Just Live

I had been told that no one would care if I were dead, and the person who told me that, also let me know that they would've happily thrown me off my own balcony, but luckily for me, they stopped themselves from doing it..... well bless their cotton socks! That was good of them, now wasn't it? That was at the end of 2023.

By the time 2024 began, all I thought about initially was being glad to see the back of the last year; thinking like most people do by seeing the New Year as a fresh start. To get back into things that I loved doing; my writing, my love of food (particularly a good quality cheese paired with a top shelf whiskey, vodka or gin), live music, working out, and introducing new things into my life like aerial yoga (if you haven't tried it, it's a hell of a lot of fun).

I found myself erring on the side of caution when 2024 began. I went from being a trusting and loving person to having no trust in anyone what-so-ever and hating pretty much everyone. I kept away for a bit; almost reclusive with the exception of allowing one or two people I knew well in and spending time with them.

But I did, slowly but surely, start to feel better. By the end of the first month, then into second, things were starting to turn around little by little. I had reconnected with one or two old friends, my writing was going well, the cheese, the top shelf spirits, the music, and the yoga were all flowing.

That is until...

Speaking of reconnecting, I had reconnected with someone from many moons ago; back when I was still young; full of hopes and dreams.

Nearly thirty years ago, we had met. We had never dated back then; we kissed in the corner of a night club, that was about it. I don't actually remember how long we knew each other or any such detail from those times, but we did know each other and hung out once or twice. We headed off in different directions and never saw or spoke to each other until he found me decades later on socials. I have a public Insta page to share my Vocal stories on (hmmm, maybe it's the good people at Vocal Media who should be blamed for this, because if I hadn't joined with you lot, I wouldn't have set up the Insta, and.....ahem.....I mean, nothing - sorry. That was a joke - I love you Vocal!) Anyway, he found me on that through mutual friends and started to follow. He had actually been following for a while before I followed back - I had remembered him, but at the time I was busy being threatened to be thrown off my balcony, so I hadn't given him much thought until later. We had started chatting after I liked a post of his about a band that we both liked.

Then the weirdest thing happened. The dude went and asked me out on a date! I don't mean a dating app, chat for five seconds then shag date. I mean an old school, "I'd love to take you out for dinner" no rush or pressure for anything else, let's get to know each other first date - well, shut my mouth! Of course I said yes. I hadn't been on a proper date, date for a long time and he was being really sweet and kind.

The couple of months hanging out were great. He said and did all the right things. We were on the same page. He was contacting me a lot more than I thought he would given that he had asked me about "taking the lead" on catching up etc, but I was good. I definitely wasn't looking for anything serious given my recent past. He was treating me like a Queen, though - something that I hadn't had for a very long time.

Pffft, sucker!

But after those couple of months, he flipped on me; quite unexpectedly and out of the blue, so I did the only thing that I could do at the time, which was to break it off after his refusal to try and, I don't know, talk it out with him or something crazy like that - then write about it here:

https://vocal.media/poets/love-bomb-68os0n9n

...and here:

https://vocal.media/poets/gaslit-m75y08l3

I should've gone for the trifecta and wrote about his ghosting me as well, but, meh.

And this was within the first few months of 2024 - hooray!

I'm sorry to say this wasn't the worst thing that happened this year - far from it. I'm not going to go further into detail about my year to be honest. Except to say there was a death of a beloved family member, some horrific workplace bullying, some verbal mistreatment from others and, finally, I want to say that Alzheimer's is a cruel disease. I wrote about that too earlier this year:

https://vocal.media/poets/lost-in-conversation

The take away of all of this for me is simple - I need to keep going and live. I need to just keep going, live and keep working on the things that make me happy and doing those things as much as I can.

Will the shit keep hitting the fan from time to time? Of course it will. Does this all mean that I'm perfect and everyone else is bad and should feel bad? NO! Is it possible that I meet another asshat that will try and win me over with their charm? I'm gonna say yes it's possible that I meet another one, but no, it'll be hard to win me over with said charm - not like before. I now like myself enough not to be sucked in by that again.

Is it all easier said than done? Will I go into relapse over some of these things, do I still need to work on things, do I still need to continue getting help? Yes, yes, and double yes. But I have to keep going, I have to keep (yes I'm going to say a typically over-the-top spiritual phrase here, so block your ears) living my best life, dammit!

Here endeth the lesson.