Day 41

One ninth through the year already. February into double digits. Don’t look back, don’t look back. Too late. The time is gone already, and warmer days are ahead. Way ahead. Don’t wish the lengthening days away. Forget about the dark days.

I had a migraine most of the day yesterday. It did go away in the end, so I could enjoy my first in-person live football match in almost a decade. To be part of one voice was somehow a release from the life inside, life inside in more ways than one, even though I kept my mask on the whole time. And, afterwards, wandering round the outside of the ground reminded me of different times, when I’d wander round the bowels of cities late and watch the night economy come to life, sounds sharper (yet somehow muted) and colours muted and shadows moving. The people no-one sees, the hidden people earning a living in the background, working when no-one else wants to work, won’t work, services no-one consciously thinks exist. Steam from invisible pipes, trolleys creaking, co-workers leaning towards each other as they walk sharing secret words about their lives, their work, jokes about those on the surface who take them for granted. It made me hyper, this twilight existence.

This morning I have that feeling of overfamiliarity that distances me from things I enjoy. My mind decides I’ve been over-indulgent, that I’ve had too much fun, that I’ve become too close to something, that I need to withdraw and reconsider and change my mind, walk back into the alone-ness I have been building for myself ever since I was a child. I have this constantly. With people, events, activities … Get too close, and I’ll become aloof. It’s like buyer’s regret, like writer’s regret after a day spent writing and going through the words the next day and deciding each and every one is useless. Burning bridges and boats. Ironic in a man who was diagnosed with attachment anxiety by his therapist (that is mostly cured), or maybe not – although this feeling is not the fear of being deserted if I get too attached; it’s the feeling of not wanting to get attached because it seems foolish and childish and wasteful when there are so many other things to be done.

And this morning, the headache is back, lingering under the surface. A light from another world. Making it difficult to focus. Eyes and mind.

Life’s confused like that. And racing towards another solstice. The speed of light.