annanotbob2's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- D Meaningful connections she said, as if I've made loads of them, which I may have once thought I did but now I'm not so sure - have I always had a big wall up, made of smart-arsery and easy flattery? I can't think who to write about - I've set the timer. I've just been texting with D - a bloke I was at school with - in fact Bloke and I were both at school with him - and we're still pals - the only other one who kept his left-wing opinions and didn't drift to the right like so many do. He's got stage 4 bladder cancer now, started chemo today. I hope and pray it'll be OK - it'll be shit for a long time but maybe there'll be another side he may live to see. I remember the sandwiches he brought to school for his lunch, thick cut fresh bread with thickly spread delicious butter and thinly sliced roast beef. He'd always give them away, I'd always have one. When I came back from the Isle of Wight festival in 1970, having smoked my first ever joint, he was the person I called to come and have a smoke in the park with me. Again I can't remember the feelings around this friendship - we must have had something good going on to have lasted all this time - I do still like him a lot - maybe part of it was he always seemed to be almost asexual - I've never known him to have a girlfriend or a boyfriend, until since last year he's for the very first time sharing his house with a partner, female as it happens. The absence of sexual interest is a good basis me - too many dodgy experiences. What did we like about each other? Politics for a start, humour maybe, irreverence. Not musical taste - he was always into weird electronica, surreal, tuneless, one of the few musical areas I'm not keen on. I think he's always quite cagey too - we were perhaps both behind screens hiding who we really are. Ah well. Today I went back to the hip yoga studio as I decided I definitely need two sessions a week and I can't find another online one. Also, I heard a podcast which says that the biggest impact on heathy aging comes not from nutrition or exercise but from being sociable. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3daNtEnO_s&list=PLArLFV5giiuJLGM56icM90tz42kIC7jfB&index=2 They say that during lockdown loads of us started exercising at home using youtube or zoom but actually there are benefits to going to a gym or studio, in being part of a community with shared interests. This was the push I needed so I signed up and off I went. I fucking loved it. As I lay my head down on the mat and exhaled a big sigh I could feel how good it was to be there. I like that the classes are a bit longer - 1hr 15, rather than just an hour, so we always start with a good long relaxation and 'arriving on the mat'. This will be regular now. Bed now, it's been a mad day. 11:30 p.m. - 10.08.23 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
||||||