Big chunk of republishing

content/post/2018/01/lifes-a-scream/index.markdown

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+title = "Life’s a scream…fear, joy or otherwise"
+date = 2018-01-19
+[[resources]]
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+categories = ["life"]
++++
+Life is just one long scream…literal or otherwise.
+
+In the literal sense, we arrived screaming. We may well go out screaming. And lots of screams in between might be the mark of a life well lived, in my humble opinion.
+
+In the sense of the metaphor, our life is a scream against Life. What matters is what you’re screaming about, and more to the point what you’re screaming *at*.
+
+Sometimes we scream in plain old fear. If we consistently saw the Universe for what it is, rather than what we *think* it is, we’d not be able to get a word in edgeways between the terror. Fortunately, this is not the case.
+
+Or the scream might be of anger.
+
+If we’re lucky the scream is a yell of joy. Not that it ever lasts…but neither does the fear, or the rage for that matter. The temporary nature of all things is, as usual, a blessing and a curse.
+
+Of course, there are other emotions but I think they can all be broadly classified under the Screams of Fear, Anger and Joy. Perhaps an oversimplication, but hey, this is only a half-sincere metaphor to begin with!
+
+There is one other scream, the trademark of Adrenaline Junkies (Capital J) everywhere.
+
+The scream of defright.
+
+That fluctuating mixture of the Rush and abject horror.
+
+Whether or not it is worth it is something I’d rather not think of because it risks showing me the error of my ways. And what *fun* would that be?
+
+Overthinking and the resultant paralysis is the enemy of progress and ultimately…fun. And what’s the point of life (there isn’t one) if it isn’t *fun *despite all the suck?
+
+Sod it. To live despite Life is the only way worth living. Live hard, and if that means living fast, so be it.

content/post/2018/01/meeting-my-match/index.markdown

@@ -17,7 +17,7 @@ Pun very much intended. The fire metaphor for relationships suits me damn fine t
 
 > what happens when I meet someone who says “HELL, yeah! Let’s do it YESTERDAY!” rather than “No, that really is a step too far this time — even *you’ll* die if you do *that!*” ?We both agreed that meeting someone more than someone who was also on our Wavelength would be dangerously fun, emphasis on the danger.
 
-But as all Junkies know, all the best things come with a healthy dose of risk. What’s Life, what’s living, if you aren’t pedal to the metal?[^1]
+But as all Junkies know, all the best things come with a healthy dose of risk. [What’s Life, what’s living, if you aren’t pedal to the metal?](post/2018/07/chasing-the-edge/)[^1]
 
 So all in all, I think I *would* like to meet my Match. My other half[^2]. The ‘your crazy matches my crazy’ kind of person. We’d burn bright, if perhaps not for very long.
 
@@ -45,7 +45,7 @@ And she *wasn’t even* my Match.
 
 Wasn’t even someone who matched my crazy, not truly. Wasn’t quite a fellow Junkie. Wasn’t on the Wavelength, either. I thought she was all of those things.[^7]
 
-God only knows what will happen when I do meet my Match. If I indeed ever have the (mis)fortune of doing so.
+Gods only know what will happen when I do meet my Match. If I indeed ever have the (mis)fortune of doing so.
 
 The results will be truly **spectacular**[^8], that much is certain.
 
@@ -63,7 +63,7 @@ The results will be truly **spectacular**[^8], that much is certain.
 
 [^5]: Maybe I’ll tell the interesting bits of that saga sometime.
 
-[^6]: First love but not first girl…that was the first lesson
+[^6]: First love but not first SO…that was the first lesson
 
 [^7]: Through rose-tinted glasses, red flags just look like flags.
 

content/post/2018/01/not-a-morning-person/index.markdown

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+title =	"I am not a morning person…and that’s OK"
+date = "2018-01-11"
+[[resources]]
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+
+Society is built for morning people. A lot of people swear by the first few hours of their day as their most productive. Many writers, including lots here on Medium, advocate an early rise.
+
+But I say to hell with that.
+
+I am not a morning person and that’s okay. My best work is done not at the break of day, but as it draws to a close. The only hours of the morning I’m truly interested in — truly productive in — are those shortly after midnight.
+
+Sod 5AM-7AM. 11PM-1AM. Those are my hours.
+
+And that’s ok. As darkness falls, society slumbers…and the night comes alive.
+
+The silence of the night, the stillness of the air is my Muse. While the world rests, I write. That is the way it is, and it is the way I like it to be.
+
+Society makes it difficult, because as I say it is geared to morning people. Or at the very least, the overwhelming majority that don’t gravitate towards being nocturnal.
+
+Not everyone is a night owl, but that’s more than okay. Because it’d be no good if the world were just as alive at night as during the day. That’d steal the magic of the starlight. There is a stillness that accompanies the darkness, in which peace and power are found.
+
+Midnight workouts[^1]. Midnight scribblings. Midnight living.
+
+That’s me. If it isn’t you, ***that’s okay too***.
+
+Fellow night owls, I salute you in solidarity. We work in the darkness and that’s okay.
+
+Morning people, you do you. You work while we slumber and that’s okay.
+
+The counting of the hours is a human construct. Night and day are more tangible, but still ultimately constructs. Where possible[^2], work when it suits you, sleep when it suits you. Do what you do whenever it is best to do it and as such maximise your time, for it is severely limited.
+
+At the *end of the day* — who gives a damn what hours of the day you use? Find your most productive time and unleash yourself in it. Regardless of it being societally acceptable.
+
+Seize the day [^3]— it doesn’t matter in which hours.
+
+***
+
+[^1]: 24/7 gym access is made for people like me…
+
+[^2]: By nature of the fact night owls and morning people cannot be always segregated, sometimes one or the other will have to adjust their schedule. Compromise, as in all things, is a key skill.
+
+[^3]: By the throat!

content/post/2018/03/never-thought-i-could-tell/index.markdown

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+title =	"A story I never thought I could tell — a confession and a plea"
+date = "2018-03-01"
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+categories = ["me",  "cw"]
+aliases = ["/post/self-harm"]
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+
+> A simple heart inscribed in midnight black ink on a lover’s skin. An innocuous question heralding a world-shattering answer…
+
+#### Content warning: self harm
+
+This piece has been written for a long time. And it has sat, like a lead weight, in my drafts for what feels like an age. I hope publishing this brings the release it has been promising, whisperlike.
+
+But this (for a few minutes longer) is a symbolic day. Today is Self-Injury Awareness Day. It is also the anniversary of my first learning about self-harm. That day, I unwittingly grew a little more aware of the darkness that eats at the world. Until then, I never knew people could find the self loathing to harm themselves.
+
+A simple heart inscribed in midnight black ink on a lover’s skin. An innocuous question heralding a world-shattering answer. Eyes forever opened to self-inflicted pain.
+
+This is something I never thought I’d be able to talk about publicly — the people that already know can be counted on one hand.
+
+I never thought I could look my father, my best friend, my sister or anyone close to me in the eye and tell them this. For fear of what they might think. How they might react.
+
+Note: if you are close to me, please do not be surprised if I don’t want to talk
+
+Indeed, I still *can’t*. So I’m sharing this with them, and the world, the only way I really know how. The written word.
+
+Regardless, this is something I **have to** tell — consequences be damned. I push my fears aside at last in the hope this might help someone, anyone. That’s all I can hope for.
+
+*Second warning — next part is graphic*
+
+I somehow never cut deep enough to leave physical scars.
+
+But I’ll still carry the echoes with me for the rest of my life.
+
+I understand.
+
+I understand the all consuming self loathing.
+
+I understand the momentary relief.
+
+I understand the shame, the fear.
+
+I understand and I hope you ***never*** truly do.
+
+My daemons did not feel evil. They felt…not like friends exactly…but familiar.
+
+That was enough for me to give in.
+
+In case that wasn’t clear — I self harmed. I took a blade and slashed at my own skin. Took twisted joy in making myself bleed.
+
+Harmed. **Past tense.** I’ve escaped the darkness now. Silenced my daemons.
+
+But there will always be that occasional whisper. Past, but never forgotten. Impossible to forget.
+
+Self harm is far more common than many people realise. Many people do not know of it at all.
+
+This has to change. People must know.
+
+Knowing that it happens isn’t enough. Based off my own experience, here’s a little bit about *why*…
+
+Self-harm is a coping method for other problems. An utterly self destructive one but also strangely addictive. For myself the root cause was a penetrating feeling of failure caused by consistently being unable to prevent others harming. I can now see that there was nothing I could have done. I had no hope of seeing that at the time.
+
+Worse, it is often a feedback loop. For myself — as twisted as this is — I never felt I was doing it ‘properly’. Whatever properly is. That fueled the gleeful roaring flame of loathing.
+
+Hopefully, now you understand a little more. Hopefully, now — you share my desire to help. But I don’t know how to help, not really. Because there is no magic bullet. There sure as hell wasn’t for me — I just sort of…stopped, one day.
+
+All I can say is this…
+
+Be kind. Be compassionate. Heal, do not hurt.
+
+Easier said than done, I know. Certainly something I am still very much working on myself. But here’s one step everyone should take:
+
+Do not, **do not ever**, romanticise or trivialise suicide, self harm, or mental issues as a whole. It’s a deeply toxic behaviour that I find wholly inexcusable.
+
+General attitude towards mental health **has** to change. Period.
+
+I’m sharing my story in the hope it will contribute to that. To the recognition of mental disorder being just as serious as the physical.
+
+*I don’t want to live in a world where people hate themselves. Do you?*

content/post/2018/05/acidic-introduction-to-hate-love/index.markdown

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+title = "An acidic introduction to hate-love"
+date = 2018-05-14
+[[resources]]
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+categories = ["me"]
++++
+
+  #### Vodka-soaked and bleeding
+
+*Foreword: I’ve been gestating this story for a long time. Because the events of it transfigured me. And that’s why I’m so sure it is worth telling, even if objectively it may not be ‘all that’. Now, YOU can be the judge of that.*
+
+I fell out of my first relationship, rolled down several (metaphorical, mostly) flights of stairs and ended up straight in another. At the very least I should be glad I learnt all that I have as early as I have. Although it doesn’t seem to have done me much good — but that’s for another time.
+
+This relationship was critically toxic, but in that particular way that seems — at the time — to be perfect. You know what I mean. That kind where red flags get trampled over with reckless abandon as lust and love wrench you together.
+
+Speaking of red flags, this was my first: The person I fell for was, it turned out, still with someone else when we got together. Much as I loathe to admit it, so was I. More than that — to my eternal shame that relationship was ended via text message. You could almost say part of what followed was my karma for pulling a dick move like that. It couldn’t all be down to that, though.
+
+What followed was a short interlude of bliss which — since it wasn’t at all painful — is entirely irrelevant. The only thing that may be tangentially of note is that I produced the only artwork I’ve ever had pride in during that time. Of course, I no longer have it.
+
+Shortly after my birthday, I get a very vague text — something along the lines of the classic ‘We need to talk’. And then get blanked until the next day, wherein I am a wreck. Naturally.
+
+So is she — she has this whole spiel about how she really needs to focus on work and whatever. Is also really broken up.
+
+I try to drown my sorrows in vodka and worse. The worse being [my experimentation with self harm](post/2018/03/never-thought-i-could-tell). Something I’m now clean of, fortunately. But that is beside the point.
+
+A few weeks later, nothing much has changed. Besides a few interludes of…confusing signals. Shortly, she confesses to me that she still has feelings for me, and me trying to move on has hurt her.
+
+…
+
+I mean, what else was I *supposed* to do?
+
+In both senses, that is. What else was I supposed to do than try to move on…
+
+…
+
+And what else was I supposed to do than welcome her back with open arms and bared heart.
+
+This time it lasted barely a week.
+
+What she said that time is different, however.
+
+She told me that she’s polyamorous. Right, fine. More than fine…but would have been nice to know beforehand. Except what she actually said is “I’m polyamorous except when I find someone who makes me monogamous”
+
+I’m sorry, **WHAT?!**
+
+Now I’m no expert but I’m pretty sure that’s *not* how polyamory works. (Feel free to learn me otherwise)
+
+But *besides* that what she told me in less words was…
+
+You are *not good ****enough**** for me.*
+
+Those words eat at me to this very day, no matter how much I try to drive them away. Slashed that heart I held out right in two. With her I felt like I was flying. She turned my whole world upside down.
+
+Then gravity (reality) kicked me in the face. And I fell off my topsy turvy world. Falling not flying, as it turned out. Which is a shame, because the wings I thought I had were really quite lovely.
+
+The worst part of all that, though? I’ll **never** know. I’ll never know if that summer of absolute bliss that we shared was real to her. Or just an illusion I cradled. Did she manipulate me every step of the way, taking twisted joy in how easily I fell for all her snares? How willingly I tore myself down to try to build her up? Or was she just as blind as I was? I will never know. Even if I ask I can’t trust the answer. Because — intentionally or otherwise — she ground up my trust in a heartbeat.
+
+A (large) part of me keeps telling me that I’m being overly dramatic. Magnifying trivial problems. But the scars I carry scream otherwise. If nothing else, these are certainly *my ****fucking**** feelings*.
+
+I bear scars, but I also cherish lessons. Most notably, and most obviously…
+
+DON’T ignore the damn [red flags](post/red-flags). No exceptions.

content/post/2018/12/chasing-her-blinkered/index.md

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+title =	"Chasing Her, Blinkered"
+date = "2018-12-22"
+[[resources]]
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+  src = "**1*SEZXRDfqb_s0kyhzZGt5GA*"
+categories = ["fiction"]
+aliases = ["/post/red-flags"]
++++
+# Semi-fiction straight from my ink splashed heart
+
+Finch looked up, dazed. Smoke curled lazily around him, caressing gently. He lay at the bottom of a blasted crater with blackened walls.
+
+The muffled voice of rationality in his head exclaimed “What the *fuck* was that?” Again. As it always did. Finch ignored it. Again. He got up. Again.
+
+He was more than shaken by now, limbs screaming at him in a twisted choir. This hadn’t been the first detonation he’d encountered and yet somehow he kept going. Forging onward, one foot after the other pounding the earth. Soon he was running again, sprinting through the knee-high grass.
+
+And why wouldn’t he? The pain soon fell away and besides this place was beautiful. Rolling fields of grassland dissected by slivers of glassy and too blue water. Along their sandy banks rows of little flags protruded almost like markers chasing the winding water. Here and there stoic oaks sprouted proudly, casting long fingers of shadow. From their branches flew multitudes of bunting, flags dancing merrily in the eternal gentle breeze. This was a literal Uncanny Valley, compounded by the misplaced sense of dread Finch got whenever he looked at the flags strewn everywhere.
+
+Finch didn’t care — his heart soared as he ran. He didn’t just run aimlessly through this painted landscape. No, he ran after *her*. Though he never quite caught her. She? She…now she was beautiful too, in the definitive sense. Dressed in a nearly transparent white shift she ran barefoot ahead of Finch. Long golden hair streamed out behind her carefree form. Now and again Finch caught glimpses of emerald eyes sparkling with joy as the woman glanced back at him. She was looking *at* him! Every time she did so his heart fluttered in his chest and he ran just a little faster. Somehow, she sped up too, yet still seemed to move effortlessly.
+
+A burst of laughter rolled over the hills, and Finch thought it was the most perfect sound he’d ever heard. All growling pains from the previous incident dissipated, blown on the unwavering breeze. He let the light from the standstill sun wash over him as he ran on.
+
+**CRACK-*BOOM***
+
+Finch was launched high into the air, momentarily living up to his innocently misguided name. He landed hard and felt several ribs crack as he did so. Pain lanced like slivers of molten fire poured into his nerves, overwhelming.
+
+He lay there, unable to move and listened to the voices in his head. This time the voice of reason screamed at him, muffled no longer. It didn’t scream to get up but to open his eyes and to see. Finch was confused — wasn’t he already seeing? He didn’t get up.
+
+His heart clawed at the inside of his chest, insisting that if Finch didn’t get
+
+up and chase after her, it would leap free of his chest and do so itself. But he didn’t get up. All the pain otherwise long forgotten had come sidling back now, and Finch was tired. He hurt from a thousand repetitions of the ground bucking in explosion underneath him. Finch was spent at last. He didn’t get up.
+
+The voice of reason was calm now the urgency had passed. Finch was not getting up, and now the voice soothingly instructed him to open his eyes. Finch was still confused, but he tried anyway. Concentrating a moment, he opened his eyes, though they were never closed.
+
+And then laying there sprawled in the crater, he *saw*.
+
+All at once the illusion shattered, and see he indeed did. The too good to be true landscape was revealed as just that. As he watched the swaying grasses withered, wilting rapidly towards blackened soil. The once proud trees were merely twisted husks and the rivers ran red like arteries. She too was revealed. The emerald glinting of the woman’s eyes had been replaced by red flickers and gone was the spun gold hair.
+
+The worst, though, was the flags. Where before they had fluttered in the breeze they now hung still. Lifeless. Each one was emblazoned with a stylised skull on a bloodied background. Red flags, red as fresh-spilt blood.
+
+Red flags. Warning signs that Finch had treated like mile markers. Reason blinkered by heart, he had run on and on. Enduring every blast and getting right back up again, striding past every flag. Now that he was broken and could run no more, he saw things as they really were.
+
+Saw the signs though it was far, far too late.
+
+***
+
+Originally published on [Medium](https://hinged.press/chasing-her-blinkered-48a8b084c6fd)
+
+***