20/09/2021 – Monday…

Time seems to have folded upon itself, stretching daily for epochs, eons; yet passing like sharp, biting gusts of wind, engulfing everything that I am.

I’m caught up, tangled, yet facing an unending expanse of every moment, lined up one behind the other. On the edge and simultaneously a direct participant. I am both audience and actor, unsure of what is mine and what is out of my grasp.

Trying to determine the boundaries of ‘rest’, and ‘growth’, and ‘productivity’, are proving near impossible. Am I trapped, a frozen glacial being doomed to forever observe without influence? Or am I unfurled, a sparrow taking its first, tentative steps on the precipice to complete freedom? I haven’t yet come to a conclusion. I’m not even sure that the scattered pieces that once made up me will even form some semblance of a human any more.

I guess the only way to know is…

Time.

Time is the longest distance between two places.

– Tennessee Williams

15/09/2021 – Wednesday…

Late at night is certainly the worst. When the whole world slumbers, and the outside is quiet. Beyond the window; nothing. When the steady breathing of the person next to you isn’t enough to soothe your mind. To settle your soul. When no amount of sheep could induce drowsiness.

When you find yourself thinking about the bad bits again. The bits you can’t change, can’t quite control. All of those facets of life too wild and untame to predict, hold on to, to mould into a shape you can digest. It’s like a small, niggling scratch deep in your brain, threatening to reduce you to insanity for the sheer impossibility of reaching to it. Fingers probs for the source of the soreness, but it’s too deep, too far, too buried to be subdued. Always there. Always present. Always threatening to engulf.

‘A sick thought can devour the body’s flesh more than fever or consumption’

– Guy de Maupassant

4 years and 3 months…

Later. And I’m back. Here again.

Lots has happened, lots has changed. An unengagement, a solo move across country. Existing in a new space, embarking upon a new career, building a new life, being a new me.

All was well. Until I realised, of course, that new isn’t really new if it’s the same fragile human beneath it all.

A global pandemic saw old patterns and old habits creeping back under my flesh and through my veins and between my well-worn synapses.

So I’m back. To update, to vent, to heal. Because, after all, where better to retreat than to the beginning.

Change, like healing, takes time.

– Veronica Roth

2 Years and 2 Months…

Have elapsed since I was last here.

Time ticks blindly, unapologetically.  So much has changed. So much is different. York is now, and shall remain, a long lost memory, as if conjured from a daydream. I had to leave. So I went home.

For myself, for my life, and for my sanity. I left the place I was and changed the life I lead. The medications remain, a constant reminder of the broken, unresolved pieces of myself.

But everything else. Well. What can I say? I hit rock bottom, and built from the embers that remained. I became whole, more or less. And when everything was beginning to improve… He came into my life.

I’m engaged now. Happy now, more or less. Every so often the cold hands of that which exists inside me close around my mind and sight becomes all but impossible.  But I no longer face that darkness alone. And I remain grateful every single day for where I am, who I am, and how far I have come. I am positive, I have grown, learned, and changed.

I’ll keep posting, keep updating, and keep allowing myself to have these moments. But hopefully, from a brighter place.

There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever. There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn’t matter anymore.

I am thawing. – Laurie Halse Anderson

Friday 24: Day Thirty-Seven…

Training again. More travel. Trains. Landscapes flashing past the window.

The entire world from a window seat. Watching life through streaked glass panes.

A good day. A bright day. Another up, and long may it reign.

Life is not always perfect. Like a road, it has many bends, ups and down, but that’s its beauty. – Amit Ray

Thursday 23: Day Thirty-Six…

Today was busy.

I still like busy. I need the busy. You can’t drown if you’re too occupied to remember that you’re treading water.

I’m coming back. I’m on the way up. I feel like a different person. The old me again.

A switch on the inside has been flicked back on, and there is light in my life once again.

Temper us in fire, and we grow stronger. When we suffer, we survive. -Cassandra Clare

Wednesday 22: Day Thirty-Five…

Not feeling too great. Physically, not mentally this time.

Which is more bearable, truth be told. Sickness I can deal with. This is the simple bit.

Avoiding vomit in the workplace isn’t the ideal. But it’s seen. Known. People can relate to this.

I made it through the day. With sympathetic cares and concern.

It wasn’t the same when I needed it more.

It’s funny how something tangible, seen and external, bears so much more weight than something hidden. I didn’t ask for it, yet it seemed to be more my fault than catching something clear.

But at least I had a distraction today. My mind was occupied with my body, and that made things simpler.

The fact that we are living does not mean we are not sick. – Joseph Brodsky

Tuesday 21: Day Thirty-Four…

More trains. More travel. More places.

Doing things and seeing things. Fresh experiences. Living more.

It’s little things. But it was needed. It’s all progress. Everything counts, every tiny step contributes towards a better place. Being in a better place, and happier with who I am.

It’s a hard road. And it still drags up setbacks. But as it goes, for right now; it seems okay.

When I discover who I am, I’ll be free. – Ralph Ellison

Monday 20: Day Thirty-Three…

Another day in the new stance. Enjoying new views. Commanding new outlooks.

The pills are helping. Being busier is helping. I needed the help, and the help came along. And now I’m just enjoying the ride.

Things seem more hectic. I can’t box feelings, events, emotions into segregated mental faculties any more. And it feels wonderful.

I thought condensing experience might make me happier. More fulfilled. But I caged myself in whilst keeping the others out.

So I’m trying to be open again. Letting things flow more naturally, rather than attempting to control every aspect of  being. It’s getting easier. Life makes more sense when there’s more to it. And it’s a hell of a lot more worthwhile.

Out of clutter, find simplicity. – Albert Einstein

Sunday 19: Day Thirty-Two…

It ebbs and flows. Today was a bad day. Things didn’t go so well.

What does it mean when your happiest tines are found in missing someone, when all you want to do is be happy when they are near?

Today hurt. Ensuing silence allows for reflection. Reflection reveals mistakes. And I made plenty.

Back to hating the person I am. The things that I do, or say. I’m embarrassed of my own actions, but I don’t know how to stop. Self-sabotage of the highest order.

I can’t keep messing this up. I can’t keep up the hurting.

There is no good day or bad day, only good or bad actions. – Amit Kalantri