Love your friends, die laughing.

Hello there, and welcome to my first official blog post. I do have another blog (zoetinytall.tumblr.com) but all I post on there are short, random musings and a lot of aesthetically pleasing images. Here, I plan to go into depth. I'll share with you a whole lot of thoughts you'd be happy never having read. My aim is that you spend time comprehending my entries and at the end find yourself thinking 'I could've used my time more wisely by attempting to count the lines on my forefinger print'. However, on some level, I know you'll find yourself mildly entertained. You're entertained even now, well aware you're wasting precious time, but it's 'car crash reading'. You don't want to carry on, you want to click the little red button in the right hand corner, but would you look at that! You're still here. You want to know what follows.

I created this blog approximately twenty three minutes ago, not to have ready for a rainy day, but to get composing instantly. I have something I wish to share. Or maybe I don't exactly. Maybe waffling will cure this dreary, heavy, claustrophobic mood I find myself in right now.

Upon feeling this way, I paid a visit to www.rainymood.com, then went on to www.8tracks.com, put on my noise cancelling headphones, curled up in the armchair with a blanket, and closed my eyes. After a while I let the music fade and now I'm typing to the sound of an invisible storm. It's awfully liberating.. Bookmark it for a rainy day. Although, that'd be pointless. Save it for a sunny day where you're feeling depressed. Pathetic fallacy is rather effective.

Anyway, the music and the invisible storm calmed me right down, until I was smiling to myself. In ten minutes I'd gone from crying to grinning, with no outside help, other than perfectly combined sounds. One song in particular amidst my chosen playlist - Love Your Friends, Die Laughing by Man Overboard - caused me to think a little bit more. When in the centre of my problematic little bubble, of course I find it hard to concentrate on the advice I would give to anybody else during a happier time. But it found its way back to me in the form of a song title, and that title is now this post's title. I'm a believer in recycling.

Here's a picture from the happiest time I've had in a good while. It was with my mum (who is more like a sister & best friend) at the last Paramore show I went to, and for three hours, I forgot that anything else existed outside of an arena full of people I temporarily considered family. I mean, what an atmosphere. Singing and shouting in unison, lack of self-consciousness whilst jumping and screaming... Nobody gave a damn. It was a perfect form of freedom. The only place more free than where I was for the evening, was down at the very front row, being thrown around like a ragdoll in a washing machine and covered in other people's sweat. But I'd been there just a week before so I was happy to take the backseat this time.

Get a look at the pure glee on my face, since when do I smile like that? I'd like many more records of that kind of happiness this year; spending time with my closest friends, laughing inside out, focusing on what I can change rather than what I can't. As hopeless as it makes me feel, I can't get rid of my problems over night. But I'm very good at finding ways to smile, to momentarily escape, and it's things like this upon which we ought to spend our efforts. Instead of striving to be happy, focus on being content.

Remind yourself of little mottos like this title.