Yet another shitty summer

But from shit, flowers grow

There are 18 new people here. Welcome. I promise you will like it here.

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I am about to be pretty real with you. Summer is the perfect setting for social envy. You want to be envied, or you end up envying. Unless you are one of those enlightened beings without a phone addiction.

The thing is that it is almost socially unacceptable to have a shitty summer. You must have a good summer, especially if the other seasons are tough. No one accepts the fact that summer can actually be pretty uneventful, boring to death, discomforting, and riddled with anxiety. We expect too much from summer, and if we do not get it, we feel social pariah.

I will tell you what mine was about:

• facing my parents’ mortality

• facing my guilt towards my parents’ mortality

• facing the fact that the above guilt has somehow kept me stuck

• facing the fact that I do not feel at home anywhere, not even at “home” anymore

• facing the fact that my internal dialogue and external reality have not moved at the pace needed to bring about change. Just an inch.

How does it look like as a summer to you guys? And all of this wasn’t while I rubbed myself with aftersun lotion.

I won’t unpack all of the above points out of respect for my parents, because I still have a 9-5 and my colleagues might read this, because I still haven’t fully processed any of the above myself. And because I realise now more than ever that being a writer will expose me to human dirt. And I need a way to manage this balance of exposure and respect.

Yes, human dirt is an expression I coined recently that describes the type of people who over-exploit people’s openness. Human dirt is so basic and animalistic that it reads a line or two of my essays, or sees me talk with an open heart about my challenges as a human being, and then thinks to themselves, “Oh, she is weak, let’s poke her with all her insecurities”. Human dirt does not understand that it is from people who do not hide issues under the carpet that our human civilisation has always moved, not forward, but deeper. “Human dirt” mistakes sincerity, which in essence is a form of generosity, for an invitation for disrespect.

Last time I wrote about how difficult it is for me to change, to accept change, to give up on people and things. It is viscerally excruciating. Nobody asked me, for example, if I wanted to move countries. From a place where I was adored, cherished, nurtured, and I was free, to a place where they judged me, insulted me, and I was suddenly a mother of one to my brother. Nobody asked me if I liked change. And I have to accept now that life won’t ask me if I like certain tweaks and turns it is about to give me. I got it now. I am just saying I wasn’t ready to start with new features other people chose for me when I still didn’t know how to read, you know?

In the midst of my summer angst, an example of “human dirt” who cannot forgive me nor forget me, apparently, for being human and for being better than her at being human, contacted me. A good thing, it must be said, about human dirt is that at some point, it really starts smelling. It reveals itself. She is a childhood friend of mine. I use the present tense because she is alive and because she IS my childhood friend. The grace I have shown her is a result of the love I used to feel for her in the past and for the shared childhood. Because trust me, if she were a person I have known recently, she would have deserved a clear, loud “fuck you, bitch”.

My point is that sometimes we do not change also because it feels like betrayal, and because some people like to remind us of the vulnerabilities we have gifted them with. Vulnerabilities that they were supposed to be a custody of. And instead, they choose to weaponise against us.

Now, I am there minding my own business, being on Teams and crying like a river because every time I thought of my mother, I was like “I do not want my mommy to dieeeee” and feeling pretty stupid and ridiculous for it when this person hits me with a message. It is a picture from ages ago, us as teenagers. A picture I do not have. I am so happy to even look at it, and I tell her. We chit-chat about our shared past. I do not ask her anything of her present. It is done very much on purpose. In the past, we existed; in the present, we don’t. And I have decided years ago that was fine. As I realised she was too childish, too hurt, too different, and immoral to be in my life. Still, I remind myself of the love I have for the person I used to know.

Now I had noticed that she was about to move somewhere. She made a lot of stories trying to sell her appliances and homeware. Still, my curiosity was kept at bay because I did not want to give the false message that I wanted to establish any link with her now. But apparently, she could not keep herself from hitting me with her news.

The convo was like this:

Her: I am moving to Australia fucking hell

Me: Congrats, enjoy it

Her: And you, you're still in Brussels? God, everyone thought I’d move to that shithole, too. 

Me: Yes, I had my reasons to stay. I will move at some point. Enjoy your new life.

What I regret a lot about the art we have created is that little has been produced about these in-between times of our lives. A lot is written about milestones, now the infinite, excruciating times of nothingness. Not much is written about transitions. A lot is written about underdogs who made it, but not many talk of the friends they lost along the way because they climbed the social ladder. That’s exactly what happened to me, and I have not even made it anywhere. During my first years in Milan I found myself in a context that was too new and different for me to survive without fully focusing on it and adapting to it. I neglected a lot of people from my past. It was a transition phase, and I recognised that it was needed for my survival. It took me years to forgive myself. I thought I had been disloyal. Now I know those friends had no compassion for me. In my place, they’d have done much worse. But the thing is, they did not reach that place anyway. And they can’t forgive me for it.

Why would she hit me with “everyone thought I’d move to that shithole too” otherwise? To give some context, after I moved away from Milan, I tried to right my wrongs with the people I had neglected. I hosted her at mine when she was looking for a job in Brussels. She was consoling me when I was complaining about how much I hated the city. If I were like her, I would have replied, “weird to call it a shithole when you wanted to move here so badly”. But I am not, and this is my strength.

There is so much more to say about betrayal, grace, change, and loyalty. But I feel this sobbing summer taught me one thing: nostalgia is a chimaera. Nostalgia is a waste of time. There are people out there who are at my level, whom I still have to meet out there. Now, excuse me, human dirt, get all out of my way.

The picture that was sent to me. The expression is very much in line with how embarrassing I feel it is to not give other people grace.