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2024 -- Looking Back
Jan. 1st, 2025 10:18 amReflections on 2024
Well, that was a year.
The good – No hospital time this year. I’ve gotten a lot more organized in the house, and I’ve also gotten rid of things. I’m digging out from the hard disk failure I suffered a few years ago, and I’ve got so much re-ripped. I also found some album conversions I didn’t want to lose, though they’re a subset of the total, and I may have to get help in ripping the vinyl again. Dixie’s still around and being her happy dog self. I have a roommate for now in case I need a pair of eyes for something. A friend got me a ticket to catch the Doobie Brothers at Starplex (which in my mind and conversation it will be for all time, I don’t care who paid to put their name on it this year).
The Bad – A very close friend has fled the state, so not only do I have one less person to try to keep from me being isolated from pretty much everyone, but I’m pretty sure this will be a long-distance friendship from now on. With my roommate looking to flee the country (I’m waiting to see what she does, because she’s very ineffective at getting anything done unless it’s right in front of her face and in crisis mode, and she’s distracting herself by trying to do a side hustle in latex fetishwear), and another close friend planning to head to St. Louis to be with her offspring, my support network on the ground is getting scant. Also, to put a bit of a bittersweet edge to the Doobies concert, we had seats but they were outside of the apron. My dermatologist has already dug a small and with luck also isolated sarcoma from my right forearm. I don’t need anymore of that, so outside can be a problem and a half.
The Ugly – Fourteen years, seven months, and twenty-four days since anyone has even held my hand in anything but a total friend manner. None of the other intimacies above that either, of course. I had a come to the Nile talk with the goddess I connect with, and she made it crystal clear that this isn’t about any failing of mine, it’s that the situation sucks and those who might want to spend time with me aren’t holding up their end of the deal. Um, okay, I can’t argue with that, especially after she pointed out how people respond to me a lot – blown away at my creativity. And that’s just one of the things they comment on – I know I have a difficult time catching how my experience is different from others, because to me everyone is as sharp, talented, and gifted with a great memory – I can access the fact that things are different when I think on it, but treat everyone like I want to be treated is a default for me, so that stuff doesn’t register much. I’ve written a rant, in Church of the SubGenius style, to remind me that I’ve got some positive things going on, and I refer to it when my moods darken, But it doesn’t solve the underlying problems – I’m in a tightening circle, and I don’t see any way out of it. And stepping back to before the digression, my romantic prospects are bleak. August 28, 2021, has turned out to be a painful day, because before that I didn’t want a partner, and wanting and getting are two very different things.
I’ve run into someone several times in dreams, it’s the same person, and I know a few things that might help – She bowls in a league and their team practices are on Thursday evenings. She lives in Frisco, and grew up there. And thanks to the aforementioned goddess, I can find her if I can make a new friend who knows a friend of hers. Convolution, you are what passes for a love life for me these days. But it’s also back to the social tightening issue – how can I meet new friends if my options for doing so are shrinking?
Then there’s the social media that I call, when being generous, Zuckerbook (Zuckerbooked for their policy to roll for the cops for just about anything and Zuckerphuqt are also regular favorites). They changed their interface and eliminated the classic view, and that one fell swoop took out most of my social interaction online. There are some things I can still do, if I have the spoons to dig through the process (I spent four days trying to send a messenger response to a friend), and some things, like being able to delete a friend or make a new post, are gone. So I’m feeling isolated.
I’m also socially isolated on Dream Width. A friend here, probably the only person who will read this (Livejournal, why did you have to get corrupted by bigots?), has told me to do things to maybe get some more people noticing me here, but what’s being suggested is a huge amount of work. So I’m considering dropping this, and taking the additional step of nuking my account. I know I’ll have to listen to frustrated conversations about how I’m not helping my growing isolation, but things are so much more complex with a major disability like blindness.
My person to person offline connections are fraying too. I had to step away from a friendship this time last year because he didn’t respect my decisions and had a practice of getting drunk and brow-beating me for hours. With one notable exception there’s a single call I look forward to each week, and the rest are more an obligation than a positive in my life. I’ve been emotional support for so many and for so long that I don’t know if I can do that anymore. I think parts of my emotions are shutting down so they won’t pull energy from my system to maintain their standby mode. And no, I’m not depressed right now (save for what this process instills, of course), so this is not my mood talking here.
And of course those are all my problem and nobody else’s. So I’m trying to figure out ways to deal with these things and cope with the changes.
That’s 2024 in a nutshell. I’m not going to hope that 2025 is better, because I don’t hope for things, but it would be nice if it’s at least not worse than 2024.
Well, that was a year.
The good – No hospital time this year. I’ve gotten a lot more organized in the house, and I’ve also gotten rid of things. I’m digging out from the hard disk failure I suffered a few years ago, and I’ve got so much re-ripped. I also found some album conversions I didn’t want to lose, though they’re a subset of the total, and I may have to get help in ripping the vinyl again. Dixie’s still around and being her happy dog self. I have a roommate for now in case I need a pair of eyes for something. A friend got me a ticket to catch the Doobie Brothers at Starplex (which in my mind and conversation it will be for all time, I don’t care who paid to put their name on it this year).
The Bad – A very close friend has fled the state, so not only do I have one less person to try to keep from me being isolated from pretty much everyone, but I’m pretty sure this will be a long-distance friendship from now on. With my roommate looking to flee the country (I’m waiting to see what she does, because she’s very ineffective at getting anything done unless it’s right in front of her face and in crisis mode, and she’s distracting herself by trying to do a side hustle in latex fetishwear), and another close friend planning to head to St. Louis to be with her offspring, my support network on the ground is getting scant. Also, to put a bit of a bittersweet edge to the Doobies concert, we had seats but they were outside of the apron. My dermatologist has already dug a small and with luck also isolated sarcoma from my right forearm. I don’t need anymore of that, so outside can be a problem and a half.
The Ugly – Fourteen years, seven months, and twenty-four days since anyone has even held my hand in anything but a total friend manner. None of the other intimacies above that either, of course. I had a come to the Nile talk with the goddess I connect with, and she made it crystal clear that this isn’t about any failing of mine, it’s that the situation sucks and those who might want to spend time with me aren’t holding up their end of the deal. Um, okay, I can’t argue with that, especially after she pointed out how people respond to me a lot – blown away at my creativity. And that’s just one of the things they comment on – I know I have a difficult time catching how my experience is different from others, because to me everyone is as sharp, talented, and gifted with a great memory – I can access the fact that things are different when I think on it, but treat everyone like I want to be treated is a default for me, so that stuff doesn’t register much. I’ve written a rant, in Church of the SubGenius style, to remind me that I’ve got some positive things going on, and I refer to it when my moods darken, But it doesn’t solve the underlying problems – I’m in a tightening circle, and I don’t see any way out of it. And stepping back to before the digression, my romantic prospects are bleak. August 28, 2021, has turned out to be a painful day, because before that I didn’t want a partner, and wanting and getting are two very different things.
I’ve run into someone several times in dreams, it’s the same person, and I know a few things that might help – She bowls in a league and their team practices are on Thursday evenings. She lives in Frisco, and grew up there. And thanks to the aforementioned goddess, I can find her if I can make a new friend who knows a friend of hers. Convolution, you are what passes for a love life for me these days. But it’s also back to the social tightening issue – how can I meet new friends if my options for doing so are shrinking?
Then there’s the social media that I call, when being generous, Zuckerbook (Zuckerbooked for their policy to roll for the cops for just about anything and Zuckerphuqt are also regular favorites). They changed their interface and eliminated the classic view, and that one fell swoop took out most of my social interaction online. There are some things I can still do, if I have the spoons to dig through the process (I spent four days trying to send a messenger response to a friend), and some things, like being able to delete a friend or make a new post, are gone. So I’m feeling isolated.
I’m also socially isolated on Dream Width. A friend here, probably the only person who will read this (Livejournal, why did you have to get corrupted by bigots?), has told me to do things to maybe get some more people noticing me here, but what’s being suggested is a huge amount of work. So I’m considering dropping this, and taking the additional step of nuking my account. I know I’ll have to listen to frustrated conversations about how I’m not helping my growing isolation, but things are so much more complex with a major disability like blindness.
My person to person offline connections are fraying too. I had to step away from a friendship this time last year because he didn’t respect my decisions and had a practice of getting drunk and brow-beating me for hours. With one notable exception there’s a single call I look forward to each week, and the rest are more an obligation than a positive in my life. I’ve been emotional support for so many and for so long that I don’t know if I can do that anymore. I think parts of my emotions are shutting down so they won’t pull energy from my system to maintain their standby mode. And no, I’m not depressed right now (save for what this process instills, of course), so this is not my mood talking here.
And of course those are all my problem and nobody else’s. So I’m trying to figure out ways to deal with these things and cope with the changes.
That’s 2024 in a nutshell. I’m not going to hope that 2025 is better, because I don’t hope for things, but it would be nice if it’s at least not worse than 2024.
