Yes!! We made it to the end of the ‘post-a-day’ challenge week – still in one piece? I hope you’ve enjoyed reading each day! Welcome to my new followers and thanks to my friends from the ‘real’ world who have read and supported me over the course of the week. It’s not been easy to write every day but then again it never is when it’s something you know you have to do. It’s been good craic and while I’d probably do it again I think I’ll wait a wee while before I give it another go!
In the meantime I’ll leave you with Lily Allen’s controversial return to the music scene. During the 24 hours since Hard Out Here‘s release it has prompted a lot of discussion from allegations of racism to claims Allen is the poster girl for modern day feminism. What can I say? I thought the video gave a pretty solid digging to the music industry as it stands and I enjoyed watching it. I hope you do too – let me know what you think!**
Bye for now,
Laura xx
** Caution: the video is a bit sweary but stick with it. Consider yourself warned!
I’ve been becoming more and more agitated by everyday sexism recently. It has been subtly creeping in to my day to day life like the crass joke an acquaintance shared recently on Facebook. The joke goes like this: A woman confronts her husband with a knife. Rather than running away in fear he produces a loaf of bread and some butter and his wife’s ‘instinct’ kicks in prompting her to make him a sandwich. Hilarious.
Then I watched a documentary on Female Genital Mutilation because, you know, our vaginas are so dangerous they need to be cut out and the remaining flesh sewn tight together, erasing any trace of our womanhood. Horrifically, this actually happens right here in the UK, not just in far away lands. Thinly veiled as the preservation of cultural identity it is in fact child abuse leaving a legacy of severe physical and emotional damage that will haunt the victim for the rest of their life. If it horrifies you – and it should – please add your name to this petition now.
Women hating is becoming cheekier by the day, its perpetrators even marketing themselves as our pals. One such example is a new television advert from ‘feminine hygiene’ brand Vagisil. Even the name sounds like an STI: I’m afraid you’ve contracted Vagisil, my dear. You’ll need some antibiotics and a cream to clear that up and, of course, you’ll need to let any partners know you have it. It thoughtfully advises us poor, stinking women that help is now at hand for it – and it alone – can help us mask our putrid natural scent for a small fee. Thank goodness for that, I can sleep easy now Vagisil is on the case! One of my favourite writers, Caroline Criado-Perez, wrote a great article in response to the new advert, you can read it here.
And of course we can’t forget the hundreds of girls all over the UK who ‘ask for it’ when they are raped. I’ve never really understood that one. Regardless of what I’m wearing if I want ‘it’ believe me, you’ll know about it. And if I don’t want ‘it’ you’ll know about that too.
Attacks on women by other women is a particular pet peeve of mine and one at which Katie Hopkins of The Apprentice ‘fame’ excels. When she’s not poking fun at the weight of female X Factor contestants via big, brave, social networking site Twitter she’s explaining just how much better than us she is on her now regular daytime TV slot on This Morning.
Hannah is crying backstage. She misread the theme for tonight. She thought it was Big Bum week. She hoped she was in with a chance.
But all hope is not lost! Not yet anyway. Often when women address woman hating we are met with impatient sighs and knowing glances with that familiar ‘here we go again’ attitude. Not wanting to come across as a whiny woman – urgh, they’re the pits, aren’t they? Always whinging for equal rights? Why don’t they just pipe down? – I’ll leave you with a great piece of writing from the team that brings us the hit US TV programme, Scandal. It pretty eloquently addresses a lot of issues facing women in the public eye and certainly gives us food for thought. But not too much. You know how we women like to watch our weight.
A pretty impressive claim, huh? This is the video my friend Mairead sent on to me the other day. It’s about 20 minutes long so settle down with a cup of tea and prepare to unlock the secret to a longer life.
Urgh. Mondays are the worst. Not content with ruining the start of your week they steal part of your Sunday night filling you with dread at what might already await you in your inbox the following morning. Or in my case what doesn’t await you. What a shitter. Here is a nice picture to sweeten the crappiness of Mo(a)nday:
But what if Mondays didn’t have to signal the beginning of the end? What if they could be the beginning of something great? My friend Mairead is bit of a wise one. We went for coffee yesterday – I drink a lot of coffee! – and she let me pick her brain about moving to London, which she herself did. She asked me a very simple question: What do you want to do? I prattled on about lots of different things and it turns out I want to do EVERYTHING! When I was wee I was the same. My dream jobs varied from hairdresser to astronaut, wildlife camera(wo)man to musician to high powered business owner. Not a lot has changed. However, thanks to a few disastrous hair experiments I carried out on my friends in Uni – sorry Manus… and Jenny… and Laura…and Sophie…ok, you get the picture! – I think it’s safe to say I can put the notion of becoming a hairdresser to bed. As for astronaut, well that’s another sorry tale! Failing astrophysics not once but TWICE at Uni put paid to that. (FYI it was a module for Arts students and I was more captivated by the tutor’s impressive beard than the science of the stars. Incidentally he showed us MANY pictures of the aurora borealis in lectures yet no pictures appeared in the exam. I felt cheated.)
I digress. Stay with me. Here’s another picture to keep you going:
When I was wee I was a real daddy’s girl. My dad was pretty cool. You’ll have to take my word for it. I wanted to be just like him when I grew up. I wanted to do a job that touched my soul and allowed me to be creative. I wanted a career I could be passionate about and proud of. (Don’t we all?!)
What a dude!
My dad was a musician and a composer who chased his dreams and did a job he loved, even though the work wasn’t always in plentiful supply. I postponed the life I wanted to go to Uni – which I loved – thinking that I could pick it back up when I came out the other side. Sadly my lovely dad passed away just before my finals and by the time I graduated the recession hit. Doom and gloom all round. I panicked and took the first job I was lucky to get and put my dreams to one side. A couple of years later I got itchy feet and switched to a career in the charity sector where I’ve stayed ever since. The problem with pushing things to the far corners of your mind is that they always resurface until you deal with them in one way or another. After listening to me prattle on in a million and one directions Mairead told me this: I talk about the things I want to do but I really need to start talking about what I am going to do. I need to stop talking myself down from acting and doing the things I really want: “Be the master of your Universe. Make things happen,” she said. She’s a clever one, that Mairead.
So what has all this got to do with Mondays? Well, what if we made Monday the day to start moving our lives towards the ones we always wanted? Mairead sent me a link to video of a TED talk last night that dealt with the top 5 regrets of the dying. I’ll share it will you here sometime, tomorrow maybe. Among the list people regretted not living the life they wanted, worrying about what other people thought of them and working too hard. Why don’t we use today to take stock while we have the chance? Let’s start a Monday revolution and turn this once loathed day of the week into one to look forward to! Let’s make Monday a day where we promise to do at least one thing that will inch us ever closer to the life we want over the life we have. Today’s post is my first step.
I’d love to hear any tips you have for making Mondays that little bit better! Have you made any changes recently to make your life the way you want it? Feel free to follow and comment on my blog. It’s always nice to hear what other people are up to and since I started my blog back in June I’ve learned about lots of things I would have otherwise missed out on so thank you to everyone who got in touch or liked a post.
With proud thanksgiving, a mother for her children,
England mourns for her dead across the sea.
Flesh of her flesh they were, spirit of her spirit,
Fallen in the cause of the free.
Solemn the drums thrill; Death august and royal
Sings sorrow up into immortal spheres,
There is music in the midst of desolation
And a glory that shines upon our tears.
They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted;
They fell with their faces to the foe.
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years contemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
They mingle not with their laughing comrades again;
They sit no more at familiar tables of home;
They have no lot in our labour of the day-time;
They sleep beyond England’s foam.
But where our desires are and our hopes profound,
Felt as a well-spring that is hidden from sight,
To the innermost heart of their own land they are known
As the stars are known to the Night;
As the stars that shall be bright when we are dust,
Moving in marches upon the heavenly plain;
As the stars that are starry in the time of our darkness,
To the end, to the end, they remain.
Tales of adventure 
