annanotbob2's Diaryland Diary

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Not for me, thanks

I’ve written the year 2024 at least 19 times and it still feels weird. This is one of those evenings when I don’t know what I’m going to write about, but will just wait and see what comes out.
And it’s the bereaved parents swimming group. We’re meant to be meeting this Sunday and I’m not going to go because a) it’s going to be windy as fuck – they’re predicting gusts of 50-70 mph which means the sea will be wild, possibly too wild to even be on the beach and probably too noisy to hear each other speak. H, the founder of the group has been making snitty remarks about me and weather forecasts as she’s prone to booking something three weeks ahead because the forecast looks good, whereas I’m done with believing anything that far off – it might be right but it might not. It’s all guesswork based on loads of information about what’s happened before and what’s happening now, but these particular circumstances have never existed before and could veer off in an unexpected direction. Now however I am believing there’s a good chance of it happening – it’s only the day after tomorrow - and she’s deciding it’ll probably be fine so let’s meet on the beach. No. Let’s not. The other reason, b) is I don’t feel able to cope with the parents of the teenagers who took their own lives. Four parents of four different teenagers. I feel OK about not being able to hear their feelings, but I don’t know how to manage the whole situation. I don’t want to leave the group as the sharing bit, where we each have the chance to speak freely for five to ten minutes about how we’re feeling, has been a huge relief and solace, to discover we all have the same kind of shit and fucked-upness, but not these new ones – that’s not the same, it’s orders of magnitude worse and I end up overwhelmed and unable to stop thinking about it, it haunts me. H says turn up after the sharing – like I can do that without giving an explanation, without saying sorry guys, your pain is too much for me, keep it to yourselves, will you? So I don’t know what I’ll do but I’m not going this Sunday, I’m swimming tomorrow before the storm hits, in the harbour with my girl.
But I did manage to get up and do the HIIT session this morning, which was hard, lots of huffy puffy sweaty Betty malarkey going on, but I did it. Honestly, squats and planks and burpees. If you’d told me I’d be doing this a couple of years ago I’d have laughed in your face but I find I want to go blazing into my old age and this seems the only way to do it. I’ve been invited to a party for someone’s birthday, dancing from 2pm-6pm “and if you think that’s funny you can fuck off”. Sounds perfect, shame it’s in Sheffield.

12:28 a.m. - 20.01.24

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