The Illness

“No disease suffered by a live man can be known, for every living person has his own peculiarities and always has his own peculiar, personal, novel, complicated disease, unknown to medicine -- not a disease of the lungs, liver, skin, heart, nerves, and so on mentioned in medical books, but a disease consisting of one of the innumerable combinations of the maladies of those organs."
                                                                    Lee Tolstoy

Every day is an ongoing battle with different problems to overcome. An individual’s ailment will be different from the next; mental, physical and so on. Her battle was supposed to disappear, to be hidden from the world but as luck would have it, the world knew within moments. Strangers would stop and ask how she was and she would respond the same each time – “I’m ok. Still alive”. Not many found that as humorous as she did. Humor was all she had. Without it she would fall deep underground into a world of sadness.

What is her illness you may be asking yourself right now. Well it is hard to explain. How do you possibly tell someone that you are ill but your are not sure what is wrong? There is something wrong, the doctors, some, and her closest friends know something is amiss. Others gossip about ‘sympathy’ and ‘attention seeking’. Most doctors mutter the word  neurological,  perhaps cerebral without offering a reason to help understand. All she knows is that a stroke like episode happened and has turned her world upside down.
Body numbness, loss of motor control, tingling, tiredness, stress, the list is endless. The suggested diagnoses are not much help either: cerebral vascular accident, multiple sclerosis, dyspepsia, presentation confusion and so on.

With no sign of a correct diagnosis all she can do is pray she lives to see another day.

The heart

The heart was made to be broken.

                                                       ― Oscar Wilde 

Love is a funny thing. You have young love, lost love, old love, wrong love yet they all end up having the same type of consequence -the broken heart. 

Young love. You learn a valuable lesson from this, you learn to love again. young love occurs during the years spent at school. You build your first true relationship with someone and everything you do revolves around them. You can't eat, sleep, think without your other half creeping into your brain. You become obsessed by the person. It's a given that it will not last and that a heart will be broken Yet it's ok, you move on, start again. 

The same goes for old love. This type of love is when you come across your love from many years ago and you remember why you fell in love with them. You don't feel attracted to them but all the good memories arise, and by default the broken-hearted feeling reappears. 

The lost love. This type has two meanings; the one that got away and the one that left for a better place, both equally as painful in some respect. The former leaves you wondering what if. What if I changed?  What if he wasn't such a complete tool? Either way, you will never know. You can never look at that person without dying a little inside. The latter of the two loves is painful. You spent as much time as you could with each other, but somehow it was their time to go. You can never create new memories and the old memories are to painful to remember.  You will never see that person, you will never grow old together.  You will never see that person's face again.

Is that all life and love is meant to be. Broken hearts and painful memories. Old age can't even stop this process. 

Those baffling creatures

Black as night, sweet as sin.” 
― Neil Gaiman, Anansi Boys

If I could bleach my eyes without them being damaged, I would.  If I could have spent the night drunk, then I would have. If I could forget the night,  I would. Being sober in a Testosterone filled room was not the ideal night I planned to have. I think I described it as a scene from a zombie apocalypse;  girls absolutely wasted beyond the point of no return, guys grabbing them like a toy they don't want to share. Guys slapping their appendages as a way to attract the females.  Well that didn't go to we'll with me, I ended up threatening to punch a guy in his sensitive areas if he pulled that peacock thing on me again. I think I was about to slap the hell out of a lot of guys.

If that wasn't bad enough, a guy I was fairly intimate with last year decided he would talk to me again,  after he ignored me for 6 months.  Something as definitely in the air last night. Maybe it was because of the home team rugby win but something was wrong.

That Girl

That girl you see at the bar isn't always drunk, just lacking in confidence. She isn't intimidating,  just shy. She isn't quiet, just unsure of how to talk to people. She prefers to listen and admire the people around her.  When she does talk, please don't mistake it as flirting as many people do.  She doesn't flirt, she just smiles with her eyes. She sits alone writing, she isn't a weirdo. She does her own thing regardless of what others think. That doesn't mean she is snobby and thinks you are beneath her, she likes being in her own bubble.

That girl doesn't like it when you accuse her of being ignorant. Nine time out of ten you are annoyingly creepy and stating the obvious. Yes she is writing in a bar, yes she is alone. She prefers to stay away from your kind, the kind that makes her stomach roll. She has a reason to ignore your advances. You don't understand being told 'no' for the umpteenth time. You insult her speech, her fashion style. That girl has her eyes set on someone else.


That guy. The guy who appears to be a walking cliche; his smile lights up the room, his eyes sparkling with mischief with a hint of playfulness. His hold makes you feel protected. His touch makes you feel warm inside. An accent that rivals the stereotypical Irish charm. An international crush. Almost perfect. That guy happens to be someone untouchable, out of her league, her friend's crush as it seems too. one could guess it's due to his ability to charm ant woman he comes across.

For now that girl will dream instead.

My choices

So after a down-the-drain interview that never happened, partly due to the school, my choices that led me there haven't been the best according to some. Apparently my life is to be lived by other people and not me, though I am pretty sure it is me doing the actual walking.

Take my desicison to apply for a new job as an example; most responses were of the following nature "that's great" or "good, see the world. You are too young to settle". Now that was nice to hear,  however, once they learn of where I want to work,it's a whole other story for instance take my job opportunity in Kuwait, the following reasons for me not to work there were due to the fact there is no alcohol.  No alcohol.  That's right. I'm pretty sure I'm going to Kuwait to teach, and not to be a party animal. The second reason was that it's very close to Saudi Arabia.  Now I know my geography isn't particularly great, but I'm certain that the UAE borders Saudi too. Pitiful excuses. It seems as though where ever I go to work no one shall be happy. It is my life. If I want to work in Saudi I will, if I want to visit Afghanistan I will. It is of my choice, not yours. I can tell you one hang for definite though - it shall be a long long time before I live back in the UK again.

Almost Comfortably Numb

Not sure that the title of this post actually matches my current mood. I'm probably just numb. Today probably has been added to one of the worst days in my life. Normally I get the sense of how bad a day is going to be soon as I wake up; I normally sleep in or fall out of the bed (quite literally), but today started of like any other.

I don't particularly want to revisit my memories of today as I am simply happy enough that it is over. Yet I need to somehow justify my feelings, or lack of. After today's events, the Middle East has finally won and has tipped me over the edge. Who knows if normality will return? Maybe it won't.

Everything and everyone here is crazy, and that is putting it lightly. Sure you do get some wonderful people, but for the most part, life here sucks. I know that tomorrow will be a different story, so I have to live it out till then. As I always say; let's see what happens.

Double noted

Post 1
She wanted to apologise for anything she might have said last drunken Friday. She felt like she had something out of place; though everything said was true - he was cute, funny, and seemed like a genuine person.
She knows that a compliment was made to another gentleman, and again that was the truth. When it came to Guns 'n' Roses, she was a huge critic. For the record, the guitar solos he played were exceptional. Not one noticeable mistake was made, well not a mistake that she could here in her drunken state.
Still, as embarrassing as she was, nothing mean was said. She had fun dancing crazy with her shoes off and adventures at 4.30 to McDonald's. It was rather lucky that she didn't send any drunken texts - that would have been a disaster.

Post 2
There it is. The inspiration to write had finally returned. Not sure what happened exactly as it's hard to describe but it's back. I was sat at my usual Saturday night table writing meaningless words when a musical note vibrates through my entire body almost like it's trying to hit my soul. A warm sensation fills me and I know I'm home. As I said, it's difficult to put such a feeling into words. All I can do is send a thank you to the band.

Speaking of which, I owe them a decent review. Maybe next week I can write one for them.