day44 - talking (ft. long man)
dear luci,
today i did a lot of talking (couldn't guess from the title, huh?). this entry is technically an entire day late so it's liable to be short but i couldn't stomach the idea of having oNE MISSING DAY staining my otherwise spotless track record.
i started the day with an eagerly anticipated breakfast. last night i felt kinda shaky about my social existence, but honestly this was one of the best breakfasts ive had in recent memory, sitting firmly alongside a couple other perfect (such as they can be) mornings. i started off feeling flighty and evasive but i decided that wasn't how i wanted things to go. i made a conscious choice to turn things around, to push past the facile pleasantries which are so much easier to default to if you're feeling guarded, and it worked. the person sitting across from me at the time, might have felt like i was just being kind, particuarly atttentive and patient to what she's going through, but it's not like that-- I just believe wholeheartedly in every word i told her. in her inherent value and worth as a person, separate from her ability to provide things for others' lives.
then: i sat and talked with whomever wandered into the conversation in the office break area for like... three freaking hours. it was awesome. like, there are some conversations that you get stuck in out of obligation or kindness, but this one was just enjoyable. every twenty minutes the thought occured to me that i should perhaps return to my work, but the chats were damn good, and i dont have any deadlines i'm working toward.
after a couple hours of actually doing some work, i showed off a game i made at an industry event held in our office. myself and the designer delivered the most kickass presentation of the night. people were engaged, they asked questions, and they seemed to genuinely enjoy the banter between us. suddenly, our little console-app/game which was sitting mostly unoccupied on my monitor had drawn some attention! it's unfortunately not the easiest game to demo, as you gotta just vibe with it and read through the story, but it was really interesting to see how our passion and enthusiasm changed the way people saw our game.
and then, i finally went home.
just kidding, no, i went to the most crowded, overstimulating (yet cheap) pub in the city to hang out with four of my favourite people. we made our way from there, to a liquor store, to guzmans (dins), to a bridge near the river. we sat under that bridge (almost a red hot chili peppers reference, minus the heroin) and talked shit, laughed, took photos, and watched japanese gummy commercials about fated gay lovers. after one of us left, the remaining four laid on the grass in front of the river until the sprinklers came on. that'll teach us.
in any case, i shall stop recounting the evening's happenings and get to the point: that's a shit ton of social interaction for one day. and i don't doubt a recharge will be imminently necessary, but so many of these little interactions left me energised, rather than exhausted. some definitely left me exhausted, but those were in the minority, and mostly attributable to awkward people in the games industry (i am, myself prone to being one of those, no shade <3). i'm lucky to be in a stage of my life where i can create, exist, and share bits and pieces of my strange-ass self with some incredible people.
i'm not happy all the time, far from it, but i am much happier than i was a month ago. my life is not all perfect, but these more frequent pockets of joy makes things damn worth it. any progress is worth celebrating. especially since it wasn't too long ago that i thought, at least partially, that going on in life was no longer worth it. glad i stuck around. glad i had people to take care of me when i couldn't take care of myself as well. i don't hold it against myself. sometimes you gotta lean.
sweet dreams, luci <3