Hello. My name’s Caelan. And I’m a trans man.
-
All things change. That is life. This past week, the UK has gained a new Prime Minister and a new King. Which is all a bit weird and sudden after waiting an age for either of these. Neither of the two historical events did the majority of the country have a say (vote) in.
I have changed too. This time last year my mental and emotional capacity was being overwhelmed by the internal swirling storm. I didn’t know why then. I didn’t understand myself then. I hadn’t for all of these years. How could I have been so blind to myself and who I am? People pleasing, playing the expected role, not listening to what my body is telling me and what I’m feeling, gaslighting myself, fear. All have played a part. And are still playing their own particular games and roles.
The next steps are to actually make the changes instead of just thinking about and imagining the changes. This is far easier to say than do. Writing not very interesting blogs that no one reads is easy. Telling someone I don’t know is hard. Telling someone I do know is far harder. Talking to the people I’m close to is terrifying.
-
What I’ve found over the last decade
- Grey hairs
- Wrinkles
- My inability to tolerate most humans
- An understanding of who I am, who that person in my head is as opposed to the one everyone sees
- What my values are and what I stand for
- Unexpected knowledge of criminal law (England and Wales)
- A broadened musical appreciation
- My partners glasses, keys and mobile phone, many times (they “misplace” things)
-
What I’ve lost over the last decade and a bit
- Too much time and money to alcohol
- Friends
- Two cats, very separately
- One job, twice
- Momentos, trinkets and assorted paraphernalia
- Patience for humanity
- Plants, approx 5
- Fitness levels
- Far too many memories
- Family members
- For a brief while, my sanity
-
I’ve just started watching Sapphire and Steel. Mostly because someone on twitter has mentioned it more than a few times now and the interest was peaked. If I’d seen this as a child I would have viewed the show and my little world differently. Or it would have all washed straight over me, as my ability to pick up deeper meaning within a tv show or film or book is something I’ve only really developed as an adult, and it’s still not spot on.
I was almost 7 months old when the first episode would have aired on ITV. (3 months later, I was apparently walking, so my mother once somewhat proudly declared.) It was not a show that featured in my childhood at all. Oddly, ITV programming generally didn’t get much of a look-in in our house. Something I still find intriguing today.
The concept that history is trapped in things and words around us is very obvious to me now. Nursery rhymes are a folk memory or mis-memory of the past. I don’t subscribe to the idea of stone tape theory but memories are attached in items and places. Those memories can be unlocked at certain points, by certain people who have shared the experience of the item and the person.
The words that are said, they always have meaning.
My father would mock me when his words to me were hurtful. “You need to grow thicker skin” As if I should just allow his bile you flow off of me. Because the hate that ran through him was so easy to throw away and hit someone else, your child, with.
Fuck you, old man.
-
This seems like the most obvious and predictable starting point. Considering. *I started this post at the start of April and then stupidly forgot to post it, as a miniscule piece of history.*
I’m luckily than some others, my employer fully supports working from home. Once again, I’m extremely grateful that I’m a civil servant. It is lonely; I’m acutely aware of the lack of social interaction. Something I find bizarre as I don’t generally like being around people.
But it’s boring, as things are not what they are supposed to be. I recently moved into a new position and the four weeks or so I experienced before lockdown, only gave a small hint at the kind of things I’d be seeing and dealing with, and now I can’t do any of the normal aspects of my (new) job.
I actually booked the week off that happened to fall within the first week of lockdown, when I realised I might well go mad with not “working” , but still working.
I’m not reading more, nor learning more, nor exercising more, all of which I could easily do with the new flexibility to my days. Instead I’m lying in bed more, boozing more, and procrastinating to new epic levels. I’m trying not to mentally beat myself up too much nonetheless. That part is the hardest to do.
I have realised that I’ve been spending far too much money on my way home each night in a very particular supermarket, as now I don’t have that as an option, I have money still in my current account at the end of the month. Which is a first.
I’m genuinely scared to actually go outside, (still at the end of official lockdown). I’ve been out maximum of twice a week since the start of this. Which means my fitness has suffered, and that has scared and sacred me. The half-arsed plan to complete the Walk 1000 Miles Challenge within a few months has been defenestrated. I’m anxious of contracting this virus; I have deep and possibly well-founded scientific, suspicions it will hit me hard. And as it looks like it isn’t merely a mild issue nor a just a respiratory illness.
I keep forgetting that I can’t just nip around the local shops to pick up whatever I want/need whenever I like. Something I’m finding particularly hard to deal with. I know that’s a terrible first world problem there’s a couple of reasons behind me feeling angsty about it. I don’t like people, but not being do the things I want to do, when I need to do them, is quietly winding me up. I had a small hint of this a couple of years ago when I was forced from my own stupidity to be stuck at home. Then, I was longing to go out and walk whenever I wanted, wherever I wanted, because I physically couldn’t. Now I’m being told by the government that I can’t do things. (I would never have survived Communism, mostly because I would have drunk myself to death.) With the passage of time, the frustrations I once felt have passed. I’m now, at the beginning of July 2020, fully adjusted and the idea of going back to normal equally scares me (still high risk) and horrifies me (normal working day?? Are you kidding me??!)
With the new shopping experience, there appears to be greater levels of judgment about what items I’m buying, more so than usual. I find myself to having to mentally justify buying anything by picking up “essential” items each time. Perhaps I’m being overly conscious about the whole situation. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to queuing outside shops, when I know that the store inside is mostly empty. I am being overwhelming annoyed by, what seems to be, every other bastard out there, the people who are failing to social distance once they’re in a store, despite all the advice/warnings and “helpful” floor markings.
What I am certain about is that the long term implications of the lockdown will be felt for some time to come. The ways of working for some will have been radically changed, possibly permanently. My sector has pushed on in ways that its being dragging it’s heels on for years. (we are only just seeing the economic fallout from Covid-19 on this, and other countries, and Brexit bollocks is only going to make things worse)
Many businesses are going to disappear, several big names have already succumbed to insolvency and entered into the administrative process; industry will gradually recover, but I doubt it’ll ever be the same as it was. And we haven’t even hit the shite-storm that is Brexit yet.
Live events, be them sporting or not have disappeared from the landscape. Glimpsing decades-old football or snooker on the beeb is an oddity; are sport freaks feeling withdrawal symptoms? The world of TV has generally taken a bit of a bizarre turn, I never thought I see inside so many celebs bedrooms as they chat to someone on a sofa.
-
Years. Eleven bleeding years. Why choose now to come back to this?
Because I’d remembered the login details, and I have more time on my hands from not travelling to and from work every day.
Too many things have happened in the intervening years to recall as things stand. Maybe some time of introspection now will be helpful. Allow me to unload and reorder some of the many thoughts scurrying around my head. Perhaps sharing these random events in the life of a nobody will be enlightening and rewarding to another.
“I’m nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there ’s a pair of us—don’t tell!
They ’d banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!”Emily Dickinson
Who am I kidding? No one reads this. And no one will read this. Which is the beauty about being able to write what the hell I like.
But why?!
Why use a dead social media form, especially using a blog that was never alive anyway? I haven’t got anything to flog, no ad revenue will be generated from whatever I post; I don’t have superb photography skills and a back catalogue of stunning photos to upload; I don’t want to limit myself to 240 characters at a time to mutter my glib points of view to an audience that is already saturated with falsehoods, gifs and other glib points of view, whilst being aware that at any point someone will crash into my mentions to “correct” me on something or just to tell me how wrong I am in my glibness; I don’t have to worry about likes, sharing, over-sharing, other people’s opinions.
I’m free here.
-
I’m beginning to see something evil about Tuesdays.
That is sounding rather overly dramatic of me. Some things don’t change that much. Sadly.
It wasn’t intentional to come back to this blog today. I did keep thinking about writing here again, I simply never quite got round to stop thinking about it and just resume writing. But suddenly I find myself with time on my hands. Time I hadn’t bargained on. And it is my own stupid fault. I’m trying to not to pessimistic and depressed about this mornings events. Least because I had to get up at 6am for ultimately nothing!
I lost my job today. My employer wasn’t happy with my absences. For years I don’t get sick, and as soon as I start working there full time, I’m picking up bugs left, right and centre. Or it was my body’s response to the fucking place? Mass gastric projectile issues don’t mix with desk-bound office work. I’m not bring the depression into the equation, which I’m not discussing with anyone anyway.
It was a collection of events I wasn’t expecting, and didn’t really need.
Not enjoying the fact that I have just added to the national statics for unemployment too and the possibly rather large problems the current financial climate is going to cause.
-
No, I haven’t completely forgetting about this blog. Just mostly forgotten.
Much and little has happened in the last few months. I’ll surmise for now:
I’ve gained a boyfriend, and the approval of his mother, and an Xbox, and an orchid, and a full time job, and managed to get out of my overdraft. I’ve had a flu-like virus. I barely open my curtains in my bedroom of late. I’m planning leaving home, for good. I shall be spending Xmas with the bf’s family, and him. I’m still bereft of a couple of friends.This evening I am going to be attending a concert at the cathedral, the Mediaeval Baebes are preforming there tonight. I’ve just got to drag the geezer from his nap and get ready, in an hour! Hmmm, I think that might be asking too much of myself.
-
My mum is dead.
She died a few minutes after 10 this morning. She shouldn’t have. It’s her birthday today. She is 60. She shouldn’t have even been in hospital. If she hadn’t fallen after midnight on Saturday, she’d still be here. She should still be saying “please, please, please”, or “yes, no!”, or “No, yes!”; “I am!”; “thank you, thank you very much” and laughing loudly and driving us slightly potty. Now I’ll never get any of that again. I’ll never get to talk to her again. I’ll never get to share anything with her again. I’ll never hug her again.
I miss her.
head ventilation 