walkies, pt 2

22nd Apr, 2025

So, I was getting ready to go out on a walk when this post started writing itself in my head. As much as I suspect I'm risking that walk ever happening by sitting down to write instead, the same is also true in reverse.

Sometimes you get one chance to do something. I wonder how many of those moments pass without me ever realising?

Not that I expect this post is going to be anything to write home about. Which is a weird metaphor in this instance. Oh well.

🐝 🐝 🐝

I seem to have accidentally gotten into the habit of going for a walk in the evening.

On Wednesday last week, I went bouldering with my girlfriend. Afterwards we went to dinner with friends, and very slightly tipsy the two of us decided to walk home the 20 minutes or so, because the weather was nice and we were both feeling good; and I don't know about her but I did it because I am very in love, and I wanted to hold her hand and enjoy her company for a little while. I don't remember a single thing we talked about during that walk, but I remember feeling at peace in her presence. That was worth it, entirely and completely.

Last Thursday was the first of this chain where I went walkies alone; I ventured out after having a shower because I was feeling energetic enough to wander for a bit, happened to briefly catch up with some friends who were around, and then wandered a bit more for the hell of it. I lay on the wet grass of the oval across the road, and remember thinking about how the moon always reminds me of a certain friend now.

On Friday I stayed home and played the new Baldur's Gate 3 patch, which is not walking, but was pretty fun.

On Saturday I had another goddamn mental breakdown and spent something like 4 hours spiraling... so I did the obvious thing, and walked the more-than-8 kilometres into the city. If you read part one then you already know a bit about this, so I won't repeat myself here. But in spite of everything, that was worthwhile too. I should go for more excessively long walks.

On Sunday, I wandered around the neighbourhood catching Pokemon on my phone, and then walked down the hill to buy milk and a sausage roll. Halfway there my phone went flat, which was frustrating cause I'd intended to use it as music-listening time. But it was a good walk overall. It was quite rainy that evening, which is an exceedingly pleasant change from recent weather.

I also walked a friend home down the street that night, after starting a tv show together - new for me, a re-watch for her. It was still raining lightly, and she raved beautifully about French philosophy for reasons I can't quite remember, and I was in love in a whole different way once again¹.

Tonight, if I'm lucky, I will go for a walk after I post this. I intend to take my camera and see what I can accomplish with a 50mm lens and absolutely no ISO to speak of. I'll be amazed if I can manage to get a picture of my own feet, frankly. But that's not really the point.

It's going to be cold out there. It's time to break out the stash of stolen hoodies.

🐝 🐝 🐝

I feel lonely tonight.

This doesn't seem very fair, because I chose it for myself. I wanted to be alone, and yet I am lonely. Just like everything else right now, I can't seem to make up my mind on this.

Everything about me is so variable at the moment. Last night was one of the happiest I have spent for a while, most entirely thanks to a friend hearing that I was watching a show she liked and choosing to come over of her own accord, and all that happened because of that².

As I said, I walked her home afterwards. Not because she particularly needed me to, but because we both enjoy it. We were happy. I was happy.

The moment she was out of sight, I got hit in the heart with this... lance of sadness. It was a physical thing. Instead of walking home, I sat down on a wet stone wall and let the cold sink into my skin. I nearly cried, alone in my beloved rain. There didn't seem to be a reason for what I was feeling; I was so happy a few moments before. What gives?

It passed, in the end - I sent her a few silly messages, and I went home and watched the rest of the episode we didn't quite finish. I sent some other friends a few messages about it, and arranged to catch up with one of them on Tuesday. I wrote my post for the night, and I promptly passed out.

By somewhere in the midpoint of that paragraph, I was feeling fine and happy again. And now today, I am lonely.

This is a oft-repeated pattern, recently. What gives?

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A little over a week ago I had a conversation with a friend, while sitting in a park during the last hours of an... eventful night, to say the least. For once, I had not particularly been the cause of the events.

As is usual for me, I don't remember most of the specifics of our conversation. What I do remember is turning to it at one point and saying something along the lines of, "Hey, you remember a few months back when I was feeling guilty, because all my friends were struggling with mental illness and I was feeling fine, happy, fulfilled? Doesn't that seem so ironic, now? I... wish I could go back to that."

And it replied,

"Yyeah. You deserve to."

Dear reader, I don't think I can at all express how much those words meant to me, the quiet ferocity with which they were said. If it is reading this, I hope it remembers the moment. I hope it knows how important those words were, still are to me.

There are a few moments recently that have served as... beacons, a guiding glow, a lighthouse in the storm. They do not actually prevent the storm; to change something so fundamental is beyond any amount of flame and light we can readily muster right now.

But they have prevented me from dashing myself against the razor rocks in the dark. I am tired, battered by the wind, often blinded by the salt-spray in my eyes. But I am in one piece, for now. It could have been much worse.

Those words were one of those moments. A brief warmth in a cold park in the middle of the night.

There's been others too, many of them mentioned here - that first walk on Wednesday; French philosophy in the rain; cigarettes on the balcony; driving home with an angel; so many other little, unexpected things. Once-off chances, taken without realising.

I hope they know they are remembered.

🐝 🐝 🐝

It's far too late at night now to reasonably go for that walk, and yet I suspect I'm going to do it anyway. Perhaps this habit will amount to something, if I nurture it. I have always meant to be the kind of person who walks for the sake of walking, and always I have stumbled and ceased shortly into those attempts. This is fine and natural, I think.

It's going to be cold outside. There will be no hand linked with mine, no shared jacket on a park bench to keep me warm tonight. This is okay. I became used to the cold when I burnt the plane tickets and all the rest of the paper trail, the bridges and the bones, and I learnt that none of that warmth lasts very long, for me. This is why I have stolen hoodies.

Did you know that I don't know why I love the rain? But it is perhaps one of my most core traits despite not knowing, this deep and unapologetic desire to be drenched by the sky and chilled to the centre of myself.

I know that it is beautiful, I know that I am almost-irresistibly drawn to stand in it whenever I see the first few drops fall, I know that I shiver with joy to hear it against the roof, and I will cry out with deranged and childish laughter when the thunder rumbles through my heart.

But I can't tell you why. Some things merely are. Some things simply will be. You cannot quench the storm, no matter the strength of your flames.



...Still, there is a mesmerising truth in the sound of raindrops hissing against an unwavering fire. They can coexist, neither smothering the other. And sometimes it is nice, to come inside from the downpour and curl up in the warmth. I hope I get to keep knowing both kinds of comfort.

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(These metaphors are audacious of me to make, moreso still to write down. This isn't at all the post I thought I was writing when I started. I don't even entirely know what it means; only that it feels right.)

(This is pretty much how I operate all of the time, unfortunately.)

(Goodnight, fiery friends. Come walk with me in the rain again some time.)

Sweet dreams 💚💚