It's been a week of walking alone. This solitude is needed, but also endured. And I'm still a week away from encountering more people. So I hope that you don't mind that I begin conversing with you, dear reader, as I find myself yearning for some sort of connection. I know I once said you are a character in my imagination and that was rude, please forgive me for being dismissive about you. If you were truly an imaginary friend I wouldn't bother writing in public.

Imagining you on the other side of the screen makes me self-conscious writing about myself. I dislike one-sided conversations, unless I have a crush on you, then you can eat my ear off, as we say in Spanish. If you are reading me then I have a crush on you, admittedly because I like the attention you give me. So please, dear reader, if anything resonates and you would like to tell me anything, my email is at the bottom of this page.

Have you ever noticed the lack of something makes it appreciate it more? My nephew is underweight, he lacks an appetite and is a very picky eater. Any food whim he may have, my sister rushes to fulfill it. I tell her: let him go hungry, that way he will learn to like food. If you spoil him with junk food because that's the only thing he will eat, he will never have a good relationship with healthy food. She says "I know that, but as a mother, I can't help but try to nourish my child, and if this is the only thing he will eat, I can only let him have it".

Do you think we are able to use this phenomena to shape (and ultimately design) ourselves? I'm skeptical. Like my sister, we are too quick to patch our needs. I chose this solitary way because "I needed time to think", not because "I want to appreciate connecting with others". I didn't think about it as a problem. Back in Barcelona, my social quick fix was hanging out with slackers at the park and smoking weed.

Please excuse me, I'm having trouble concentrating because I am very hungry. I will go have breakfast. Today is a rest day so I will finish writing throughout the day.

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After breakfast I had a nap, and I woke up feeling exhausted and grumpy. The sensation was that of a hangover, without the headache. I thought I would be able to shake it off by starting the day. So I went to a sports store to buy a new shirt. I accidentally left a shirt behind in Belaguer and I needed to replace it.

After an unpleasant experience at the store I visited the Castle of Monzón. On my way there I saw two ladies arguing bitterly about something I didn't understand. The animosity was such that a small congregation of curious people stood by watching, me included.

After this I went up to the castle/fortress. As I walked through it I was thinking: so much money and energy is dedicated to conflict. So many lives are lost to war. It is all senseless. My ersatz hangover was in full force, I felt exhausted and hopeless. I was still bitter about the experience at the store.

It is only now that I'm writing that I see the fractal of conflict play out at different scales. If inter-national conflict is senseless, then inter-personal conflict is senseless too, as is intra-personal conflict. The hermetic principle applies: “as above, so below; as within, so without”.

I came down the castle and came back to the residence wanting to shake off this feeling. I resolved to be extra kind to the next person I encountered. It was a man having lunch in the dining room of the residence. "Good afternoon, enjoy your meal, bon apetit", I told him. He didn't answer, not even a grunt.

I sighed and felt very sad. After fixing myself lunch I had a long nap. I woke up after two hours, still feeling exhausted and hopeless. I dragged myself to the public pool. I felt completely anhedonic. I didn't feel like swimming or doing anything at all. I thought having a coffee might help, and it did, as I gained enough energy to go up the water slide which cheered me up a little bit. After coming down I practiced my handstand, and then went up again. And I entered this sort of autistic loop, running up the five flights of stairs and sliding down the toboggan, coming out of the water to perform a handstand, and repeating the process ad infinitum.

I have no further insight or redemption for the day, other than I was able to extricate myself from this negative rumination by finding focus in an autistic trance. I have the intuition that my experience today will make sense further along the journey.

Sorry for dumping all this on you, dear reader.