Ka
Have you ever noticed that time passes very slowly when you least want it to? Like when you're in the last few minutes of study and all you want to do is run away and never come back, but time ticks by as slowly as an asmathic snail. Time also has this awful habit of flying when you just want it to come to a standstill, so you can live in the moment for a life time, but we all know this is an impossible feat. As much as time may inconvenience us, I suppose we should be somewhat grateful for it, because as some one once told me that time was created so that we could truly appreciate what we have, because it won't last forever. I think this saying could apply to a lot of us, in every day life. How many times have we heard 'l can't wait for this week to be over' or 'I can't wait until I leave school', by saying this we are wishing the limited time we have away, without even realising it
Ka
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“Repeal Project seeks to vindicate the rights of Irish women by reflecting , respecting and representing the need and want for free, safe and legal access to abortion in Ireland. Making it seen that this issue needs to be heard. ” - Repeal Project Whilst sitting down to dinner with my family on Saturday evening, I began to tell my parents that I, much to my dismay, had been chosen to write a blog in English this week. I still had to decided what I would write about yet. Many suggestions were made, all of which were turned down by me because as we all know I am very fussy and opinionated. My Father who was beginning to lose his patience with me to write something that would get a reaction from people, and I had my light bulb moment. For anybody who is in my base class and was actually listening in religion when we discussed the topic of abortion, I’m sure you have come to the conclusion that I have a strong opinion surrounding it and if you question me, I may unintentionally become defensive or angry. I’m not quite sure why I get like this, but I think it may be down to the fact that it bothers me that so many people make assumptions and have a black-and-white way of thinking around an issue that is so obviously not as defined as that. In 2014, on average, 10 women traveled from Ireland to Britain every day for an abortion, that is roughly 3,660 women in the year who have traveled abroad to have this procedure performed. Also in 2014, 1,017 abortion pills were seized by Irish Customs. That is more than double the amount seized in 2013. In my opinion these figure clearly show that there is a desperate need for abortion to be made available to women in Ireland. I know right about now approximately half have the class have tuned out as it is a Tuesday morning, so I want you to do something for me. Imagine that you are one of those 3,660 women, being forced out of the country to have a procedure performed on you because the laws of your homeland prohibit you from receiving this basic level of medical treatment. Its an unpleasant thought isn't it? It probably scares you. It scares me too. And just like the nurse who gave us the talk two weeks ago said, it can happen to anybody, you can get caught out. Its horrible and unfortunate but it happens. 'Women in Ireland don't have autonomy over their own bodies and I am ashamed of my homeland for placing these barbaric restrictions on them. A woman should be the only person to make decisions concerning the matters of her own body and that's that.' - anon This statement, in my opinion, could not be anymore true. A woman, no matter what race or religion should be entitled to make independent decisions regarding her own body. At the moment, Repeal the Eighth is taking over social media. Probably everybody in the room has seen pictures or videos or read one of the countless article surrounding this topic. There is a online petition which has been signed by thousands and marches have been held all over the country in protest. The amount of people who have signed petitions, bought merchandise, attended these marches or who have simply tweeted about the issue shows that it is no longer a taboo. People want to see the change. I’m slightly afraid that I might have come on a bit strong there. I want to stress the fact that I am not, in any way, shape, or form a pro-abortionist. And I’m sure we can all agree that I’m also not a pro-life campaigner. I find myself in the grey area of a supposedly black and white matter. Judging on the comments and contributions that were made in religion, I can safely say that a lot of us are here. This grey area has a name, it’s called being pro-choice. Being pro-choice doesn't necessarily mean that you are pro-abortion, or that, if faced with an unintended pregnancy, you would have an abortion. Being pro-choice means that you believe that women, not the government, should make their own healthcare decisions in relation to this matter. Why should anybody except the person who is affected have a say in the decision that is about to be made? It baffles me to think that there are people out there who are making up their minds and have little to no knowledge about the situation. I’m not trying to say that I am more educated on this than the next person, but I would like to urge people to do your research and make what up your mind based on what you think is right. For more information on the topic, visit websites such as www.abortionrightscampagain.ie or www.repeal.ie CW
Last night I took a bath and today I have to write a blog post, so as luck would have it now you get to hear about my newfound outlook on the nature of bath-taking. I can tell you’re on the edge of your seat already. Now, I know some people are already at a disadvantage because they might not have a bath at home. “How am I going to relate to this?” you’re thinking, unimpressed at my choice of subject before you’ve even heard what I have to say. To that I would respond, 1. Not everything is about you, and 2. Just hear me out, I am going somewhere with this…I think. It’s a widely accepted idea that baths and stress relief go hand in hand. People stick the word ‘relaxing’ in front of the word ‘bath’ as if they just belong together, as if you wouldn’t dream of using any other adjective to describe a bath other than that one. I don’t know if you’ve ever played the computer game Sims 4, so allow me to explain briefly: when sim people don’t do anything fun for a long period of time they get ‘tense’ and they huff and puff all over the place and won’t do anything you tell them to do. But all of a sudden, if you plonk them in the bath, they’re irritability dissipates and they’re as carefree as can be. I guess the general consensus is that this mimics real life, but I’ve always been unconvinced. Over the summer I was reading The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, and over the summer I was also taking a lot of baths. There’s a popular quote from The Bell Jar where Plath says “There must be quite a few things a hot bath won't cure, but I don't know many of them.” I can remember reading that, sweltering in the sun of a Boston heatwave, mind you, and thinking to myself that’s an endearing idea, Sylvia, but I don’t know if it’s all that true. I’ve never found any consoling or calming effect in taking a bath; I mostly just do it as something to do. I was thinking about how everyone from the people who made Sims 4 to Sylvia Plath can’t be wrong, and wondering why I don’t achieve the same Zen feeling everyone else seems to, despite the fact that I consider myself quite the bath aficionado. Finally, about 5 minutes before I started writing this, it hit me: I’ve been doing baths wrong all my life. My dad lives in America and in his house in America there’s a television in the bathroom. Not a fancy one or anything, as a matter of fact it’s quite an old one, but he’s had this set-up since I was about nine years old. It’s original function was so that you could watch TV in the bath, although a few summers ago when I was over the two of us came up with the bright idea of getting a clear shower curtain, so now you can watch TV in the shower too. But that’s beside the point. When I visit him in America I take a bath almost every day, for no real reason other than to watch TV and maybe bring some snacks in with me too. It’s almost comical. In my everyday life, however, there is no TV in the bathroom. Hence, I never bothered to take baths in my own house up until very recently. I’ve gotten fond of it lately though, because I’ve found myself new distractions to compensate for the absence of a television. I bring in music and even take the heart-stopping risk of using my phone over the water. I keep full text conversations going with people when I’m supposed to be relaxing. It’s no wonder I didn’t get what Sylvia meant. The first sentence after the paragraph I quoted from The Bell Jar is “I meditate in the bath.” How am I supposed to meditate if I won’t put my phone down or switch off the TV? How am I supposed to think calming thoughts, or any thoughts at all if I won’t turn off the music and exist in the silence, even just for a few minutes? I think everyone is guilty of this in their own way. I mean, think about it: when’s the last time you just…stopped? I’m asking for a time when your phone was nowhere to be seen and you weren’t engaged in any conversation and you weren’t making a to-do list in your head for the week and you were just being. I know I don’t have one, because evidently my attention span is so short that I need to put my electronic appliances’ wellbeing in danger just to stay in the bath for twenty minutes. I’m not really preaching the ‘put the phone away and pay attention to your life’ thing, I’m trying more for a ‘take a few minutes to just stop and be’ sort of thing. I’m not even going to tell you it’s easy either. You can actually feel the resistance of your mind wanting to go get something done or distract itself in some way, rather than just staying stagnant and letting things be as they are and nothing more. Relaxing takes a certain amount of focus and effort, even though that may seem contradictory. It is important to make a point of slowing down to a stop once in a while, though. I really believe that. Go take a bath, and do it correctly please. And if you don’t have a bath, find something else to do that fulfills the same objective, I guess. I’m can’t come up with all the answers for you.
HS THE END IS NEAR. Donald Trump has been sworn in as the 45th President of America. There is a lot of mixed opinions about Trump becoming President. Most of these are bad opinions. More people showed up to protests than to his inauguration so what is that telling us? A lot of people are taking this to the extreme by involving his young son as a target. America has freedom of speech but I don't like when they use it to bully a 10 year old boy. Why should a young boy of ten suffer at his fathers expense this is not on. The first 100 days will show what kind of President he will be. Things may go right, things may go wrong we don't know. The world just has to wait and wonder. You may wonder why adults and children were so effected by this decision throughout the world by an American President. It is because America has a lot of influence over the world through trade, business and the economy of most nations, so this in turn makes the decisions for the welfare of countries as a whole. So as it stands today as I am writing this blog Donald Trump holds the Trump card and we have to sit back and wait and see how it unfolds. C.L The country life is a wonderful place to live. The air is fresh, the fields are green, and the roads are quite. Animals graze in fields unfazed by life around them. The birds chirp and sing songs creating a happy atmosphere. Going for a walk is peaceful as no noisy cars are passing by and you don't need to worry about what you are wearing because who is going to see you. During the summer months the tractors are speeding by trying to get the silage cut before the rain comes, creating an aroma of freshly cute grass. In everyone's gardens, and growing wild on the side of the road, flowers are blooming. Everyone knows their neighbors when you live in the country usually meaning the nearest house to you with could be across the fields or a mile up the road. In the country you can have as big as a garden you want and which many people might grow their own fruit or veg or keep a few hens to be organic.
MOS Sport is involved in most of our lives, it gives most of our lives meaning and in sport there’s community. Community spirit is very important in sport. If the team or club don’t form together to make a family like bond they wont play like a team which means they wont win any matches. For example in 2015 the intermediates from Piltown camogie won the all Ireland final and throughout that whole series of matches the spirit in our club was unbelievable I wasn’t even on the team but it was probably one of the best days of my life, the whole club even people who didn’t have any relations on the team went up to Croke park to support the team even people outside the club from different clubs around the county were there. The team arrived back into the Piltown GAA complex and I have never seen one big bunch of people so happy so this shows that sport and club or community spirit is very important to a lot of people. LN Change. Defined in the Oxford Dictionary as to make or become different. Change occurs daily in our busy lives. Little changes like eating dinner before homework or having tea instead of coffee . Big changes like moving house or losing someone. The little changes we hardly notice, we forget they happen and suddenly life is different. People grow and change every day right in front of our eyes and we don't see it. Weird isn't it? Changes can build and bulid or they can happen in an instant but ultimately they affect us. Whether that's positively or negatively you decide, because like it or not, change happens and honestly, how you choose sometimes has an even greater affect than the change itself.
Honestly change scares me. I try and try to oppress the fear and put on a brave face to the world but I don't like it. I don't like the way tomorrow is uncertain and you can argue the fact that it adds excitment to life but sometimes it doesn't. Like a family not knowing whether their home is safe or where a man may find his next meal. But, I do see the positives. Like a surprise visit from a family member abroad or a career move in the direction you want. So yes, it also excites me and causes me to think and dream for the future. But that doesn't mean I have to like it. Personally, I don't like the way little changes go unnoticed and therefore I try my hardest to notice everything. To be aware of things others might miss and be knowledgeable about the people around me. Like the drop of a smile from a friend's face. I don't like the way I've changed from a little girl who had an unbelievable thirst for knowledge and read a book a day to a young woman who scrolls through her phone for nothing, claiming to be keeping up to date with the world but only losing the world around her. The young woman who buys books in the hope that the little girl will come back. But, she hasn't and she won't. That little girl has changed like the body replaces cells or the leaves fall off the trees. And that's life. Change is life. Maybe I need to put on my big girl pants and get over my overthinking that results in sleepless nights. Maybe I can try and pry those little girl traits out once more and add them to the young woman who loses herself time and time again to those midnight woes. Maybe then those two can live in harmony with one another. Maybe I need to let life happen because, what I do know is that if you, as well as I, don't change and grow, we won't live. EOD After the whole hurrah and ordeal of the Christmas season you have one week before you start afresh and begin exciting things in the new year ahead of you. During this week, decisions are made. One of the most “important” decisions decided at this time are your New Years Resolutions. This is the mental list that most people make, of what they want to achieve in the upcoming year and goals they want to reach (some of which are usually very unrealistic). From personal experience, my resolutions usually last 2-3 weeks when I’m feeling motivated and driven. But, once I start getting back to everyday life and a normal routine again, all of my plans suddenly go out the window. The typical resolutions, and the most frequent ones I hear are “I want to be more fit” and “I need to eat healthier” which are perfectly fine, but really though? Are you sure you’re going to workout “5 days a week” and cut out all sugar in your diet? Now of course, there are some amazing, well- disciplined people who would actually do this and stick to it, but honestly, I probably wouldn’t get through a day of that. Besides that, I feel like the majority of people my age create their resolutions solely on things like fitness, health and schoolwork. I don’t see anything wrong with this, but sometimes it’s the smaller things that can really make you feel good about yourself and give you that self-satisfaction we all crave. Things like being that bit kinder and helpful to your parents, friends and even strangers can go a long way. Anyway, it was actually proven that giving creates more happiness in a person than receiving. So, just by smiling at a stranger or helping someone when they’re upset will make you feel happier than the person you just comforted. In my opinion, I think resolutions are so beneficial whether you are bettering yourself physically or looking out for the people around you a bit more. They’re a way to set out what you hope for the 365 days laying in front of you, and a push start on improving yourself as a person. MB |
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