Be quiet everyone, I’m in a frenzy

I’ve just enjoyed an excel­lent night out with four won­der­ful friends. A pub crawl (stopped halfway due to being behind sched­ule and need­ing some­thing to eat), fol­lowed by an Indian meal in a cosy res­taur­ant off Oxford Street. But it seemed to be my turn on this occa­sion to get the sud­den change of mood at the end of the even­ing. In the drunken fun of the night’s pro­ceed­ings, I quietly did some­thing fool­ish that I shouldn’t have done, which unfor­tu­nately set all sorts of thoughts whirr­ing in my head. I gave in to the com­pul­sion to do a dis­ap­pear­ing act at the end of the night. I tried to be subtle, but such things never are — there’s always a touch of the drama queen about such moments, even though I genu­inely did not want to spoil things for every­one else who was fin­ish­ing the even­ing on a high. If I’d stayed on the tube, I would have been home by about 1.00am at the very latest. I got home at just before 3.00am, hav­ing wandered the West Lon­don streets in the rain for nearly two hours. Yes, it’s as corny as it sounds, I’m afraid.

I know I shouldn’t be writ­ing any of this here. I’ve crossed the self-imposed bound­ar­ies that tell me what I should and shouldn’t include in Wherever You Are. My one con­sol­a­tion is that the six or seven very close friends who reg­u­larly read this web­log know exactly what I’m like (they won’t be sur­prised, and may well read between the lines), while every­one else out there in world wide web-land only knows what I choose to say here. And while talk­ing to a friend would undoubtedly have been help­ful, as I walked around tonight I didn’t feel I could do that. The reas­ons went through my mind — they’re not here, I can’t bother this per­son, that person’s got enough prob­lems of their own without me adding to them, I’ve bothered this per­son enough with my dif­fi­culties, and so on. I know any of them would be there for me, but I just didn’t feel able to call upon them on this occasion.

If I was doing the sens­ible thing, and writ­ing this for my eyes only in some note­book or other, I wouldn’t need to impose the lim­its on what I’m say­ing, lim­its that I can feel clos­ing in on every word I type here. I could be true to myself. But all that is bal­anced by the need I have, at this moment, to com­mu­nic­ate. The need to feel that what I’m say­ing might be heard by someone other than just myself. And yes, this could appear like an attention-seeking need for an audi­ence, but I prom­ise it isn’t.

I guess all I really need (said as if it was that simple and straight­for­ward) is to turn off my mind for a little while — to stop think­ing. No, I’m not even think­ing, if I’m hon­est. It’s not as logical or as gran­di­ose as that. I’m not con­sciously con­sid­er­ing things ration­ally. I’m just use­lessly twist­ing a thou­sand things around in my head. Twist­ing the threads round and round as I look for answers, and then watch­ing them spin out and unravel before me.

This whole entry here has been point­less and stu­pid. Whether or not it’s the effects of alco­hol, but I feel phys­ic­ally sick. I am quite lit­er­ally tired and emo­tional. I think I should go to bed. Goodnight.