10.03.2024
Face recognition troubles are increasing. Because she was wearing different clothes, I didn’t recognise the person from that context on the tube yesterday. I thought it was her. Then I thought maybe it just looks like her and then I ignored her. Because it is weird to say hi to someone on the tube if it isn’t that person. It sounds like a chat up line. That was the minor one – because I kind of recognised her, or at least I thought it kind of looked like her before I changed my mind. The major one was today. I spent the entire morning talking to that person, someone I’ve never met before. And then, later, because she was wearing a hat instead of wearing her hair down, I didn’t recognise her any more. I thought it was someone else that was there. I only found out because I asked her if she had been at the other place where the flowers came from because I hadn’t seen her there.
You know, when I was a kid, I thought it was really stupid that no one could recognise Superman as Clark Kent in the comic books because he just wore glasses. Now it turns out that I’m even worse than that. All they have to do is change their clothes or cover their hair. Then I can’t recognise a woman any more, even like today when it was literally just five minutes after I finished talking to her.
They gave out Mother’s Day flowers to some women in that context today. Someone joked that I had given them to someone. Actually, I helped to transport those flowers. I took someone up in the lift that was carrying them. As we were talking, I asked him about the lady with the crutch that refused to go in the lift to go up. What was the reason behind it? Was she scared of being in the lift? The man told me that she wanted to prove that she could do it and she wanted to get the exercise from doing it. She is a very resilient woman. I have watched her struggling up all those stairs with the crutch. He said it was silly. I told him that it wasn’t. I told him that I admired that woman. I have admired her since I have seen her doing it. You have heroes and heroines in every nook and cranny in this life.
She is like my grandmother. My grandmother would walk everywhere to save two pence on shopping on a product. Even though she had bad knees. Because that money she saved would be for her sons when she left them it. Because she had come from poverty. Because she had to leave everything behind in the Partition. The poor and the oppressed have a superhuman strength. That generation. That generation that raised me. While we were in the lift, that person told me that their mother had died forty years ago. I told him that was sad, that I was born around that time ago and that you never really lose someone. You think about them every day. So that’s how those flowers came to those women. Through that journey I took and through that conversation.
My holidays have been booked for the end of April. I have asked my friend if he is free and am waiting to find out. I am going to go to Scotland and the Hebrides – either with him or by myself. It is going to be an exploration of the natural world with some time in Edinburgh. Someone asked me if I ever go on holiday today. Because I haven’t taken a holiday from work for about two years really. The reason I haven’t gone anywhere is because I have been waiting for someone special to go with me. For a long time. I have them all saved up: Athens, Rome, Florence, China, Japan.
Actually, I have probably been to as many places as other people. I used to go camping in Wales every summer with my brother and his friends. I have been hiking in the mountains in Nepal. I have been hiking in Iceland. I have been to Washington D.C. on a business trip with my brother for the museum and the botanical gardens and the bonsai garden. I have been to Spain and France with my family. I went to India in the village as a child. I have been to Abu Dhabi and Dubai several times with my family. I have been to some of the swankiest hotels and restaurants in the whole world. How many other places do you need to go to? I don’t like travelling that much. You never meet anyone there. Other people aren’t interested in doing the things that I want to do. It is very expensive and I keep on thinking the money would be better spent elsewhere on something productive and useful.
The best holiday experience I have ever had was when we were in Nepal. I was the only one that could speak Hindi in the group which they speak out there. One guy got sick because he ate the meat there which the rest of us avoided. As a result, we had to change our plans while he got better in the hostel we were staying at. Back then, I can’t remember my age, but I believe it was early thirties. They had a young woman there in the hostel that was a university student. The older women trusted me and the others for some reason, and they sent her with us by herself to explore the local area. The only one that she could speak to was me. So I spent the whole day with this young woman Bobita talking to her about her life and her plans for the future. She guided us around. She took special care of me. When I got leeches on me, she took them off my leg, ignoring all the other men. That was the most beautiful holiday experience – because I had the companionship of a nice woman and learnt about her culture. When we got back, the older women – her relatives – told me to take her back home with me and marry her. And she would have done if I had asked her – because she comes from the same culture as me, since Indian and Nepalese culture are the same. When we left the hostel, she was sad and she gave us her contact details so we didn’t lose touch. But she was nice but not my type. So I didn’t contact her ever again – I’m not stupid. She would have thought it was something else and I might be a lot of things, but I would never hurt an innocent woman on purpose.
Anyway, I am putting up some of my holiday diaries up on my ‘About’ Page here if anyone wants to read them. As one document ‘Holiday Diaries’.
I forced myself to do the right thing given the situation and the feelings of someone else. What I wanted to do was to take them out of my life completely. Because every time I look at them, I remember what happened. The disappointment. If it was anyone else… But it is not someone else. It is that person. With Girl 1 and Girl 3 – who it was more understandable that she said no so it was easier to force myself to talk to her and be friendly with her – I haven’t forgotten the past. It is not the same any more. Even now, I make sure that there are topics that I won’t ask them about because I don’t want to know who they have or are going to choose over me and I don’t want to think about them and their lives all the time. But this is life. You hide your sadness. Because no one will ever share your sadness with you.
diary of a lone man 