Same-Sex Marriage Referendum - What You Need to Know and Why You Need to Vote

On May 22nd, Ireland will vote in a referendum for same-sex marriage. This means that same-sex couples will be able to legally marry one another and will have the same rights as their heterosexual counterparts. In other words, marriage between a man and a man or a woman and a woman will be granted the same legal rights as marriage between a man and woman and will be granted the same status under the Constitution. Likewise, these couples will be recognised as a family and therefore be entitled to the Constitutional protection for families.

Although most polls done so far have shown that the Yes side is popular, there are many institutions and groups who are advocating the No side, and many polls have shown that there is a large number of people in the undecided middle-ground. In my opinion, it is this middle ground which will ultimately decide the outcome of the referendum. From talking to family and friends, I know that a lot of the people in my life will be voting yes. Most of these are young, under the age of 30. I read somewhere recently that the people most likely to vote Yes in the upcoming referendum are young, women, and urban. I am all three, so surprise surprise, I'll be arriving at the polling station carrying rainbow flags and singing ABBA songs. But I know of people from way outside of Dublin who are voting no. I know of people over the age of 30 who are voting no. And I know men who are voting no. One of these people is my age and is voting no. One of these people has a gay son and is voting no. To anyone, this is shocking, but to me especially it's shocking because up until right before this referendum, I've lived in a happy little bubble thinking that everyone thought the way that I thought. It's only since sparking conversations with people about the referendum that I've understood just how much we don't have a guaranteed outcome on May 22nd.

I want to get something straight here, that I do not want to shove a yes vote down anyone's throat. Yes, in an ideal world, everyone in Ireland would vote Yes and prove that we're moving forward as a society. But that's totally not the case. The institutions and groups that are pushing for a No vote have been making a lot of (in my opinion) uneducated and irrational points about how Ireland will change for the worse if a Yes vote wins. One of the major groups representing the No side is the Mothers and Fathers Matter group, who have been making a lot of radical statements, in my opinion. Here are seven reasons to vote No according to the Mothers and Fathers Matter group. I actually love reading the reasons not to vote Yes, because they make me more sure of my Yes vote. Saying that all children need a mother and a father is ridiculous, and undermines the value of single parents in the country. Reason 3 to vote No, according to the group, is that "A Child's Identity is Important". It's just not important if that child then turns out to be gay, but whatever, right? Other reasons to vote No are to "Keep Ideology out of Schools" (surely this is the ultimate contradiction as most schools in the country are Catholic?!), to "Protect conscious rights and freedoms" (except for those of gay people, of course), and "Every child deserves a mothers love", which is the most insulting and insensitive reason of all, as there are already plenty of single heterosexual dad's in the country that are doing a great job.

Today, Riyadh Khalif, an Irish Youtuber, put up a video about growing up gay in Ireland, and what it would mean to him if a Yes vote was passed. If anyone reading this post is in the undecided middle-ground of the vote, then please please please listen to the things Riyadh says in this video. Everyone should have the right to love whoever they want to, and a No vote will only push Ireland back to the 1940s. When my future son/daughter come to me and ask what I voted in the referendum, whether they're straight/gay/bi/trans/asexual, I'll be able to proudly tell them that I voted Yes to make Irish history. Will you?

New Year, New Me?

I know it's a bit late (two weeks late, to be exact) to be writing a post about new year's resolutions, so I won't. But recently I watched a YouTube video about taking control of your life and making the most of every opportunity you get and it made me want to put my thoughts down into words. 2015 is the first year in my entire twenty-one years of existing where I honestly haven't got a clue of what is ahead. I went straight from primary school to secondary school, and straight from secondary school to university. After graduating in November, I'm finally at a place where there's no more guaranteed "next step" in life, unless I start making the changes I need to make in order for things to progress any further.
Over the past few months, I've been feeling sorry for myself as I watch my peers post about their amazing jobs while I'm still working at minimum wage in a retail job that I hate. For a whole month or so I completely stopped applying for jobs and even writing on this blog, because every time I thought that something was going somewhere I would get another rejection email that would burst my bubble. But, after watching a very motivational video, I've decided that 2015 will be my year. Yep, I'm two weeks late with the resolutions but I don't care. No matter what comes my way, I'll deal with it. I get 20 rejection emails in a row? Cool. The next one could be someone expressing interest in me. Although it might be very easy to sit and feel sorry for myself because I'm working in a job I'd rather not be in, sulking about it is  l i t e r a l l y  going to get me nowhere.
I've just got to

No, seriously though. 

I don't have a clue of what this year will bring, sure. But, I can try my damned hardest to make sure I don't end this year as unhappy in myself as I did the last. 2015 will be the year of me, and I'm ready for whatever life throws at me.

"Interstellar" chat and why you need to see it

I think I was possibly one of the only people on the face of this Earth that wasn't excited to see Interstellar this month. For me, the trailer lacked a gripping storyline and looked just like any other space movie. Despite this, I felt I had to give in to the hype and see the movie that everyone was talking about, and I was delighted I did.

Set in the near future, Earth is looking bleak as ever as it struggles to sustain humanity. Crops no longer grow because of dusts that sweep the land, and because there are too many people qualified in the technologies and sciences, people must go back to basics and focus on farming and reproducing in order to maintain the human race. Cooper (played by Matthew McConaughey) is an ex NASA test pilot and engineer who has had to turn to farming to do his part for his family and the world. After being led back to NASA by an unknown form of intelligence sending him and his family coded messages, he is chosen to be part of a team of explorers sent into space to find an alternative world for the human race to live.
Even reading that description still doesn't interest me, and if, like me, you're still hesitant on seeing the movie, then let me say one thing. Not only are the special effects amazing and the worlds that the explorers find are truly realistic looking, but the movie really gets to you.  Watching the movie, I found myself shed a tear a handful of times and the underlying message really stuck with me even after leaving the cinema. Already, we can see that all the sought after careers are in the sciences, computing and technologies and each year there are less and less people wanting to take over the family farm. While there are (I'm sure) plenty of jobs in these fields, what happens to the people who would have previously spent their years farming and looking after the soils of the earth? The more years that pass, the more that deforestation occurs and global warming is still a massive issue that needs to be tackled in our society. Though I (hopefully) won't see anything like the scenes in Interstellar in my lifetime, I know that I will definitely see the extinction of many species we take for granted today and my children and their children might possibly see things not too different from things seen in the movie.
Will the world, like in the movie, wait until it's too late to do anything? Will we wait for extreme climate changes and food shortages before we decide to make changes? I don't think enough people are talking about this message that Interstellar is so blatantly shoving in our faces and we probably won't start talking about it until it's too late.
I feel like I'm sounding like a bit of a tree hugger right now (and maybe I am), but there's something about how this movie got to me emotionally that caused this little rant. Regardless of who you are or the type of movies you usually like to watch, you need to go see Interstellar. Watch the trailer here.

Graduation blues

This week I will be graduating from my course at Dublin City University with a 2.1 B.A. degree. Even contemplating saying that sentence about three years ago would have made me giggle with excitement but right now all I'm feeling is an overwhelming sense of being underwhelmed. Am I even making any sense? The thing is, as the ceremony gets closer and closer I can't help but wish I could just stop time for a while. I really and truly do not want to graduate.
My experience of University wasn't amazing but it wasn't terrible either. After falling out with one of my best friends in first year and another left the course, second year taught me a lot about myself. I didn't have a steady "group" of friends in my course and so a lot of the time felt quite alone on campus, which, for someone who finds it easy to make friends, is a very scary thing. I got heavily involved in society life, in particular the DCU Harry Potter Society which made me fall in love with university and life on campus. DCU's society life is possibly the best thing about the university and I would recommend studying at DCU just for its clubs and societies alone.
But this isn't why I'm dreading graduation. Yes, I'm sad to say goodbye to the 12pm starts and the free pizza and the fact that making a documentary was considered "classwork", but I respect that all of that was part of an experience in life that can only last a certain amount of time and I should let it go when it's time to let it go. I'm dreading graduation because it feels to me like it's life's way of rubbing it in my face that I'm not employed in the field that I want yet. It's like a giant ceremony where life reminds me that I'm currently working full time in a retail job which I absolutely despise and has me in tears frequently. Lately all I've been seeing are Facebook posts and LinkedIn updates from my classmates about amazing jobs they've gotten in places I could only dream of.
A few weeks ago I went for an interview in one of Ireland's leading PR companies and it went horribly bad. The interviewer basically told me mid-interview that I wasn't getting the job but that they appreciated my effort. Since then I've lost my fire when applying for jobs and with every other rejection email I get I feel my confidence getting lower and lower and lower. My whole life I've been an enthusiastic and confident person but since leaving university I feel myself sinking into myself and I'm not happy any more. I watched my boyfriend walk from university into a job in RTE (Ireland's biggest broadcaster) and I am so proud of him, he deserves it so much. But I can't help but ask; when is it my turn? How many emails or video applications or online tests do I have to do before someone will say that they want me in their company? What's even worse is that I've encountered a few internships that I would kill to have but because they are unpaid I can't even consider applying for them.
I feel like this whole post is just one big moan after the other but I have to vent my frustration at the situation I'm in. The sooner it gets to my graduation, the more I don't want to attend. I feel like there's no point in accepting my degree or celebrating with my family because the next day I'll still be going back to working 9-4 in a job I hate, and then spending the rest of my day applying for jobs and internships which I'll get rejected from anyway. Standing up there accepting my degree from the president of DCU is going to make me feel like a sham because I'm really starting to believe that I'll never use my degree in my career. Maybe I was never meant to have a career in my chosen field.
Reading back on this post is super depressing and so I'm sorry if you've made it this far but hopefully my next post will be a bit happier, and hopefully someday in the near future I'll be posting about how amazing my career is. Hopefully.

Talk soon, Erica.

Lush "Cosmetic Warrior" review

First thing's first, I by no means have good skin. My skin probably hasn't been clear since I was about 15 and I can't see it clearing up until I'm well into my mid-late twenties (I was a "late bloomer" skin-wise). That being said, one thing I've really been impressed with lately and am loving using on my skin is Lush's "Cosmetic Warrior" face mask.
Because I have troublesome "teenage" skin, I've always been advised by staff at Lush to use their "Cupcake" face mask, and though it was very nourishing for my skin I found that all it really did for my spots was bring them to the surface rather than fight them altogether. Then one day whilst reading Lush's magazine I stumbled upon "Cosmetic Warrior" and knew I had to try it from the description: "Garlic and tea tree work together naturally to keep troublesome spots at bay". Made of Kaolin, green grapes, eggs, honey, garlic and tea tree oil, the mask isn't the nicest looking, or smelling. But after just one use of the mask I knew that I liked it. I don't know exactly what it is that worked so well with my skin type but it was as if washing off the face mask washed away 15% of my spots immediately, and that was after only one use!
So why is it so effective? Well, I'm guessing that the garlic plays a huge part. I've tried tons of face masks the past 6 years or so and never have I used one that listed garlic as one of the ingredients. But, through recent research online I've found out that garlic is amazing for your skin! Naturally, garlic is anti-bacterial, anti-fungal and anti-viral, and though it can sometimes be a trigger for acne when digested, when applied directly onto the skin it does wonders. This, combined with the tree-tree oil, is what I really think makes the mask so antiseptic and blemish-beating.
Tonight, I used the mask almost a month after buying it first and I'm still finding it works amazingly for my skin. I have combination, acne-prone skin and I think I've finally found a mask that I'll be able to keep consistent with my skincare routine. I wouldn't recommend this mask to anyone with dry skin as it really does dry out the skin whilst working to target blemishes, but even I have dry patches and I just make sure to use a nourishing moisturiser afterwards to get my skin feeling hydrated!
Definitely give this one a go if your skin is acting up a lot.

Talk soon!
Erica.