Finding Hope2018 in Songs
Posted on December 29, 2018
Just as I did last year, I want to send off 2018 with the songs that made up my year, the songs that marked the happy moments and the sad, the lost and the lonely. Here goes:
1. Damn Sky by Kalie Shorr
I am obsessed with Kalie’s most recent EP, Awake. It’s SO GOOD. The songwriting, the production, the guitar parts, the vocals… I love it. There are multiple songs I could’ve chosen for this list but I think this one is so empowering. These songs have been the soundtrack to my year and I listen to them practically everyday.
What do you do when your whole heart breaks
And love only leaves you blind
Somebody had to light the way
So I learned to have the stars in my own damn sky
I got the nails, I got the hammer
If I got myself, I got the answers
2. I Am Disappeared by Frank Turner
Back in February I went to my university’s monthly songwriters’ circle and Frank Turner was the special guest. I love his songwriting, especially his lyric writing. The stories he tells are so rich and vivid. He asked if anyone had a request and someone shouted out this song and I just fell in love with it on the spot. It’s become a soundtrack to my anxiety, but not in a negative way. It’s like it translates my anxiety into something real and that’s such a relief.
I keep having dreams
Of pioneers and pirate ships and Bob Dylan
Of people wrapped up tight in the things that will kill them
Of being trapped in a lift plunging straight to the bottom
Of open seas and ways of life we’ve forgotten
I keep having dreams
3. Without by Megan O’Neill
Another month, another songwriters’ circle. Megan was the special guest at the March circle and I just fell in love with her voice. And her lyrics and her melodies. With every song she played, I was more and more inspired. This one is a particular favourite.
If I can’t have you, you can’t have me
‘Cause it’s all or nothing and there’s nothing in between
If you’re halfway in, I’m halfway out
Baby, we can’t shine in the shadow of a doubt
I can’t live with a love you can live without
4. Babe by Sugarland feat. Taylor Swift
I still can’t quite believe that two of my absolute favourite artists/bands collaborated and created such a beautiful song (and performed it live – what I wouldn’t give to have been there). It’s one of those songs that I’ve just had on repeat. I love Jennifer Nettles’ voice and Taylor Swift’s lyrics blow me away as usual. The imagery is especially gorgeous. I also love the combination of their voices, a nice treat that we otherwise wouldn’t have.
What a waste
Taking down the pictures and the plans we made, yeah
And it’s strange how your face doesn’t look so innocent
Your secret has its consequence and that’s on you, babe
I break down every time you call
We’re a wreck, you’re the wrecking ball
We said no one else, how could you do this, babe?
5. Running Out Of Red Lights by Lena Stone
I have loved Lena’s writing ever since I saw her perform at Tin Pan South in 2016 and I feel like I’ve been waiting for her to release this song for almost as long. It’s so beautiful and the sense of urgency is so real. And I freaking love the electric guitar part, more than life itself. Just kidding, but I do really love it. I can’t wait for her to release more music.
Six blocks down from your new place
High heels never hitting those breaks
If nothing’s gonna stop me then it’s too late
To change my mind
Wishing I could leave you in the rearview
‘Cause every yellow that I run through
Gets me closer to crashing to you
Tonight
And I’m running out of red lights
6. Tennessee Bound by Sinead Burgess
I saw Sinead Burgess open for The Shires on their tour earlier this year and I loved her writing from the first song, which was this one. I was in a really bad place and her energy just woke me up. It was magical. And now, every time I feel like I’m getting lost, I listen to it and it reminds me of that. I’m really grateful for that.
Hell, I’m ready for my brand new life
Get a new apartment, change my hair, no I won’t be thinking twice
About the things that I’m gonna miss
‘Cause I sure as hell ain’t going out like this
So I’m ready for my brand new life
7. New Light by Baylor Wilson
I have Song Suffragettes to thank for the discovery of this song. They posted a video of it on their YouTube channel and I just fell in love. I love her voice. And I love the lyrics: they’re all beautiful but there’s one – “I thought ‘love’ was just a word that people use, until I heard you say it and I said back to you” – that takes my breath away every time I hear it. There’s something about it that makes me believe that love really is out there somewhere.
Every wrong turn turned out all right
And even when the sun sets, it’s still gonna rise
I see it in a new light
I see it in a true light
Every chapter, every verse of my life
Every time that I look in your eyes
Every cloud and all the blue in the sky
Now I see it in a new light
8. Nightmare by Nikita Karmen
My inner songwriting nerd gets so excited about this song. I saw Nikita Karmen at Tin Pan South earlier this year and I just fell in love with the way she writes lyrics. They’re smart and funny and quirky and wise; I get major songwriting jealousy. And the fact that she deliberately rhymes ‘right’ with ‘right’ and then ‘left’ with ‘left’ – in the SAME SONG – makes me shriek every time I hear it; I love it.
It was just a little doubt that got left behind
From a love that didn’t work out
Just ghosts from yesterday
But they don’t live here now
Reach over to my left
To know you never left
9. Eyes Closed by Halsey
I got to see Halsey live this year (twice!) and it was an amazing experience (even though I was in a really difficult place). This was the first song on the set list and the crowd sang along so loudly that it took my breath away. Literally. I felt breathless with… just awe. The concert was amazing and the crowd was amazing and it was really, really special. This song reminds me of that and I’m really grateful for it.
Now if I keep my eyes closed, he looks just like you
But he’ll never stay, they never do
Now if I keep my eyes closed, he feels just like you
But you’ve been replaced
I’m face to face
With someone new
10. Get Up by Nick Wilson
I heard this song at one of my university’s songwriters’ circle and then listened to it on repeat for the next week. It’s beautiful. The imagery is gorgeous, the production is amazing, and his voice sounds incredible. And it sounds even better live!
You gotta get up, you gotta get up
I know it’s always better than you think it will be
It’s never enough, it’s never enough
You don’t know what you want until you know what you need
Don’t break the silence when it’s beautiful
Just hold your tongue
But you gotta get up, you gotta get up now
11. The Goldfish Song by Kina Grannis
I finally got to see Kina Grannis live this year after following her on YouTube for years and years. That was so exciting and I got to hear so many favourite songs, old and new. This is one of those favourites and I’ve been listening to it on and off for the last few months. I guess it just really resonated with me.
I know what you’ve been thinking
It’s too soon to empty my cocoon
This butterfly’s not ready
But wouldn’t she know better than you
12. Loving You, Using You by Caylan Hays
Caylan is one of my favourite people and I am so excited that she’s putting her gorgeous songwriting out into the world. We’ve written together several times and I always look forward to it because she just has this way with words that is different to anybody else I’ve ever met. This song is so raw and so honest and I’m so excited for the project she’s about to release.
Maybe I’m loving you because I’m lonely
Maybe I’m holding you because you know me
Maybe I’m loving you
Oh, because you’re lonely too
Maybe I’m here because I’m grieving
Maybe I’m terrified of leaving
Maybe I’m loving you
Maybe I’m using you
I wish I knew the truth
13. The Middle by Zedd, Maren Morris, and Grey
I know that the format of this is twelve songs – one for every month – but I have to include this one, a song for the whole year if you like. This is no doubt my most played song of the year – it feels pretty fitting that just a few weeks ago, it was nominated for multiple Grammys. And I got to here it performed live and acoustic. I love it. Maren’s voice is beyond gorgeous and there is no song more fun to sing in the car.
So pull me closer
Why don’t you pull me close?
Why don’t you come on over?
I can’t just let you go
Oh baby, why don’t you just meet me in the middle?
I’m losing my mind just a little
So why don’t you just meet me in the middle?
In the middle
So there we go. My 2018, my songs of 2018. As always, there could’ve been so many more but I’ll leave it there. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much I enjoyed writing it.
Grateful 2018
Posted on December 24, 2018
Last year, I posted on Christmas Eve about the things I was grateful for (here) and I really liked it as a practice. Since we don’t have Thanksgiving in the UK, there’s no holiday directly related to being thankful and I think it’s important to make time to think and feel these things. And I always feel overwhelmed by how lucky I am at Christmas so this seems like a good time to do it, to do this post.
My family – I am endlessly grateful to my family. They have loved and supported me through some really difficult times this year and even though that’s what family should do, I’m so, so grateful to them for doing that. I don’t take them for granted. A particular shout out to my Mum for going above and beyond. She’s my hero.
My friends – I am also endlessly grateful to my friends. I haven’t seen as much of them as I would’ve liked this year but I’ve been doing my best to stay in touch. They mean so much to me and I hope they know that. Again, a particular shout out to Richard because he has been incredible this year, supporting me as a friend and a writing partner. I’m more grateful than I can say.
My therapist – I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I am so grateful for my therapist. My depression has been brutal this year and there were more than a few moments where I had no idea how I was going to survive (I say that like it’s over and I’m not sure whether it’s over or not). I absolutely wouldn’t have made it through that without her.
Song Suffragettes – If you don’t know what Song Suffragettes is, prepare to have your musical life changed. It’s an organisation in Nashville that focuses on boosting the up and coming female songwriting talent and they have weekly shows showcasing these awesome women. I was lucky enough to join them on my last trip to Nashville and it was definitely the best day of my year (and one of the best in my life). Everyone involved is so lovely and they are doing such important work. Check them out on Twitter here.
Claire Wineland – I’ve written about Claire quite a bit (here, here, here, and here if you’re interested) but she’s been on my mind a lot. I miss her – her presence in my life – more than I know what to do with but I am so grateful to have had her at all. That doesn’t make me okay with what happened (not at all) but I am grateful. She was an incredible human being and she’s still helping people even though she’s no longer here.
Flowers – This is a simple one but having beautiful, colourful flowers around improves my mood and improves my day. In a year that’s felt very dark and colourless, having flowers in the house has made a noticeable difference to my day-to-day life.
My bullet journal – Having somewhere to organise my thoughts and my life has been so helpful. Up until now I’ve never had a system that really worked for me so this is a big deal. I’ve written more about it here.
Lauren Kaech – I discovered Lauren on YouTube earlier this year and I have found her videos and her attitude really inspiring. I talked about her in my post about social media favourites and she makes videos about her experience of living with an eating disorder. And while that’s not an experience I can directly relate to, there are aspects that I can. She talks about facing the things that scare you, the realities of happiness, and a whole host of recovery related topics that apply to anxiety and depression as well as eating disorders. I’m so grateful to have had this in my life this year and at my very worst (in the very worst of my depression), looking forward to her videos got me through the day and kept me going.
Swimming – I’ve written a whole post about this (here) but I wanted to include it here because I’m so, so grateful for it. Almost every morning, I get up and go to the pool and do something that makes sense. Even if the rest of the day doesn’t, that does. I’m also really proud of myself for keeping this up for six months, especially given how bad my depression has been.
Taylor Swift – Miss Swift was on my grateful list last year and the reasons are all still relevant. But this year, I got to see her live (twice!) and that experience was so much fun in the middle of a really dark place. I felt all that weight lift for a couple of hours and that is a big deal. I’m also really grateful to her for voicing her political opinions (breaking her career long silence on the subject) and encouraging young people to vote. In the twenty four hours after she made her Instagram post on the subject, 65,000 people registered to vote, which is just incredible. It made me really proud to be a fan. I don’t think I can say more than, as always, I am grateful for Taylor Swift.
So there you have it. I could write more – there are so many things to be grateful for – but I’ll stop there. I’m wishing you all a safe, happy, and healthy Christmas and I’ll see you in the next post.
Beautiful, Stunning, Stressful Iceland
Posted on December 22, 2018
If you follow me on social media, you’ll know that I was in Iceland this last weekend. It’s somewhere that I’ve wanted to go for years and I’ve always wanted to see the Northern Lights so I was very excited when everything fell together and this trip became possible. Despite only being there for four days, we managed to pack in a lot and it was all just so, so special so I wanted to document it here.
By the time we got there and left our stuff in the hotel, there wasn’t time for much but we did have time to go to the whale museum. I’d read about it and really wanted to go and it was beautiful: a warehouse full of huge models of different species of whale and dolphin. The audio guide was super informative and I learned a lot.
The scenery in Iceland is stunning – that was probably my favourite thing about Iceland. When we – me and my Mum – started talking about this trip, I asked if we could go somewhere ‘new and beautiful’ and Iceland was certainly that. It was so, so beautiful. I kept having this weird anxiety that my brain wasn’t big enough to hold all of the beautiful things I was seeing.
We visited the Skogafoss waterfall – we actually ended up seeing it twice because the two tours we went on overlapped for certain sites – which was just amazing. You can walk right up to it and I got completely soaked but it was so worth it. I just stood there and soaked up the magnificence of it. It was so, so beautiful.
Down in Vik, in the south of Iceland, we went to the first live lava show in the world, which was incredible. They told us all about the volcanoes in Iceland and then we got to witness real flowing lava. That was so cool, one of the coolest experiences of my life.
From there, we went on to the beach, a black sand beach. I’d never seen black sand before and it was so surreal. I could’ve stayed there forever because it was just so beautiful and it was all feeding my soul in a way that I can’t really explain.
One of the other things I wanted to do was to walk on a glacier and visit the ice caves but when we went to make that happen, we learned that the hike involved was very physical and therefore more than I could handle. That was really hard to accept. I really, really wanted to go. But my energy and my stamina are so low at the moment that it just wasn’t possible. However, we did get to visit a glacier, which was amazing. It was all so breathtakingly beautiful.
Our first trip out to look for the Northern Lights was cancelled because of too much cloud but we went out the next night and we did in fact manage to see some of the Northern Lights, a green ribbon above the horizon. It looked different to all the photos I’d seen and it wasn’t as dramatic as you’re lead to believe but it was beautiful and it was a really special experience.
“Last night was surreal. We left the hotel at eight thirty and drove around the Icelandic countryside, looking for the Northern Lights. We had a fantastic (and hilarious) guide (shout out to Roman from @graylineiceland) who kept us entertained and informed and even though it took a while, we did find them. It wasn’t a ‘spectacular’ show but I don’t mind. Seeing them at all was so special and this photo, this record of that moment makes me smile so big. It might be faint, it might be grainy, but it’s proof that it happened and I’m so, so grateful for it.” (x)
One of the things I really, really wanted to see was the glacier lagoon, Jökulsárlón. One of my friends had been and her pictures blew my mind so it was first on my list when it came to planning this trip. And it was absolutely stunning. I could’ve stood there for hours, just drinking it all in. There weren’t enough words for all the colours, all the blues, and I was just fascinated by all the different textures in the ice.
And down from the glacier lagoon is The Diamond Beach, a stretch of black sand that’s littered with chunks of ice. Tiny icebergs! It was so surreal and so beautiful. Each one was different and beautiful and watching the waves rush up the beach, over and around them, was unlike anything I’ve ever seen.
The last thing we did was go whale watching. I’ve been whale watching before (in Australia and New Zealand) but that was a long time ago and I love whales. We’d been told that we were unlikely to see anything at this time of year but we decided that we wanted to try anyway. It was freezing cold and incredibly windy but it was worth it: we spent about an hour with a humpback whale that was feeding near one of the islands and I also saw a dolphin. Plus the scenery was absolutely stunning. It was a great experience to end the trip on.
The thing that struck me most about Iceland was the space. And the quiet. It was good for my soul in a way that I don’t really understand and can’t really explain. Plus the mountains. There’s something about looking at mountains that is just so calming to me.
Having said that, I dealt with A LOT of anxiety while we were away. There was so much uncertainty: I didn’t know what we were going to do about food, I didn’t know how long we would be driving for each day, I didn’t know what I would be required to do, and so on and so on and so on. It was really hard and it was really exhausting. I’d forgotten how much uncertainty and anxiety comes with travelling. Having my Mum with me really helped but it was a real struggle, a moment to moment struggle. As much as I loved Iceland, it was a relief to come home and go back to certainty.
So that Iceland. Beautiful, stunning, stressful Iceland.
I would like to dedicate this post and this adventure to Claire Wineland. She was part of the inspiration for this trip. I was already in the worst depressive episode I’ve ever experienced and her death hit me really hard. It was such a tragedy and I needed to know that there was more than just tragedy in the world. I needed to see that to help me keep going.
Since her death, I’ve been wearing a purple bracelet (the colour of Cystic Fibrosis awareness, I believe – please correct me if I’m wrong or if there is a more fitting colour) because I wanted a constant reminder of Claire and her words and because I wanted to carry her with me. It’s strange: I’ve never had any beliefs about what happens after death but recently I’ve just had this feeling that if I carry her with me, she gets to see the things I see and experience the things I experience. I don’t know why I feel like that or what I believe about life after death but I just have this feeling. I just have this feeling.
It was all so beautiful that I couldn’t just take photos. I took some video and I’ve put it together into a vlog of sorts:
Music by the wonderful heartsease.
Finding Hope 