Looking sideways

When I was growing up, we had this tradition at home that, whenever we were all under the same roof, we would sit at the table together, and have food together. My parents were very adamant about it. One of us wanted to eat while watching TV? Tough. I can still hear my dad saying that family time together is important, and we should use these opportunities to spend time with each other. Oh, and no distractions either. There were no smartphones at the time, but handheld video game consoles, magazines, any distractions were barred from the table. It was food and talk to each other. This tradition continued all the way into my 20's, although less and less, as my parents didn't always live with us. When Yogi and I moved in together, he showed me very early on that this was also important for him. He had a similar tradition with his family, so it was a somewhat seamless transition for both of us.  Having this ritual proved especially tricky, but equally necessary, when I started fly...

A few days ago a good friend of mine, who also happens to be very clever and wise, told me about some experiments he had been doing with ChatGPT. This friend happens to be a psychologist, and he's been experimenting with trying to personify the AI bot, discussing his feelings with it and attempting to be analysed by it. He told me that, surprisingly, he got really good results and was impressed with the way it went. He told me I should give it a go, and normally I’d be sceptical of trusting AI with my feelings - despite trusting a blog with it… Yes, I can see the irony. But in this case, I have huge trust and admiration for this friend, so I decided to follow his advice and, well, give it a go. I wasn’t sure where to start, so I input a prompt saying that I thought I had OCD and I would like help trying to understand it. This turned into a good 2 hour long chat with the, where I talked about the various things that I feel, things that happen inside my brain and things I know about ...

It felt like a movie scene: I had just left my flat and was halfway through to the bus stop to catch the 1X to work, with a cup of coffee in my hand and some pop diva singing inside my noise cancelling earphones. The song ended, and the next song came on: GUY from Lady Gaga. Completely random and unplanned. I smirked and thought to myself that the only thing missing was my bus stop crush. And then, just a few steps ahead, he came out of the gates of his block of flats. I am pretty sure he saw me, but he didn't show any signs indicating that he did, so I gave him the benefit of doubt. We crossed path twice again before I sat down inside the bus, and then there was no doubt left: he actively chose not to acknowledge me. Which was not unexpected, since he did the same thing the whole weekend, after I asked him for his contact details. But I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. First things first: how did we get here? A couple of weeks back I decided to walk up to him one morning and s...

As I sat inside that church, during one of the lowest points of my life, I felt the vibration of the multiple drums going through my body, even though the sound of those instruments was muffled and unclear. Bolero, with its increasing intensity, was playing through my noise cancelling headphones, blocking any attempts of sounds to penetrate from outside. I gazed into the grandiosity of that atrium, the paths taken by the shockwaves caused by those instruments, how it went around the curves made of concrete, and made its way back to move me whilst it failed to make itself heard. Suddenly, something else hit me: I suppose I have a thing for killing. That is a bold statement, so before you plant multiple red flags all over me, embody Lady Gaga screaming "KILLAH" and dial whatever 3 (or more) digit number the police uses wherever you are, let me expand and clarify this. I don't mean literally killing someone, the physical act of taking someone's life. In fact, one of my f...

That ship has sailed, for us both. It was one simple act, for a few minutes, but it changed our story forever. Neither of us will ever be able to say that we have never done this. And that haunts me now. When I heard what you had done, the room around me disappeared. The floor vanished, and suddenly I was floating in this empty space where things changed forever. I started shaking. I went into survival mode, and I hated you. Like I never hated anyone before, ever. Deep down inside, I wish you had never been born, that you had never come into our lives. I felt disgust for you. I did not understand these feelings then, and perhaps this is one of the reasons why things unfolded they way they did. When we met again, I did something very wrong. I said the right things, I have strong arguments to justify why I did it, and I had the best interests of those involved at heart. But the way I acted was wrong, and suddenly I went down to the same level as you. Here I was, doing to you what I, just...

Just a quick update: I finally walked up to the guy at the bus stop and talked to him. We only chatted for a few minutes, and he was lovely. It's been half an hour since, and I'm still shaking. G.U.Y. - Lady Gaga (Artpop, who'd have thought...)

This text was written about 3 months ago, but I did not publish it then. I was extremely overwhelmed at the time. So much so that, in the following days after I wrote it, I had a massive breakdown, which prompted me to get away from everything, including the blog. I am in a much better place now, and the next entry after this one will explore that. But before discussing how I feel now, I think there is a value in this text, which is why I decided to publish it even after all the time that passed. Please be mindful of my mental state when it was written, therefore be aware that this text is very raw and might be triggering. How did I end up back here again? This is a question I’ve been asking myself often these days. I thought I made huge progress, but somehow I am back at square one. I always heard people saying that things don’t just fall on your lap, that if you want something, you have to get off your arse and do something about it. The thing is, I did! I have done a lot about it, a...

Bus stop at Brighton Marina. 7:50AM. Arriving with a cup of coffee in hand. The following conversation happens entirely inside the head. Oh look, the cute guy is coming! I have such a crush on him… I wonder why he gets the 7:55 only sometimes. I have to get the same bus at the same time every day, but I don’t see him often at this time. Sometimes he takes the seven instead. He must work at 8:30, like me. I would love to take the 7, so many buses come and go, and the 1X takes so long, 15 minutes apart. But the 7 takes too long for me, wouldn’t work. I’d be late. That mustache suits him so well. I wish I looked good with a mustache. Everybody looks good with a mustache, except for me. His eyes are also beautiful. I should look at him and smile, to show him that I am interested. Yes, I think that’s a good idea. But I have to be discreet and flirty at the same time, in case he’s not into guys. How can I produce that kind of smile? Well let’s try to be natural and see what happens. 7:52AM. ...

Do you know when you don’t see something at first, and then suddenly you do, and from that moment on you cannot unsee it anymore? I remember an episode of a sitcom where they showed this in a very effective way: the sound of a glass breaking. It’s the perfect metaphor, if you think about it. Once it’s broken, you can try to glue it back together, but it will never go back to what it once was, no matter what carglass tells you. Entropy one, advertising zero. It’s almost philosophical, if you think about it. And reassuring. Because physics and math are both very reassuring. But I digress. In the case of my specific glass, it was not a perfect piece beforehand. I saw cracks on it, but I chose to believe that the thing was strong enough to stay in one piece. You can call me naïve, but I prefer to see myself as a glass half full kind of person, who will always expect the best out of people. There are downsides to this approach, but I don’t want to digress again. One thing I can say is that,...

As I was laying down between those big, beautiful muscled arms dotted with freckles, I thought about my teenage self. I thought about how he was completely lost with his sexuality, how he knew deep down that he liked boys, but he felt trapped in a world where he had to like girls. How he forced himself to try to be something he wasn’t. On top of all that, I remembered how he was a chubby, awkward person, with so much acne that his face resembled a cheese grater. How he was secretly in love with the jocks from his school, and how he was absolutely sure they would never look at him. Because he thought of himself as unattractive, but also showing his interest would mean, in his mind, that he would be bullied and made fun of. I wanted to swap places with him, to put him inside the big arms of this very handsome, but most importantly, extremely nice, kind and lovely boy who was hugging me. I wanted to show the teenager that he also deserved love and care, and that there are people who would...