2006-2010

In some ways writing this fourth instalment of my autoblography is the simplest and in some ways the most challenging. On the one hand all one has to do is look over my blog to get an impression of that timeframe. On the other hand I feel the need to draw conclusions from the last few posts. I will try to both supplement existing blog posts and present some personal life philosophy too.

I wonder who I am following two decades of adulthood. I feel I have experienced lots of things and taken some surprising directions. And yet I also feel like the person I was in childhood – contemplative… sentimental… cautious yet whimsical… As much as things change they stay the same. Is that a problem? Sometimes. I think I will never change that much in fundamentals but I can and do shift the focus on facets of who I am. I tend to go with the flow but recently have gotten better – in fits and starts – at making things happen for me. This entry takes care of much of what I have done in recent years.

I decided that it is okay to just have work rather than a career. This is a controversial statement because of the popular notion that we have to be productive go-getting self-starters. Ultimately I want a good life and jobs are only part of that. I do have to work on motivation but I accept that I will never be an ambitious stress-junkie and that gives me a kind of freedom. Part of that involves developing non-work past-times. I have put more concerted effort into the solitary things I have always enjoyed. And the ironic thing is that part of that effort has involved asking others to help me do that. This has had varying degrees of success.

I invited some friends to pose for me to sketch and several were surprisingly keen. From those life drawings I would derive the basic lines to invent landscapes. Rather than just doodling now-and-then I have produced dozens of pencil sketches and have a modest folio. I feel I have more than that, however, because those who helped me derived something from the experience, which is in turn gratifying for me.

I participated in Monash Wordfest 2010 by entering a short story. I also attended a number of writing workshops and in one the author-facilitator expressed admiration of my impromptu writing. This sort of feedback made me think my entry would be recognized in an award category but that never happened. It was a mixed experience therefore but one I will try on a regular basis because sharing what one makes is a good thing.

I made contact with some academics to ask them whether the ideological classification I developed in the Political Objectives Test warrants further exploration in the form of me returning to study as a post-graduate. For this I have gotten zero response despite polite reminders from me. How far can I go in turning asking into pestering? I have never done that well and wonder whether it is worth it. I prefer asking nicely.

The text supporting that online political tool was finalized in 2009-2010 while I had lots of spare time living in the sleepy town that is our national capital. Likewise I completed documentation for my fantasy setting in which I one day hope to narrate daring adventures for friends.

Many of the pastimes I describe are inward-looking but I have also become more outward-looking. In this most recent timeframe I stumbled into a few relationships which is more than usual for me. Did I just get more attractive or did I wander into some kind of wonderland? I suspect the choristers I now hang with will say it is the latter. Such experiences enrich life but are also challenging. I even had a fling towards the end of 2010 – a new thing for me. It was non-committal and yet the bond of friendship can be the only commitment needed in such liaisons. That experience provided a sense of connection I sorely needed following the end of my most recent relationship. It seemed a bit of a daring adventure at the time. The news took some friends by surprise but, if anything, improved my reputation as someone who handles things with care. That can only bode well for the future.

Lest you think I am self-deprecating I stress that words in this paragraph are descriptive rather than judgemental. I am a good person but I am also lazy and selfish. I desire companionship but am now wary of partnership with its demand for regular indicators-of-progress towards some distant life objective. This may well set me apart from my peers at that coming class reunion. Mortgages… children… divorces… it may just be all too much for me. I prefer the meeting rather than the merging of lives. But even that is a want rather than a need. To be me and be part of a community is what matters and anything more is a bonus. Other humans make me human even if solitude allows me to be me.

At the start of this set of posts I declared that we are all alone and that nobody will ever truly understand what it is to be me. I stand by that but also think it is an heroic undertaking to challenge that harsh fact as best we can. That is what friends are for so expect me to be the late-night conversationalist I have always been. And in seeking to understand you I will also do my best to understand who I am. Finally if I have drawn any conclusions from this let it be known that they are subject to change as life changes. I am still some kind of work-in-progress.

This was the final post in my autoblography but then time passed and more life happened so I have belatedly written more.

2001-2005

As once century turned into another and the cheers of a New Year's Eve party faded into echoes I reflect that things were much of a muchness but there were some exceptions to that in store for me.

There are plenty of ways I can fill the time and feel satisfied with my life even if nothing much is happening. Things like deciding that even nerds need exercise and lap swimming regularly... or reading on topics like popular twentieth century music history... or writing random short fiction. And then there is always some party or dinner on the weekend to look forward to. Still sometimes things just happen to you.

Every once in a while my passive courting method worked. In this time it worked only once but gave me rather an experience. At a party a random guest made moves on me. We interacted and exchanged numbers and she enticed me to visit her. This was an effort on my part as it involved rural public transport. We got along well but wanted different things. She was into growing her own food and progeny far from the maddening crowd. I in contrast declared that I must always live within walking distance of a milk bar. Eventually we recognized that anything between us was doomed. Luckily for me I had plenty of friends to console me.

While I spent some weekends away from home, I spent others working in the office of the Australian Democrats. Office work inevitably blurred with tasks undertaken in my growing number of roles within the party. This cause I had chosen and those I worked alongside became a powerful motivating force in my life and in some ways I think I was unusually proactive and proficient at that time. At my most involved I was coordinating the behind-the-scenes organization (as distinct from political campaign work) of the entire state division. I was sitting once at Huntingdale station in flannal shirt and jeans with my back to the wall and my feet on the bench. I was on the way into State Office. Suddenly the incongruity hit me - someone like me with such a responsibility in my hands and party secrets in my backpack as I waited for the train. Still it was a kind of calling for me and some fun things I remember include forming the Monash Democrats with Julie, developing draft mission statements with Corey, and campaigning for the election of Jess.

Politics amost devoured my life but I still did other things alongside it. I decided to codify my clerical work experience by undertaking a TAFE course in administration and look for roles accordingly. I also moved into a new share household on the invitation of Polly & Olav who purchased a home in Mulgrave. This setting fitted my lone walker persona well and the presence at Waverley Gardens of a cut-price cinema helped me to while away slack Sundays. In some ways seeing a movie alone is the best way to see it - just you and the story you are drawn into.

However towards the end of this time things were starting to pall. Flirting was confined to the odd party. A desire for emotional self-sufficiency is all very well but can be difficult to manifest. I was at a loss and turning to and fro wondering what to do. Things were set to become more complex and generally better. And both luck and making active decisions played into that development as I look back over the most recent part of my life to date.

My autoblography continues here and becomes somehwat more thematic than narrative.

1991-1995

Something that has provoked a reflective mood in me is getting invited to the twentieth anniversary dinner of my HSC class at Noble Park Secondary College. Suddenly I am looking back over two decades of adulthood and this is as good a time as any for an 'autoblography'. I will do four blog posts each dedicated to a five year chunk of my life to date, starting here.

On graduating from school I was a gangly nerd from a working class background who was thrilled to be accepted into Monash University. From 1991 to 1995 I did a Bachelor Of Arts with Honours and a Graduate Diploma In Education. In all that time I lived in the family home half an hour (by bus and walk) from Campus with my mother, father and younger brother Lukas. It was a time of many new things - hardly surprising since I was a rather sheltered 18 year old.

I made friends during a United Nations Tertiary Youth Conference (an opportunity that flowed on from another such event during HSC) which was wonderful. A small group of us recognized that we were some kind of group within the wider group there and dubbed ourselves Us. It was giddying to spend so much time talking all day and night but there was a sobering aspect of this - everyone in Us (which included my two best school friends Guy and Steve) went to different unis and O-Week was still in the future. At Monash I knew pretty much nobody so had the experience of wanting to spend my spare time with these new friends from far-off campuses. And yet I had to find a way of belonging at Monash too.

If you can do something once then you can do it any number of times and I did find friends at Uni. I tended to regard tute mates as colleagues and focused my friend-making efforts on cross-faculty groups of common interest. I was most drawn into the Fellowship Of Middle Earth (FOME) - fellow fantasy and science fiction fans. Suddenly I was sitting every day in the Caf - what we dubbed Korner - with assorted FOMEites and fellow travelers. I attended discussions and sleep-overs and picnics and it was fantastic. If you can be infatuated with a group then I sure was. And I must have also practiced one or more of the GSFs in my youth. However I also had the opportunity to compare and contrast the way things worked in both Korner and Us which may have helped me develop a sense of skepticism for the virtues of group identity. It at any rate told me that it is worth keeping your eggs in more than one basket.

Life involves work as well as play and I did have some of that. Principally I was a student and focused on that with the support of my parents. I had some work at a library on campus and volunteered at the old Musuem Of Victoria (now solely the site of the State Library). I had barely any income but my needs were also small what with living at home. Fewer things were expected of us back then. I met the Internet (a two-tone text-only version) for the first time at uni but it was just a method of communicating with friends. I adopted my moniker of 'Luddite' in recognition of the fact I still did things like prepare essays on an electronic typewriter at home (and there is nothing as amazing as a reel of correction tape). Lukas - the technically savvy and stubborn child of our parents - forcibly sat me down to show me how to word-process in time for my political history Honours thesis. Backspace is so much cooler than correction tape let me tell you!

All those classes and study sessions were interspersed with lots of sitting in the caf or under trees. In this time I got a lot more friends and over time went from having a majority of male friends to a majority of female friends. At the risk of generalizing, women talk better than men and - dammit - talk was what drove me then. It was only a matter of time till romance came along but it still surprised me once it did.

I am sure that every insular adolescent nerd has those gloomy moments in which they feel sure they will be alone forever. And in a sense they are the only ones of us who are right because we are all alone - nobody will ever truly understand what it is to be me. But it is too soon in my narrative to introduce such philosophical considerations. The fact is that I had the good fortune of stumbling tentatively into one relationship and then another over time. Sure - prospective partners had to make huge hints for it to ever happen and I suspect that experience has only shaped my tendency to sit back and let others make the overtures. I give my apology now to anyone who was exasperated by my elusive ways.

Between relationships there is still plenty to do in life and I turned my hand to all sorts of solitary past-times. I discovered my favourite band in Queen - suddenly I was a fan of something like all the cool kids - but that band ended round that same time with the loss of its singer to HIV. I honed my native drawing ability somewhat by attending a life drawing short course. This exposed me to nudity in a frank and everyday way - the only time I ever felt embarrassed was while a model was disrobing or re-robing. I made a pathetic attempt at running a stall at the craft market selling hand-made novelty greeting cards. I even penned poetry back in those days. I remember writing some while in Germany of how homesick I was and I was only away for a month!

I visited German relatives - something that could only happen because Germany had been re-unified and we were now free to visit and be visited by family from the former German Democratic Republic. In that month I spent most of my time in two townships and, because I never embraced the local interest in cigarettes, beer and sausages, I became something of a loner walking streets I had never seen and gazing at houses seemingly as old as the hills they obscured. I remember then thinking that I had rediscovered the solitary me of childhood, an aspect of me that had atrophied while I was ensconced in friendship every day between classes. It was something I valued and drew on in the days that followed university.

And it continues here.

2021-2025

The five years since my last autoblography instalment seem to have gone by fast and yet what happened during that time? I will try to cover some of that here.

2021 was much like the year that preceeded it - dominated by pandemic. One effect of that experience on me is a sense that any home like mine that includes some yard and closeness to both shops and parkland is worth feeling satisfied with. But once lockdowns ended they left a lingering sense of nothing much happening. Just sitting and observing had become seductive.

It took a while to get back out and I had always chosen friends who are more interesting than exciting. Our naturally sedentary ways were accentuated by recent events and that was frustrating. I wanted to get together more and in larger groups. But maybe I cannot blame the times because we are also getting older. Besides which, a quick look over records says that plenty still happenend in the last few years.

Sensitive to the concerns of others, I divided a big celebration of mine into two somewhat smaller events to mathematically reduce the potential number of infectious connections. But we have gotten more self-assured since and, in any case, most events tend to be small. I marked an anniversary with high-tea at the Windsor. Saw some quirky art in the refurbished Flinders Street Station Ballroom. Submitted some sketches to a life-drawing group exhibit. Witnessed the wonder of our own triceratops skeleton at Melbourne Museum. Wandered Lightscape at the Botanic Gardens. Camped at a farm. A key household in my life hosted Solstice gatherings. I revisited things that I had been missing - billiards and bowling and karaoke singing. Along the way some old friendships have been maintained.

And then there was a return to some travel. I went both interstate and overseas. One thing I notice from those journeys is that it takes more than a week of intense contact in a tour group for me to form friendships. It can take several months or more but that has been happening in two unusual ways for me.

One has taken the form of getting to know some loocals via a favourite cafe. That venue has now closed (the operators wanting a change of pace) but the connections have persisted for me in the form of a continuing gaming campaign hosted by another operator in the same set of shops. Our game group is refreshingly intergenerational and works surprisingly well.

Another is that I now do recreational things with a few workmates. This is partly because we have a decent 'culture fit' and partly because I have been working in the same course now for a while. Those classes in general adult education draw on a mix of backgrounds and ability levels in a way that is both challenging and rewarding. But back to those workmates - we have been sampling different cuisines and taking train rides to regional towns during holidays. Thus I have new human connections even if I still wish for more of the old ones.

There are things in life other than friends and family however. I still try to be both creative and civic. This involves bite-sized chunks of involvement in whatever project or cause. The smallest campaign I contributed to may also have been the most successful. It turned the 800 Bus (the same one I took to uni way back at the start of adult life) into a more frequent and longer-running service that extends to Sundays. I still use that bus now and I'm happy to see this small boon for so many commuters.

Getting off a bus can sometimes be a bit jarring to my joints. This is one of many reminders that I'm getting old. I try to keep active and well and connected but it is an effort. I supppose writing like this is also an act of self-preservation. And I still wake finding I look forward to something every day. Continuity thus persists alongside change.

If however I somehow perish short of the next instalment then the moment has been prepared for. Ages ago I blogged on what sort of funeral I would wish to have. I will hold that in abeyance for as long as I can.

2016-2020

It is a decade to the month since I started my autoblography and - yikes - three decades since I finished school. The last entry was one of contrasts and I suppose this one is too.

I spent more time with Lukas as we worked together on sorting Dad’s estate, from decluttering his stuff to arranging an ashes-scattering event in rural Maldon in 2016. I hung with Lukas now-and-then at his new project site. He has rented an inner-suburban warehouse in which craftspersons can hire creative workspaces. The common area can also host events and he has even converted part of the place into his living quarters.

In my own working life, assisting special needs students at tertiary institutions freed me from welfare and, while casual, became my longest-term role. It could be difficult however, as the balance of roles offered shifted more recently to upper-secondary vocational students with behavioural conditions, whose raucous classmates and smartphones perpetually distract them from school work.

I maintained some civic involvement and am pretty happy with how I do that. But more of my spare time was devoted to personal interests. I was now only an audience member at MonUCS concerts but still participated in a few intervarsity choral festivals.

Some choral friends maintained regular contact via events like pot-luck lunches and entertaining soirees held at various family or share households. Others I'm close to invited me to dinners and video nights and I went on more dates with Belinda. A particular focus for us was exploring galleries, museums and zoos. We even did this on holidays in Sydney visiting close friends.

My furthest travel by far was a solo holiday in 2017 to England and Wales, a long-postponed and much-cherished memory for me now. But there are only so many times one can do things like that, and I spent more time having fun at home.

My D&D game came to an eventual end but then I started indulging in that other old hobby of collecting Transformers. This went beyond browsing shops to attending second-hand toy bazaars and collection events with a few Korner friends.

Another thing to do was visiting suburban festivals, such as Live At Warrawee in Oakleigh, from around 2018. Our local government hosted various live bands, food trucks and community stalls, and I gathered friends together for picnics there. Then there was the opening of the nerdy Pixel Bar across from Huntingdale Station, which provided a very convenient setting to meet for a few drinks. It seems like this was still a time of fun, but it contrasted with its past because the number and variety of friends coming to things dwindled. Friends of different generations, some more rapidly than others, were settling into lives of work and family.

I was given more responsibility too. By 2019 Mum finally accepted she needed to move into aged care and her kids took charge. Once more we were decluttering and this time it was a vastly bigger job. There was also a ton of adminstrivia in finding and getting her into a decent nursing home. And then there were the many months of fuss as Mum herself fitfully adjusted to residential life. It took close to 12 months to find a semblance of normality. We started having some fun at her local cafe and in a visit to the Darebin Parklands of her youth. But then global pandemic hit and severely limited our movements and face-to-face contact.

Coronavirus has changed much in our lives. Hardly surprising for a once-in-a-century calamity. Suddenly tiny changes in a life close to home become novel. I did some cat-sitting just a suburb or so away and it felt like a short holiday. Otherwise my life is pretty sedate except possibly for a rich internal life.

I had to overcome my technophobia and buy some new tech to allow me to get with the huge trend of video conference calling. Craft went online and I sometimes attend. I also partake in a semi-regular session linking Melbourne with a few friends in London and Edinburgh. Sharing holiday houses is more fun but this is better for us than nothing.

One of the more surprising uses of Zoom for me has been involvement in a local trivia night with strangers. I was vetted for invitation to it by the operators of my favourite local cafe (which I visit via creek walks). I’m getting into this recurrent activity slowly. Neighbourbood interaction has never been much of a thing in my suburban life but, if ever there was a time to revive some neglected practices it is now.

2020 has got me thinking that proactive change is more important yet also more difficult than it was. I have been pondering a few future changes. One is eventually moving address to something that better fits changing circumstances. Another is assessing whether my job still does that. Yet another is more travel even if within smaller horizons. Then there is concerted creativity such as a short story anthology set in my fantasy world. Finally, forming closer bonds with particular friends is somethng I desire. The last decade and especially the present historic moment has shown how worthwhile that can be.

For now I’m done reminiscing. Possibly I will make more such posts in another five years or so.

2011-2015

Back in 2010 I wrote an autoblography in four instalments, each covering five years of adult life. That done I moved onto other things. 2015 passed me by and now in 2020 it would be worth giving my latest decade similar coverage. So here is what I recall was significant for me from 2011 to 2015.

I consider July 2012 to be the best month of my life. I had recently finished a stint in data-entry for the latest Australian Census. This surprisingly fun role had left me with plenty of back-pay and I was living a life of leisure. I did some interstate travel. I participated in my favourite ever intervarsity choral festival of MIV. I hosted a cracking fortieth birthday party. And my love life was coming along rather well. I call it the best month of my life and I even suspected as much back then. It is good to be aware of such happy times while they are happening. But I need to backtrack a bit.

I started a new and recurring interstate fling part-way into 2011 that lasted till late 2013. I also entered into a non-exclusive yet committed relationship from 2012 which overlapped with that fling. I fondly recall a relevant moment from MIV. I was lunching with both those concerned but then excused myself to visit the loo. They took the chance to confirm that everything was fine between them. Consent was assured in a warm yet matter-of-fact way. I recommend excusing yourself as something to do during gatherings. You never know if your friends need to 'talk behind your back' and it may well be for your benefit (they could for instance be organizing a surprise party for you).

Since 2012 my relationship with Belinda continued in the form of regular dating and communication. We became companions rather than partners (terms I use to distinguish between the meeting and the merging of lives). Our relationship is non-exclusive partly because she has even older commitments that have since been confirmed by cultural espousal. I may have other interactions if the opportunity arises (keeping in mind that I’m rather reserved and somewhat fussy). And I could be considered polyamorous simply because I have the ability to share.

Moving in a choral scene had definitely given me much but I think I made a contribution too. Till the end of 2012 I was MonUCS social-secretary. I enjoyed this so much more than any sort of party-political role. My task was to facilitate fun for others, something I do in my personal life anyway. I organized pretty much everything I had intended, from a hedge maze visit to nights for bowling and pool, and retired from the committee after two years. But I stuck with MonUCS and averaged singing in two concerts in every three. By then I felt I knew who my personal friends were and we did more stuff among ourselves. I was even encouraged by Varia to run a role-play game for mostly choral friends in late 2013.

Also in 2013 I started working as a sometime invigilator and then note-taker and integration aide at tertiary institutions. If the Australian Census had been my best workplace, this would over time become the role that suited me best. It was in education but had the flexibility that teaching had lacked. It was casual but I was soon getting more and more shifts. It was of definite value to those I served but it could at times be edifying for me too.

Alongside work I made occasional contributions to civic life. One involved getting choral friends Jess and Paul along to a meet-the-candidates event. Another was to be an interviewee for an oral history project in 2014.

Looking over my photos from the time reminds me of assorted things worth remembering. I had the regular company of Belinda on dates involving everything from Mongolian barbeque to boating at Fairfield Park. Holidaying with London visitors Steve & Nieves was always a good way to see old friends like Sean, Jen, Paul & Helen all at once (rare in our ever-more distinct adult lives). There were some fine costumes on show at Halloween parties held at Greta Street. And other events with Korner friends included seeing the Doctor Who fiftieth anniversary special at the Jam Factory, witnessing a roller-derby game complete with ska band, and dog-sitting for the Bowies.

A few things changed in 2015. One was that my long-time share arrangement ended and I moved a mile into a neigbouring suburb. It was surprising what this small shift did to my preferred public transport routes and shopping destinations. Some old routines changed as it took more effort to attend MonUCS and less to attend half of Craft nights (since I now lived in one of the two houses that hosted it). Dad visited on one occasion seemingly to check that my new abode was okay. There was an unusual sense of purpose to his visit. Soon I discovered why.

In July a close friend of Dad pressured him into calling Lukas and I to tell us he had lung cancer. We went into a frenzy of calm yet grave activity. He was taking what medical help he could. Some of that time he spent at home with help from others. Some of it he spent in hospital and the last few weeks in a hospice receiving palliative care. It was September and he enjoyed having the door of his room left ajar to better smell the springtime garden he could otherwise only see. We made sure his friends knew and got a chance to visit or call. We did what we could. Dad died at the age of 76. He had been smoking for over five decades and I think he got away with more than many smokers do. Only six months before he had been camping with amateur prospector friends. Only three months before he had been living independently and taking walks at his local beach. And even in his last week he managed to enjoy small things like dark chocolate. That is the sort of talk that informed his eulogy.

Organizing the funeral that October was a lot of work, especially in a small family. Our parents had been divorced for decades and Mum could do barely more than ask how things were and confirm the odd fact for us to pass onto the civil celebrant. Dad's own relatives were far away in Germany (as well as cousins I discovered who are Japanese). I think Lukas and I did well – friends of Dad even commented that they now had a model of simplicity for their own funerals. But it made me feel older somehow. Surely it was the sadness and stress of it all and yet, I almost feel as if the death of a parent triggered aging itself in me.

Well, that was a huge contrast from start to finish. I will give it a rest now and return to this topic in six months to cover 2016-2020.

1996-2000

In the last instalment I had gone to university and just rediscovered my solitary self. Now I will continue my autoblography till the turn of the century.

I had known all my teens that there was a lack of love between my parents. Eventually circumstances overcame inertia and they divorced. Having this happen as I was finishing uni and Lukas was only starting was much more convenient for us than if we had experienced it as kids. And yet it still left me with a lingering sense of the impact on others of forming a family, a feeling that is with me even now.

Within a relatively short time we went from four under one roof to four under four. I had the opportunity to move into a share household with good uni friends Damien and Polly. I had spent long hours hanging at other student share households and so now I was in my own I embraced it fully. Staying awake into the night chatting or watching re-runs of the very daggy Prisoner… hosting awesome parties crammed with friends… giving younger friends a place to hang as had been done for me. We went from bad landlords (Cesspool) to good landlords (Flea Circus) but in both cases made these houses our home. A bit later I lived in another household (Currajong Street) with an ever-shifting cast of residents a few blocks from the new share house of Lukas – Stonedhenge. It was lots of fun visiting them and having a sense of both family and friends in the one neigbourhood.

I was an emergency teacher for much of this time and yet never managed to become permanent – a mix of factors including lack of demand for particular subjects in the late 90s played into this. Over time I became jaded with the whole thing and, looking back, I wonder why I ever expected to manage adolescents, given that I had never coped all that well with them while I was one. Eventually teaching work ceded to other things, including volunteering in the Australian Democrats state office.

I had been a member of the ADs in my uni days but never got much into it. In the late 90s however there was an active youth wing which I was drawn into. My academic interest in politics was complemented by a hands-on experience of campaigning and even candidacy. It was an exciting time to feel part of a movement and everyone needs a sense of belonging to something.

In other ways however this was a very lonely time for me. I had to decide who exactly were friends and acquaintances on having left the constant human throng of uni life (even if I still visited it regularly). I held onto key friends and we did new and interesting things… Sean and I went on long interstate drives… Emily ran a small singing group… Jen got us into exclusive costumed movie premiers. And yet in this time I quietly became more insular.

There had been a time in which I would discuss personal issues but during this time I decided that I knew what my issues were and only had to choose to act on that understanding. Why discuss these things with anyone other than myself? And one nice thing with living in a share household is you can go for a walk at any time of the night to take care of them walking blues.

Even change for the better is scary and so it was simpler just to take solace in the same past-times and friends. I developed my patented method of courting – circulate among those you know seeming nice and interesting till eventually someone jumps you. It can work. It worked once in this whole timeframe. And then I was paying far too much attention to political activism to truly attend to that fledgling relationship. What was the matter with me? Possibly it is just difficult to decide what is important in life because so many things are important and some of us can only ever throw ourselves into so much. As one century became the next more was set to stay the same than to change.

The story continues here.