Hello and happy October!
It's been a long two weeks since the last time I posted, but jury duty is finally over and the job hunt, and therefore blogging, can continue. I have to admit that it is one of the hardest things I have ever had to do... when all is said and done, you are deciding the fate of someone else's life, not to mention countless others who may have been affected by their actions. It's not as easy as you may think.
Still, I learned some invaluable life lessons from it and intend to take those with me. Let's not dwell on it, but move onwards and upwards!
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So, I was watching X Factor the other night, (was that too dramatic a change from the previous topic?) and it suddenly dawned on me that if I were to enter, I would be classified in the "overs" category. (Do not worry, I will not be entering any time soon. I have the musical abilities of a drowning cat and the moves of one as well, come to think of it...)
However, the realisation in itself was rather harsh as, although you accept you are getting older, it doesn't feel as though you are, at least not to me. But, something like that puts it in black and white, you are in the "overs" group, which implicitly means that you are past your prime. The word "over" in itself means finished. Done, dusted. Take "How's your boyfriend? I dunno... we're over" as an example. It just has such negative connotations in so many ways... overweight, overrated, over the legal limit... What good can come of being "over"??
In all honesty, nobody expects an "over" to actually go on and win the programme, do they? I mean, sure, Steve Brookstein won the first season but then he disappeared back into the blue from whence he came.
I can't help thinking that this is a shame. I think some of the "overs" have incredible talent this year, and it's true for other seasons too. If age really ain't nothin' but a number, why is it so easy to say when somebody's number is up? I, for one, refuse to believe that being 25 or above (note the intentional avoidance of the term "over") means that you cannot aspire to greater things.
As a bit of a cheer-up, I have collated some proof that it is never too late to follow your dream or change your career: (*Majority of info found on Wikipedia... may or may not be accurate).
1) Let's start with probably the most famous one of all. Jesus Christ. It is commonly known that he was a carpenter. In Luke 3:23 it says "And Jesus himself, when he began [to teach], was about thirty years of age" so he started as a carpenter, had a career change at 30 and did alright for himself, what with being the saviour of the human race and all.
2) Then we have another carpenter... Harrison Ford (Indiana Jones). He had had 'bit' parts and uncredited voice work in a few films, but when this didn't prove as lucrative as he had hoped, he turned to carpentry to support his then wife and two sons. As a result, he was hired to build cabinets at George Lucas' home, who then cast him in American Graffiti at the age of 31. From that he went on to work with Lucas again in a little film called Star Wars. Have you heard of it? Me neither. It just goes to show, when one wooden door closes, another one opens.
3) Colonel Sanders of KFC fame didn't start franchising his restaurants and finger-licking-good recipe until the age of 65! Prior to that, he had worked as a farmer, insurance salesman and a fireman.
4) Sting (of "Sting and the Police" fame) worked as an English teacher before achieving fame as a rocker. Who knows? Maybe those experiences helped him to write some of his lyrics.
5) Speaking of writing... J.K Rowling hasn't done so badly for herself, has she? She was living on benefits, got divorced and was a single mum, only for the idea of Harry Potter to pop into her head whilst on a train from Manchester to London. She even taught English abroad (like me!) Who would have said that half a decade later she would be a multi-millionaire?
6) Walt Disney embarked on a career as a newspaper editor, only to be fired for "lacking imagination and having no good ideas". Enough said.
7) Apparently, many of Albert Einstein's teachers thought he would never amount to anything. He didn't start speaking until he was 4 (I started when I was 3... does that make me a genius too??) and he failed many of his exams, causing his teachers to brand him as lazy and insubordinate. He managed to graduate (just), but struggled to find a job due to the fact that nobody wanted to write him a recommendation. He started work as a patent clerk, which he ended up doing for 7 years. It wasn't until he was 26 (in the "overs") that he had his first theoretical papers recognised and published.
8) On a similar note, Thomas Edison, one of the world's most prolific inventors was labelled as "too stupid to learn" and was fired from his first two jobs for being "non-productive". He was 46 when he invented the first 'commercially practical incandescent light'. I love the irony now, that when somebody has an idea it is often depicted as a lightbulb. In your face teachers.
9) A source of national pride, Winston Churchill finally became PM at the age of 62, after many years of political failures and defeats. If at first you don't succeed and all that.
And finally...
10) Good ol' Elvis Presley was told by a concert manager, Jim Denny: "You ain't going nowhere son. You oughta go back to driving a truck!" when he was just 19. He kept on working, and did alright in the end.
So there you have it. It ain't over until the fat old lady sings, or writes a book, or becomes prime minister. She can change whenever she wants to ;)
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