Hallelujah

Recently I've been going through a bit of a rough patch. Some of my really close mates, including my best friend, my brother and my boyfriend have all gone off to university. That has actually been a lot harder than I thought and I seem to spend most of my time wishing I was where they are. Yeah yeah I know: boo hoo, woe is me and all that. It sounds pathetic doesn't it? But, that's pretty much how I've been feeling, until tonight.

Tonight I walked home in the dark and the pouring rain. I left Zumba (amazing! You should all have a go!) with my umbrella open, my hood up, my head bent and my iPod in - completely ready to block out the world and everthing it entailed. All I wanted was to get home as fast as possible.

As I was trudging down the main road, 'Hallelujah' as sung by Ben Cantelon came on my iPod. It is  song of pure worship, with so few lyrics but so much meaning. Cantelon put all his effort into praisig God and suddenly I realised how selfish I had been. Yeah my loved ones may be far away, and yeah I may be stressed, and yeah things might not be working out too great with school. But you know what, God is always there. He is always, always there and I have failed to notice that.

An image cam into my mind, of God's love like the rain pouring down all around me. I could have kept my umbrella open and my hood up all the way home and tried to protect myself from the water as much as I could, but my feet would still have been soaked. The wind would still have blown my umbrella away from my face, exposing me to the rain, if only for a moment. There was no where to hide on my travels. No where to shelter from the rain. So, instead of fruitlessly trying I put away my umbrella, pulled back my hood and tilted my face towards heaven.

Suddenly, my walk home became worship. God's love was everywhere, soaking me to the skin, almost to the point where I felt as if my whole body was immersed in water. I love my God and wherever it is that I am going, wherever this journey is leading me I know it will be raining all the way if I keep my head tilted heavenwards.

Deep I know, but I wanted to worship in a similar way to Ben Cantelon and where he does it through music, I can do it through language.

Coming In With A Bang!

Seeing as I can't exactly go out with a bang, I thought I'd do the opposite. Let me explain...

I wanted to end summer on a high, leaving me motivated, alert and relieved of tension (these last two weeks I could have really done with a back massage or something) ready for school. But no. Instead it looks as though I will finish summer just as stressed as I started it. This revelation occured to me tonight when my boyfriend came round merely so he could get changed in my bathroom, douse himself in Lynx and go out again to a party where he will, no doubt, drink his weight in alcohol and have a whale of a time doing it. Standard Adam Laycock summer (I know you shouldn't wish ill on people, but I do hope his has a banging headache tomorrow morning). My life, on the other hand, has been consumed by work. Personal statement, catch-up summer work, university open days, the ELAT, extra reading - these are the kind of things that occupy my head.

But no fear! God is here! (Nope, still can't finish a post without mentioning him!) As always, my wonderful friend Jesus has alluded to the fact that I am indeed being ridiculous. Let's be honest, all I can do is work as hard and I can; he has his hand on the rest. Whatever happens, I will end up where he wants me. After all, what are friends for? So, instead of sitting in my hovel eating leftover Easter eggs I will be motivated! I will enter Year 13 as a cross between braird and stampeeding horses; this year is the start of something new, yet I intend to hit the ground running. This is my first chance to put myself on the map, and I intend to make my mark!

So, a new mantra is in order I feel; work hard, play hard. Afterall, Jesus did say "I came to give you life so you could live it to the full." Look out my friends, a new era of Amy has arrived!

(Oh and Adam, I do love you really!)

Word of the Day: braird - the first sprouts or shoots of grass, corn, or other crops; new growth.

Comeback Blog...

It's been so long since I last posted, I wanted to write something that would really grab you all. Some incredible, wiredrawn piece that would leave you reeling. I wanted to write about the beauty of the leaves as they fell to the ground. I wanted to describe the delicate sound they made as their dried bodies touched down.

But I missed Autumn.

I wanted to write about exams, and how my brain recently felt as though it would melt and trickle out of my ear, all my knowledge disappearing as a result of a breakdown.

But somehow I survived.

I wanted to write about Emma and how clever Jane Austen must have thought herself. How this hugely acclaimed literature is really just an example of women who don't push the bounderies far enough. How Emma is an irritating little girl who's story could have been 300 pages shorter had she realised her future as quickly as I did.

But I had no time to dedicate to it.

I wanted an incredible comeback blog, dedicated to one subject. Instead, I have given you small rants on three. Oh the irony of writer's block...


Word of the Day: wiredrawn - finely spun; extremely intricate

God and Glee

Hello fellow Blogspotters! I'm back!
My absence has been a long one, and is unfortunately due to the horrors that are exams. I just felt like I wouldn't be writing at my best if I was stressed out and tired, thus I didn't write at all. I hope you didn't miss me too much, and I have decided to come back with a post to wow you all, in order to make up for lost time!

I had a theme for this post all planned out, but after taking a break from rapid History AS Level catch up to watch Glee, I decided that the episode was so meaningful and hard-hitting, that I just had to write about it.
Here is a quick synopsis to get you up to date: Kurt's dad suffered a heart attack and was subsequently comatosed. It was heart wrenching to watch him sit at his Father's bedside, wishing him to squeeze his hand. Trying to help in any way they could, Kurt's Glee friends offered to pray in any which way they believed. As Glee is such a culturally and socially diverse program (one of the many reasons why we all love it!) this involved methods from Jewish to Protestant prayer. Kurt, however, was having none of it.
What I loved about the episode was not that it meant the name Jesus was said on national television (as I'm sure most of you would assume about me, being the Jesus freak and all!). No, it was the beautiful speech Mercedes gave to Kurt as a means of comfort. She basically said; you don't have to believe in God, or the power of prayer, but you have to believe in something. No one can manage this life alone.
In my opinion, she is totally right. Not just because I do believe in God, but because why would you want to believe there is nothing? Maybe Christianity is not the only true faith. Maybe all religions are paths to the same God. I do not believe for a second you have to call yourself a Christian to have God in you. But surely it is more comforting, more supportive to believe that there is someone or something out there, whatever it is, than to believe there is an endless void? Why would you want to go at this life alone?
I realise that many people will come back at me and say "But Amy, I'm not alone! I have my friends and family." Trust me, I know they are so, so important: I couldn't survive without mine! But if it's just them, then everything is worldly. Is there really nothing spiritual in this life? No spiritual paphian that makes a difference to our lives?
I hate to think so.
These thoughts have been swimming around in my head since Glee ended, so I thought I'd share them with you.
How's that for a come back post?

Word of the Day: paphian. Of or pertaining to love.

Boom Boom Boom

Has your heartbeat ever been replaced by another pulse? A beat so strong it courses through your body, and seems to resonate within you? You know the experience doesn't come from within, and the supposed heartbeat is artificial, but that does not make it any less real or powerful. It is at times like these, when a person can become truly lost. One person in a mass of people. One body in a sea of others. One heart beating in time with a noise far greater than any it could generate.
Let me give you an example.
This month I have been to two concerts. The first of which was the utterley incredible Linkin Park. Their music is so heartfelt, and often raw. You can tell that as Chester Bennington sings out his lyrics, he really means them. Moreover, part of what made their performance was the drum beat. The majority of the songs were built on a hard, low bass beat which the sound system amplified and projected through the audience. The beat was so loud, and so low it pumped through my body and seemed to, as stated at the start, replace my own heartbeat. I became lost in the rawness of the music and the mass of people I was sharing it with. The experience was one you must encounter, as it's description could never quite level the feeling. Later in the month I went to a Paramore concert, and the feeling was mimicked in a number of their songs. Hoever, Paramore can be somewhat softer than Linkin Park.
A rock concert is truly the music genre at it's finest. If you're a fan of any band that comes under that umbrella I urge you to have this experience. Have a go at letting the drums of your favourite band replace your heartbeat.

Word of the Day: namaste. A conventional Hindu expression on meeting or parting.
I haven't included it, as it was impossible to work in. I'm sure you can see why! Sorry if I've disappointed!

Why So Serious?

I realised that pretty much all my blog posts so far have been rather serious. I don't want you all to think that I'm grey and dull, and while I'm so grateful for all the positive feedback I've been getting from this blog (from one of my friends in particular) I wanted to write something a little more light-hearted tonight. That's why at the moment I am also listening to Key 103 as Mike Posner tells me I think I'm cooler than him (which is totally not true Mike!), looking through some funny pictures of some good times, and just generally chilling.
A few of my friends are going through hard times at the moment, and I think it's imporatant to provide a little light relief every now again,. For example, a blog post that has no "purpose" as such, but has just been written for the sake of writing. That is why this post has no Word of the Day today. Just to shake things up a bit.
Going back at what I said at the beginning of this post about being grey and boring, I've just realised I think that's what a lot of people think about Christianity. I reckon most people envisage an old guy with a long flowing white beard, sitting up on a load of clouds and glaring down at us. They think he's holding a clipboard and telling Christians what they can and can't do each day, trying to ruin people's fun. Trust me, if that was God, I wouldn't want to know him! I love my faith, because it's not boring and dull. It's an exciting relationship with my best friend. The furthest thing from grey and boring!

The Lunar-Man

I looked up into the sky this evening, and noticed it was a half moon. At first glance it purely looked like a white semi-circle hovering in the velvet sky, as it always does. But when I began to look closely, I started to see a face. Not the standard man-in-the-moon that you see in a full moon, staring out at you. I began to see the moon's face in profile. As if he was gazing across the sky, at some celestial formation to his left. I tilted my head to one side and smiled at this peculiarly placed man. Then, once again, I began to see something different. I no longer saw the lunar-man's face, instead the moon looked more like it was missing it's better half. The glistening white seemed to stop too abruptly, with no shading between it and the black. It was more like someone had taken a bite out of it, and left it hollow. You could see the line where the moon ended, and the night sky began, but it almost looked like you could see the hollow inside too. I'm not going to lie, I preferred the smiling lunar-man to this eerie sight. I wanted to hopscotch across the space and fill the moon up again, so it was restored to it's former beauty.
It got me thinking, we can all see different images and ideas, in the same physical object. It's like cloud gazing; often one person can see a pattern, yet their friend has no idea how the cloud resembles that thing! Sometimes we notice things that others don't, or we interpret things in a way no-one else does. I wonder why that is? And I wonder why there are just some things we can never explain to anyone else, because they purely don't see it, or understand. If we could combine our understandings, we would be wiser than we ever thought possible!
But I guess that's just life isn't it. We have to learn from other people's wisdom, in order to try and see the things we can't quite on our own.

Word of the Day: hopscotch - to journey quickly and directly usually from one far place to another
I've decided to define the word of the day, as most of you who read this are too lazy to look up what they mean! To be honest, I don't blame you. I probably would be too!