Abbreviation

I had something much longer.  Much darker.  Much angrier.

Suffice to say, I'm completely bricking it about Monday

The Martian

A steady, obnoxious beeping that eventually roused me from a deep and profound desire to just fucking die.
As I groggily came to, I wondered why I wasn't more dead.

Okay, I've had a good night's sleep, and things don't seem as hopeless as they did yesterday.

My asshole is doing as much to keep me alive as my brain.

As with most of life's problems, this one can be solved by a box of pure radiation.

Ignorance is not bliss

There's a horrible and uncomfortable moment when you realise you can't work out if a friend is lying.

As far as I'm concerned, the following is a basic fact: I lie to my friends; we all do.  I therefore, expect that my friends are and will lie to me.

Most of the time one of two things happens:

1. You know your friend well enough to know that they're lying, know why they're lying, and accept as part of the tacit agreement of friendship that you do not call them out on it, engage them in their lie, and file away the different meaning in your head for actual later use.
2. It's one of the millions of trivial little every day lies we all tell constantly that are so inconsequential you can't be bothered to spend your time working out whether they lied or not and don't even bother to file the information in the first place.

Either way life and friendship goes on much the same and everyone hides each others failings and flaws for each other because otherwise we all go insane.

But sometimes, your friend tells you something, and as hard as you try to analyse it, you cannot work out whether that's the truth or not.  Both options are reasonable, both options are valid, both options could be successfully argued both for and against.  Even sitting there and going over it and over it in your head in twenty different ways, you come to the realisation that either you don't know your friend well enough, or it's entirely possible they lied to you.

Worse than the lie itself, worse than the act of lying, is the fact that they might be able to lie to you and you might not know it.

Containment Breach

Pressure is building.

Today is another day where dark thoughts cast a long shadow over my mind.  This has been continuing to build for a few weeks now.  I can't entirely say why.  I have some ideas.  But nothing concrete.

I yo-yo a lot at the moment.

When I'm okay, I'm totally fine.  Things may be bad, and things may continue to be bad, but I know that there are new things to come.  I want to see what they are.  It might all go to hell and I might crash and burn even more spectacularly than I have before, but I'm excited for the journey, the discovery, of seeing how it pans out and where I'll end up.  I catch myself laughing at nothing in the shower.  I dance in the street.  I sit awed by the developments of the last few months.  I live.

When I'm down, I'm teetering on the abyss.  I'm one day away from disappearing again.  I'd give up if I could find a way.  It all seems rather pointless, to keep trying, to carry on, it's not going to end anywhere good.  It's stretching out rations pretending it will help you them last longer, when all it does is cause hasten the day problems kick in.  My hood stays up.  My cap is pulled down low.  I'd miss the things to come, truly, but I just don't have the energy to keep going.

There's nothing in-between at the moment.  And there should be.  Because I don't feel that bad somehow.  I don't feel hypomanic, or suicidal, , or rather some days I do, but not everyday, however my emotional state begs otherwise.  I go through both of the above 20 times a day.  It makes it hard to know if it was a good day or a bad day.


Something is going on in my head, or my life, and I don't know what.  I don't know how to fix it, or remove myself from it, or just make it a little more bearable.  I couldn't tell you anything of consequence about it, no specifics.

I'm acutely aware the support network I have that I feel comfortable talking to about these things is a grand total of 2.  That's problematic.  They can't be around all the time.  They have their own lives, their own problems to deal with.  I fundamentally have issued trusting people who used to be this close to me for various reasons.  It sucks but it's the truth.  There are other things I trust them about.  Important things.  Just not this.

I carry on.  Pretending to make it through work.  Trying to get to my weekends.  Convincing myself that various things to look forward to in the next few months aren't impossibly far away.  Tired of feeling stuck in the middle - neither determined to give up, nor resolved to move on.


Pressure continues to build, no longer in the back of my head, but encroaching forward.

It's Wasn't Tuesday This Time

Today I miss you.

Today I miss our talks, and our fights, our secret unseen messages to each other, the ways we'd show we cared when others couldn't see, how we absolutely hated each other and knew it every moment of every day.

I miss your safety.  The breath I'd release being held in your arms again that first night.  A smile I've yet to get back since.  The knowledge that as long as we lay there it didn't matter how bad it all was, what my head said or yours, we'd lie there, awake, sleeping, crying, breathing.

The second night, pulling you in close to me.  Watching guard over your shoulder that nothing would threaten you.  The purpose and surety that I could.  Whatever it was, I could.  I could summon any strength in those moments, when you had none.

I miss dreading that fight.  Knowing it would happen every single time.  Knowing it was to come.  Knowing it was stupid, and pointless, and that it was everything we both knew was true.

I miss being so scared I could never say goodbye.  Or you couldn't.  One of us was always statuesque.  Rigid, unmoving.  Unable to return that finale embrace.  I miss the hurt, and release of a 12h long journey home spent crying the entire way.  So badly the automated cameras couldn't validate my ID.

Today I miss you.  Tomorrow you'll be the guy I'm moving on from.  But tonight I want you here.

List

1. At least once per week, visit a place you keep meaning to get round to visiting.
2. Find time for a sit down breakfast, even if it's cereal, once per week
3. New blog, on tube advertising and related items (dedicated to my friend CJ, whom I had many discussions about this phenomenon with, and the particular lack of it in Boston) - this one requires me getting the funds together for a camera, so may not start right now.
4. I forget what this one was, there definitely was something here, and something worthwhile at that, so for now I'll just keep it as a placeholder.
5. Chainsword.

Small unnoticed things

Cards on the mantlepiece

Shut the fuck up you're amazing

So this was obviously a private conversation, but I've decided to share some parts of it, because it's the first time I think I've ever managed to properly put into words that do due justice to the truly platonic love I have for #Blondie

In worrying about him, and giving him more that he was giving me (cause he's hiding from his own demons in fairness) I failed you: by being too angry to wait for you; by being so angry it overrode my near constant impulse to look out for you in whatever way I can.  You are one of the few people I can save, and sometimes I need to for my own sanity, and I failed you on that this weekend.

Sometimes I hold myself to an unnecessarily and unfairly high standard, it's silly I know.  But you are one of the people I can consistently meet it for ... I know your safety isn't my responsibility, and it's not something I can ever guarantee, but it is something I can do, that I can't do for a lot of people, for a lot of people I wish I could ... never doubt that I will strive to do better by both of us next time.

In some very rare moments, I manage to articulate exactly what my feelings are, without losing anything along the way.  This was one of them.

Pedestals

I have learnt from repeated, harsh, crushing, bruising experience, to trust my instincts.  Even when they seem counter-intuitive.  I will regret it otherwise.

The analogous lesson has so far not been applied to how I assess the needs of friends.

For all of the praises my friends have about my character, I have an above average habit for letting them down.

But more to the point, I have the habit of letting down ones I didn't expect to, which are always the worst possible ones to have let down in any situation. 

I'm trying; the first step is admitting there's a problem, but it's still something I seem to get very wrong a lot of the time.

Dicks fuck assholes too

Today I watched one of my best friends be an asshole.

That shouldn't have been a surprise; it's certainly nothing new in terms of how we interact with each other.  He was an asshole to people he cares about.

Even that's not the problem.  The problem is his choice of actions (due disclaimer: I should note my actions have not been admirable at various points this weekend) is one that reveals that he was calculated, to a mercenary extent.  He knew what he was doing, he knew how it would come across to others, he knew what the consequences of it would be.  And he still chose to do it.

It's not a drunken mistake or heat of the moment idiocy, it's calculated, to inflict exactly the damage that it does, knowing full well every step needed to achieve that.

The biggest problem was that I then realised I like my friend because he's an asshole.  Which is exactly why I like(d) my ex.  Which is exactly why me and another best friend of mine get on.

As another friend commented: like attracts like.

I knew from the moment my friend made step 1 of his choices exactly what it would lead to, and the repercussions, because it's the same reaction I would have to that situation and so I instantly knew every reason why it was made.

No surprises, but me and the people I hold as role models aren't exactly shining paragons of... well... anything.

Statistics

In the 9 or so months we've been playing, I think I've cum with #superaggressivefb maybe 5 times.  He does better, but it's maybe 15?

We've played a whole lot more than that.

Good sex doesn't have to mean orgasm.  Or anything even attempting to get there.  Good sex is silly and fun and you get lost in the moment and its just about the fact you both enjoy whatever's going on and get turned on by it.
Orgasms are great.  But not seeing them as the end goal is important I think.  Kinksters are often better at this I think because so much of what they/we do is 'foreplay'

Good sex people, go get some.

I know you I walked with you once upon a dream

Sitting in the nice lounge waiting for my flight at Terminal 2.

Airports are no longer bittersweet places for me.  Or rather, they are, but with less of the melancholy aftertaste.  Airports, the imminence of travel, getting away, has managed to maintain its sense of lightness it brings to me.  The freedom of self and nerdy love of watching the constant ballet of movement even at 3am.

I'm here at that most previous of times, dusk, when the lights of the airport start to glimmer identifying myriads of different points along the field.

I know what each of those lights means. I understand the entire layout, the significance, the warnings and clearances.  And I am so glad I do.

I miss flying.  Somewhere in the multitude of imaginary universes (i use imaginary in the H6D sense) I am doing so.  I didn't fail my medical, I didn't have dreams I poured years of my heart and head and self into crushed, I didn't have to find a new dream - something I'm still working on daily.

But it no longer hurts.  10 years later, I love flying again.  I just wish I could afford to once more.

Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A Start

I have no idea why I never posted this, it was written five years ago now when I was still with Chris.  But everything contained within is still perfectly valid.




Chris is not a console gamer. he never had one himself, and unlike the rest of our generation, seemingly neither did anyone he was friends with as a child.  In fact it's kind of pityingly funny to put a console controller in his hand, be it PS3, Xbox, N64 whatever.  "What's fire?!  Wait, Left 1 AND Right 2 AT THE SAME TIME?!?!  Z BUTTON?!?!  Where the hell is the z button?!  UNDERNEATH?!?!"  I blame his lack of console gaming as a child for Chris generally having issues playing any kind of FPS genre game.  Anyone who played goldeneye as a kid (or indeed still does, for let's face it, that game is a genuine classic), learnt how to aim, shoot, jump, and maintain camera angle all at the same time by necessity.  And equally, I find that regardless of what console you play/ed above others, you can generally adjust to a different console with relatively little difficulties; there is always at least one L and R button, the z button, if it exists, is always underneath.  The trackpad is usually movement, if there's 2 of them, the other is camera angle, and the fire button is almost always the button nearest your right thumb.  Simple.

Chris criticizes the need to memorize strings of button presses to execute special moves, as this doesn't happen at all on computers really.  Fair point, though I reckon that's a skill you learn through playing consoles naturally.  And I think it allows for more flexibility than a PC game, you don't need to have certain spells or moves readied all the time, you can cast a heal simply by remembering what button sequence you need, and the most commonly used actions often have rather memorable sequences anyway.

Despite only owning a wii (and also technically a PS2), I love console games.  For one thing they're social, sure, you can play Starcraft 2 on battlenet with someone, or even have an Unreal Tournament LAN party, but a few hours spent playing Halo, or Goldeneye, or Mariokart, encourages so much more social activity, is so much more active, something to do with actually sitting next to each other and sharing the same screen.  Especially when there's 4 of you and you have to squint to find your own quadrant and what's happening in it.  I could quite happily spend a Sunday afternoon only half getting dressed in the most comfortable, loose fitting clothes I own, ordering pizza 'cause nobody can be arsed to cook, and blowing the hell out of each other with rocket launchers or dune buggies. 

So if anyone wants  to be my dossing-around-the-house-buddy, let me know.  Though for the next few months, 'Sunday' might have to seem suspiciously like 'Tuesday'.

Six feet happily underground

A friend told me they're still trying to work out what to say for my eulogy.

I didn't tell them I currently have every desire to be at theirs.

Truth is Singular

Mine.
...sort of.
How so?
*after a long pause* in many and varied ways, yes and no.

...stop being so accurate.

Silos

I can't talk to you about the dark things.

But you're the first person I run to whenever this happens.

Looking For Love In All The Wrong Places

People have been rereading my blog and commenting, making me reread my blog and prompting me to actually write something

6 weeks ago I ended up in hospital.  I disappeared for a few days, and my parents eventually tracked me down,  turned up, got me discharged and took me home.

Not home.  Their home.

A place I will always have a bed, for sure, but it is not my home, I didn't grow up there, I've barely slept 2 weeks worth of nights there combined, and it's in the country.

It was the worst possible place I could be.  I barely spoke to them, I beat my hands against the backseats of my car as I was taken home because the voices in my head were screaming so loudly.  When I finally slept, I had bad dreams, I woke up early and immediately asked to be allowed to go home.  My home.


A few days later I was staying with a good friend and #superaggressivefb.  It was probably the first major incident of my mental state he's had to deal with, at least directly.

And so, very quietly and calmly, at one moment we were alone, he simply said: "And next time, you will call me."

I grumbled non-commitantly.

"The next time, you WILL call me."

"Fine." I whisper, resignedly adding him to the mental list of people to inform in the first instance after the event.

"So next time, it won't be your parents picking you up, it will be me and you'll come here."

20 different thought streams fire off in my head at once.  Huge senses of anger and relief.  The imagined conversation between my friend and #superaggressivefb where he explains how my parents are a trigger.  Irritation that #superaggressivefb knows me so well already as to use my own though process against me.  Frustration.  At him.  At myself.  At my friend.

...#superaggressivefb smirks.  That smirk that he knows all of the above has passed through my mind in a heartbeat.  The smirk that makes me want to see him bleeding on the floor in front of me.

"I will." I say, conciliatory, lacking the grit of teeth my previous response had.

It was the moment that he went from someone I was becoming really good friends with, to getting catapulted into the upper echelons of my trust.  However he knows it and uses it, someone who can gauge me that well is fully capable of walk through every defence I have if they so choose to do so, so I inevitably trust them when implicitly when they demonstrate only a judicious application of this skill.  

(As an aside, the fact that #superaggressivefb has this total level of trust from me, and yet still instils fear and uncertainty when he asks me if I'm sure before he hits me, is the exact thing that turns me on the most about him.

It was also the moment I realised not only was #superaggressivefb a good friend, he was a support network I didn't even know I had.

This weekend I ended up in hospital.  Through my own stupidity more than anything else.  And waiting there, when I awoke, was #superaggressivefb and my other friend.  They took me home.  To #superaggressivefb's home.  They took care of me.  And then they made sure it didn't ruin my weekend.   I remember giving their names as my emergency contacts in the ambulance, but it took me until this afternoon to realise that I didn't have to think who I'd contact, I was just asked and those were the two names instantly in my head.

10 weeks ago I was struggling to rebuild the close support network I'd surrounded myself with over 2 years and lost all in one week.

Now I have the first block to it.

I still don't have my reason.  I have something keeping me interested however, something that for now, I choose to keep very personal.  I'm angry more days than I'm happy.  I bailed midway through a friend's birthday this weekend because I couldn't handle that much social interaction.  Work continues to help distract me from my problems, and exacerbate them as everything bottlenecks at me.  Today is a struggle and time just stretches on and on as the clock refuses to budge.  But it's perversely reassuring to know that when it all goes wrong, I won't be so alone next time, there'll be someone there beside me.

Hiding the words that dont come out

The other day, I was given a very privileged insight into a friend.  It was short, and understated by them. But a lot of our friendship is.  We say little, often passed-over, things to each other, because we don't need to respond.

That little action spoke more volumes than I could possibly put down in a simple blog post.  It's more than a matter of simple trust, it's the understanding of our friendship that one simple comment was all that was required; the peek into how they've come to be the person they are; who they once were; an idea of some little bits of a person that few might know about.

It was, quietly, an emotionally intense moment for me, and I find myself still reeling slightly this morning.  Trust is easy to repay, privilege is a much more tricky beast.