Jordan Parker

Y’know somedays when things just really don’t go your way? You have a bad day at work and no matter what you feeling like you’re doing should be right, it ends up worse in the eyes of your higher ups? When the tram isn’t coming and the next station is another twenty minutes out of your way. When you go and try to meet some new people to lighten what feels like a shitty blip in the system and no one is interesting in having a conversation? When you miss the last tram home because you got lost in that awful drink at the bar that you thought you’d try to at least add some level of variety and difference to an otherwise terrible day? Thinking about it… maybe it was all my fault?

I mean realistically – negativity attracts negativity doesn’t it? Maybe people saw a face like thunder as I attempted to approach them at the bar for a conversation; didn’t want to deal with a seemingly irritable stranger and of course being a stranger, they’ve no reason to give me the time of day. Missing that tram was beyond a kick in the gut. I bought that god awful drink to try and give myself something to feel like I had achieved in the day – something different and otherwise gray pastel painting. Suppose I found myself so lost in thought about everything that hadn’t really gone my way that I had completely lost track of the passage of time and I found myself sitting at a bar longer after I knew the final tram heading home would have left. I must have let out the most exasperated sigh because I got a couple of slightly concerned looks from both the bartender and a couple sat to the side of me. At the time, I wished that one of them would’ve asked if I was ok to give me licence to just cry and let out how dreadful everything had gone but realistically, I don’t think I would’ve wanted to have had anything to do with me today either.

I think today has been the first day when I’ve really felt what it means to be a bit more of a fully fleshed out adult. Maybe in a bit of a more depressing way but I’ve felt what it means to be alone in a big city. No one really to talk to about everything going on in my head and just having to bottle it all up and get on with it because I’ve got responsibilities to maintain. I know that this hopefully isn’t the norm and I’ve just had a bad day and will be a much happier man when I can finally get to sleep and put this day behind me but… yeah there’s definitely an isolating feeling when there isn’t really anyone immediately around to just be an earpiece.

There’s a part of me that wants to be able to take days like this in my stride but it does leave me with a somewhat pit in my stomach in knowing that more days like this are certainly bound to come and really I am a bit more alone in this world than I’m openly willing to admit to myself – maybe just a blog to nowhere I suppose. A grey cloud or two doesn’t immediately transform the sky into a thunderstorm.