Sometimes, the internet drops a true gem into your hands. Discovering this was one of those times.
"The first time I saw her
Everything in my head went quiet..."
So begins the most beautiful love poem I have ever had the chance to see performed. I dare you not to feel serious feelings as you watch Neil Hilborn speak of love and loss, a typical subject, granted, but portrayed in such a transfixing way. The thing that is special about this poem, though, is that the relationship in the poem is plagued by obsessive compulsive disorder. For anyone who knows someone who is obsessive compulsive, you can understand how hard it is for that person to function normally. Imagine how hard it is for you, as a relatively normal person, to develop a relationship with someone. Now imagine that you, with all your kinks and downfalls, also have to avoid every crack in the pavement, or have to repeat each motion you do seven times, or have to organise all your items in colours.
The poem begins with the couple's first meeting, and with the girl enchanted by all his quirks. But eventually the quirks become too much for his love and she leaves him alone. The story of so much of love, but so much more heart-wrenching.
I really have no idea whether or not Neil is actually OCD, but his vision of this relationship and the illness is beguiling. Love is difficult enough as it is, which is probably why this poem is the first to almost move me to tears. Please, press play and enjoy his performance mastery for yourself.
And also, have a look at his other work. This guy is a poetry slam genius and I hope, one day, I'll have the chance to watch him perform live.
Sorry for my week-long absence... It was probably longer but, all the same, I apologise.
I spent this last week at Soul Survivor (Week B) in Somerset with about fifteen kids from my church. It was a good week, and much better than I thought it would be. I even found myself enjoying my first time camping! I was prepared to hate my time there with intense passion and I think, up to a point on about the second or third day, I was still certain that that would happen. Yet I found myself so engrossed in it all. Recently, I had been feeling disillusioned by Christianity and my own faith. If I'm honest, I was about ready to call myself out on it and stop labelling myself Christian. And I still have many of these same issues with religion (not just Christianity - all organised religion), but this week I silently dedicated myself to Christ once again and I feel so good about it. I feel a shift in my outlook on life, as if I will finally be able to do the things I have wanted to for so long. Yes, I do fear the struggle of faith in these modern times but I sense that I really am not alone, and feeling the Spirit basically every day this week made me remember this. It was wonderful to spend this time in such a spiritual place and I am so looking forward to next year's event.
But what I really want to write about is how I spent my free time this week. I spent a lot of time with boys this week, which reminded me how much I missed having good male friends. This is a major downfall of going to a girls' school. You lose the ability to make good guy friends, and those are my favourite type of friends! For me, a girl who has always identified as rather boyish, being trapped in a girls' school for five years and only knowing the sort of boys that are absolute twats made me feel as if I would lose that forever. You know, in primary school, I was basically only friends with boys. I played kiss chase on the boys' team, I played football with them, I created Captain Underpants sequels with my best boy friend... I even challenged them to burp the alphabet. Having male friends has always been so natural and so comfortable for me and I had been fed up of female friends and their constant bickering and desire to talk about how attractive or "slutty" others are. So this week, in which I spent the majority of my time with some awkward sixteen-year-olds and the rest with some immature thirteen-year-olds, made me feel so relaxed. For the first time in so long, I had no need to play up my adult, mature side. I danced terribly whenever I wanted, I laughed at their shamefully bad innuendo, I had used underwear thrown in my face (then threw it at others), I partook in extreme Nerf gun battles, I injured people (and myself), I played pranks... I felt like me again. It felt right.
I spent most of my time with a group of three boys, two sixteen-year-olds and a fifteen-year-old. One of those, I felt closer to than the others. It had been in my mind to make friends with him for an awfully long time, verging on a year, but this week I finally decided to make it happen. On the second day, I tagged along with him and his friends and this pattern of being ditched by my friends and having to go around with them carried on for most of the rest of the week. By the third day, he called me his friend (a requirement for me because I prefer not to assume friendship before it is confirmed), by the fourth, I was hanging out in his tent at midnight (against the rules according to the fifteen-year-old who I made incredibly uncomfortable) and by the fifth, he was laying in my lap and being asked if I was his girlfriend by an eight-year-old. In all honesty, I cannot say that that is not what I want. I do. I have been interested in him for a while. But I feel that at this point, I just want to be friends. Yet I am worried. Often, on these sorts of trips, you bond with a group and suddenly, when you get back it seems as if it never happened. You go on with life as if that week of it never occurred, as if you never shared some great moments, as if you never made any memories. This time, I refuse to let that happen. I refuse to neglect a relationship with one of the few people I have found that I amsimilar to. I refuse to damage a tie with someone who I already miss. I refuse to lose a friendship so good that a twenty-five-year-old said of it after less than a week, "That's love". I cannot let this connection be severed.
(But I probably will because that is what I do, after all. I am horrifyingly bad at maintaining relationships...) I am not about to sit around and wait for myself to ruin this though. I have to do something about this. I have to make some changes. And this will be my most important one...
Yet again, this was going to be a fashion post. But my camera hates me so I guess we have to deal with it. Anyway, I guess this is sort of a fashion post. Here's my stance on dress codes.
First of
all, clothing of appropriate standard, which serve purpose both in school and
out of school, is incredibly difficult to find. Hardly
any item of clothing I see on a
regular basis are to dress code standard. Shirts are sheer, jackets are leather
or denim, shoes are creepers, trainers or Dr Martens, trousers are non-existent
if not jeans… It is becoming impossible to easily purchase clothing adhering to
regulation. Why must we, as students, worry about the state of our dressage
when we have other concerns, namely our
education to focus on? Most American schools do not have uniforms, allowing
students to concentrate on their work, and whatever else may come their way. And
a growing number of schools in the UK, such as King Edward VI community college
in the fabulous town of Totnes (from this Guardian article), have dropped
uniform allowing students to only adhere to the 3Cs rule – clean, comfortable
and covered up. Should that not be the way it is for everyone? As long as
you’re clothed and ready to learn, should uniformity really matter?
Secondly, on the case of bullying, I do not
agree that bullying is classist. Bullying is pervasive regardless of your family
background. A suit will not make a bizarre girl any more likely to make
friends. If you are going to be bullied, you will be, regardless of your
monetary status. And I can assure you that, in a girls’ school, though they
would like you to think it, brands do not really matter. You are genuinely more
likely to be ridiculed for carrying a Prada bag around with you 24/7 than for a
simple unbranded one, because it will make you
the abnormal one. And self-expression through clothing is honestly more
likely to make you real and genuine friends. If you wear a suit, everyone is
the same until you get talking. But when wearing your favourite band tees,
people will come to you and ask about your music taste, say that they like the
same music and socialise. Freer dress codes allow potential friends and
acquaintances to be pre-filtered for you, which is especially useful for socially
challenged introverts such as myself.
Finally, with a disallowance of “skirts longer
than 10cm above the knee”, “satin” and “tops with straps thinner than 5cm”, it
seems that the dress code targets mostly females for indecencies. Dress codes
are often innately sexist, not giving women the freedom to wear short skirts,
in particular. Why? Is the view of my upper thigh suggestive? Does the sight of
my exposed shoulder attract males? As a feminist, I refuse to alter the way I
dress to save lustful boys from temptation. Rules like this perpetuate the
classic rapist defence, “Her skirt was too short. She was asking for it.” I
refuse to condone that. I refuse to adhere to regulations set to place the
responsibility of sexual attraction on the female alone. In the 21st
century, this should not be the way women have to live.
On a recent vote taken throughout our school, I
was with the year eights, talking to their form tutor who is also my biology
teacher. On the question “Do you agree with the proposed dress code?” There was
a box to tick for yes, and another for no. He drew in another box, saying to me,
“That’s going to piss them off.” I turned to see “jeans” written next to it. Jeans... I
concur.
The idea of feminism being
irrelevant and antiquated is one purveyed throughout society, from the mass
media to the naïve students at the high-achieving girls’ school that I attend. That
is not to say that these people do not want gender equality; they just refuse to accept the fact that feminism is still necessary in today’s society.
A few months ago, a friend
came to me, asking for “feminist help”. Happy to educate someone
new on the importance of gender rights, I agreed. His responses to my texts,
however, were incredibly alarming. Often he would return with, “But women have
their equal pay now. Shouldn’t they just get over it now?” This infuriated me
(just to clarify, he was not
representing his own view and rather trying to make a balanced argument on the
relevancy of feminism for a school project) and at the time I had no real
rebuttal to give except that equal pay was not yet a reality and that there is SO much more to feminism than that. According to the European Institute for Gender
Equality’s Gender Equality Index, even the UK is only three quarters of the way
to economic gender equality. So how can feminism be out-dated if it has not even
achieved what it set out to do?
Well, you see, the issue with
feminism is that it has one fatal flaw: its name. Feminism, as a concept, was first
began to give females the same rights as males, a noble cause. At its core is
still this desire for men and women to be equal, but with this seeming equality
in the Western world, the use of a pro-XX word seems wrong and obsolete. What
is required to revive feminism is gender-neutrality. As a self-professed
feminist, I don’t care for the “girl power” of the 90s; what I want is equality. I want to see young
girls encouraged to be footballers and rugby players, and I want young boys to
be comfortable with the idea of being hairdressers and nurses. I hate the
chauvinism that exists in male-dominated professions. I want things to get
better for females, but that does not mean it has to get any worse for males,
and I think the fear of it getting worse is what puts most men off of feminism.
Another thing that puts not
only males, but also females (myself included!) off of feminism is their perception of feminists and feminism. When I first started reading
up on feminism, the only feminists that I knew were all what I like to call
“militant feminists”; I had heard horror stories of some going to anti-abortion
protests and shouting in the faces of pro-lifers, telling them that their beliefs,
even their beliefs in God, were all wrong. That was not the sort of person that
I wished to be perceived as, and I think a huge proportion of potential young
feminists do not identify as such because of this. You do not need to believe that men are unnecessary for the continuation of the human race and all that crazy stuff! So many people I know think that! And unfortunately, I think even
more young girls believe that calling themselves feminists will make them less
desirable to males, a saddening reality both because it should not do and
because, in my opinion, you should believe what you think is right, not what
you believe will make you more likeable to others.
In my honest opinion,
feminism is just as relevant today as it has always been. Feminism is needed
because there are still more women than men working against domestic violence
and rape culture and numerous other gender-related issues. Males and females must
be seen as equal to discourage wage discrepancies, to obliterate rape culture,
to stop FGM, to end stigmatisation of LGBT communities, to stamp down on
gender-related violence, to normalise “house-husbands” married to working
wives, to kill body-shaming culture, to allow people to be themselves and to be
happy, regardless of how they are.
Yes, I am a feminist and I
will be until the day that I die. You should be too.
The other day, I finished watching Greetings from Tim Buckley and it reignited my love for Jeff Buckley. In my opinion, Penn Badgley did an incredible job of imitating, but not massacring, Jeff's voice as I would have expected him to do, and his characteristics were exactly how I had always imagined Jeff's to be. However, the movie was definitely not as good as I would have liked it to be. I was excited for it for so long and to be honest, it let me down a little bit. But how could I pass up the chance to watch a film about one of my favourite ever musicians?
So, let me back-track a little bit. When I first listened to Jeff Buckley, years ago, I was enamoured, absolutely in love. I researched a lot and read a lot about him and one of the first things I discovered was that he died, drowning in Wolf River, on my first birthday. I think that on the day that I found out, I nearly cried. Just knowing that I may have spent that exact second that he was dying enjoying my first birthday, in the absolute ecstasy that a birthday is to you when you are young, broke my heart. It still breaks my heart. Every birthday I make sure to listen to a few songs, if not the full albums and a cut-out from a magazine calendar sits on my wall of the date with his name and a little coffin drawn on it.
For so long, I felt like because of this we had an affinity, a connection by fate. I felt like this coincidence, minute as it was, joined us together. I remember once, as an idiotic fourteen-year-old, saying to my friend, "Hey, imagine if when he died, his soul passed on to me... if I was Jeff reincarnated." Then I realised that I was already born when he died so that was dumb of me. Can we just ignore the idiocy of my younger self please? Okay let's. Now, I just see his music as absolutely stunning. I listen to his voice and I sometimes feel tears welling up in my eyes, hearing that haunting falsetto and stunning guitar work. I can't really explain it, but I just find his music so touching, so torturously beautiful. His music made me fall in love with him.
So here are my top three Jeff Buckley songs, for your listening pleasure:
Vancouver
From the album: Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk (1999)
This song is Buckley's voice at its most versatile, meandering elegantly from the deep, almost hoarse vocals of the verse to the mellow high notes of the chorus. And the broken chords of the riff have this magical way of actually turning knots in my stomach. Simply amazing.
Nightmares By The Sea
From the album: Sketches for My Sweetheart the Drunk (1999)
There is really something special about this song. One time I listened to this for a full six hours in a Frankfurt hotel reception, but I wanted to listen to it forever. The guitar riff is absolutely haunting, in the most beautiful of ways. The idea of "coral graves" and the line "stay with me under these waves, tonight" is strange; it all seems so scarily prophetic.
Lover, You Should've Come Over
From the album: Grace (1994)
This one is a new love of mine. It has slowly grown on me over the past few months. My favourite lyric from this is, "I feel too young to hold on, and I'm much too old to break free and run" because that is probably the place that I'm at right now with most everything. Honestly though, his lyrics are poetry and this song is heart-achingly beautiful.
Although Jeff is dead, I do believe that he is one of those artists whose spirit truly lives on through their music. In Grace, he sings, "drink a bit of wine, we both might go tomorrow". He knew it, and I believe he lived his life as if he might, at any moment, suddenly be gone. If there is one thing we can all learn from him, it is to live as if tonight is our last night and to do what makes us truly happy, never afraid to die...
The after-party was intended to be a fashion post but as my laptop and memory card are refusing to cooperate, unfortunately, that will have to be arranged for another time.
I feel a bit lost now... Time to improvise, I guess.
*****
One of my favourite stores and online communities, Lomography, have made a new Kickstarter project - one of the most exciting I've ever seen, if I'm honest. The aim is to recreate the legendary Petzval lens for use on modern cameras, both digital and analog (the lens works with any Canon EF or Nikon F mount camera). The effects that the lens provides are absolutely stunning, and so similar to the original.
Using the original 19th-century Petzval lens
Using the first prototype of Lomography's new Petzval Portrait Lens
Using the first prototype of Lomography's new Petzval Portrait Lens
I'm simply astounded by the blurred bokeh effect it creates and am so excited to see the photos produced by the people who buy it! Sadly, I do not have the $500 required to support the project and get the special edition black lens that I have fallen in love with so I will have to make do with living vicariously with the photographers through Flickr. Luckily though, the amazing Lomography community have already funded the project - in fact they are currently at over $600,000, $500,000 over their goal. So if you, like me, cannot afford to pledge in the next 28 days, the lenses should be on sale by February 2014 on the Lomography shop for you to buy, retailing at $499.
Until then, I would suggest having a look at the site if you're interested in analog photography. Their range of products and services, such as the Lomography Smartphone Scanner and the Lomo Lubitel 166+, definitely will not disappoint!
I read an interesting article yesterday, written by the wonderful Stephen King, which spoke of the importance of first lines. Much like first impressions for people, they make or break a novel (or article or indeed, blog post) and either draw the reader in, or make them feel they cannot spend a second further reading. I wholly agree and that is why I intend on making this first post the best I possibly can. A blog must begin on as good a start as any novel, especially if it is to be taken seriously (and this blog is determined to be taken seriously).
It starts from here.
My aim from here on is to describe myself, leaving very few obvious remnants of me in writing this. It has always seemed to me rather a difficult task, how to tell someone who you are without telling them who you are. But I shall make my attempt.
I know very little of life and love, living in my own mind and imaginary worlds, choosing them over the place where I was born, the people I meet. The only attraction to the life I lead in this desolate house is that of the nature, surrounding and encompassing me; not too close that I feel swallowed up and insignificant, yet not too far that I struggle to find the time to be within it. And death resides not far from my abode, locked within the gates but occasionally slithering through the cracks to lay its hands on another poor soul, destined to leave this world... Art is my love: music, fashion, photography, writing. Yet I do not love them enough to depend on them; I want to change lives through the law. I want to make it available and usable for the people who need it for their own wellbeing, not for those who use it to make money and to hurt others. The law could be an incredible power for good if we would only let it be... I love to be in new places, but not with new people. I wish to see the world and everything beautiful in it and hopefully, if all goes to plan, in a year I shall make my start, in America... My dreams are few and far between but what I desire most in this world is happiness, and I will go to the ends of the earth in order to find it.
I think that sums me up.
Is that good enough?
I hope so.
So welcome to the blog. The inauguration is complete. The blog will now take a dance with its gender-neutral significant other, and hope that their first term in office is successful, filled with happy memories and dreams come true, and that they can live to survive another.
