An acceptance speech for real life 💙

And then what happens 

People are all there on the calls feeding your broken shell with ideas and advice

Their true feelings come out at the bucket load

You are breathing in deeply and trying to manage the thoughts you have about it all yourself

They all want to help but how can they really

How can anyone really know the heart and mind of another

How does anyone really know how another’s heart breaks and how it heals?

The phone calls end, the dead tone is deafening like white noise 

You are left in a room in a house which feels so cold

A house that had once sang to you your future plans and dreams

A house with pictures that cover walls of memories that you shared with someone who was supposed to be the everything you had always wanted

The house that is such a long way away

Away from the family that filled you with the love that you have searched for as a result

Your upbringing created the dream of true love

How do you build it up

Build it up from the ruin on the ground that lays in front of you 

The rubble that clouds your sight

Blocks the reality

That maybe 

Maybe 

Your gut was always aware

The gut had been screaming so loud 

For so long

That maybe you had not noticed that hum anymore

There is a beauty to this 

I promise you

A beauty that far exceeds your current thoughts and minds filled nights

Your dreams and nightmares have no idea 

They can not see this

For this is a bigger picture

The pixels far exceed the iOS on your devices

The picture is full of smiles and truth

Truth that might blur the current picture sat in frames in some half packed box in the attic

We are not always aware of the road below

We are too busy looking up

Too busy stressed from life, work life and living 

The strain of reality living in what we have coined the global pandemic

We cannot be blamed for not having the clearest vision in history to see what may have been the brightest light

We might have mistaken it for the sun

We all know that is getting hotter with the climate 

How the fcuk do we keep up with this

Trust me though 

It is not a completed novel

This is just a new chapter

Same character

But having seen through 20 plus vision 

Heart and mind on the window sill

Gut on a pedal stool 

Trust me

You will and have already levelled up

Levelling up and building strength 

Evolution at its best

Outgrown that picture 

Shed the skin 

When you are ready

Let it go

But don’t look back 

There was never a thing you could do more

You tried every thing 

And everyone knows that 

Last page

Gone are the future days in which I thought you would be here

Gone are the memories of our highest times

For now we are a were not a now

And that hurts

G & P

Come down from the heights 

They are not safe anymore for the wind is coming and will not wait 

Life has been a tumultuous existence in which heart and soul has been pushed against its rock and hard place

The pain has been squeezed deep into the pores of your skin and left you effortlessly tired

You are no longer able to muster the words of forgiveness and solitude is your only friend

The lights burn too bright for the sore eyes which are stained and wrinkled from the stinging of salted water which poured so heavily from them 

I will not apologise for being

For being is a blessing in this uncomfortable existence 

The existence which has taken the beauty of company of others and replaced it with the fear of ill health and guilt

We have been blamed and slaughtered for wanting to see those we love

Cancelled plans that have been the light for so many’s tunnel

Weddings and births are now a solo project in which only the brave or stupid can partake

Life is not as we knew it

But a sketch that was left out in the ruins of thunderstorms to smudge and become drenched

We are no longer able to see through the tinted lenses that are placed on our faces as we wake to the morning tune of birds

Concealed like some cheap make up you got free in a bingo hall toilet

Sticking to the floor that has been trampled for so many years the carpet is so weathered the colour doesn’t have a name

Dragging our limbs up stairs in fear of lifts or social contact

Becoming shadows of our former glory days

Nostalgia over fantasy times we can’t remember 

Missing the days of a bus journey without concern over masks or distance 

Eye contact being something we all avoided but now how we read a rooms mood

How we interpret feeling for the voice and normal conversation diminishes to a face time call in this new societal norm of 2021

Come down from the heights

Look down at your hands holding a phone which encompasses your new life

Time lost to short videos of action and comedy 

For this is our new normal

This is our life now 

This islands carpet

Take me higher 

Fly me out of this country 

Out of the world

That is shredded and falling apart

The surrounding environments feel weathered and no longer hold their classy feelings of being someone

The world has changed so much I can’t quite remember the before

Not just the guidance or recommendations or laws

But the people

So many people lost battles to something we can’t even see

Just an image designed to show that it’s dangerous 

With it it takes your last breath 

Not a soul can run from it and everyone I know I just want to protect 

But people listen to that moral panic 

That media storm that has taken the innocence and trust 

It throws itself dangerously against our shelter and drowns all that gets caught out

Not anything can run from that 

It’s like some csi film glitch that always runs you out 

Take me higher 

Put me in a seat and throw me into the atmosphere 

Let the faith and belief that I have help me land safely

That faith in the human I am 

Just a dash in time 

Born to make a difference

An impact on another

I feel like a saviour and a victim in the same second

Random rambles 

From the earth that we walk on

Under a sky that keeps the sun shining

From a different country

But in our island

Our island of chances and possibilities 

Never shade where you grew up

For it created who you are today

All those experiences and memories are encapsulated in this place of calm and peace

Enough peace to hear my thoughts this evening

Enough peace to empty the bins 

Process my ramblings into text to share with you 

Still hurts

It still hurts you know

That healing process has been going on for months

Like the wound that won’t seal

It pours out all over me sometimes

At night the tears are falling

I try all I can to control it but sometimes I just let it in

Let it consume

It has to

I’m still angry about it all the time 

Angry that it was him and us and now 

When life is already difficult 

When your career has become your life as you slowly drown below the expectations 

As you struggle to keep up with the mental well-being of all your students your staff and now family too

Hardest assault course I’ve ever been through 

Hated every second of it

Didn’t want to lose on my final day of college 

So I didn’t show up at all

Who was she

Run away at any risk of losing

These days I can be in last place and still push through 

It still hurts me though..

Seen as a role model

Me a role model?

Me inspiration 

Can’t quite get my breathe at those comments

I just blush and dismiss them

Crazy cat really aren’t I?

But I figure if I get better at this bit, the rest will fall in line 

Never really been someone who gives up 

I don’t give up on anyone

Not one student have I left behind

Drag them if I have to

Need that attitude with myself now

But just know

It still hurts

But I have faith in the healing 

Not all doom and gloom

 What is there to be from all of this really

Are we to look back in horror and clench at the conversations around us as people whisper lies about the actual reality of COVID

Are we to pipe up and wave our hands and say we know we know we were here

Look at how the historians change and merge truths with propaganda to fear factor a new generation

People will be afraid to hug or dance at weddings

the elderly of our society will be left alone in fear of causing them harm

Health will never be the same

Thats what they want us to think isn't it?

Just completely lose ourselves in this crazy dream that does not need to be awoken from

No not i, sir

Not i at all

We congregated and communicated through the one invention we all thought was full of hate

we created groups of people we loved online and braced ourselves for online calls

we went on video with our favourite drink and toasted into the new year with tears for the sorrow we felt for those we were missing

we set alarms for the early start on christmas day to make sure we have enough time with those we had not seen in over 9 months

we cheered on a thurs and celebrated an institution that was always here since 1948 but now had meaning and a link to our feelings

they made us better

who knew after all this time

the calls for sickness and illness reduced to leave the lines free for those who were actually struggling

people worked

missed colleagues

mental health rose

but we were all in it together

it was not all doom and gloom

we all gathered around the television on the PM announcements

the country split up

like we were all isolated countries forgetting that we were all one once

shops closed

the streets were empty

I kept up the walking into the city centre

in the wind rain, hail and even snow

we saw our breathe in the dusk as we looked up at empty buildings that were once so full of souls and life

birthday parties were for the bubble only

video calls and candles 

voicenotes became the new hug

we all just carried on

just like they always said we did in the history books

like the British do

And all this without a manual

without a previous example

without a google answer

we did it though

together we are strong

Not all doom and gloom

And then what

Am I supposed to just carry on like it’s fine

Is it supposed to be fine

I can’t fucking tell anymore

But I know I’m exhausted 

And I know for the most part this just makes me feel crappy

I didn’t expect this nor do I want it again

But sometimes in life this is all we actually need

Just that pick me up

That feeling of being needed

The attention even

But for how long until that spell goes out 

Until I am left just feeling abused on some floor in the middle of nowhere

I can’t tell anyone 

No one would understand 

They never do

Our minds our own worlds

They are not for the faint hearted 

They are not to be understood or explained

They are just instant pictures and messages like an over subscribed Snapchat account

I don’t even understand the lingo anymore anyway

I don’t have the time to learn 

It just makes me feel old

Older by the year but still with a young heart

My cardiologist told me that at least

A young heart

One that is still capable of being bruised and hurt by people who do not understand my motive

Never a negative feeling 

Just a want to support and guide people

To the detriment of my own minds world

To the detriment of my own emotions

That battered bruised heart just sat there in a pool of pain 

Me just trying to find that last piece to a puzzle I created through inception

Knowing I could fix it

Knowing they knew I could fix it

Call me Bob the fcuking builder

I have so many tools

So much time for anyone but myself

Not in some self obsessed or please feel sorry for me bull shit

But because it’s how I am

Always have been 

I will help a stranger a friend or a foe

I will cross bridges of heights I feel scared of

I will dive into the depths of the watery hell that is my fear to catch your bracelet

I won’t give up

I cannot walk away

I have to be left

But with that being left leaves me emotionally damaged and in need of something new

Constant cycles of no real smiles 

But that feeling when I’m making a difference

That is the best feeling in the world 

I could climb so high

On the adrenaline of feeling alive

Necessary 

Needed

Asked for

Validation at the highest degree