Neglect

The theme of today's post came from the fact I have been creatively negligent recently-I have not been taking the time to write and update this blog or work on any of my other projects. I have a novel and a play sitting part written on my hard drive, two books half read, a costume mockup unfinished and several incomplete posts on both my blogs.

However, we are all constantly negligent in some way or another when you really think about it-we prioritise at the expense of neglecting things that might be more important than we realise. Lately, I have been negligent of my health, my creativity and several of my friends. I've been out late at the expense of my immune system, I've been exercising or helping my mum at the expense of social engagements-especially phone calls. I've been running errands at the expense of family meals. While the things we do are important, and often need to be done we neglect to acknowledge that so too are the things we put off.

One thing we humans often do is neglect our emotional needs. Because emotions and conversations and drama are time-consuming, energy-consuming; we can't get on with all the daily tasks that need to be done if we are busy working on our emotions. But what we forget is that maybe, if we took a little time, often, to acknowledge and look at our feeling, our well-being, we wouldn't have to have the semi-regular explosions of emotion when things get on top of us. Just a thought.

Another thing I neglect is really making an effort in my relationships. I am guilty of taking some of my friends and family for granted. I'm not always bothered to take a call or have a lengthy facebook conversation or play basketball with my little brother. Sometimes I want to be selfish, I feel a need to focus on me. Lately, since I have had less to do and, for a change, am not in a relationship, I have been placing more of an emphasis on the people who make the effort to be in my life-by making an effort to let them. Neglecting something for another person is the best kind of neglect simply because it is the least selfish. Yet it is also good for the soul to actually invest in your relationships. 

I think my worst sin of neglect is my laziness. I neglect to reach my full potential in some endeavours. I settle. I accept satisfaction in the place of delight. I let goals and plans slide, I meander through things instead if powering into them. This post is more meandering than pointed, more vague than poignant. 

I feel a little dull when I think of neglect, of laziness. It reeks of complacency and boredom. With just a hint of pretentiousness. But then, it's what's on my mind-and exploring my mind is one thing I rarely neglect to do- I should simply think more closely about  which of my discoveries may be worth sharing. 

Happiness

Oh my daysss! Have you ever let out a breath you didn't realise you were holding? Ever felt relieved without even realising you were tense? It is a wow feeling.
No feeling quite compares to realising you are happy, or calm, or relieved. It's always amazing to feel this way but it's so much better when you realise it. When you are aware of a good feeling its potency is trebled. You appreciate it, you revel in it, you acknowledge how gloriously great it is to feel, well, great!
We learn in life very early how to notice sadness, anger, pain. How to wallow in it, throw it around or carry it with us. We take happiness for granted. We think that happiness is the normal state of things and that sadness is an anomaly that we should take notice of. We don't accept how special and important good feelings are. We feel entitled to contentment.
And frankly so we should be but that doesn't mean we should forget to appreciate it. Like love, happiness may not feel constant but it is much more so than we realise. We have the ability to be happy all the time but we feel like something needs to make us happy. Just as we expect a trigger for anger or sadness, and forget that sometimes these feelings come unbidden-as should happiness, if we would only recognise it.
I guess happiness is one of those under-rated things, like the euro-saver menu, mums doing the grocery shopping, spooning and cream cheese. We need to recognise happiness when it's upon us. Otherwise we will continue to pursue something which cannot be caught.

Sleeping Babes

I think there is nothing that makes you love someone more than when you see them sleep. We are all at our gentlest, most vulnerable and childlike when we are sleeping. For me at least, seeing a friend sleeping stirs some warm, fuzzy mothering part of me that makes me smile and want to stroke their hair or kiss their forehead. The confident blonde who shook her ass in a tight dress with you on the dance floor suddenly looks younger, softer, peacefully innocent and free of the weight of self consciousness. The strong lad who downed a few too many beers, slagged you and threw you over his shoulder suddenly looks like a pouting toddler, his normally tensed body relaxed, his face softened and more childlike.
Nothing is more endearing than the squished face or tangled limbs of a sleeping friend. The funny expression they fell asleep wearing, making you wonder what they're dreaming of. The awkward pose they dozed off in somehow seeming to reveal a part of them you don't see while they are awake. Even those of us who do not doze off at our most elegant are somehow beautiful in our sleep purely because of that absence of insecurity and self awareness,. The innocence and purity of our sleeping selves is revealing, but only in the kindest way. Even if they are drooling, or snoring, or muttering or their face is squished unflatteringly into the pillow the softness of our relaxation makes us peaceful. Makes us look like a child in a way that speaks to the relationship instinct in all of us. The part of us that wants hugs, that wants to love, that wants to smile and be smiled at. It is a heart-breakingly perfect feeling to see someone you love sleeping because it reminds you of everything you instinctually love about them, not just their jokes, their stories, their voice when they're excited, their goofy dance moves or the way they hold your hand in a crowded place or how they walk when you're staggering through the night together. You just seem to somehow see everything and nothing all at once. The most simplified version of them, free of the adornments of them consciously engaging with you. It's simply lovely in its lovely simplicity.

Scattered self

It's scary sometimes to think there are little parts of me scattered about the world. In people's memories, in filing cabinets in schools and workplaces, in a bank, in dustbins, in other people's houses and here on the Internet. I wonder sometimes if strangers see little bits of me and wonder about who I am, what I might look like, whether we'd get on.
It' scary because sometimes you want people to see you completely, to understand you in all your hidden complexity, to accept the parts you show of yourself as manifestations of the things you sometimes hide away. Other days you wish you could hide everything about you, portray this someone else, some outer persona, independent of all the things you know about yourself. Not because we are afraid of what other people think of us. But because we are afraid of what we will think of ourselves if we let the parts we don't like to look at out. It is like wanting to be gloriously naked some days, revel in your unique imperfections but have others marvel at the wonder of the human form. Yet other days we will want to cover our body in so many layers we no longer appear ourselves. To protect our soft parts, our scarred parts, the bits that don't quite match. Because we will have to look at them ourselves. And we are scared to expose these things to people who won't realise we can't change them, because we feel like our imperfections are our own cross to bear and that we can't impose that trust upon others whose minds we cannot influence to perceive them as we wish them to be perceived.
So too is the mind. It is scarred and freckled and stretched and damaged in places. Our consciousness is that bit more private because we have too much control of what is seen of it, yet other times no control over what we reveal. We can decide what to use to cover up or flaunt our physical form, but sometimes the mind leaves parts of itself in the world without us realising- while we are trying so hard to control it.
I wonder about the people attached to the little bits of world that cross my path. The owner of the lost glove hung over the railing, the person who feeds the cat that follows me home, the stranger that dropped an entire chicken fillet roll in the alley near the dart station or the face that smiled as I cycled past the bus. So many stories weave through our own and I wonder sometimes how many people might have read a page of mine. And I hope that the writing at least shows me in a good light.

Drink, Smoke and be Merry

Last night was a truly fantastic night. For the first time ever I think I was a little tipsy. I was giggly, I was relaxed and I had a lot of fun. My friend and I even got stuck in a bath together which was both a result of and a cause for a fit of giggles!
While I did wake up with what I call a food hangover (due to my allergies) I was in good humour despite a mere hour and half of sleep and spending the morning cleaning my friends house! One of my favourite things that stayed with me from the night was everyone's smiles. The embarrassed grin of someone stuck in a bathtub, the mellow glow of someone who'd just smoked a joint and the raucous laughter of people sharing a few cans and talking about stupid things, like boobs or braces.
The night was one of those memorable evenings where I just felt so loved and the happiness was infectious. Walking in I was hugged and squealed at and smiled at more than I have been in a very long time and I felt a weight I didn't realise I was carrying lift from my shoulders because I felt so relaxed. So happy and just...Alive!
People's smiles are the greatest reminder of how much you love them. Seeing someone you love happy is the greatest feeling I believe there is. It meant I didn't stop smiling all night because some people, such as my ex-boyfriend, while completely off of their tits, wore the blissful smiles of the thoroughly stoned for the entirety of the night. I was comfortable in the atmosphere. It was easy. It's been a while since I've felt so completely at ease.
Cans were scattered about the house, people passed out (or rather dozed off!), several threw up (most politely into appropriate receptacles), cigarette butts and roaches littered the garden and voices and music swelled. It was the perfect party atmosphere that you would write in a teen movie. But it was real. It was my people, the people I just want to throw my arms around and plant a big ol kiss on their collective faces. There was no drama, there was no uncomfortableness and no peer pressure. People were drinking and smoking but no one was 'in the horrors' as we call it. No one was aggro. No one was annoying (with one exception of an unwelcome guest). Most importantly, no one was dragging anyone down. If someone was sick, someone stepped in, if someone was getting tired, they looked for a quiet spot and curled up before they had a chance to get cranky!
Last night was  the very definition of 'merry'. It was the scene in Lord of the Rings when the hobbits are drinking pints, it was the party at the end of Superbad when they finally got there with the alcohol, it was the prom at the end of Mean Girls when everyone learns to get along. Happiness is a party surrounded by people you love.

Who really wants the D?

At the risk of sounding like Carrie Bradshaw by writing and questioning concepts relating to matters of the heart I feel I need to express my confusion at the male race. I know that men say that women are complicated and I don't deny this fact but the very fact that men are supposed to be simple makes it all the more frustrating when they are mysterious.
Some people argue that if a boy pays any attention to you that is not, by circumstance, necessary he 'wants the D' (obviously not the D its a choice of phrase). If he makes the effort to contact you he wants the D. If he pays you a compliment we definitely wants the D.
Lets suppose that this is not true and that boys are in fact a little less one dimensional than they would have you believe. I happen to have a good few guy friends who obviously hang out with me or talk to me without sexual motivation and therefore fall into the category of 'not wanting the D'.
By contrast there will always be those boys who hang out with you or, more commonly in this technology age, relentlessly facebook or text messaging you, simply because your hormones cause you to have two glands on the front of your body. Yes I wear a bra, it doesn't mean I'm going to fall at your feet because of your eloquent phrasing 'you're hot'...wow. Take me sir...not!
Realistically, half the people who act like they want you, wouldn't know what to do if you agreed and half the people that looked like they don't know who you are secretly find you attractive. Who's talking to you because you're fun and who's hanging with you just because you have a second X chromosome? Who really wants the D? Are all my guy friends secretly wondering what I look like naked? Are all the lads who walk past without wolf whistling thinking I'm a hound? The answer is-who fucking knows? If we could read minds life would be a lot less work...but also potentially very awkward and creepy! Lets just hope that if someone really wants you-they will say so.

Snuff

So this is an unusual direction to take but I was at a club recently, working, and had my first really college experience where I was offered drugs. I actually laughed. Someone offered me some pills and I was so, I guess, surprised, that I just kind of laughed. I don't even drink and there was actual drugs being offered to me of all people. It felt...weird.
It did however set me on the intriguing subject of substance, which of course were discussed in their many forms at different stages during the night. After several acquaintances swallowed some gods-know-what, I joined a group in a haze of smoke with their rollies dangling from lips and between fingers, before dancing with another crowd with their beers in hand. The most intriguing substance I encountered however was snuff. My friend who was using it laughed at himself for the habit, saying it made him look terribly posh to say he would rather snuff than smoke. Despite that fact that there's no way to sniff snuff without looking like a cocaine snorter this was probably the singular flaw of the substance. My friend made a very compelling argument for snuff, and,  as substances go, it seems to have few drawbacks. It is all the fun of a cigarette only without the negative effects! As a non-smoker I wouldn't see the joy of consuming what is essentially pure nicotine but in opposition to the humble cigarette it seemed by far the preferable option. None of the yellowing of fingers and teeth, no smell on your hair and clothes, no ashen taste in your mouth to scare off potential lovers, no need to carry a lighter, skins or filters and most compellingly in my friend's words 'NO CANCER!'. Call me old fashioned-like snuff-but a no cancer option sounds pretty nice in this modern world where it seems to becoming more and more like the common cold!
As a substance-free individual I was surprisingly won over to the underdog snuff. I think if you were to abuse anything, it seems, at face value and based on one friend's propaganda, the safest form of substance fun. I don't think I'll start carrying a tin but I was definitely fascinated by the concept, and it seemed far less scary than the effects I've seen of alcohol, cigarettes, drugs and even the humble marijuana. For ye who strive to try all life's sensations-let me know how snuff stands up against it's cousin the cigarette!