Wednesday, 12 June 2013

Expectations vs. Reality aka the Tale of the Ice Cream Shoes



If there’s one thing I have learnt in my 22 and half years of being on this earth (good god I’m old)  it is that life NEVER turns out like you expect. 

Expectation: Have a high flying career, quite possibly as an actress in a hit TV show and star in films on the fly. Be really successful, rich and famous and live in a gorgeous home with a corner sofa a wood burning stove and an aga.

Reality: Outside sweaty lugging great big chunks of wood.

When I was 6 or maybe it was 8 or 9 I don’t remember I apparently wanted to be a fashion designer. I have a folder floating around the house somewhere filled with my ‘designs’ and I use the terms ‘designs’ loosely here. Amongst my portfolio there’s a design for ice cream shoes which I recently learnt has been pioneered by a collaboration between Melissa and Karl Lagerfeld- I knew that I should have got a patent on that idea.
Here’s a picture of their shoes but I can’t for the life of me find my version. If I ever stumble across it I can send it you. 

The fashion designer idea didn’t last very long because according to my Ford House (junior school) yearbook my allegiance had turned to becoming a beautician. However I don’t think this career plan would pan out very well because I can’t even do my own make-up/nails properly never mind anyone else’s.

Next on the line of career goals was an actresses and to this day this dream is still going strong but in reality when faced with any rejection or criticism I just burst into tears. Seriously I would be useless on any reality TV programme. 

But back to the present and I am moving chunks of tree trunk, well I was about fifteen minutes ago right now I’m typing. If you asked if I ever expected in a million years that I would be carting wood to and fro in a wheel barrow I would have just laughed in your face. Neither would I have expected that a whole year after graduating university to still be living at home, unemployed and well on the way to becoming the forty year old virgin. Scratch that, I kind of thought that last one might have become a reality.

Yet enough about me, I’m sure that the poor child in Africa never expected that it’s parents would die of Aids and leave them to look after it’s younger siblings and the house or should I say mud hut at the ripe old age of six. The nearest source of water is 10 miles away and the water has to be carried the whole way in a bucket balanced on their head. Even though the water is filthy the children have no choice but to drink the infection and disease infested concoction. Meanwhile while the oldest is carrying the water back from the well his younger sister gets bitten by a mosquito and contracts malaria and dies before she can be transported to the hospital. Yes I’m sure that’s how the child expected that their life would turn out.

Hopes, dreams and expectations often go hand in hand and whilst you may want your life to pan out one way, in reality it rarely ever does. So what can we conclude from this post? 

LIFE SUCKS

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