I was talking to a young person in No Limits yesterday who wasn't bothered about music. I was chatting with another colleague at the time who is very into his music when this person came in and joined into our conversation. They said something along the lines of 'oh, you're talking about music, that's dull'.... they just had no interest in music at all. That's something I just can't get my head around. Music colours every part of my life. Major events are remembered through music - when I think of my lovely Grandad around the time he died I hear Meatloaf... when I'm excited about going to watch Wales in a rugby international I am surrounded in my head by the crowds singing Delilah and Bread Of Heaven.... In the same way, when I hear the songs they trigger the memory - Drinking In LA by Bran Van 3000 is me and Lynda walking drunkenly through Talybont at 3 in the morning.... Motorcycle Emptiness is the last night of my first year at uni.... the Sex Pistols version of My Way is my first kiss (I know, I'm so punk!)... Teenage Dirtbag is simply Gareth....
I couldn't describe to this young person how music makes me feel, how it's like an extension of me, it expresses what I cannot find the words or sounds for. I love that a song will appear on the radio or my ipod that takes me somewhere or makes me feel something unexpected. On the way to work today my ipod was on random and it played Ring Of Fire. I was straight back to going to see Jet Heeled Striker: of the way their playing makes me feel and of the hope I have for them to succeed and survive in such a turbulent industry.
For me oil on canvas can really never paint a petal so so delicate as a beautiful song can.
Somewhere, Between The Sacred Silence And Sleep, Disorder, Disorder, Disorder
Do you ever wish you could just make your thoughts shut the fuck up? Today is one of those days. My mind has been racing since I woke up and nothing seems to drown it out or make it stop... I've tried music, TV, chattering with people and nothing. Seriously beginning to think the only solution is starting at one end of my table full of alcohol and working my way to the other. To drink myself so obliterated that I don't even remember my own name, let alone be able to think about things. Knowing my luck though, like cockroaches after a chemical war, my thoughts would still be live and well.
Mostly I'm thinking about Gran. Every month seems to bring a new problem or issue with her. The most recent thing being she's fallen again causing damage to her foot and a deep wound on her leg that's now got infected. Last night she told me the morning after she did it she had to crawl down the corridor to the bathroom because she couldn't walk. An 87 year old lady on her hands and knees. It broke my heart. I feel so guilty that I'm down here and she's in Wales all alone. What scares me is that I know there's only one route that all this can go. Now when I see her my immediate thought isn't that I'm looking at Gran, it's that I'm looking at a frail old lady. I hate this and I'm powerless to change anything.
Mostly I'm thinking about Gran. Every month seems to bring a new problem or issue with her. The most recent thing being she's fallen again causing damage to her foot and a deep wound on her leg that's now got infected. Last night she told me the morning after she did it she had to crawl down the corridor to the bathroom because she couldn't walk. An 87 year old lady on her hands and knees. It broke my heart. I feel so guilty that I'm down here and she's in Wales all alone. What scares me is that I know there's only one route that all this can go. Now when I see her my immediate thought isn't that I'm looking at Gran, it's that I'm looking at a frail old lady. I hate this and I'm powerless to change anything.
Birds Flying High You Know How I Feel
Something's changed in me recently and it's a good thing. I don't spend my life being depressed by any means, but for the first time in a while I can put my hand on my heart and say I'm actually really happy. I still hate my job, but I've found that I can handle the crap that I feel from that because I feeling generally so good. I've been going to Slimming World for about 14 months and to date I have lost 3 stone 9 and 1/2 Lb - ten of which I've lost in the last two weeks. These last two weeks I've found it so easy to stick to. Plus, I've found myself wanting to do exercise for the first time in a long time - maybe because I actually have the ability to do it now! So every other day I'm riding 15 to 20 km and I feel so good during and after it that I just want to do more and more. I feel like at 27 I'm getting my life back from being stuck inside me, and it's great.
This renewed vigour has spread itself throughout my life. I'm rediscovering and falling in love again with music. With my beautiful CDs. All 600 odd of them. Each day I get up and am excited about what album I'm going to pick to listen to on the way to work.
I'm slightly scared about writing this blog. For two reasons really. First because I find my weight an incredibly hard thing to talk about. It took me 24 sessions before I could talk to my therapist about it. But I'm tackling it now and I'm getting my head straight on secretive eating and stuff which is helping every day. And every day it gets easier to deal with and easier to talk about. And each time I talk about it my secrets lose their power over me.
The second reason for being scared is because I don't want to scare off this good mood! A bit like a baby deer - by letting it know I'm here I hope it won't run away!
This renewed vigour has spread itself throughout my life. I'm rediscovering and falling in love again with music. With my beautiful CDs. All 600 odd of them. Each day I get up and am excited about what album I'm going to pick to listen to on the way to work.
I'm slightly scared about writing this blog. For two reasons really. First because I find my weight an incredibly hard thing to talk about. It took me 24 sessions before I could talk to my therapist about it. But I'm tackling it now and I'm getting my head straight on secretive eating and stuff which is helping every day. And every day it gets easier to deal with and easier to talk about. And each time I talk about it my secrets lose their power over me.
The second reason for being scared is because I don't want to scare off this good mood! A bit like a baby deer - by letting it know I'm here I hope it won't run away!
And Just Like The Movies We Play Out Our Last Scene
I have had the most brilliant weekend. I spent Saturday night with most of the people who mean more to me than anyone else in the entire world. They are the most incredible group of friends I could wish for. We laugh together, cry together, have learnt together, and play together. In varying degrees of time, we've grown up together. These people know me pretty much entirely, and amazingly are still there! I have more to thank them for - each one of them in different ways - than I would ever be able to really explain.
The weekend was only marred by the floods of tears that my poor Mum had to deal with on Sunday afternoon! In short, I had the blues big style (plus I was tired, hungover and PMT-ing, not a good combination!). My very best friend, Jenn, and her lovely husband came down for this weekend especially for the party. Jenn has lived in a different place to me since the end of uni, 6 years now. Every time she's down and I have to say goodbye it makes me well up. I hate that she's so far away, that I can't pop round for a random cuppa or to borrow a book or something. Carl is currently home for ten days from uni in Scarborough: Scarborough FFS!! Can you get much further away from Southampton?? I couldn't be happier for him that he's in uni there and doing his thing. But dropping him at his parents house yesterday and saying "see you at Christmas" when it's only the summer holidays felt like a kick in the guts.
My Mum had just managed to ebb the flow of tears, when I started all over again, starting with me saying "everybody leaves me Mum, why does nobody want to be near me?"! I know! I proceeded to cry over Tom my Infant School boyfriend who left for another school, Bethan my friend from Infants who moved back to Chepstow, and beautiful Sophie who left me in year five to go to South Africa (okay, so there are places further away than Scarborough!). In fairness, Soph did return but lives in Manchester which is still far too far away.
It's the feeling of being left behind that's so hard to handle. That they can come home to us, but then they leave and go back to friends up there. I'm left here with a gaping hole where one of my best friends should be stood.
Today I have found more perspective on the situation. In an ideal world, my friends would all live within about 10 miles of me. But I know that's an unrealistic, and rather selfish, wish. I have to concentrate instead on how good it is when we are together, and that although there may be many many miles between us, we are always close to each other.
The weekend was only marred by the floods of tears that my poor Mum had to deal with on Sunday afternoon! In short, I had the blues big style (plus I was tired, hungover and PMT-ing, not a good combination!). My very best friend, Jenn, and her lovely husband came down for this weekend especially for the party. Jenn has lived in a different place to me since the end of uni, 6 years now. Every time she's down and I have to say goodbye it makes me well up. I hate that she's so far away, that I can't pop round for a random cuppa or to borrow a book or something. Carl is currently home for ten days from uni in Scarborough: Scarborough FFS!! Can you get much further away from Southampton?? I couldn't be happier for him that he's in uni there and doing his thing. But dropping him at his parents house yesterday and saying "see you at Christmas" when it's only the summer holidays felt like a kick in the guts.
My Mum had just managed to ebb the flow of tears, when I started all over again, starting with me saying "everybody leaves me Mum, why does nobody want to be near me?"! I know! I proceeded to cry over Tom my Infant School boyfriend who left for another school, Bethan my friend from Infants who moved back to Chepstow, and beautiful Sophie who left me in year five to go to South Africa (okay, so there are places further away than Scarborough!). In fairness, Soph did return but lives in Manchester which is still far too far away.
It's the feeling of being left behind that's so hard to handle. That they can come home to us, but then they leave and go back to friends up there. I'm left here with a gaping hole where one of my best friends should be stood.
Today I have found more perspective on the situation. In an ideal world, my friends would all live within about 10 miles of me. But I know that's an unrealistic, and rather selfish, wish. I have to concentrate instead on how good it is when we are together, and that although there may be many many miles between us, we are always close to each other.
Let The Music Play, Down At Fraggle Rock
This week I have a HUGE (and by huge I mean colossal) decision to make. I've had a dream since I was about twelve on a holiday in the Lake District (exotic, I know!) to open my own cafe. Over the years the dream has altered slightly and today has come to rest with it being a cafe with a musical edge. I would have open mic nights and stay open into the evenings for live music. There would be guitars available to pick up and play if they want. There would be local artists work for sale on the walls, and a liquor licence to sell bottles of beer and wine.
Then there's the other potential path, something I haven't dreamt about forever, but I get huge satisfaction from - counselling. My dream with counselling though had never been a straightforward one. I always think of counselling as an addition to something else I do.
So here is plan three: that I go down the cafe route, and when I am stable enough I can expand to counselling too. Maybe even just continue as I do now and volunteer somewhere. I think part of my love of counselling is giving something precious to someone and expecting nothing in return.
Idea two is the safest of the three. Idea one I get tingly and excited about but I feel like I will have wasted the last however many years of studying. So idea three makes most logical sense. I just don't know though if it's a possibility. The thought of not ever doing it though breaks my heart. I don't know if I can do it, but I don't know if I can not do it either.
Then there's the other potential path, something I haven't dreamt about forever, but I get huge satisfaction from - counselling. My dream with counselling though had never been a straightforward one. I always think of counselling as an addition to something else I do.
So here is plan three: that I go down the cafe route, and when I am stable enough I can expand to counselling too. Maybe even just continue as I do now and volunteer somewhere. I think part of my love of counselling is giving something precious to someone and expecting nothing in return.
Idea two is the safest of the three. Idea one I get tingly and excited about but I feel like I will have wasted the last however many years of studying. So idea three makes most logical sense. I just don't know though if it's a possibility. The thought of not ever doing it though breaks my heart. I don't know if I can do it, but I don't know if I can not do it either.
Bound By Wild Desire, I Fell Into A Ring Of Fire
Last night was the first in what looks set to be a happy future of headlining for Jet Heeled Striker. There was something different about Adam when talking to him before they even got on stage. There was an extra spark in his eye - he always looks relaxed and happy when on stage but last night there was an extra level of adrenaline bouncing around him.
Clearly it wasn't limited to Adam though, because all the guys looked like they had the adrenaline flowing when they hit the stage. It was a great sight. They were relaxed and confident as ever, but there was a bit of a devil-may-care attitude going on too. Not in an arrogant 'you should all listen to us and think we're magnificent' way, but in a 'we love what we're doing and we're going to enjoy ourselves tonight' way. They knew it was their stage, their night, rather than preparing it for someone else. A night that they deserved, and that did not disappoint.
They played their way beautifully through the set which showed their talent at songwriting and performing - each song sounding both unique and as a part of something bigger at the same time. If I actually was ever unselfconscious enough to dance sober (moshing doesn't count as dancing!) then I would have danced my way through the entire thing!
I'm not going to rant on for ages, because to be honest, you should be going to see this band rather than taking my word for it. Adam naming me during the evening before playing the subliminal Generation X (I've changed my mind again, this IS still my favourite song) has no bearing on me saying how good they are - honest!
The only negative comment I have to make - other than that the second band to play were worse than anything I've heard for a very long time - is that they're not playing again until September 25th in The Joiners. However, if last night is anything to go on, it's likely to be a very good night.
Clearly it wasn't limited to Adam though, because all the guys looked like they had the adrenaline flowing when they hit the stage. It was a great sight. They were relaxed and confident as ever, but there was a bit of a devil-may-care attitude going on too. Not in an arrogant 'you should all listen to us and think we're magnificent' way, but in a 'we love what we're doing and we're going to enjoy ourselves tonight' way. They knew it was their stage, their night, rather than preparing it for someone else. A night that they deserved, and that did not disappoint.
They played their way beautifully through the set which showed their talent at songwriting and performing - each song sounding both unique and as a part of something bigger at the same time. If I actually was ever unselfconscious enough to dance sober (moshing doesn't count as dancing!) then I would have danced my way through the entire thing!
I'm not going to rant on for ages, because to be honest, you should be going to see this band rather than taking my word for it. Adam naming me during the evening before playing the subliminal Generation X (I've changed my mind again, this IS still my favourite song) has no bearing on me saying how good they are - honest!
The only negative comment I have to make - other than that the second band to play were worse than anything I've heard for a very long time - is that they're not playing again until September 25th in The Joiners. However, if last night is anything to go on, it's likely to be a very good night.
All We Want From You Are The Kicks You've Given Us
In the Cardiff afterlife
We sensed the making of our lives
Gotta love Manic Street Preachers for making sense of my sometimes very confusing life!
We sensed the making of our lives
Gotta love Manic Street Preachers for making sense of my sometimes very confusing life!
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