"I Can Never Leave The Past Behind"

My hair was MADE for the 80s.

2012 began with a trip to the 1980s. My friend Estelle had an 80s themed hen party in Clonakilty, West Cork. It was definitely the most fun hen party I have attended! Everyone was lovely, we played games like "make a dress out of toilet paper" and hit the various bars in Clon. I must say, it was much more fun than a night out in Cork, which is always crowded, loud and generally yucky. We accidentally wandered into a 1920s themed club, which was SO MUCH FUN!

This was my background ALL YEAR :)

Of course, next I had to claim back the limelight for my birthday party in mid-January. I was so lucky that so many of my friends traveled from the UK to come and dress up as Disney characters in this house we rented for the weekend. At the time, my ickly doggie Millie was on the cusp of death, which did rather make things more stressful for me, but I still feel so privileged that my friends came and spent the weekend with me!

It was in February that Conor and Estelle got married - what a fabulous day! There was a TONNE of music, from a long lost Baroque hymn to a metal cover band. My sister, Alison played the cello and I made the cake. I can hardly believe it's been nearly a year since the wedding! The cake took three days to make and was comprised of 120 chocolate and red velvet cupcakes, plus one giant cupcake at the top and I made myself a cupcake print dress to wear on the day. Conor and Estelle are such a lovely couple and have so many wonderful friends! A great day was had by all. 

Also in this month, Alison and I went to Cobh to enjoy a night of free dinner and free accommodation thanks to a prize Alison had won! We went to Gilberts and ate until we could eat no more before falling into bed and eating breakfast in their penthouse the following morning!

In March, the inimitable Miss Ellie Murray turned the big one-eight! For a few days, our group entered the episode of Gavin & Stacey which has, up to very recently, been Ellie's life. It was there that Ellie and I embarked upon a walk to Costa, wrote a violin part for our song about Sherlock, watched Father Ted before rocking up to a rugby club to boogie the night away for her birthday party. Pam and Mick took us out for dinner and treated me to a very British pie in a pub. It was delicious. :) 

The in the days after the party, Ellie brought us to Cheshire to a tea room that was IN a cathedral. Not in a room in a cathedral - the WHOLE cathedral was a tea room! I gasped. It was amazing and shocking!

Creepy Amy clone.

We also went to 'The Lady Lever' for tea and a cake. It was there that Kylie and I shared one of my top cakes of 2012 - a delicious carrot cake. (Ellie and Cathrin shared a "chocolate cloud cake" which was also very impressive.) It was here that I came across the painting to the right, which looks UPSETTINGLY like me as a child. I showed the picture to my dad and sister upon returning home and both are as astonished and weirded out as I am. I feel like Homer in the episode with Mr Sparkle...

Torc Waterfall, Killarney.

Martha took a short trip to Killarney in April. It was there that I went on a run that is, to this day, the most special and beautiful run I have experienced. I went just after the sun came up, it was cold, crisp and dry and I ran around a lake into Muckross grounds. There were so many trees and fields, and it was just serenely quiet. On the way back to where we were staying, I walked through the ruins of an old chapel and grave yard that was dappled in sunlight through the trees. Even though I know it was public, it felt so hidden and secret. Definitely one of my stand-out moments of 2012.

Later on that month, I began working in Bantry, West Cork. Bantry is far, far away and I taught there two days a week on top of my own teaching in Cork. It was such a strange place and so weird to go and stay in a B&B once a week but it was really fun to get to listen to podcasts and music, and to read in the time I wasn't working. I met a lot of very nice people there, too! :) When I arrived to teach piano, this sign was waiting for me! --->






In May, I was completely delighted to welcome two of my dearest friends, Kylie and Melinda to my home for a relaxing few days. We went into Cork and examined the wares for sale, drank hot chocolate and the introduced me to Spaced for the first time. I also invited them to a special tea party followed by a trip to see Avengers Assemble with Martha and Orla.

In June, so much happened! Far too much for me to recount here, but most of it occurred within one week. Bevin came from America and so we spent a week showing her some of the more more exciting parts of England - like London, Warwick Castle, London, Southend-On-Sea, London and some other places.

Emilieee ♥

Here is a picture taken directly after the moment I got a phone call saying I was being offered a place in 3rd year of a BMus performance degree programme. So glad I was with my friends when it happened! :) It was at approximately the same time that we saw the Olympic flame run past the window, too!

Ellie at Electric for a scone and a spot of knitting.

I was so happy in July because Ellie-Murray came to stay with me for four days! We sat down, we ate yoghurts, we went to see Dark Knight Rises, we went shopping, to Blarney Castle, we drank tea. It was a jolly lovely holiday. We even went to the Cork Food Festival and toured the food, eating our way around Cork, essentially, and basking in the evening sun.

At the end of July (the 31st, to be specific!) Lucy, Mel, Emilie and I went to Leavesden Studios for Harry's birthday. It was lovely, we got to see all the beautiful props from the films and it was awe-inspiring to see even that small portion of all the work that went into the films. At the same time, Lucy and I shot a video for LeakyCon 2012 which meant that by the time the tour was over, we really NEEDED to go to TGI Friday for a cocktail. ;) Emilie kindly invited me to stay with her while in London, and I got to experience London during the Olympics (It was weird and quiet!)

Post launch party, the support team has a breather.

Immediately after our Harry Potter adventure (in August,) I took a train to Macclesfield to stay with Laura and Cathrin for their birthdays. They were also releasing their first Goodnight Astor album. We had a lovely few days of watching Gavin and Stacy and listening to the musical hits of the 80s, 90s and 00s before their show.









Apart from going back to college, September was an important month for me and a few of my friends, as we were fortunate enough to go to the launch of The Casual Vacancy. After an interview and Q&A, the occupants of the Southbank Centre were able to meet J.K. Rowling to have their books signed. Here is the seemingly rather innocuous of the very thing occurring...




October was a whirlwind of college work and teaching. I joined the 21st century and bought an iPhone.

On the 30th of November to the 2nd of December my friends and I travelled to Edinburgh for the Snow Ball and Lucy's 30th birthday. We dressed up as action heroes and villains for Lucy's birthday.

The next day, we went to the Snow Ball. Laura, Cathrin and I were performing with Harry and the Potters, Riddle TM and the Pumpkin Pasties.

Happy New Year everyone! I hope your year was fabulous and you're all ready for 2013! I'm going to have to go off and think about my new year's resolutions! One will definitely be to blog more! :)

x

Mrs Sparkly's Ten Commandments Award

It's so nice when the people you know acknowledge your blog! I sometimes feel I'm writing to myself (which is fine. I'm comfortable with self-communication.) Thank you Evin, from Sláinte Cork for nominating me for Mrs Sparky's Ten Commandments Award. What’s involved? I need to answer some questions about myself, and here we go…

*Describe yourself in 7 words:

Friendly, interested, loving, sincere, enthusiastic, eccentric, weird.

*What keeps you up at night?

Planning adventures and projects. Sometimes I'll start writing little songs in my head or stories, sometimes I get really involved. It's a problem that I get really excited about things when I'm trying to sleep, because I just want to get up and sing. Someone sleeps next to the music room in my house, so I've had to be really strict about no late-night song-writing. (Which, now that I think about it, could account for my lower song output!)

*Whom would you like to be?

The best version of Amy. It's my ambition to keep trying to be a better person, with better skills. I have a loooong way to go, but I'm trying!

*What am I wearing right now?

This:

But with a black and gold waist-cinching belt, and black tights. Spectacles. A head of curly brown hair, and a smile.

*What scares you?

• Greed, ignorance. 
• Being misinterpreted.
• Animal cruelty. 
• The quest for happiness - not fully knowing if I'm happy now or if it's something that's coming later. 
• The concept that I'm wasting my life, that I'm spreading myself too thin and I should be focusing just on singing.
• Artistic confinement.

*What are the best and worst things about blogging?

Best: It's nice to have a place to just get it all down. It doesn't matter if no one reads it, it's a thought that I had and it's good to be able to revisit ideas and events with another frame of mind.

Worst: Not being able to do it while I'm running. I write the best mental blogs when I'm running!

*If I could change one thing about myself, what would it be?

I'd like to be more able to relax, and to suffer less joint and muscle pain.

*Slankets, yes or no?

No. They seem like such a good idea in theory... but no.

*Tell us something about the person who nominated you.

Evin has beautiful eyes and a blogging addiction. She has lovely, long, straight hair and looks completely different when it's up or down. In her apartment, Evin has a Little Liam, a fishy chair, and a staple gun, which she uses to staple things, and to ward off clowns with suspicious-smelling fridge foods.

My next step in this award is to nominate 10 others.

These are my favourites, and my friends! I really hope that you'll all give it a go! :)

The TARDIS in my Mind: http://thetardisinmymind.blogspot.ie/

The red red robin goes blog blog blogging along: http://redbreastedbird.blogspot.ie/

Goodnight Boutique: http://goodnightboutique.com/

The Smallest Smallholding: http://www.smallestsmallholding.com/

This Yorkshire Life: http://thisyorkshirelife.blogspot.ie/

The Savage Searching: http://savagesearching.wordpress.com/

LizzDelicious: http://www.lizzdelicious.com/

Question.

If you love someone very much, and they love something very much, do you think it's your responsibility to engage with the thing? Like if it's a nerdy TV show, books, game, music, whatever?


I do.

Timeturners and Armies.

I wish that I could have been given a crystal ball when I was twelve years old and given a glimpse of my future. If I had known how reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone would shape my life, perhaps I would have been more enthusiastic about getting to read it. The truth is that my best friend at the time pestered and pestered me for weeks to read Philosopher's Stone and Chamber of Secrets.

Eventually I relented and checked them both out of my tiny local library. I remember sitting down on my bed, opening it up and being swallowed up by the story. I broke only to call the friend and whisper frantically (because I wasn't allowed to use the phone) that "SNAPE IS LORD VOLDEMORT! SNAPE! IS! LORD! VOLDEMORT!!" I remember that so vividly. Immediately I was swallowed up again, and finishing that first book, I realise now, my life changed.

From the second I met Harry, my life was better. School was more fun as my equally obsessed friend and I reenacted scenes from the books in empty corridors and made our new secondary school our own Hogwarts. (We even scratched a snake onto the tap in one of the girls' bathrooms.) When I was thirteen and fourteen, I lived and breathed the books. In classes, I did my very best to out-Hermione my friend, and we did our homework with quills. We had a folder filled with fanfic and fan art that we found on the handful of fan sites that existed back then and it was our most prized possession, apart from the books themselves.

When Prisoner of Azkaban came out, my friend and I both put our names down on a waiting list in the library for it. (We weren't aware yet that people often just went and bought books they hadn't already read.) The depth of story completely bowled me over. It occurs to me now that I never analyse these things as they happen to me, all I knew was that suddenly there were Marauders and I was in love with two of them. But really, J.K. Rowling has a way of NOT writing things that leads the readers to fill in the gaps themselves. It came at just the right age, where that amazing childish imagination hadn't yet succumbed to teenage 'coolness.' My friend and I spent hours imagining ourselves at Hogwarts, with Harry, Ron and Hermione. We knew them as friends. I longed for friends who were just like them in real life - just as courageous, loyal, funny and caring.

I couldn't possibly write all the ways in which Harry has affected my life. When, initially the movies were announced and the tiny fandom began to grow I resented every new fan who turned up and said they loved it as much as I did, or as much as any of the people I knew online. I was a child then. In fact, I was a child until very recently and in many ways I will never stop being one. But at the time I didn't understand that people could read three, four, five, etc, books in a row and still understand, love and enjoy them as much as we did, having lived them out several times.

Again, if I'd had a crystal ball and seen what this enlarged fandom would be capable of - adopting causes, changing the world, helping not only others but each other - maybe I wouldn't have minded. And of course, I would see my wonderful friends.

There's a fierceness, I think, in a way a Harry Potter fan loves their friends. I know that among my closest friends there is an unspoken understanding that we are the Rons and Hermiones to each others' Harrys. We're going to be there for each other when we're needed.

This brings me to, if you'll allow me, the 'crux' of this post. My Rons and Hermiones. My Nevilles, Ginnys and Lunas.

In every one of Harry's friends there is an admirable quality. Ron is loyal, unassuming and does everything he can to help. Hermione is clever and prepared. Neville is ready to step up and do what he has to for the good of others. Ginny is ferocious when it comes to protecting the people she loves. And Luna sees the world in a different way, and embraces the differences she sees. Harry doesn't feel that there is anything special about him. In fact, we are led to believe for a long time that he is very average. But Harry sees these qualities in his friends - in every person he picks out something that is admirable.

I've noticed over the last few years that once you leave school, college or work, the people you were friends with may drift away from you. Often you were only friends because you were sharing a common daily life, not because you had anything in common. I have also noticed that in each of my friends now, I can tell you at least one quality in them that I admire. Harry Potter has brought me together with so many different people and I admire all of them. They're my friends. The word has taken on new meaning to me in the last few years. In a way I went through a very traumatic phase last year of examining my existing friendships and thinking about how I felt when I was with a person, or how they treated me. It resulted in me letting some friends drift away, to see if they cared enough to come back again. (Not one of those friends did.)

Even though that was difficult, it helped me to see the incredible relationships I did have and gave me more time to spend on the people with whom to spend time is its own reward. Rewarding. I give my love and more love comes back. Only today did I realise how much love I have and how many people I love, in so many different ways. And I know that if I hadn't picked up that book twelve years ago, I wouldn't have these people who make my life so much richer. I may not have the privilege of being friends with people I deeply admire.

"I longed for friends who were just like them in real life - just as courageous, loyal, funny and caring."

Thanks to Harry, I found them.









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London Audition

The audition went quite well really! Much better than I expected! I was expecting to mess up my monologues and get really flustered and rush through them. But I managed to say them in a way that was beyond my expectations of myself. I think they found my Irishy one funny, which is good. They didn't really laugh very much, though.

My songs went quite well, even though I thoroughly messed up one part of "Let Me Be Your Wings. I missed an entry and screwed up a syncopated but. But whatever. I feel like I dealt with it well, which is a good sign of a performer.

The pianist is like the musical director on "Wicked" in the West End, so I nearly had a conniption because one of my songs was "Defying Gravity." God, it was such a good feeling to sing it with him. I was so elated and enjoyed it so much. UNFORTUNATELY, he didn't follow me at all and took it much too fast, which didn't give me enough time to change register a few times. But I did my best and he should have been following my lead.

The workshop was NOT SCARY!! Christ, I've had Drama classes more scary than that!! It was a short physical warm up with spine rolls and rhythmic movement followed by a 3 minute improvisation. I *love* improv. So... well, that was awesome? The girl I was doing it with ended it after about 1 minute though. Idiot.


Meeting up with everyone was just wonderful. My flight was delayed and thus I was 1.5hrs late to meet everyone but I got to see them for a while and we went to the Science Museum. (fun) Once the younger people went home, myself, Chloé, Neil and James S went to a quiet pub near King's Cross for a few drinks and a loong chat. It was just thoroughly enjoyable. I had a pint of water and two bottles of J2O. Lots of fluid. Neil had come all the way down from Scotland just to hang out! How great!!!

I stayed with Chloé on Sunday night. I had never met her before. I am besotted. I think she's amazing! I'm utterly astounded by how wonderful she is. She's so kind and funny and fun and just so nice? And she has amazing taste in MUSIC and obviously BOOKS and she's so TIDY and ARTISTIC and she's FRENCH and I don't know. I'm just marvelling at the fact that I never knew her before, I suppose. Like definitely I wish everyone had a Chloé. She made me feel so at home in her little bedroom!!

After the audition I went home with my friend James and we had dinner out and I stayed at his place in Windsor. That was nice. We watched YouTube videos for a while and in the morning I made him breakfast with food i'd brought from here. He put me in a taxi and everything.

Jaysus lads. People. Humans. They're just awesome. I love them!!



This a photo of me singing at the opera show two weeks ago! :) The thumbnail above is a photo of the whole cast!

Martha

You know how it is when you're young: your mother is friends with someone and so you are expected to socialize with their children. You do it because you have to, not because you want to.

That's what happened with Martha and me. We were very young, maybe 3 and 4 years old, forced together by our mothers' friendship. I didn't like her. She was too quiet and she used to copy everything I did. Also, she was from the country and knew how to grow vegetables and look after chickens and things I had no clue about.  

At the age of 12 or thereabouts something suddenly clicked into place and Martha and I became good friends, going from strength to strength in our friendship over the years. Over the years I watched as she turned from a quiet little country girl to a confident, cool, talented adult and maybe as a result of that I feel more like she is my sister than just my friend. 

She is the person that I queued up for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows with for 16 hours and read it with, surviving on a diet or chocolate, tea and kettle chips.

Sadly we recently realised that we haven't seen each other in nearly a year. Because of going to college on opposite ends of the country , we haven't hugged since my 21st birthday last January.

Martha will turn 21 on the 9th December 2008 and I will be there, in Belfast to celebrate with her. The best part is that we both know that no matter what happens, no matter how far apart we are or how long we go without seeing each other, we will always be friends. We can always pick up where we left off.

Can't wait to see you, Martha. <3

Turn to the Music: 

In memory of the summer spent watching DIGIMON!!! This fun fun fun track "All Star" by Smash Mouth