16.04.2024
Pretty depressing day. Such is life. When you think about your problems.
I spent the whole morning and into the afternoon doing my art history assignment. I just need to write it up now. That is going to be the hardest part because I am losing motivation in doing things and I am distracted nowadays. It has got to the stage where even the important things are pointless now.
But there is one thing about research and contemplating artworks and fitting them into your stories – you are lost in the flow. You forget about everything and everyone else. Because that is when your mind truly focuses on things.
When I was volunteering to teach English to refugees and migrants and give them the extra help that they needed, I used to have conversations with them at the end of the lessons as a group. They used to look forward to that part. It gave them a chance to talk and listen to each other’s stories. One day, I asked them to share a happy memory from their childhood. Do you want to know something peculiar? None of them could share a happy memory. Whether they blotted out any memory of happiness from their childhoods, or they literally couldn’t remember anything, they all came out with sad stories of unhappiness. That’s human nature for you.
But I have many happy memories from my childhood. Reading books and living in the adventures – we went to the library regularly although we didn’t have many books at home. Visiting my grandparents and then sleeping in the bed with my grandfather while he told us stories into the night time. My grandmother who made the most delicious chicken curry when we were visiting and fed us snacks that she made like fried bread and gulab jamun. Sometimes, they would buy us cream cakes. Holding my mother’s scarf while she cooked and talked to me in the kitchen. When my father bought me a top of the line Sony Walkman with a radio in it when he was working abroad because it was the thing I most wanted in the whole world to listen to my music on. Eating ice cream on the beach with my family. Going to the shops with my parents for the groceries. Going to school and being around my friends. It is an endless list. I had a very happy childhood.
Afterwards, I went to visit my friend. She has suffered a lot. But for me, she is always positive. I gave her a bouquet of white roses. I always bring her flowers when I visit her at home. I kept my little troubles to myself because she has big ones in her life and in her family at the moment. It was my job to listen so that she could unload and feel a little better and to say things to support her. I have started saying goodbye to her about ten minutes before I have to leave because she never wants me to go and will start talking about other things.
Next, I went down to the shops at the big mall in Stratford. It is a depressing place. The sales assistants don’t interact with you in any way when you are buying anything, the ‘book shop’ didn’t have any non-fiction books in it and the smallest range of books I have ever seen in a book shop, everything and everyone looks so cheap and mean. And that area is more up market than the area that I actually live in. That’s what it is like to live in a type of ghetto. I went to the Marks and Spencer’s clothing store and bought myself some nice white T-shirts because summer is coming up. I have never actually bought a white T-shirt that costs more than five pounds in my entire life. As a result, they look cheap. But, in summer, white is one of my favourite colours. So, for the first time in my life, I have spent twenty pounds on a nice, white T-shirt that I actually like and looks good on me. I bought two of them. After all, in my life, there is just me to spend that money on. No family of my own. Where else is it going to be spent? Was it a case of retail therapy? Women are going to look at my muscles in those T-shirts in the summer. I am still ripped. I’ve attracted women with my body before. If you have to get superficial, you have to get superficial.
Motivation is so low that I can’t be bothered scraping off the beard off my face. I don’t like beards. They are not a good look and they add age onto your face.
Now that the diary is over, I have to do some remote overtime for work. Just work. Nothing else. For nothing.
diary of a lone man 