Thursday 25 April 2013

Train journey appreciation post.

I love train journeys. I love the buzz of the people, their conversations, their anticipation for their destination, their variety. I love the views, people's back gardens, back ends of industrial estates, mountains, the sea, fields, school playgrounds, offices, valleys, rivers. I love it when you go into a tunnel and the frequency changes and it's as if you've entered a black hole to arrive on the other side in another universe. I love the gentle lull of the train on its tracks, as it drums you into a daze. I love the warmth of the train and, when you're lucky, the sun finding your face as you move with it, chasing it. I think that the train is the most gentle of transports, its slow and calm journey is soothing as you find comfort knowing that this beastly machine will get you safely to your destination. A train journey is often a very satisfying one to make.

This is why above all the destruction of areas of natural beauty, I am against HS2. I don't believe that the majority of people want to get to Birmingham a whopping time of 20 minutes earlier, because the train journey is an important experience. People can easily get work done on a train, especially with plug points and WiFi. Most people take their train journeys as a chance to relax, finish bits and pieces, read a book, listen to some music, just watch the world go by. I don't see how spending billions of pounds on a train that won't even be able to reach it's full speed will benefit any man or woman. Whether business or not. I am not against change or development within our country and economy, but I don't believe that getting people to cities 20 minutes faster will make much difference. I don't understand this concern with time. We have plenty of time if we only stop for a moment to notice. Efficiency is only usually effective when people are calm and relaxed about doing things and getting to places. If we offer a journey that is supposedly faster, people will be expecting that and when it's not delivered it will only cause angst.

I say no to HS2 because train journeys can be a wonderful experience, and a high-speed train takes away that magic. Trains are the majestic old grandfathers of modern transportation, don't let's ruin that.

Thursday 18 April 2013

Freya Mallard - Wonderland.

One of my close friends, Freya, has started a fashion blog to express her love of the latest vogue. She writes in such a way that you're not bored to death by a detailed description of Vivienne Westwood shoes or whatnot. I'm really impressed with the quality of her blog and I believe it should have a good readership, because it's interesting and well presented. She's also a good photographer and showcases a lot of her work through her blog as well. So, I'm using my blog to promote her blog like all good blogging friends should. I hope you enjoy it.

https://freya-mallard.squarespace.com/

People watching.

There is something deeply calming, and satisfying, in watching people from a quiet cafe as they unknowingly act out a play for you whilst you sit and drink coffee. As they walk past in their hundreds thinking a thousand different things, going to a thousand different places and coming from a thousand different pasts. Each one of them has lived a separate life and secretly you witness a tiny fragment of it without their knowledge. How delicious.

You notice differences in people, and similarities. Their gaits, sometimes their voices, their stance, their behaviour in the outside world. You see families walking along and watch an entire different world stroll past as they take a separate history to yours with them. You watch arguments, and laughter, and anxiety as you sit indifferently with a cappuccino.

The magic is that they don't know you're dipping quickly in and out of every one of their lives, for one moment of their existence. It's like one hundred different secrets absorbed by you in one sitting, and you'll never tell. Sometimes you don't even notice you're taking these secrets, they just enter your subconscious as your brain feeds on detail.

And once you finish your coffee, pay the bill, stand up from your table, put your wallet away and walk off, you take those stories with you. Those tiny shared moments in time are stored away somewhere in your memory, they may never come out again but they will be marked as the moment you stood still and the Earth kept moving. The moment you observed from the outside, let your life pause whilst everyone else carried on and stole secrets with your coffee.

I urge you to people watch, it's truly wonderful for the soul.

Tuesday 9 April 2013

I'm a wimp.

There are so many opportunities that I can take and so many paths I can follow that quite often I shy away in fear of reaching the unknown. Sometimes I want to grab myself and shout right up close to my face "YOU CAN DO IT MOLLIE THERE IS NOTHING TO BE AFRAID OF" because too many times I have said no.

A few of my school friends took the opportunity, an opportunity I also had, to go to Ghana on a trip of a life time. I decided not to go because I'd probably get scared there, I'd be out of my territory, I'd get ill. I wasn't bothered about not going even when they left for the airport, but as soon as they returned yesterday evening I knew I'd made a very big mistake. From the photos that have been posted and the tweets that I've seen in my feed it looks like my friends have just had the absolute time of their lives. An experience I feel almost upset to have let pass me by.

I have the chance in a few years to possibly take this opportunity again, and boy will I try my best to get it. This has taught me to never again let chances gently slip pass me whilst every one else around has the most incredible experiences. It was a challenge that would have been good for me, it will be a challenge that will help me in the future.

I hope that this has taught me to stop saying no, to not think about being ill or being scared and to just focus completely on the positives. I want to go somewhere and have my perspectives changed for the better, because to me that's the most amazing experience a person can have.

Thursday 4 April 2013

I am scared of Global Warming.

I am scared of Global Warming. I am scared of living in an England that is below 10 degrees everyday with constant overcast. I am scared of the ice caps melting and floods occurring all over the world. I am scared of the world that I know changing so rapidly that we hardly have time to think. I don't care if the idea is supposedly some big plot to scam us all for our money. I can see it happening, and I am scared.

But what, exactly, am I supposed to do about it? How can I prevent myself and my family from ever living in a dark age? I think that actually instead of us all complaining about the money going into ecological attributes and changes, we should encourage it. I want to know more about what I can do, I want to see people making a difference. I do not care if the actual warming of our atmosphere is a myth,  something is happening and I want to stop it. I think we all need to be told how, and pretty damn soon. 

Tuesday 2 April 2013

I have a yellow trench coat. For crying out loud.

I am a very middle class, straight laced, well educated, well mannered, well spoken, well behaved, ordinary looking girl and sometimes, just sometimes, I think how excruciatingly boring that is. I am grateful for being well educated and well spoken, I can go anywhere with that. But will I have missed something by the time I reach my 40s when I live in a nice house with a nice husband with our nice children? What will I have experienced? The time of my life at a good university? Some occasional drunk nights but never to the point of vomiting because two glasses of red wine and half a pint is enough to make the room spin?

Will my biggest thrill come from buying a pair of expensive duck egg blue brogues? Will my cottage in a home county be full of Cath Kidston and 'nice' little quotes about "Living, Loving and Laughing"?

I don't think I want that. Not quite. There has to be something more to it, I have to have a secret memory of another life I touched the edge of. I have to at least try.

I want to get a nose piercing, but I'm told that will look trashy. That's not 'me'. You won't be able to get a job easily. Who said I was pining for a career where people are judged purely on their looks? Who said I wanted to experiment with my image for anybody? Why am I even asking them?

I could just cut my hair off, wear it short, put some eye liner on, walk out the door, find a pub and do whatever. I could be an entirely different person.

What's stopping me?

I wear flowery patterns, pastel colours, Peter Pan collars, dresses, pixie boots, messenger bag, I have a yellow trench coat for crying out loud. Could I fit any more cosily into this middle class, home county little bubble I live in?

I like who I am, I like what I am, sometimes I mostly like how people see me. But what else is there? And do I want to find out? Will it ruin me? Will it make me? Will it make a new me?

I just don't want to belong to a cliché anymore. Can I do that? Can I break away from the ordinary? Do I want to?

I don't know. I don't know who I am, what I want but I sure as hell want to work it out. I think you'll all know when I do.