities. That is the only way I think I can mend. Is by honouring her by learning from this.

Nikki: Did you feel - and have you felt - that there’s a place for this kind of grief in the bereavement conversation, in terms of the resources available to you, the support networks, the communities? If not, what would you have found helpful?

Jameela: I think different people need different things. I've just felt so ashamed, and so haven't wanted to talk about it much to anyone. I am a good friend. I am at times, a great friend. I take it so seriously. My boyfriend jokes that friendship is my only hobby and interest. I just got so busy last year, and it's when she needed me most.

My other friends who have witnessed a more present version of me feel compelled to reassure me that I was enough. But I wasn't. The only comfort I found all year was my typically cruel and unusual therapist saying "yep, you could have done more, you could have been a better friend. So what now?" She's the only person who confirmed what I knew. She made me feel less insane and lonely in my shame. She let it pass through me, while everyone else tried to stamp it out. Which doesn't work.

Sometimes you just have to let people rage and hate themselves. It passes quicker when you don't interrupt it. When you just hold it with them. Let people feel the guilt. Let them feel the regret. If you try to bury someone's emotions, they lay in waiting and come out later in some other insidious way or illness.

I think what some people find hard is that when your partner passes it's seen as a tragedy, and is treated as such. But a loss of friendship is inaccurately overlooked as if your friends aren't also the absolute loves of your life. They're beyond family because I chose them. They chose me. It's monumental.

Nikki: One of the lines that I found particularly affecting in your reading was this one: ‘there is someone in all our lives that we are taking for granted right now, in this very moment. Someone we are fobbing off.’ There is a huge emphasis right now - and never more so than at this time of year - on prioritising ourselves. That it’s ok to cancel plans and stay home. That it’s ok to end a friendship that’s proving challenging. What do you make of this narrative, as someone who has lost someone so dear to you?

Jameela: Listen, it's different strokes for different folks. If you hate mince pies, bloody awful Christmas songs and parties, fucking stay home. Friendship rarely happens in a crowd. And if a friendship has run its course and you don't see them in your future, and you want to cut loose to avoid wasting their time and yours, then it's ok to let that go.

But IF you do see them in your vision for your time ahead, please god, call them NOW. Right now. Stop reading this interview and send the text. Life comes at you so much faster as you get older. When we get a job we don't put our feet up and chill, we work to maintain the position. I think it's important we treat relationships the same way. Love is work. It's upkeep. It's affirmation. Its demonstrations beyond an emoji-based reply to someone's Instagram story. Love is reciprocity. Give what you hope to receive.

Nikki: You write of a desire to ‘work harder’ on your friendships. Of course, friendship does require work. It requires time, energy and labour. Do you think there’s an expectation that friendships should feel easy? And that if they aren’t feeling easy, they aren’t right for us?

Jameela: Friendship should feel safe. It should be easy to be yourself around a true friend. But maintaining that bond, especially as we get older, and we have responsibilities, kids, work, our own partners etc requires effort. Because, of course it does. Life changes and marks each of us, and we have to work to try to stay aligned with each other as this happens.

I fear we are so caught up in this slightly repulsive trend of hyper-individualism, masked behind "therapy speak" about things like "boundaries" these days. We can't handle anything difficult. We are losing the art of confrontation and engagement in anything complicated, because we can always just retreat off to our phones, and laptops without getting bored. We have constant distraction for life if we want it. But do you want a life that was lived? Or distracted from?

In my opinion, Friendship is love. It's not always straightforward. I don't know why we see romantic love as something so sacred, that is allowed to be so many shades of complex, but when it comes to friendship we expect a binary of black and white. It's all the same shit, just without the shagging.

Nikki: What tools, resources or words have you found most useful this year? What would you want someone who is grieving the death of a close friend to know?

Jameela: Take your time to fully mourn the loss. And then use it. Channel it. Take the lesson. Work out how to honour the person you’ve lost. What would they want you to do? Who would they want you to become? I have never been a spiritual person, but a part of me is both comforted and absolutely horrified by the possibility that she's around, watching me.

When choosing photos for my Substack piece about her, only some photos would load, and others simply wouldn't, for no reason. I took it as a sign she didn't like that picture and so I obeyed. Have I gone completely insane? Possibly. But is it making me accountable and making me better? Absolutely. Will I ever wank again? Probably not, no.

Make sure you go out of your way to relish every moment of love you can scavenge for in this all too horrendous world. Nothing else matters. Do it all for the friend who can't anymore. Izzy is, unbelievably, not here anymore, and that is such a loss for this world. But she would want me to tell you all to send the texts. Make the calls. And solidify the plans.