Not Being Here
09/11/24 21:02
Addenda: I struggled to present the context of this one properly, it reads more negatively than I intended, so please try read it as such (well, if you read it at all!).
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I find how people behave interesting - mainly as I don’t really understand it, for the most part. It’s no secret I struggle with this - it’s been obvious to me for several years that people communicate with more than just words. There’s some form of social dance that goes on, one that I am not equipped to read. It leads to confusion sometimes, and often frustration on my part (and sometimes offense on the other). People often think I’m annoyed about things probably a factor of 20 more times than I’m actually annoyed about anything. The irony being that when I am annoyed about something they really do know.
It’s taken me a long time to realise that this isn’t on purpose, it’s just how we communicate is different. One thing shines out from all of this - for me anyway - and that is that I have a very literal view of the world. Usually what I say is exactly what I mean, without any embellishment. This isn’t however how most people communicate. I will never understand why somebody saying ‘The car is blue’ is seen as harsher as somebody who says ‘The car is very blue!’. Reading that back I think that needs to be said out-loud for anyone to understand what I meant. It’s especially true around subjects that make people uncomfortable - with one of those subjects being death.
Death is a weird subject isn’t it? I mean even the tenses of the word bothers people in different ways (me too, but I’ll get to that in a minute). Die, died, dead, dying. Some of these words I’ve observed give people ‘The Fear’, so it got me thinking about them too - mainly as this proposition has raised its head in my surrounds recently.
Let me put it out there - dead doesn’t bother me any more than not being born. It’s a state of being I have no relation to, no memory of, so I have no fear of it. Dying however - the transition - that bears some concern. I don’t want it to be awful. I also don’t think it’s that hard - I mean people of our type have been doing it for at least 300,000 years, and if they can do it I reckon I’ll do it just as spectacularly. What concerns me most though is the impact on others. This is a fairly modern thought for me, and one I should be - am - thankful for. -
In a break to the prose - a scene setup if you will - I journal a lot. I use it as a way to keep myself focused on what I want to do, what I don’t want to do, what’s working, what isn’t etc. Those journals take form of writing and audio notes. I know this isn’t unique to me - a personal diary is hardly earth shattering news. For me though, sometimes, I read stuff that I can’t remember experiencing or writing about. I sometimes don’t remember the scenarios around why I wrote something. That can sometimes be incredibly jolting to read. If you can’t be brutishly honest with yourself, who can you be? That’s also the reason my journals are so locked down.
Anyway, death. Post sponsored by omg drama - it isn’t, but you won’t read it in the right way if I don’t set the perspective first. Try it again, without the drama. I’m right aren’t I.
A few of my journals from Late Jan/early Feb 24 this year were about how to handle things if I died in the next couple of years. I’ve enacted many of those things. Digital separation was a right effort - I’ve ended up managing so many people’s backups, photos, iCloud, email (29 B2 365 licenses if that means anything to you), and even have separate password databases for people. Not least for the ‘Daaad how to I logon to Instagram?’. Sure, Law Grad, I got you. Finances were another. I’d accidentally ended up with complex finances through laziness, so I sorted those out into a couple of institutions, documented them etc. I even put together a hard disk with all the stuff my daughter could possibly be ever interested in, and of course included the password to the email account I’ve been emailing to since she was ....probably a year old? - about our experiences. I even read most of them - had a few tears, but mostly smiles and joy.
All of this was gloriously organised, and very much, well, me. Then I stumbled on some entries from late Jan/early Feb and they scared me a bit. Back then, I’d not had any diagnosis and the current thinking was .. limited. Yet the pain I was in was exponentially getting worse. Some of these entries involved how I would measure when enough was enough, and what I would do when enough became enough. Two things struck me about these entries - and the timeline matched too:
1: Practicality. How, organisation.
2: Impact on people.
I had item 1 nailed (all of them sucked, to be clear), item 2 however is where everything fell apart. I have experience of a very close friend choosing not to be here, and truth be told I still haven’t forgiven her for it. It’s a quiet unforgiven, but it’s certainly there. I don’t think it would be enough for me to not land on her like an over-excited Labrador as I’m sure I will when we finally get to meet again. You get the point. It’s a quiet anger, as in reality the anger is really inward - how didn’t I know that somebody so joyous, so important to my day, was having such a hard time?
My conclusion from this - and perhaps I haven’t explained this properly here - is that it’s people that got me through that period. That’s you, and you. Texting me repeatedly when I didn’t/hadn’t replied, emailing, calling. Turning up at my house with food. Shouting at me when I was in so much pain I passed out and then blamed some random drug. You gave my day value, you gave me value. I don’t think I can ever thank any of you enough for that.
I’ve been through a bit of a transition. I don’t think I’ll ever ‘forgive’* my friend for what she did, but I am so, so much closer to understanding it. For that though, I need to bear some responsibility for not being as solid as my ‘family’ has been. I will do my very best to make sure I never make that mistake again.
*I’ve struggled with this sentence. She doesn’t need my forgiveness, nor am I qualified or responsible to give it. This bit is all about how I felt. I know what I meant, I just can’t find the words.
===
I find how people behave interesting - mainly as I don’t really understand it, for the most part. It’s no secret I struggle with this - it’s been obvious to me for several years that people communicate with more than just words. There’s some form of social dance that goes on, one that I am not equipped to read. It leads to confusion sometimes, and often frustration on my part (and sometimes offense on the other). People often think I’m annoyed about things probably a factor of 20 more times than I’m actually annoyed about anything. The irony being that when I am annoyed about something they really do know.
It’s taken me a long time to realise that this isn’t on purpose, it’s just how we communicate is different. One thing shines out from all of this - for me anyway - and that is that I have a very literal view of the world. Usually what I say is exactly what I mean, without any embellishment. This isn’t however how most people communicate. I will never understand why somebody saying ‘The car is blue’ is seen as harsher as somebody who says ‘The car is very blue!’. Reading that back I think that needs to be said out-loud for anyone to understand what I meant. It’s especially true around subjects that make people uncomfortable - with one of those subjects being death.
Death is a weird subject isn’t it? I mean even the tenses of the word bothers people in different ways (me too, but I’ll get to that in a minute). Die, died, dead, dying. Some of these words I’ve observed give people ‘The Fear’, so it got me thinking about them too - mainly as this proposition has raised its head in my surrounds recently.
Let me put it out there - dead doesn’t bother me any more than not being born. It’s a state of being I have no relation to, no memory of, so I have no fear of it. Dying however - the transition - that bears some concern. I don’t want it to be awful. I also don’t think it’s that hard - I mean people of our type have been doing it for at least 300,000 years, and if they can do it I reckon I’ll do it just as spectacularly. What concerns me most though is the impact on others. This is a fairly modern thought for me, and one I should be - am - thankful for. -
In a break to the prose - a scene setup if you will - I journal a lot. I use it as a way to keep myself focused on what I want to do, what I don’t want to do, what’s working, what isn’t etc. Those journals take form of writing and audio notes. I know this isn’t unique to me - a personal diary is hardly earth shattering news. For me though, sometimes, I read stuff that I can’t remember experiencing or writing about. I sometimes don’t remember the scenarios around why I wrote something. That can sometimes be incredibly jolting to read. If you can’t be brutishly honest with yourself, who can you be? That’s also the reason my journals are so locked down.
Anyway, death. Post sponsored by omg drama - it isn’t, but you won’t read it in the right way if I don’t set the perspective first. Try it again, without the drama. I’m right aren’t I.
A few of my journals from Late Jan/early Feb 24 this year were about how to handle things if I died in the next couple of years. I’ve enacted many of those things. Digital separation was a right effort - I’ve ended up managing so many people’s backups, photos, iCloud, email (29 B2 365 licenses if that means anything to you), and even have separate password databases for people. Not least for the ‘Daaad how to I logon to Instagram?’. Sure, Law Grad, I got you. Finances were another. I’d accidentally ended up with complex finances through laziness, so I sorted those out into a couple of institutions, documented them etc. I even put together a hard disk with all the stuff my daughter could possibly be ever interested in, and of course included the password to the email account I’ve been emailing to since she was ....probably a year old? - about our experiences. I even read most of them - had a few tears, but mostly smiles and joy.
All of this was gloriously organised, and very much, well, me. Then I stumbled on some entries from late Jan/early Feb and they scared me a bit. Back then, I’d not had any diagnosis and the current thinking was .. limited. Yet the pain I was in was exponentially getting worse. Some of these entries involved how I would measure when enough was enough, and what I would do when enough became enough. Two things struck me about these entries - and the timeline matched too:
1: Practicality. How, organisation.
2: Impact on people.
I had item 1 nailed (all of them sucked, to be clear), item 2 however is where everything fell apart. I have experience of a very close friend choosing not to be here, and truth be told I still haven’t forgiven her for it. It’s a quiet unforgiven, but it’s certainly there. I don’t think it would be enough for me to not land on her like an over-excited Labrador as I’m sure I will when we finally get to meet again. You get the point. It’s a quiet anger, as in reality the anger is really inward - how didn’t I know that somebody so joyous, so important to my day, was having such a hard time?
My conclusion from this - and perhaps I haven’t explained this properly here - is that it’s people that got me through that period. That’s you, and you. Texting me repeatedly when I didn’t/hadn’t replied, emailing, calling. Turning up at my house with food. Shouting at me when I was in so much pain I passed out and then blamed some random drug. You gave my day value, you gave me value. I don’t think I can ever thank any of you enough for that.
I’ve been through a bit of a transition. I don’t think I’ll ever ‘forgive’* my friend for what she did, but I am so, so much closer to understanding it. For that though, I need to bear some responsibility for not being as solid as my ‘family’ has been. I will do my very best to make sure I never make that mistake again.
*I’ve struggled with this sentence. She doesn’t need my forgiveness, nor am I qualified or responsible to give it. This bit is all about how I felt. I know what I meant, I just can’t find the words.
