A to Z Challenge Day 18: Random ramblings, reality and Robbie Williams

I am a very random person.  If you asked most of my friends to describe me, I guarantee one of the first things they would say is that I'm random.  Strange things pop into my head at odd times, my train of thought often derails, accelerates or stops unexpectedly, and I usually have so much going on in my head that I'll say something to someone and just expect them to know what I'm talking about because I've been having an inner dialogue in my head, so why shouldn't they know, right?  Luckily the two people in my life who have embraced my randomness the most - my mum and my sister-in-law Amanda - can keep up, understand my ramblings, and are usually able to hop on the express train when my thoughts are running away with me.  Sometimes I'll have so much going on in my head that I'll be halfway through a sentence and I can't even remember what I was saying.  I've heard that being scatterbrained is a chronic symptom of creativity, and a sign of genius, so I guess being a writer puts me somewhere between genius and insanity.  Creative genius?  Creative insanity?  All of the above?  Who knows.

Taken yesterday while out with Amanda for the day.  She thinks it's hilarious that I love to take pictures of anything and everything and pose with strange things.  Yesterday, it was a frog garden stool, this bunny, and a baby chick, among other things.

So, all of this leads me to reality.  As you can probably guess, I don't spend much time living in reality.  I've said it before, but writers really are a crazy bunch - we spend hours, days, months isolated from the real world, making things up, creating people in our minds, fabricating imaginary worlds and conversing with the voices in our heads.  I'm a daydreamer and I love living in my own little world, whatever that world might be on any given day.  Reality can be so depressing and stressful, there are so many bad things in this world, why wouldn't I want to escape into a fantasy world of my own creating?  Don't get me wrong, I can be completely rooted in reality when I need to be, but I try not to take life too seriously, and just enjoy every minute of it, whether I'm in the real world or not.

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Today's R singer is in honour of my mum, who is celebrating her birthday today.  My mum is my best friend and hands-down, the best human being I've ever had the privilege of knowing.  Despite the double generation gap between us (she had me in her 40s, so she's technically old enough to be my grandmother), we love a lot of the same things, and she lets me take a lot of credit for keeping her young.  One musician we both love is Robbie Williams.  I had heard a bit of his music over the years, knew him from Take That, but didn't really become a fan until about 2002 when I met a guy online named Willie.  He lived in England and we became fast friends - I introduced him to Avril Lavigne's music and he introduced me to Robbie's and we sent each other CDs, DVDs, etc.  Avril was born and grew up in the same town as I'm from, so there were lots of pieces about her in the local paper and I would send them to him, along with merchandise I'd come across, and he would do the same with Robbie paraphernalia.  Anyway, Willie was an amazing man, an incredible artist and a wonderful friend.  He died of cancer several years ago...I still miss him, and I owe him a lot.  A song I associate with my mum, because the lyrics are just so fitting, is "Angel" by Robbie Williams.  That was Willie's song for his mum too, so when I hear it, I think of him, and it's just too bittersweet and painful to listen to very often.  My mum's and my favorite Robbie song is "Feel" - when it was popular and on the radio a lot, we would blast it in the car whenever it came on and sing along.  So this song is dedicated to my beautiful mother - happy birthday mummy - and to Willie.

"My head speaks a language I don't understand"