A timely time

Hello to anyone who still has this on their mailing list, or who for some reason has been checking this webpage for 5 years without fail! What are you doing? What would possess you to check back here for so long? What has possessed me to check back here after so long? How was I able to remember my log in credentials? It probably does not speak well of my password security protocols, no indeed.

I've just spent a not inordinate amount of time reading some of the posts of my former self, marvelling at the use of metaphor, at the amount of feeling I was able to place in lieu of not doing much at all. It would have been a sobering experience, had I not been most of the way through a case of beer and a bottle of wine at the time. It's been interesting, relearning some of those old patterns of thought, being simultaneously comforted and disturbed by the fact that what I have done in the past remains, at least on the interwebs. If I go back far enough, I am very embarrassed by the man I once was.

But it's a good thing - I am glad that I have something hanging around to remind me of some of those times: and in fact, to date, this blog represents the longest standing enterprise that I have dedicated myself to outside of education and, you know, being alive. Off and on, it went on for 6 years. What the actual living fuck. Obviously, the main concern and most intriguing concern for myself over the years has been myself. I would like to say that that has changed - probably it is more accurate to say that I got too accustomed to myself to think that any of it was worth writing down, and probably rightly so.

But all of that being said, it is time for an update. You might have gotten away with a five year hiatus 20 years ago, but nowadays we have all these things that do things all the time in a timely manner - apart from cutting off your own hands, it is unlikely that you haven't typed anything today. So here we are, together, in an elevator, someone you have seen around and know has a name but are really hoping that wont have to strike up a conversation with because your wife left you and if not for the obligation of income you'd rather spend the rest of your life in a ditch. An update on the life of an insignificant being, pushing though life at the same speed as the rest of you, a tiny mote within an uncaring universe who still hasn't learnt how to spell check his work.

Since the last you heard from me:

 - I have lived alone for three years, at present I type this from a darkened room, listening to music. This is a net win.

- I have finally stopped studying. For the last two years, I have been gainfully employed in a business that offers possibility of advancement. I have found, unexpectedly, that I enjoy such an environment, and much like a video game I am spending inordinate amounts of time and effort to raise my level in a system that those outside of the system neither understand nor want to understand.

- I have gotten quicker at typing. I still eat too many toasted sandwiches.

- I now have a method of transport, a vehicle that is two wheels joined by a chamber that explodes. This was a thing that I never thought that I would ever do, and I find that I enjoy it almost beyond reason.

- Many of the socks that I owned 5 years ago I still own. Apparently I form attachments with foot coverings easier than I form relationships with humans, for, apart from a few long term companions, I have socks that I have known for longer than many people. Some would say that this is a serious defect in my character - I would argue that I am simply working my way up. If I can accept a sock full of holes now, much greater the chance that I will be able to accept you in the future.

- I've not yet travelled, around my country nor overseas, but I still harbour hopes to do so.

- Being an adult brings with it its own set of exhaustions - work, bills, measuring yourself against the success of your peers,  unexpected insights into the tribulations of your parents - but it also brings contentment. Contentment is not always a good thing, and come only at the sacrifice of idealism and often energy. But it beats not being out of bed because of he mind demons. Now I stay in bed because I want to.

- Mostly. No doubt I'll stumble on this post in some years time and wonder at the idealism and energy I exhibit now.

- I've thrown away a lot of cutlery, plates, and old acquaintances, mostly via the same channels. What I have left is either necessary or invaluable or, I don't know, that giant anatomically accurate heart soft toy I bought the other week when I was drunk and had access to the internet. A reflection of my soul.

- I am drunk and have access to the internet.

This is a modest list. I like that it is 100% accurate while only briefly touching anything that could be called truth. Such is everything you have ever heard everywhere. I won't promise that this will happen again tomorrow - shit, I'm not even going to promise that this is going to happen ever again. I shall put some words here whenever I god damn feel like it. You can't make me. Or rather, you can make me, but that would mean coercion, force, bribery or blackmail - and although I've done more than enough to be blackmailed over I'd probably rather just lick a porcupine even though they have diseases on their spikes, if I could have been bribed the guilt of absence would have gotten this updated sometime sooner, pushing my hands onto computer keys forcefully means that you are technically writing this yourself just using my body as a proxy which I might be ok with but we'd have to talk about that first and I'm not even certain coercion is actually a word.

So yes. You'll hear from me in five years. But probably not. Because fuck it.