New Year, New...

Welcome all, my first point of call in this blog would be to say a belated Merry Christmas to you all, I hope you all had lovely days and got everything you wanted from Santa Claus and, as this is likely to be the last entry before the New Year, I wish you all a happy New Year, may 2012 bring happiness to all.

So, 2012 is upon us. Which means its time for the endless "a new year, a new me" routine which never really means anything because they remain the same. It's the same nonsensical madness in relation to "New Years Resolutions" - who actually sticks to them past the end of January, let alone all year? No-one I know, that's for sure, so please don't bother humouring me and more importantly, yourself. But what else does 2012 bring for people? Well, apart from everyone being scared of the world ending, which it clearly isn't going to. I love being able to say that in the knowledge that if the world does end, I don't have to eat my words about being wrong, because we'll all be dead.

But for me on a personal note, 2012 is a huge year. Some would say my biggest yet, but realistically, everyone so far has been that. But this could perhaps be a life-defining year. Why you ask? Final year of my degree, exams, graduation, scary times ahead. Hopefully my passage into the real world. And whilst on topic, I'd like to say that I imagine this will be my last blog for a while, I struggle to find time/motivation for it now, but now that I have essays and revision to be doing, I suppose I should prioritise those if I feel like writing. But back to the point. Exams. Funny situation I find myself in, I've had my life all planned out since I was about 12, what I wanted to do etc. But university has changed that, and I now find myself with no plans whatsoever as to where I want to be this time next year.

To me, the exams aren't just the typical "degree career prospects" and such and such. On a personal level, my degree is much more. It's the chance to finally realise all the potential I had. A ridiculously intelligent youth if I may say so myself, blessed with amazing talents, I had the whole world in front of me. At the age of 3, I could tell you every fact about every dinosaur there was, I could even spell the words involved, which I probably couldn't do now, aged 20. Yet for all this, I struggled to grasp such simple things as to how to hold a pen properly. Although my love for dinosaurs died, my intelligence remained the same. As most of you will already know, it was decided that it would be best for me to advance straight from Year 1 to Year 3, based on what I knew. The decision was certainly vindicated with my SATs results, dropping a mere 8 marks over 3 papers, without blowing my own trumpet. But the possibilities were endless. Nothing seemed out of reach. Offered scholarships at private schools, but not full ones, my parents had to reluctantly turn them down on grounds of finance. In retrospect, I'm glad, I wouldn't have wanted to go to a private school. For all the extra you learn, it seems life skills aren't among them. And so I went to Houghton Kepier. My tenure there was short, lasting just a year, as my parents relationship broke down completely, and so we moved off to Ferryhill.

Nothing against Ferryhill B+E College, but that's what I accredit my downfall to. Some of it has to be accredited to myself, granted, for acting like a dick in some classes, but the standard of teaching was poor. Don't get me wrong, there were some great teachers there (Mr Houchen, Mr Jones to name two), but for every good teacher there were 5 bad ones. During my time there, I found a correlation between whether I enjoyed the subject and whether I did well. That's what makes a good teacher to me, the ability to make a boring subject enjoyable. And this is probably why I flourished in their subjects but not so much the others. At the end of Ferryhill, my grades were respectable, and above average. But nowhere near the standard you would have predicted a mere 5 years ago. And then came QE 6th Form College, billed as being, at the time, the 4th best 6th form college in the country. Yet still, my talents weren't realised. I chose subjects I didn't enjoy nearly as much as I expected, and the split teaching was to my displeasure, as for Psychology I did really well on one side of the course with one teacher who I enjoyed, but poor on the other. And so my grades declined even further.

So off to uni I went, and as a result of my grades, probably wouldn't have got in to a top university to study Law. Not that this bothered me slightly, without knowing which unis were 'good' or not, I had my heart set on Leeds Met anyway, so all worked out in the end. Even if I had fulfilled all my earlier potential, the fact that I wasn't private schooled, put me at a massive disadvantage to the so-called elitist universities of Oxford and Cambridge. Into my final year, and I'm looking at a 2:1, with potential for possibly a 1st class honours if I do really well this year.

Funny how it works out like that isn't it? If I had lived up to all the hype, I would potentially be leaving a good university with a 1st or maybe a 2:1. Yet, even though I suffered a big decline in my middle years, the end product remains the same? And I've managed to live a pretty good social life in my eyes, the perfect balance between a life, and my work. To me, it isn't just about the simple career prospects of the degree, I feel a sense of urgency to get a good degree, because I can finally end the guilt I feel of not living up to expectations. Because like I said, the end product is the same, so why wouldn't I feel good? But perhaps more importantly than the personal gain, the pride in my family's eyes when I graduate. To make them feel justified in supporting me all the way through my life, both when younger through helping me, and in the later years financially. Words can't even begin to describe how much I owe them all, and for that I am eternally grateful. I just want to hurry up and get into the real world so I can start repaying the faith. But first, I need to find out exactly what path I want my life to take.

I was going to talk about another topic, but I think I've spoke enough about my life today, so I'll leave it there, and will hopefully come back with that topic in the next couple of days. But like I said, time will be hard to come by, so I hope you all understand if I don't get round to it. And to echo my sentiments earlier, I hope 2012 brings all the happiness, joy and luck you need to succeed.

Thanks for reading,

Thomas.