#f0e5d2 #ffc90e #ff7f27 #87833a #035f31 #0e3c65 -------------- [oct 19, 12pm] had a good time overall at the friend's over the workbreak, i suppose an extended date of sorts. note: have theyed him here for anonymity's sake but will lean out of it at one point i started missing my cat a lot again and bawled in his arms about it, him reminding me i'm still in the 'before' of things and it will likely not feel as awful once it comes - he has a senior cat too (16yo, adopted at 6yo, he's 32), and 4 childhood cats since passed, my cat *is* my main childhood cat (20yo, adopted at 3.5mo, i'm 29) - she's still alive and as well as a 20yo indoor cat can be, merely less active and less able to clean herself than before. i do believe it, though in my case this is also tied up with really tricky feelings wrt my strained resentful relationship with my parents, which i haven't felt emotionally safe to address with them still, and some suppressed grief actual as well... so. prone to feeling really heavy to carry emotionally, this side of things. probably the heaviest thing on my heart for the time being. it's just sad i'll likely never get to spend a full sleep with her across my lap again, but i needed to move out for my sanity's sake, and had to keep her with them for her sanity's sake... https://special.fish/lists/5ebf5fc1d09ca50a0bc13d61 looked at the main page while letting my mind wander a bit on what else to write and how, and found this, as the daily list. touching. it's a sunny day here, and forecasts so for the coming days. it was also sunny the day i got home, as well as in the friend's city when we went out to eat before driving me to the airport for my flight out (in the car, one last forehead kiss, one last direct kiss, a couple of hugs; wish i would've been able to spot his car leaving the parking lot, but it is okay). something of a solace, despite the fact i'm having 4 workdays in a row now, but it should be relatively easy, and i have my 1kg box of storebought potato salad for these 4 days' lunches. even workdays feel lighter with the sun out. we had a heart to heart talk as well the day i left, before we got out of bed, concluded mutually that a proper long-distance relationship wouldn't be right, especially as there's some needs mismatches in the give-and-take both ways, so i recognize it's definitely for the best. still a little sad, in the night i still find myself missing his comforting presence, his big hugs, even the way his kisses felt. still left some piece of my heart there with him, both bittersweet and beautiful. still cherish how he's given me the safe space to be fully earnest and open with him, about both the light and the heavy on my heart, not ending up bottling anything up to the point of resentment. growing up, i needed to shield myself a lot as not to get hurt as much as a bit of an outsider, so there was a lot of bottling up emotions definitely. this safety to open up making me feel safer to try be more vulnerable with my longer-term friends too if need be. and my best friend agreeing with vulnerability being a bitch but necessary at times. and it all making me realize that i deserve myself and my needs being taken fully seriously, even by my own self. i want to live closer to my friends - and to a larger amount of My People than would be in a small town - in the long-term, which will be difficult to navigate as someone who deeply values stability. not impossible, just got to plan things for the longer-term to pull this off in a way that wouldn't hurt as much. oh, and this friend, of all the people i've had deep feelings for, has influenced me to acquire a perhaps slightly amusing combination of items into my life: airfryer, satisfyer, twin-line dental floss picks... i just tend to rawdog life with what i have most of the time, but it's good to have things to make it genuinely easier. well, aside from the satisfyer - sometimes nice to have things to make life more pleasing?? even at the risk of spoiling me too much to get me going in other ways??? :-p (one thing i didn't expect, from the first-experiences while there - i had never slept with a guy in this way before - was how specifically the sides of my tongue would end up tender and sore most likely from rubbing against my teeth while [ahem!!] hahah) i've been combing through my bandcamp collection, opting to archive the albums etc i can no longer mentally afford to care as much about, i get too overwhelmed with big skippable collections, as i haven't really been one for playlist making and also tend to be more artist-oriented with my listens. i'm about 160/410 through with it. 40%, rounding up to account for a few albums down the line that i will definitely keep. not bad. easier to face the emotional baggage when the physical or virtual baggage feels more in check and less overwhelming. it does feel good generally to be home, and to live on my own with my odd self, nobody on my ass about my habits and whatnot, nobody whose items and interior design decisions to have to consider in parallel. ------------- [sep 27, 8pm] quiet existence. candles lit, quietly beautiful sunset. warm feelings for a particular friend continue their quiet slow course. get to see him in a couple of weeks, staying at his for a few days. both looking forward to it. making sense of all this baggage, on a few levels. feels a certain kind of way. lighter, bit by bit. gonna go continue combing thru my recentmore emails, cleaning some out, doing a bit of it at work the other day when it was slow there felt nice. might get a glass of water with some ice, on the side. a nice album on, have been combing thru my files to see what to keep and what to archive, on whatever amount of these 10 dvd-rs i bought on a whim the other time. keeping this one for sure. simply don't find myself having a lot of energy to maintain an archivist-mindset type of music collection directly at hand these days, want to foster just the stuff that pulls me in.