of making friends.
The bad art
of making bad friends.
The poor art
of making 'useful' friends.
The sad art
of losing friends constantly.
I never had imaginary friends,
for I had books and a teddy
and no imagination.
Old friends are like old
or fading enthusiasms.
Most of my few friends
are dead - some twenty years ago.
Of friendship
I always had too-high an expectation.
14 comments:
A massive loss of old friends from around 2017 onwards contributed greatly to a long a depression and lasting bitterness that I still have not fully shaken off.
The reasons and motivations of everyone involved were - of course - rather trivial and base.
I call it "the Great Cleansing."
So, reading your post had a bit of a cathartic effect.
Hope you are doing alright, Anthony. :)
- Martin
It's VITAL not to get bitter. Maintain a SENSE OF HUMOUR. Without humour we're lost.
I'm 'doing' well, thanks. Have started painting again. Have absolutely no 'social life' which suits me perfectly. "the Great Liberation" ! I'm 'happier' than I have ever been, since about the age of 7.
Let us enjoy the days of Trump the Great Trickster....
Hello again, Martin,
I am thinking of going to Berlin (via Hannover) in early Spring or in September. I was last there in 1987. It might be even better now that there are lots of Syrians. (Syrians have even appeared here, selling food at the markets.) Would you like to meet me there ? Actually I don't know whether you are in Austria or Germany or Switzerland... I'd pay for a nice quiet hotel...separate rooms if preferred. I'm sure you could do with a trip and a 'break'...
I have other plans for this spring, I'll hopefully be in Scotland in a month for a longer period of time. Maybe at some point I'll pass through Caylus and say 'hello'. Also, I'd very much prefer staying in a tent in a forest on my own somewhere secluded.
There is still one thing I wonder about: Of course, you had your fair share of lows, but have you never succumbed to bitterness lasting for years or over a decade?
Scotland is an excellent choice. Warm clothes required: wet in the west, sometimes Siberian in the East. No, I never succumbed to bitterness. Only disappointment and regret, which are equally useless. I have always had interests and books and painting "to fall back on". Having various interests and keeping alert are probably indispensable in old age.
On the other hand, my dislike of human beings as a species might well be my form of bitterness.
I'd be happy to receive you. Nearest airports: Toulouse, Bergerac. Nearest railway station: Caussade (direct, or via Bordeaux & Montauban from Paris).
Another question! I have lost some of my high(er) frequency hearing since January due to a bad cold. It might possibly return, or maybe not and this is causing quite some grief - life really is just one damned thing after another with the occasional break in between.
However, since you've mentioned your hearing aid(s) several times in your blog, it made me wonder when your hearing started to deteriorate and how you coped with it. At least it helps you with ignoring other people's palaver!
On the earlier subject : the only people who have made me bitter are the xenophobic, homophobic local police.
Yes, being deaf has its advantages. You can probably get hearing-aids for free. You can certainly get a test for free via your doctor. I became deaf on high registers very slowly, but it only became serious around 2016. At first I hated wearing the hearing aids (which were free, and worth at least 1,500 euros). Gradually I got used to them. When I got my ears re-tested here in France I got a new pair, and I use them mainly for one-to-one conversations, and the radio. I am due for another test at the end of the month.
If you can't get them free from German healthcare, I can send you a pair (for free) which might suit you very well. At the moment they are on eBay.
https://www.ebay.fr/sch/i.html?_nkw=protheses+oticon&_sacat=15032&_from=R40&_trksid=p4432023.m570.l1313
But read what I say in the ad.
Two very nice Germans have moved close to me. One, also called Martin, is seriously deaf, with implants and hearing-aids. We get on well. The other, Christine, likes my paintings and my 'guerrilla-gardening'. I have been helping her with plants.
I'd hope that the 'local police' you are referring to are a thing of many decades past in Ireland and Great Britain. Or have you encountered any recent troubles with the Gendarmerie? That wouldn’t surprise me either.
I'm caught between losing hope and holding onto mild optimism that my hearing issue will eventually resolve. I miss the richness of the river's sound during my occasional strolls along its banks. My eustachian tube still feels clogged, likely due to the severe cold and flu I had back in February. I’m not even half your age, but the past decade seems to have taken an extra toll on me.
Thank you for the offer. If I need them, I’ll let you know or pick them up.
The Northern Irish police always treated me very well, because I was middle class and "went to a good school". I had a bad time with the Gendarmerie, being a dissident immigrant who insulted a very unpleasant Gendarme. In the end it cost me a thousand euros and a prison sentence suspended for 5 years, which has not yet expired.
I think it very likely that your hearing loss is temporary.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/mar/26/leave-the-hurt-behind-how-to-let-go-of-a-grudge
Oddly enough I went back to check this thread for more comments.
Of course, the article is correct in its assessment. But being heavily neurotic myself when processing emotional baggage, simple trickeries like 'cognitive reframing' do not work on me.
E.g. a diagnosis which was dismissed as inconsequential by my then GP, drove me into deep despair in 2020/21. Basically, the neurologists nonchalantly informed me that my brain was full of tiny scars. However, by the time the pathology was revealed, it must have already been a done deal, possibly stemming from my years as an infant.
It took me seven years to 'process' - or rather to finally discard - my first bout of completely disproportional and pointless lovesickness.
- "Attachments and their consequences have been a disaster for humanity", was already written eons ago, presumably not in a tiny cabin in Montana.
Yet, in the spirit of a more recent post of yours, I shall and have been removing myself further and further from the gobbet of private pain, as strangely enticing as its stale reek might be.
My flight to Scotland will depart in two weeks. If my means allow I'll travel to Norway after that until autumn Hopefully, I'll manage to spend six months outdoors, with barely any internet. My diet will consist of oats, peanuts, walnuts, vitamin pills, and the occasional bunch of carrots and herring.
On a side note I guess you are already well aware of this man:
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-59174870
I'm not an extremist. Those 'hermits' who get articles written about them tend to be male egotists, usually trying to prove something (often to themselves). Your proposed diet seems ludicrous, even in Norway. Vitamin pills ? Peanuts ? Bunch of carrots ? No lichen (very nourishing) ? Reindeer milk ? Cockles & mussels ? Bearberries, cloudberries, dewberries ?
My planned diet will indeed be abysmal, but within budget and nutrionally mostly complete. I hope I won't restrict myself to exclusively that and learn how to at least forage for berries. I'm quite out of touch with Mother Nature, so thanks for the heads-up, Anthony.
Lichen do not seem to be that straightforward to prepare, with some requiring boiling in ash water.
Luckily clean water is easy to come by in the Highlands and Norway. That used to be my main worry. Due to severe dehydration I foolishly opted for drinking out of rivers close to the Alps twice. Both times I got sick. Once for days and once for a month.
But I'll definitely not try to milk any reindeer, that is bound to go wrong!
And yes, being a 'famous' hermit is oxymoronic.
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