clinging to the wreckage

  Only two have been the one.   In 1999, in South Africa, I met the first… she departed and moved to California, where I later visited her. Unfortunately, we became so close that we destroyed everything.   In 2013, in Madrid, I met the second. She already had a child and a life partner… and later I moved to the USA.   I now know, those two were ‘the one’. I have no contact with, or knowledge of, the first, but I am still in touch with the second… even if communicating with her is like trying to extract water from a rock. She has two sons now and is married.   Just a fleeting thought to be recorded for posterity. Others have come very close and have been loved deeply… but those two were the one.                      

  The temperature dropped to -5 last night and will do the same again tonight. I feel so sad and sorry for my feral cat, Fundar, who has been my friend here in the building for the past three years. She won’t allow anyone to stroke her or get too near… but she does let me sit next to her as she eats or as she basks in the sun. She refuses to come inside and, on the odd occasion that she has found herself inside, she has panicked. Today I found her sitting in the sun, but the temperature had only risen to 3 degrees Celsius, and it was still windy, so she was cold. She is a wise creature, though, she somehow knows how to cope with these varying weather extremes. I do wonder where she sleeps at night. Tonight I have ordered a weatherproof outdoor bed for her, but I am not sure if I am allowed to put it out in the building. I will try and see what happens.

  It’s always been a conflict. My life. Always stuck between the obedient, clean, well-behaved boy and the anti-establishment punk rocker who wants to see a change to the world order. These days, I still listen to punk rock, grindcore, and death metal, along with country, pop, rock, hip hop and a wide variety of music forms. I still read literature written by dreamers and poets and drunks and drug addicts. I live in a relatively small and scruffy apartment. And… I invest in companies such as Microsoft, Apple, Google, Amazon, and a host of index funds. I save conscientiously, and I keep a budget to track all of my expenses.   If you want to save money… don’t get married… don’t buy a house… don’t have children. It’s dramatic, yes, but it is true. If you feel that you must do those things, and even if you don’t, stop dreaming about extravagant meals in fancy rooftop restaurants in Paris and New York. It’s not always about earning more money, demanding a raise, complaining that yo...