Playground Swings

 

Playground Swings – a poem

**all photo credits to my sister**

silence
a child’s cry
they both call me to this place of familiarity
at different times
I think it’s
the security of a soft landing
the comfort of children playing
the simplicity of just saying
or
or it’s the lonely poeticness of a playground when it’s empty,
the cold, quiet paradox of a place like this in silence.
and something about the way
I can always smile here

thinking out loud on playground swings,
these creaking chains are the only ones that will ever set me free,
and yet still I’m trapped,
torn back down to earth
by the limits of my wings,
I want to fly higher
and I will
never quite knowing
stomach lurching
you will catch me when I’m falling
right?

Hood up
pulled over my face like a shadow
legs stretched to the sky
lips and mind searching for the ‘why’
in everything

my fingers are getting cold
kinda slipping
letting go
I’ve been here too long
nostalgia
memories burn holes
in your pocket
matches set fire to the past
then watch as flames destroy souls
and poetry is composed
and the future is all they leave us
covered in ash
so close and yet so far away

the wind blows in my face
just reminding me of its power
I rise and fall like the waves
and I can do nothing
yet I still strike out for the shore
and swim
but sometimes I am torn between
the devil and the deep blue sea
and sometimes
the mystery of the horizon
is too beautiful
and I fill the ocean with my tears
whilst the tide takes me
and I have to decide whether to fight
or to let go.

but I am stronger
I am stronger
than anyone knows
and I will sing a song
my song
and people will hear me
and they will lean over the fence and listen
and I will be a child on a playground swing again

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Be A Little ‘Sadder’

Disclaimer: this post could be seen as a bit controversial. I just want to begin by saying that I’m not blaming anyone, I’m simply sharing my experiences and opinions and, as always, feel totally free to comment below if you disagree. I would love to hear your thoughts.

In our society so many positive things are labeled as negatives. Putting effort into something or taking it seriously is seen as ‘lame’ and having a dream and putting all your heart into following it is seen as ‘sad’.

I have had many experiences of people telling me that something I’ve done or made or that something I strongly believe in is ‘cringy’. Who are they to tell me that?

They don’t understand the motivation and dedication it takes to get up and go to work every day of your summer holidays to fund for something you love to do. They don’t understand the reason that you take your education seriously and the mindset of doing something to the best of your ability because you learn from it and you can be proud of what you’ve achieved.  To do something to help someone else because we need more kindness in this world.  To put your soul into making our society a better place to live in when you could just care about yourself.  To them that’s uncool. It’s lame. It’s sad.

They don’t understand what it’s like to love something so much that it hurts. To think of it during every moment, to dream of it day and night. To want to dedicate your life to it. To be willing to work hard and sacrifice to get where it is that you want to go.

I look at those people who call me sad or lame and I think about whose future looks brighter. Mine or theirs? I feel sad for people who don’t take anything seriously, who believe that life is a joke because that is what their life will be. One big joke. We will be following our dreams, making a difference and living our lives the way we have created them and they will have missed out on that because of their ignorant perceptions.

I feel sad and angry. People’s lives could be so much more. They could be so much better.

So be a little ‘sadder’, don’t be afraid of being called ‘lame’. All I’m asking is that we change the way we think a little bit, rewind and ask ourselves ‘Why are we calling that lame? Why is that sad?’ Often the things we dismiss or label are priceless, beautiful things that we can learn a lot from if we really take the time.

Please comment and share! I believe that this is a really important issue for our society to become aware of and I would love to hear what you think? 

 

{Messin’ With A Camera and Some Words}

I’ve taken some kinda aesthetic photos recently. Not a photographer, but I like messing around with my phone camera so yeah, guys, enjoy…

I tell the sunset that I miss you. I tell it how my heart aches and how, if the blue of the sky was a little deeper, it could be an upside-down ocean.

 

~sparkler wizard in his element~

What the mirror sees is what I forget – wild hair and cowgirl jeans. Bracelets up one arm, a metallic road spanning bruised skin stretched over muscle, swimmer’s muscle. Swimmer’s bruises. This is me. 

Fire and noise call me from afar. The drums feel like a revolution. There are crowds, but all I see are hands, tucked in pockets, reaching for the sky, for the fireworks that explode above their heads, just out of reach. Beautiful, but fleeting and no one’s to keep. There’s smoke, but all I see are flames, leaping through the air towards me. They call me, set my soul on fire. There’s sparks that burn my heart and it….it makes me feel alive.

Cars pass like moments, seconds even. Things we wanted to say, but….never did. Times when we turned our unspoken words into sighs….wrote the text message, but deleted it before we pressed send. Talked to the stars. Hid our feelings in metaphors and rhymes. I’m guilty. Another car past.

Stop! Don’t run into the fire, don’t burn, don’t follow the crowd, don’t be hypnotised by the flames, listen to my warning in the dark. Please.

“Mummy, the sky’s on fire.” 

I like talking to the sky. I tell it how I feel and then that I don’t know what to feel. I tell it that I don’t know what to say and it listens. I sing in the car because it makes me feel powerful. Just like when I’m in the water, I feel like I’m on top of the world, but I’m not. I feel the light above me and I fight my way up. 

Music I Love 🤟🎶 (A Tag)

Heyo people 💙

I saw this tag on my good friend Ruby’s blog and I thought it would be an amazing way to share the music I love with you guys.

Rules: 

• Thank the person who tagged you and link back to their blog.
• Share the tag graphic – sorry, sadly I couldn’t manage to get this onto here
• Link to the original blogs ( Scribes & Archers and Of Rainy Days and Stardust Veins)
• Answer the questions (I made up some of my own too #sneakyyy)
• Tag 5 bloggers and give them 10 questions to answer (or just pass on the questions you got)

What is your favourite song?

Had to pick three, sorry not sorry 😉

I find it really hard to explain why I love songs so much, but these are just….I don’t know…the lyrics, the feels, the memories they bring back 😍 I will never get tired of listening to these.

What song defines you as a person?

I have to admit to loving Disney music maybe slightly more than I should??? And everything about this song is so me 😁

What song brings back memories? (I made this question up, but I really wanted to answer it #rebel) 

Every time I hear this song it takes me straight back to my sailing trip in Scotland last summer. I made some of my best friends and learnt so much. If any of you are reading this now…. 🤗…and keep seshing 😉

Just summer and dancing madly☀️🎶

What song takes your breath away?

This beautiful, heart-breaking piece sing by my amazingly talented friend Elm is just 😍😮😭

Favourite song from a musical?

Rebellion. Revolution. One of the best movies ever made 😍🤯

I cannot remember a time when I didn’t want to be Calamity Jane 😂

Me and my Dad love watching Oliver! and this song will always make me smile 🙂

What is a song that you can’t help but love?

Just love this ❤️

Lol, this song is so crazy, but so perfect 🤟👌

What’s one song you can’t help but dance to?

*starts dancing* 💃

*dances even more* 💃💃💃

What’s a song you can’t help but sing to?

Know all the words #proud 😝

What is a song that makes you cry?

Oh my god….😭

So so sad, but so powerful as well 👌😢

 

This just hits home for me….and the video as well…😭😍 Also it reminds me of my friends in Scotland 🙂

I cry every single time. So emotional.

All round amazing song?  

Woah, so good. 🤯 So good 🎶 This is music, people 👍

A recent discovery, but I love it 👏

Another fave 🤟

Such an underrated song, but so fun and full of energy with great lyrics ☀️

I tag whoever feels like doing this! It’s super fun. Let me know if you do this tag. Did you listen to any of these? What did you think? What are some of your fave songs? 

 

 

 

 

 

Shadows And Promises

There are shadows that don’t match their shape,
Promises that were only ever made.
Not kept.

Waves come crawling back to the shore,
On their hands and knees and full of remorse,
They can’t go back.
Not any more.

One day, people will wake up and open their eyes,
Hollowness will fill up and chemistry will override,
And life will go on.

Maybe we’ll stop doing things whilst not really knowing why,
Stop sitting in the dark and spark a fire.
Maybe we’ll set light to our hearts and learn how to truly love.
Maybe…

And I’ll look out for you because, for a reason I don’t even know,
the perfect, hazy memory of you fills my soul.
And I need you.
I need you so bad.

I think of all the nights I’ll cry
because I don’t have the answer,
or the reason why.
And that destroys me.

I dream of shadows that don’t match their shape,
Promises that are only made,
Never kept.
And I need you.
I need you so bad.

Three Wishes – Random Ramblings

I’ve been thinking…if I could wish for any three things, what would they be? It’s such a cliché question, but one with so much potential and so many possibilities that my mind flies from one thing to another until I’m so dizzy that I just have to stop.

Stop. Sometimes when your thoughts get too much and you start to feel too much and your heart fills up and you start to overthink to the point that any minute you might just explode, you just have to stop. Breathe.

I crave depth and freedom and I find it so hard to live in a world where everything is shallow and fake. My own head is the only place I can find some escape from that, but my thoughts are just too much sometimes.

Still, I keep thinking, what three wishes would I choose? Here’s my conclusion. How about you?

1. That the distance between me and some of the people I care about the most wasn’t so great.
2. That people in the world would wake up and see what’s important and start working in harmony to achieve it so that everyone could be happy and content.
3. That I could have a sailing boat and sail around the world helping others, teaching people to sail and loving life ❤️❤️

 

 

What Can We Do?!

This is the top headline I see when I open the news this morning.

Fifth of 14 Year Old Girls Self-Harm

Out of the 5,624 girls who responded to the survey, 1,237 said they had self-harmed.

109,000 children aged 14 may have self-harmed across the UK during the 12-month period in 2015 – 76,000 girls and 33,000 boys.

Those who felt boys should be tough and girls should have nice clothes were least happy with life.

These are all sentences that jump out at me. It makes me think – this is it. This is my world, this is the society I’m growing up in. This is it. I am a fourteen year old girl. It’s my generation they’re talking about here. What can I do?!

I can try my best to be ‘a light in the darkness’ in the only ways I know how, but what am I really doing? How am I reaching the people who really need help? Even if I could, what difference would I make? I don’t understand what that 20% of fourteen year old girls have been through. I don’t understand what it’s like to be that desperate. And I can’t claim to, but I do have to do something.

It’s not because I’m a nice, selfless, caring person. No, I just have to. I can’t sit back and let this happen. We’ve allowed these issues to settle in our society and now we’re paying the price. No, the more vulnerable of us are paying the price and they deserve everyone’s help and support to get out of the place they’re in.

I feel extremely sad and angry. And I feel helpless, I feel like I can’t do anything. The only thing I can do is be a friend. That’s something I can do.

This post isn’t a pretty poem. It’s not well-written. It’s a rant fueled by emotion and desperation. I can see my world being dragged down in front of my eyes and all around me people are getting on with their lives and telling me that everything’s fine and will sort itself out. It’s not and it won’t. Not unless we do something about it.

Thing is, what can we do?

On Friendships, Being Different and The Future…

*Note: not attacking/blaming anyone here. These are just my own opinions. If you disagree feel free to say so and we can discuss it 🙂* 

My little sister came home crying today because she feels so different to all of her friends, she feels like she doesn’t fit in. Truth is, she doesn’t. She doesn’t even want to. 

I walk past and see her standing there surrounded by her entire peer group. They’re all around her – singing stupid songs, doing silly things and talking about TV shows and movies she has no interest in. I catch her eye. She looks so sad and alone.

Later, back at home, she’s pretty upset. “Why can’t my friends be normal?” she asks me. Her perception of normal makes me smile. “They are normal” I tell her “It’s you who’s different.”

She doesn’t want to fit in with them, to be the same, to wear the same type of clothes, to talk the same kind of rubbish – she just wants her friends to be themselves,  to have fun and not care about being ‘cool’ and fitting in. She just wants them to see what’s good and important, to realise that what they’re watching, listening to and basing their small-minded lives around is nonsense. No one ever did anything notable by being like everyone else.

Look, I understand how hard it is to escape from. This stuff is all around us. Our own society is telling us how to think and act, but our whole future is at stake here!

I understand my sister’s struggle. It’s kinda like there’s something that sets us apart. Like our eyes are opened.  Like for some reason we can see the stupidity and danger in following the crowd. I listen to the rubbish some of my own friends and I feel like screaming at them “wake up! Is this how you want to spend your life??!?!”

Sometimes I wonder if anyone actually even likes this stuff – TV shows, music, internet trends and crazes? Maybe everyone is only obsessed because with it because it’s popular and they think they’ll be left out if they don’t join in with the hype?  Wouldn’t it be cool if one person was like ‘guys, what’re we doing? This is seriously so bad!’ and everyone else admitted they never liked it either?! There’s always got to be a first one, right?!

When I talk to my friends one-on-one we have the BEST conversations. Sure, they’re often a bit crazy, but that’s okay. We talk about our dreams and hopes and our struggles and things we’ve done and learnt. How we feel and things that have made us laugh or smile. We talk about memories and stories and things we’re scared of. Things that make us happy, things that make us sad. Very rarely do I have these conversations when there’s a big group of us. Everyone’s so worried about being popular and liked and fitting in that the conversation always turns back to the same old nonsense. ‘Here we go again.” I think, without enthusiasm. I either roll my eyes and zone out – or listen, get all worked up and offend someone. Oops! 😂

If you’ve known me or have been reading this blog for any length of time you’ll know how much I’ve struggled with friendships. It hasn’t been easy for me to avoid peer-pressure. In fact, I’ve probably succumbed to it more than I’d care to admit when things were really tough. I’ve found it so hard to find anyone like me and by ‘like me’ I don’t really mean into the same stuff – I mean not afraid to be themselves and be an individual.

I remember this one day when I just had to let it all go. Holding in the words was suffocating me and I needed to breathe. I wrote this whole long piece, but this was what stood out to me the most when I say back and read through it  at the end:

Do you ever know for certain that you’re not like them or like them or them or them or them? 
but you wonder who you are like?
And you wonder if you’ll ever find anyone like you?

This is why I’m so grateful for the friends I keep in touch with online. They are what real friendship looks like. Blogging friends, friends I’ve met sailing, friends I don’t see often enough, but talk to via email. I’m so lucky and happy with the friends I have in my life and I don’t know where I’d be without them.

So yeah, I’m worried. I’m worried about the future of our world in the hands of this next generation – my generation. We’re lost and the only thing we have to guide us is the negative influences of our society. You see the sickening results of it all around you – mental health, suicide rates, kids nearly losing their lives after jumping out of cars for some new internet trend. Need I say more?

It’s crazy. It’s tragic. And it has to stop. If you’re with me, let me know. It’s not easy for any if of us, but we can do this together, okay 👌❤️

Nothing More Than A Ghost – A Poem

His breaths laboured and laced with pain.
Her breaths as soft as summer rain.

His body slumped, holding in all the grief,
Her body floating, her touch cool and brief.

His eyes wide and unseeing, tears overspilling,
Her eyes deep and longing, her gentle gaze chilling.

His arms wrapped around his torso, holding everything in,
Her arms limp and lifeless, for onto life does she no longer cling.

His fingers curled around a photograph of her,
Her fingers lightly brushing away all the things that were.

His voice calling out her sweet name.
Her voice echoing his stricken pain.

His thoughts searching through memories of them both,
Her being nothing more than a ghost.

  Nearly myself cry writing this! Hope you guys are all okay. Xxx

Extracts From My Journal + The Best Of 2017 Blog Awards Have Arrived Again (Yay!!!)

30th November 2017

It’s a proven scientific fact that any energy that keeps getting larger and larger will eventually explode. For example, friction will  eventually burst into flames. Well, there’s friction in my mind right now.

My Mum called it emotional turmoil, my Dad called it being lost, but I think friction is a good word at the moment. I’ve already burst into flames a few times, the energy always seems to die down, simmer quietly for a little while and then begin to build up until, you guessed it, I explode again with emotion again. Most of the time I don’t even know what causes all of these feelings. 

I need to look towards my future, focus on the positives that lie ahead and stop clinging onto the negatives of the here and the now. Being sad and discontent never made anyone’s life better, I’ve got to take action. 

2nd December 2017

Today I went to see Wonder at the cinema. As the scenes from my favourite book flashed past my eyes, I immersed myself in the story, rediscovering the powerful themes that run through it. Many of them are relevant to my life right now – being different, going to school, fitting in, standing out, real friendships, finding your place in this world, staying true to who you are. 

In all of the characters that I’ve known and loved for so long, I suddenly saw myself. When I read the book (and I must have read it 100 times, no kidding) I am an observer in Auggie, Via, Miranda, Jack Will, Julian, Summer, Justin and everyone else’s lives. However, watching the movie made me see their story in a different light. I felt like I was there, I was part of it.

I was Via, struggling with friendships. I was Miranda, just trying to fit in with the crowd, wanting to be liked. I was Summer, trying to be a good friend and Jack Will, trying but not always succeeding.There are no words for how much I loved this movie and how much of an impact it had on me. 
4th December 2017

I went to my teen yoga class today. Although I’m not flexible enough to do half of the poses I still love it. It’s amazing for relaxation, concentration, exercise and the releasing of stress. 

My yoga teacher, Luna, says that in yoga thoughts are like clouds, we let them drift by without holding onto them. You go into your body and just observe your mind. It makes you less anxious and stressed plus it helps you concentrate on your thoughts and make more sense of them. This was great for me, for someone who’s brain is especially active and often anxious, it helped me chill out and bring things into perspective. </

In other news from the life of Gracie Chick, my prize for when I cam runner-up in a poetry competition arrived. I received a certificate and a small bundle of writing supplies (a notepad, two pencils, one pen and a bookmark). Exciting! 🙂 

I’ve also been really into cooking with foraged goodies. This time of year is brilliant for wild food and I’ve been making the most of the abundance of it on the farm where I live. 

</I made this delicious lunch for my family, it’s a chickweed and lettuce salad with a berry vinegar dressing and crumbled parmesan on toast. It was SO good. 

</A yummy snack of roasted burdock root chips sprinkled with sesame seeds. Okay, I hope you enjoyed that little peek into my life at the moment. I felt like doing an update and I wanted to be honest.<Now, I have an exciting announcement to make ~ Megan is hosting the Best Of 2017 Blogging Awards for the third year in a row! By taking the survey now, you can vote for all the amazing blogs and posts out there that you’ve particularly loved. So, what are you waiting for? Go VOTE!

What’s going on in your life at the moment? Don’t be afraid of honesty, I often am and it never makes you feel better when you bottle it up. You can send me an email if you feel like talking. 🙂 🙂 🙂 Oh, and will you vote in the Best Of 2017 Blogging Awards?