Sunday 31 January 2016

Pre-Birthday Celebrations... Well, Kinda!

So. It's Sunday evening and I'm sitting rather awkwardly on this wooden chair/shoe holder (its specific title has either slipped from my frazzled brain or I've yet to come across it in my dictionary) whilst sniffing the chocolate cake-scented air, which is heavy with the atmosphere that is typical in the hours before a major event.

Such as my 17th birthday which, in four hours' time, will finally arrive, and will mark a further step towards adulthood which, as turning 18 is generally viewed as the all-important milestone in one's life, will be my final birthday before I become an adult - a fact that I really can't get my head around. Well, I might sometimes feel much older than my years (particularly in some of my classes at school where the boys may shout and get carried away with their primary school-inspired humour, while I'm literally resisting the urge to scream at them like a teacher - but then again, wouldn't most girls feel the same?), yet seeing a new and bigger number that represents my age somewhat terrifies me because I'm once again getting further away from the sweet comfort blanket that is childhood, which I sometimes feel slipped too quickly out of my fingers before I could truly appreciate it.

Then again, does everyone take their childhood for granted? While we are living it, such an innocent period in our lives feels eternal and, if you were anything like myself at the age of nine, you would wonder whether you were forever condemned to be assigned to stomach-churning pink clothes and Hannah Montana merchandise (despite detesting it with a passion, skirts with the show's logo still found their way onto my skirts!) because your age dictates as to what levels of sophistication and maturity you can be exposed to.

Even as a youngster, I craved to be older because it symbolised excitement - something that remains present in my extremely long wishlist as it provides a welcome escape from the dramas and hassles of everyday life, which certainly doesn't surprise me when pretty much all of this week has been devoted to finishing my Performing Arts coursework in time for Tuesday! Seriously, you will discover yourself wrapped up in dreams and wishes when piles of panic-inducing coursework land on your lap...

In addition to this, I've been fighting 'the lurgy' - otherwise known as the common cold and awfully sore throat - all week, which kick-started in epic style last Sunday when I struggled to swallow anything without a jolt of agonising pain bolting through my mouth. Ouch. Despite this pain passing, I've also had to contend with the sniffles (thanks to my school switching the heating on full blast while the UK faces its mildest winter in history - whilst turning it off when it is as chilling as torturing your shampooed hair with an ultra cold rinse - and a dreadfully sore throat, which is to blame for my current inability to talk for more than five seconds without sounding like a Dalek whose voice is breaking like that of an male teenager. Not so nice, is it?

Still, the show - or at least my birthday - must go on, especially if an Aero and Revel-adorned chocolate cake will be the star of the show tomorrow after I return from an exhausting day at school where, hopefully, some people will have remembered that it is my birthday. Unlike a number of people in my year, I haven't taken it upon myself to brag about my birthday to the entire world (e.g. every single teenager in the local town via Facebook) because such an occasion is one out of millions of birthdays that take place every day and may not get any recognition, which I find tremendously sad because no one - regardless of gender, sexuality, race or so-called 'class' - should receive more or less attention on the most important day in their lives.

Yet, as a teenager, a bit of attention - of the decent kind, of course - would be welcome, especially as I've always made an effort to say 'Happy Birthday' to anyone whose birthday I knew fell on that day in the past. Nevertheless, I won't shed bucket loads of tears if few people return such polite gestures - at least I know that I possess the strength to not lower myself to such ignorant behaviour!

Birthdays are birthdays, and I'm looking forward to enjoying a peaceful, albeit slightly chocolate-mad one this year. With so much going on at the moment - such as revision, completing remaining bits of coursework (hurrah!) and battling what seems to be a particularly nefarious mutation of the common cold - I've had little time to write about how I'm feeling, which is ironic because my voice is too creaky and weak to speak properly, yet I will make more of an effort in the near future thanks to half-term approaching in a fortnight's time. Yay!

Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me, Happy Birthday to me... Well, at least writing instead of singing along won't hurt my voice!

Sunday 3 January 2016

The Late Sunday Night 'Holidays are ending!' Panic

The end is nigh. Or near, whatever 'nigh' is actually supposed to mean, though I don't literally mean the end in the sense that the zombie virus will rapidly mutate and spread like a particularly strong wave of 'Belieber' fever throughout the nation, destroying all that society has long associated with mankind. Hmm. These are exactly the kind of reasons I come up to justify why I deserve far more sleep than I'm currently getting which, for the past fortnight, has transformed me into a somewhat nocturnal creature with deathly pale skin and glistening red lips (thanks to constant applications of Rimmel lipstick, nonetheless) to match my oh-so-scary appearance. 

Even though my casual style might have connotations of Halloween when, technically, it is still Christmas (despite literally 99.9% of the population groaning at the thought of seeing another tub of Celebrations), I suppose that my thoughts have remained focused on Christmas which, as of Tuesday, is over for me. Well, in the sense that I've got the joy of returning to rising out of bed like half-asleep Dracula at six in the morning for the pleasure of revising and studying with a renewed agility at school - a routine that will remain in place until mid-February. Yay. 

Unfortunately, I'm all too aware of the fact that I'll be celebrating my 17th birthday - which, before the thought even dares to pop into your mind, will not entail any driving lessons or half beaten-up cars - in the comfort of the classroom on a freaking MONDAY. *yelps hysterically* And, as is typical with adolescents, I'm as enthusiastic as Garfield the lasagne-devouring cat about facing the first and rather intimidating day of the week; an attitude which I'm nevertheless so sure will guide me through my weekly Maths mock that just so happens to take place every single Monday morning!!!

Oh yeah, please don't assume that those three exclamation marks symbolise my gregarious elation over having the honour of gazing at questions which I truly do not know the answers to just mere hours after emerging from my bed. Really, birthdays and school are a nefarious mixture that only brings horror to all associated parties, let alone the birthday boy or girl. Well, I've figured that I'll do most of my celebrating the weekend before my birthday because a) time won't be limited to just a few hours after coming home from school and b) I won't be in a ten mile radius of a shuttlecock (as badminton, which I swear looks like the HARDEST game I'll ever play in my life, will be taking centre stage in my P.E. lessons in the upcoming term)!

Anyway, my birthday is nowhere in sight for a couple of weeks yet, though the pressure will certainly be placed on my famously indecisive self before I even know it to start looking for potential gifts. Yet another chore that I'm not so thrilled about doing... 

With tomorrow being the very last day in my two week Christmas holiday, I guess that I'm feeling a little bit sorry for myself because having time to relax and remember that my sole purpose in life isn't to achieve A*s like athletes winning gold medals at the Olympics has enabled me to put things into perspective. By that, I'm increasingly feeling more confident about not being seen as 'popular' by my peers who, for the record, are actually a year younger than me: a fact that is sometimes easily forgotten, even though my differences with them is never surprising. So what if people whom I don't particularly like can't be bothered to like my profile picture on Facebook which, to be honest, I only uploaded so that the public can see what I look like and not confuse me with another person who shares my name - definitely not for the purpose of exposing my body in a similar manner to a Page 3 model! Too often, I've been disgusted by the way that quite a few people, namely girls, post selfies which so obviously exploit their, ahem, features so that they can gain a few extra 'likes', which I strongly believe are over-rated and quite a pathetic and meaningless indication of one's so-called 'popularity'. 

You want my honest opinion on popularity? It can go and be blown into millions of little shreds because it means absolutely nothing! Too many teens assume that popularity instantly buys happiness or at least a comfortable seat on the table that so many people at school are dying to sit at, yet it is on a par with liquid foundation: it only conceals the cracks within your persona which, from the angle I've settled myself at, is pretty obvious. In the past few weeks, I've witnessed a group of what the majority of my year would consider to be the It girls - the ones that could possibly win the 'coveted' title of Prom Queen in a few months' time - fall out, for reasons which I don't know and am not at all interested in finding out because it is none of my business (though I wish some people could adopt this philosophy so that they aren't pestering me about my life). Although I've sometimes wished that I could have shared just a little bit of the friendship that these girls had, I realise now that anything could have blown it apart - because popularity is fragile. Why do you think that celebrities such as Britney Spears or Justin Bieber have fallen apart when their fame - the ultimate popularity status - wrecked with their happiness? 

It doesn't matter that so many people before them have made ridiculous and reckless decisions, which should serve as an eternal reminder for how to not lead your lives, yet numerous adolescents nonetheless follow a path towards sacrificing their individuality - as precious and priceless as your virginity, if you really want to appreciate its value - for the sake of fitting in with a crowd of people whom, if they weren't labelled as the popular guys, you don't particularly like. And can that truly be the recipe for happiness? Few things in life are free and, although standing up for your own beliefs might single you out as the 'weirdo' at school, you can hold your head up high and be proud of having such a wise head on your shoulders - besides, the most fascinating people in society are the ones who refuse to conform. There's a reason why the majority of famous people are famous: their talents stand out. As if yours will be if you simply adopt the airs and graces (or lack of) of your 'peers'!

Rant over, I'm more than ready to shrug off the unfairness and inequality that defines school life for the sake of focusing on my exams, the first of which takes place in exactly four months' time. Gulp. Exams are only as terrifying as you make them out to be, yet if I carry on revising and putting in as much effort as I have done for the past year, my only problem will be remembering life without exams by the time they officially finish at approximately ten in the morning on Friday 17th June. Like I wasn't going to remember the date when my summer of freedom and adventure begins!

What else is there to say? I'm looking ahead to a positive year and Tuesday is just the beginnings to a means of an end. Let battle commence!

Friday 1 January 2016

New Year, New Outlook, New Chances

As of 5.44pm, which is the time when I commenced writing this entry, I have been living in 2016 - a year brimming with possibilities and opportunities for none other than moi, though I do hope that your 2016 shines as brightly too - for seventeen hours and forty-four minutes, which doesn't even account the numerous hours I devoted to sleeping off my late night euphoria in bed this morning. Needless to say, I was rather reluctant to separate myself from sheets of sheer warmth (which definitely counteracts my lizard-like chilliness) at 10.30am, especially when New Year had already come and gone in such a rush!

Still, I wasn't the only person to have been enchanted by the fantastic firework display which brought London and indeed the whole of the UK (if you weren't already dropping off into a slumber by then) to a standstill for ten magical minutes as the nation were blown away by crackles and pops of colourful delights that lit up the city's sky. Moments like those somehow make me believe for a short while that anything is pretty much possible because I suppose that I never really let my expectations become too grand, perhaps in fear of being disappointed: hardly the ideal emotion you want to be experiencing as a new year kicks off.

Nevertheless, I proudly and discreetly maintain my childhood passion for magic which, in recent years, has been boosted by watching spell-binding programmes such as Charmed and Buffy the Vampire Slayer (though Willow's temporary descent into black magic doesn't really represent the kind of magic my heart believes in). Although you might struggle to understand why the likes of Phoebe Halliwell or Willow Rosenburg have to do with New Year celebrations, I think that they fit perfectly. Why? Whenever the New Year approaches, I start to cling to these optimistic beliefs that all of my dreams - including the less realistic ones, such as getting my hands on a Louis Vuitton bag (though, let's face it, the nearest I will get to one is gazing at its picture on the Harrods website) - will come true, pretty much in a similar way to my fairy godmother appearing and casting spells of absolute joy for me.

Fortunately, my thoughts and beliefs have developed a more, well, sophisticated taste in recent years, and I think that I've pretty much persuaded my mum that I'm no longer obsessed with hovering cars becoming the upcoming year's latest creation (though Back of the Future's lack of reliable predictions secretly annoys me!). Still. Even when problems may be looming in the faraway distance, I nonetheless hope for success - or at least a sprinkling of positivity - to be awaiting around the corner. Personally, magic symbolises happiness for me because, if I had just a little bit of it, plenty of good would be injected into my life, which would of course produce a very happy year.

Besides, one of the few things that I do like about New Year is that, for once, pretty much everyone is united with the intention of goodwill for not only themselves, but other people. Too easily I can forget about all of the people surrounding me either at school or at home because transporting myself to Sky Go or Revision Mania (albeit not on quite a pleasurable par with Sleepyland) is sometimes much easier than noticing others; occasionally, all that I want to see is myself. And well, is that really so bad? Deep down inside of us, I cannot shrug off the feeling that we automatically view our needs as more important than those of other people because we possess a disguised instinct for always defending ourselves; regardless of whether they share our likeable personalities or interests, we will usually take care of ourselves first before we even consider the plight of another person.

Selfishness, which is pretty much the only word that I can think of to describe my point (even though I don't see it in such a negative way), is brilliant for achieving your personal successes and remaining level-headed when focusing on a particular target. Obviously, I get to express some of my typical teenage selfishness by spending hours cooped up in my bedroom at a time for my studies, which might deprive me of some precious time that I could otherwise use for hanging out with my family and friends, yet it isn't selfish at all because it is benefitting me. If only goodness can come out of it, selfishness - or awareness of your own needs - should be celebrated for enabling society to develop their own abilities and confidence in themselves. Well, sometimes we need to learn certain things from ourselves instead of from others - a point that I will definitely remember whilst revising for my exams over the next few months!

However, forgetting about our own needs for a little while and embracing other people's happiness instead simply contributes to the magic of New Year which, despite only really lasting for one evening, warms you up a bit and gives you an incentive to look back at New Year's Eve in a positive light for years' to come. OK, people often reminisce about how many shots of vodka they could drink until they shared a hedgehog's bed - a green, leafy bush - to finish off their New Year, yet there is a hidden message behind the last day - and indeed the first - of the new year which, if you look between the lines, is only awaiting to be recognised and valued.

Here's to a very positive and Happy New Year, albeit one declared officially eighteen hours and twenty one minutes later!