Bucket list.

I don't know if this was a subconscious topic that came about after the reflection of my last post, but today Becky and I were discussing things that we'd like to do with our lives and decided that we should make a bucket list. For those of you who don't know what a bucket list is, it is a comprehensive list of all the things that you'd like to do before you kick the bucket. Shuffle off your mortal coil, etc.

This got me to wondering, how many of the things that we want to do in our lives are in sync with the things other people want to do. For example, is their a fashionable trend of life-time goals? One of my life time goals has always been to see the Northern Lights, I know for a fact that at least one of my friends shares this ambition, and I imagine a lot of other people want to do that too.

The thing is as our world slowly grows smaller (metaphorically) the adventure is starting to be sucked out of living so people look for the next exciting thing to do. One hundred years ago, travelling to America would have been a massive deal, now it's more extreme to go to Australia or New Zealand. I wonder how long it will be before people begin to travel beyond our world realistically.

Just a thought.

Anyway, this is what this blog was always about - living life to the full and experiencing everything that we can. I think there is still a lot missing (mainly the less extreme stuff!) but this is the list that Becky and I formulated.

1. Visit Marrakech
2. See northern lights
3. See pyramids
4. Cross the equator
5. Visit all continents
6. Fly a plane
7. Build a house
8. Climb Kilimanjaro
9. Live in Canada
10. Trek the great wall
11. Machu Picchu
12. Fly first class on virgin atlantic
13. Orient express
14. Go caving in the salt caves mexico
15. Gamble in las vegas
16. Have a ride in a husky-drawn sleigh
17. Celebrate new years twice in japan and Hawaii
18. Stroke a wild penguin
19. Go white water rafting
20. Go Hogmanay with the family
21. Go to Lapland
22. Get married
23. Have kids
24. Hold a koala
25. Visit Sydney
26. Get a pet micro pig and duck
27. Build a guitar
28. Build a tree house
29. Go surfing in Hawaii
30. Climb Mauna loa volcano
31. Go New York for new years
32. Get a makeover by Gok
33. Go to a real irish pub
34. Tell a customer the truth
35. Learn another language
36. Go on holiday for a month
37. Go to a protest
38. Go to an oil spill site and clean cute animals
39. Do some graffiti
40. Go in an igloo
41. Get a samoyd
42. Go in a thermal pool
43. Row down the amazon
44. Own a lighthouse
45. Ride an elephant
46. Go berry picking in an orchard
47. Caribbean cruise
48. Go to the water festival in Thailand
49. Stay a night in the Burj al Arab
50. Shower in a waterfall

Let me know if you share any of these dreams!

Ginger.

It's strange how the smallest things can create such an affect, such a change of perspective in our lives.

Over the past two years I have been reminded on more than one occasion of our own mortality. There have been severely different triggers to this reminder. The burning of bridges is a strange way to realise that we might never see a person again, it also shares a significant likeness to death. Death has presented itself to me in the form of accidents from which I've been lucky to survive. And lastly, most obviously, death has been portrayed by death itself. My Nan passed away on the 11th of July this year.

All these moments prompt me to consider my own mortality and how I spend my time. I am aware that I rarely spend it wisely. I always know that I have something to be doing and that my list of things to do is ever-increasing.

Perhaps the strangest thing to inspire me to do more with my life is my goldfish, Ginger. My fiancee and I bought a pair of goldfish early last year. Cleo and Ginger. Original, we know.

The pair have suffered a rather arduous life, living with my fiancee and I; we've moved house four times and our busy schedule (and perhaps in part, laziness) has meant that their tank hasn't always been pristine.

The first sign of mortality Ginger gave me was when I found him (Yes, I'm assuming my goldfish is a boy), not long after we got them, floating upside down at the bottom of the tank, a stone lodged tightly in its mouth. The stupid thing had choked to death, I thought.

Upon closer inspection, I noticed the fish had a gut full of black stones, the same as was in it's mouth. Becky (my fiancee) and I mourned its death and prepared to fish it out for the flush. Never have I been so shaken up as when this dead fish, now in a stein, spat the stone out and jolted back to life. For the remainder of the day Ginger swam upside down. Becky and I were to visit her parents that night for the weekend. We assumed that although Ginger had narrowly avoided death, that it would die, if not because it was upside down but because it had a tummy full of stones that meant it kept sinking to the bottom. To ensure that Cleo didn't follow suit, we removed the stones from their tank.

On returning home at the end of the weekend, we found, much to our surprise, Ginger swimming happily around, the right way up. No sign of stones.

It surprised me that this little fish had dodged the bullet so narrowly and yet was back on top form, performing ballet around its tank with Cleo.

Earlier on this year, Becky and I packed our bags and went on a tremulous plane journey to the blistering heats of Sharm el Sheikh in the middle of June. It was only on our fifth day that it occurred to me suddenly that our fish were most certainly dead, because we hadn't arranged a way to feed them in our absence, not only this but it'd be another five days before we returned. Guiltily we resigned ourselves to the fact that we had killed Ginger and Cleo. Upon our return the fish swam happily (I assume they probably weren't happy, but I like to pretend) around a rather dirty tank. Through guilt I cleaned the tank immediately and fed them copiously.

On a rare occasion, Becky was cleaning out their tank (I say rare, because although they were originally her fish, I had been charged with feeding them and cleaning them), Ginger somehow managed to escape whilst being transported from the dirty water into the new clean water. This escape was ill-conceived, as the sink that it dove precariously into wasn't full of water. Panicking, Becky managed to recover the floundering fish and return it to the water, however she was terrified she might have shocked it to death. The fish, however, continued through its hardships.

It are these moments that have signified a passage through adversity and a struggle to overcome difficulty. More than that, Ginger has managed for all this time to escape death, even when floating dismally before death's door. Ginger has reminded me that no matter how small you are, nor how insignificant people might think you are, you have the ability to have an affect on the larger picture. You have the capacity to make someone laugh, or think, or take action.

Goldfish are such a simple creature, and therefore such a simple pleasure. They don't play with you, like a cat or a dog, they don't cuddle with you, you can't stroke them. They are there to look after and watch. And I guess if you watch carefully, you will begin to notice some elements of yourself in them. You may be insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but that doesn't mean your actions aren't unnoticed or have a lesser affect.

Yesterday, I cleaned out Cleo and Ginger's tank, I later returned to find Ginger floating on its side at the surface of the water. Nobody escapes death. But it's a question of what affect you leave on the world before you die. I used to look down on Goldfish as a pet, but as silly as t sounds, after Ginger, I can't say I'd ever look at anything in the same way.

R.I.P. Ginger, 19/11/11

Trials

So I'm slowly getting back into the swing of creativity after a month downtime at the end of my MA. I've picked up where I left off with my dissertation and I'm continuing with it, the idea is to complete it by Christmas and then send manuscripts everywhere until someone accepts it!

I've got myself involved in a pantomime with the guys from Private Fears in Public Places and I got one of the lead male parts - it should be interesting to do panto again. I forgot how silly it could be. It's not really acting as such, but it is great fun to get up on the stage still. Besides if nothing else it gives me something to do whilst I plot how I want to put on Closer. - The company I did Private Fears with is talking about me directing the next play, I've always wanted to do Closer so I think I'm going to go with that. We shall see though.

Hopefully I can work all this out around work, because I have given myself a lot to do and little time to do it in.

That's all for now, be back soon to update!

Catching up.

I'm not entirely sure where the last two weeks have gone. It's been just over a fortnight since my last post and to be honest I haven't been that productive. I've applied for some jobs I am interested in and received a handful of replies saying they don't want me in return.

One project that I've put some energy into that is paying back is the online magazine. A couple of weeks ago I suggested to some of my friends that we begin one and the response seems to have been good. I've slacked with the progression of it the last few days because I feel like I've been at work non-stop but I think it has got direction now and is going the right way.

We've decided that our magazine will be 'Red Leaf Literary Magazine'. I think the target is new and adventurous authors that want to grab a foothold in the world of published literature, hopefully we can provide that foothold. I'll talk more about the magazine once everything is about to go live.

I've been reviewing my dissertation (I got my marks back from that by the way and it was all hunky dory), a mark of 65, my highest mark this year, so can't complain. I've been deciding where to take it. I would have liked to finish it before christmas but I don't want to sacrifice the quality of the plot (it is after all a genre fiction, and thus plot-driven).

I'll try and update again later this week. My friend Aisya from Malaysia is visiting this weekend however, so it's doubtful it will be over the weekend. Monday, perhaps.

On The Roll

Today has above all else been a day for productivity. I woke up in the mood for getting things done; going out and ensuring that life continues smoothly. Usually days like this have a tendency to get you down because it is never entirely practical to complete all the missions you set yourself to a high standard, yet nothing I did today required my usual perfectionist attitude.

I began with the boring bit; finances. I have a financial ineptitude and I rarely hide it. I know I'm bad with money. Today was about exerting a little bit of effort to try and set things in order once and for all. I've finally left my old bank who were messing me around in favour for having all my accounts managed by the same bank. This has all gone relatively smoothly.

Second up I enquired about further education - something I might reveal more about soon. Thirdly I have begun the chase towards work. The last couple of days have proven that getting work in the creative industries is going to be a job in itself and is something I must persist with and keep on top of. It won't be easy, but for me there has always been a thrill-of-the-chase element to my life. Even if the destination isn't what I thought it would be, it has always been about the journey.

Finally I've begun tidying the flat. It has been a state since I started work on my dissertation and I couldn't stand working in it any longer, so I've begun what will hopefully continue to be the start of a new and better life in Portsmouth.

I will update more soon, so long for now.

New Projects.

So I've been searching for volunteer work in journalism, columnist writing and so forth. The search began when I realised that every real job in journalism requires people with experience. My friend pointed out that the experience didn't need to be paid so I spent some time looking for magazines that needed free writers. This is apparently harder than it sounds.

After my search returned only one response for a woman's lifestyle magazine that requested I submitted the exact same information I already had done to another page I confess, I lost faith in that idea.

This brought about the idea of creating my own online magazine, so with this new idea in mind I approached my fellow group of writers from the Masters and we began brain storming ideas. We're still in the process of figuring out what kind of magazine it will be, but hopefully it will be an opportunity for us and other writers of a similar disadvantage to promote ourselves. Who knows.

On top of that I've been working on some music for my new project. A couple of ideas are sounding quite promising and I might reveal snippits soon. I've also asked a couple of friends from my newly acquainted Crossfade Amateur Dramatics group if they'd be interested in singing on it and we seem to have come to an agreement.

All in all things are moving smoothly, keep an eye on this, more to come soon!

Beginning.

It has occurred to me that I spend too much of my time thinking about the things that I want and things that I don't have rather than enjoying what I do have. I've spent a great deal of my year thinking about what I want to achieve rather than actually achieving them. I've spent time trying to create an image for myself rather than accepting who I am already.

What have I achieved this year? Well, I've celebrated my engagement, self-published a poetry book, completed a masters degree in creative writing, returned to the stage and written a fair portion of my first novel. I think I could do more, but I should be happy with what I have achieved so far.

This brings me to wonder what drives people. I read stories about other people's accomplishments, and that is what drives me. I want to be the person people are reading about. I want people to think 'He's a busy, creative guy.' But I don't know why I want people to think that. There is no benefit in that for me other than a sense of achievement. I guess that must be it. I just enjoy feeling like I've accomplished something.

As you can see, I've decided to start blogging again. As much for me as anyone else. It's a good release and it keeps me writing. This time it won't be filled with things I want to do, but things that I am doing. I've spent too much of my life wanting things and not enough time going out and achieving them.