Sad post again (Sorry)

I know I said that I wouldn’t blog about something sad again for a while, but recently my university has been rocked by the shocking news that one of the students had committed suicide. At first I was wary of writing a blog post about it, because I did not want to devalue his life by simply using it as a blog topic, but it didn’t feel right to write anything else at this point.

This is going to be a short post, because I honestly don’t know what to say. Anything I say will come off as being insensitive or unsympathetic. First I have to say that I didn’t know him well. We had all the same subjects; he was friends with many of my friends and we had chilled together once or twice, so a part of me feels like I should say something, but at the same time I feel like I don’t have the right to form any type of opinion about the situation. Many people who didn’t know him at all seem to think it’s ok to make judgments or assumptions about it. The thing I hate the most is everyone’s bizarre way of spreading rumours. But what I’ve learnt is  also that often the rumours are less horrific than the truth.

What scares me is that our lives in university are often so rushed that we don’t always know what is going on behind locked doors. People hide their emotions so well and there are times when our lives simply go by each other.

I walked into the dining room after the news of his death broke and a close friend of his sat quietly crying into her meal. I walked to her and hugged her tight for a few minutes and in that moment I realized that we often undervalue the connections and friendships we make at university. Whether we like it or not we are connected to these people 24/7. Even though we all come from different backgrounds we share a home with them. Whether it’s a res, a dining hall, a lecture hall or even a favourite club/ pub we are connected by this crazy little town. That which affects one affects us all. We should never forget this...

At this point all I can do is pray and be there for his friends… RIP Matty

Happy thoughts:

While re-reading my last few blog posts I realised that I have been seriously negative in many of them and I really think it’s time I brighten up. I’m young and healthy and I have the chance to live my life fully. While unpacking after the holiday I found a note that a friend wrote to me quite a while ago and it made me smile. That small note made me realize that the small things in life are the things that matter the most.

So I’m making you a list of small things that have made me happy in the last month:

·         A message from an old friend

·         Peanut butter in the dining hall

·         A Harry Potter reference/joke

·         Libido shots

·         A song about hugging cats

·         Youtube

·         That feeling of when a crush says hello

·         Reading a book for pleasure.

·         Putting a flower in my hair

·         Dancing in my room

·         The smell of fresh laundry

·         A phone call from a family member, particularly a sibling!

·         Praying for someone who truly needs a prayer

·         Laying in the sun with my friends for hours

Flowers in the Bot-Gardens

So instead of focusing on the negative side of things I just look at these things and the darker times seem to fade away. This might seem like an idealistic notion, but it’s all we got to get us through the tough times.

Oh Life and Death

The concept of death has been haunting me a lot lately and I figured that if I wrote a blog post about it, it would help. So let's see how it goes... A dear friend of mine lost a loved one recently and all I can do is be there for her, because, honestly, I know that whatever I say will not be the right thing.I could trty to say:“It’s understandable”-, but how can I say that? I won’t be able to fully understand her pain so that’s a fail and the phrase: “It’ll get better in time” is also a tough one, because it might not get better, so how can I possibly say that to her. So I pray and try my best…

During the span of the last three years I’ve witnessed the death of six loved ones, family members and friends so I experienced enough sadness to last a while.

Death makes you question everything you thought you knew about the world. I first experienced death when I was only 5-years-old when my great-aunt died. At the time I didn’t know at the time what death meant. I knew that there had to be a certain degree of sadness associated with it, since my whole family was sad about her death, but did know what it MEANT.

I fear death. I think that any person whether you are religious or not fears death to a certain degree. Death scares me, because death seems like the end of existence; of consciousness; of being. I fear the dark emptiness; the sense that my thoughts are feelings will suddenly end.

One day about a year after my grandfather had passed away my paternal grandmother, one of my most loved relatives, started getting hiccups. We didn’t think anything about it at the time. I mean they were just hiccups. Everyone gets hiccups from time to time. But they never stopped. Pretty soon my grandmother couldn’t eat anything without hiccupping. After that she struggled to eat at all.

I was a hard time in my family’s life. A 14-year-old friend of my brother had just been killed in car accident. On the way home from the funeral we got the call that my grandmother had Pancreas cancer. For those of you that don’t know Pancreas cancer is on the most untreatable of cancers, since the pancreas lies below many of the other organs, thus the cancerous tumours cannot be surgically removed. My grandmother was an extremely strong women and to watch her begin to fade way and grow weaker day by day was one of the hardest things I’ve ever experienced. It’s been more than a year later now and every so often I end up thinking about her and the amazing life she lived.

A part of me is sad about it and another part of me is really proud that I was privileged enough to have had a grandmother like her. She lived a very amazing life and she helped my become the person I am today. I miss her everyday...

Death affects many people and families, but that is why my parents remind me every day that we have to appreciate our loved one while we can. That is why we have to live life to the full, ‘cause it could end so quickly…

Life is a gift from God- Treat it that way…

Actor of the week: Jon Cryer

I decided that because I have such an obsession with actors and actresses that I will be doing a kind of an Actor/ Actress of the week analysis every week just to inform you about the actor/ actress who I admire. Naturally I’m quite busy with you know having a life and, you know, getting a degree and such so I might have to miss a week or two, but I will try to get one out every Sunday ro Monday morning.

This week’s Actor of the week is the talented Jon Cryer. Lately to catch up with Charlie Sheen’s departure I have been watching a lot of episodes of Two And a half Men and even though Charlie is supposedly the main character in the show I find myself laughing more at Alan’s weird and wonderful antics. Jon Cryer seems to fully embody Alan’s pathetic and quirky attitude.

Jonathan Niven "Jon" Cryer (born April 16, 1965) is an American actor, screenwriter and film producer. He made his motion picture debut in the 1984 romantic comedy No Small Affair, but gained greater fame as "Duckie" in the 1986 John Hughes-scripted film Pretty in Pink. In 1998, he finished writing and producing the independent film Went to Coney Island on a Mission from God... Be Back by Five.

Jon Cryer is best known for his role as Ducky in the 80’s classic John Hughes movies “Pretty in Pink” even then his potential of phenomenal comedy was evident. In “Pretty in Pink” Cryer does a scene in which Ducky impersonates Otis Redding by singing his famous song  “Try A Little Tenderness.”

His performance in Two and a Half Men has earned him six consecutive Primetime Emmy nominations and one Emmy win in 2006! Well deserved!  The man has the ability to do accents unlike any other actor!

Let’s hope that when the ninth season of Two and a Half Men that Jon Cryer can hold up the comedy of the show.