how time flies

Why, hello there!

So, a results day (all A*s I'm happy to announce), 2 maths exams, a christmas, 2 english language exams and a valentine's day later - how have you all been?

I think my only excuse for not posting is time. Time is relative, but it always seems to run out for everyone. I wake up at 6:30 for school, and suddenly it's 9pm and all I've done is worked. I've left myself no time for the things I love and enjoy: reading has been neglected for quite a few months, blogging has been shoved under the metaphorical bed in the cluttered room that is my life and writing hasn't been a part of my life for several years.

Time is something that I find difficult to juggle. It's like I'm sat at a pottery wheel, and time is a lump of clay in front of me. But, as proven by my 7 year old self, I'm rather bad at pottery. I think I've made a decent bowl and then suddenly the wheel speeds up and the clay - or time, in this analogy - flies off the wheel and I'm out of clay/time.

This was taken mere moments before the clay flew off the wheel. Yup, it wasn't just an analogy - it actually happened.

So hobbies, passions and anything that isn't school related has been pushed aside as I focus on molding the little time I have left around school work so I don't crash and burn during summer exams.

But I'm stressed and I'm tired and I woke up at 3am this morning with a burning desire to write something. And so, after a whole day of clearing my bookshelf, re-shelving books onto my new (larger) bookshelf, working on my art exam, making flashcards and notes on Nazi Germany and running around making tea for family members, I sat down in my room with my laptop, took a breath, and started this post.

I'm not sure what made me wake up, what urged me to write, what made my heart pound frantically against my chest from the need to just write something, but I think an aspect of it was an email I received from my dad.

On February 15th this year, I went to a National History Museum about 20 minutes from where I live. It's not a normal museum - they take apart buildings from various parts of history, brick by brick, and then rebuild them on their grounds, putting the bricks in the exact order they were originally in, until the building is now on their grounds. They have a lake and streams, with a wonderful willow tree, and old buildings scattered everywhere.

I've been there many, many times, but I went with my dad for the specific purpose of taking photos for my aforementioned art exam project. While taking a photo, my dad took a photo of me, standing on a rock in the middle of a stream with my camera in hand. At the time, he mentioned remembering taking a similar photo around the same area.

The next day, he emailed me the photo he took, plus one from February 16th 2008. Of me in the exact same place.

These photos, 8 years and 1 day apart, show me how far I've come, how far I have to go, and how fast time flies. At 8 years old, I probably felt like I'd never be more stressed. That class test was probably stressing me out, or an argument among friends might have seemed like the biggest worry that I would ever have in my life.

And now, at 16 years old, these exams seem like the most important thing in my life, this year feels like the be-all and end-all, my GCSEs have priority over everything else in my life - whether that's hobbies, friends, family or just my own happiness.

My point is, time passes too quickly for me to sacrifice my own happiness for academic results. And I know, after I publish this post, shut down my laptop, tell my family I love them, go to sleep and start another day, I won't change anything. But it feels really nice to write this down. It feels nice to write again.

Sorry for the long post. But I hope you're glad I'm back - I know I am! I'm hoping to give myself more time to do the things I love, but if I can only manage one, I choose blogging.

I think I'll change what I'm posting. I'll post things like this, but I think I'll also start posting book and film reviews, so that this blog links in with my Instagram account @fiction.and.tea (it's focused on books, if you couldn't guess) I have a slideshow of my feed over on the left, so if you like the look of it, do give me a follow - there's a link under my 'Let's Socialise' section.

If you'd like to, comment your blog links below, or any thoughts you have. Thank you for reading x