storms – Observations and Misunderstandings

The first time I came to Greece, perhaps it was about four years ago now. Time is strange, it decides itself how fast it moves. It may have even been five years. The destination was Lesvos and it was with the intention of being some kind of hero, there to save the refugees. Actually I’m not entirely sure what the intention was, it was just suggested to me by a friend as something to do and I thought why not. We arrived in a storm. For about four days the island was battered as people slept rough, they slept wet, they slept on hillsides that resembled rivers. The scene was destruction and devastation. It was post-apocalyptic in everyway except that I was able to return to my little hotel room once all the heroism was done for the day.

There is a lot that could be said about that time, little of it positive in a way but there are always things which shine through the clouds. I made friends who will be friends for a lifetime. That isn’t always something you can say. I also saw the world in a way I hadn’t previously, and I understood seeing truth in another form, despite being hard to take, was a good thing for the mind. These things are all about me though because to view it from any other perspective is too much of a challenge. Thousands of people passed through everyday. The fate of nearly all of them unknown to me. Many survived but I don’t doubt many didn’t, their fates too horrific for these words here.

I’m not sure why I’m going into this. I always feel so self-indulgent. The knowledge I’ll likely always have a hotel room to go to if I need devalues something of any assistance I could give. The words become hollow, if they ever weren’t. That and the knowledge I could also jump on a plane with relative ease and go to any of those countries people were dying just to reach. There is probably a sense of guilt in a way but we shouldn’t feel guilty when ultimately we’re powerless. It is also a completely pointless emotion as we can’t help the lives we were born into. We can help what we do with them but even then we’re limited in anything genuine. It does make you grateful for a bit but that slowly passes as you start casting envious eyes around once more. I can understand how people become detached when they exist in that world for so long. Or maybe they’re detached when they begin and that is how they last. That is unfair. People do what they can. What they have to.

I know why I’m going into this. I’m in day three back in Greece and it’s currently day two of Storm Ioannis. Apparently there will be a day three and day four will be the day the world comes back to life. The scenario couldn’t be further from the last and I am as much a different person as those people I now meet but arriving in a storm seems familiar enough that it has made me reminisce. Reminisce in the most miserable and sad of ways but then weather can do that to you. Our moods are so very defined by the nature of our environment. What is important though is to remember to come out with the sunshine once it returns. It’s best not to leave yourself in the storm.

If we were using weather to describe mood, this last week would have just about summed it up perfectly. As the storms arrived I went down a rabbit hole. I’m not one for describing how I feel online. Generally exposing myself like that is not always something that comes easily to me and in truth there are times I pour scorn on people who share their mood in social media posts. I should probably stop being so unfair on people crying out for help in such moments of desperation, it likely does nothing more than expose my own ignorance of mental health issues.

This has been an intense year. That is probably an understatement. In a way I am happy about how it has turned out, I took advantage of the new version of existence that came along. There are some things I would have liked to have done more of such as learning how to code but with all the work and the need to rest and procrastinate, I just ran out of time. Maybe less procrastination, or more efficiency with it. Can you efficiently procrastinate?

I always knew I would move on from here and I am fine with that because I have moved on from many places, I never saw this stop as a final one and it has already been about six months longer than had been planned. With lockdown any need to achieve or succeed, or create something or make money or do something or whatever self-induced pressures I put on myself evaporated. I had no choice but to stay in one spot and work with what I had. with options come pressures. I loved it and in a way I carried this on. However as it came time to wrap up this chapter I realised I had to step back out into this world and all the old fears and irrationalities, and ultimately all the stupid bullshit returned. For nearly two months now I have been working everyday on the pizzas and delivering bread three sometimes four mornings a week. You don’t sleep much in these circumstances and this simply exacerbates things. Throw in the fact me and my friend have a rather tempestuous relationship, it all seemed to come to a head this week.

If I were to say I lost my mind I would not be exagerating. I started to believe everyone was working against me, that they were trying to sabotage me. At one point one of the guys came down from the bakery to pick up some oven gloves from the cafe as they had run out up there. I wasn’t about and he took the best two pairs. In my mind he did this because it was all part of pushing me out. Looking back now it is almost comical but in that moment it was entirely serious. My body was tensing up, my neck still hurts and I was getting headaches. I have worked many seasonal jobs in the past which have been everyday for extended periods but they’ve rarely involved the mental stress of running things or maintaining personal relationships within the whole daily operation. It’s safe to say I now know my limits.

It’s also safe to say now the winds only signify change and the movement into something new. My friend suggested we stop the pizzas on Monday instead of continuing for two more weeks as originally planned. At first I took it in the same stride of paranoid lunacy I had previously been experiencing and planned on having it out with him when I next saw him. In the end with that being about two days later it was just a chat between two people who had been mates since they were eight years old. In that time I had already started to calm down but he had seen how much I needed a rest and he was right to suggest we stop. I’m grateful for him pulling me out of the rabbit hole because I doubt I would have been able to do it on my own without doing something overly dramatic and ridiculous.

Life is full of pressures. Some pushed upon us but many entirely of our own making. When we look in from the outside we can rationally understand were things need to change. If it is ourselves though, when it’s our own minds which seem to have gone AWOL being able to make sense of things can almost be an impossible act. It is time mentally for some recuperation. With the awakening of my senses this is already underway. The pressures are off and I can breath again. We rest, we recover, we take a step followed by another and we get on with it. We get on with what comes next. Something always comes next, how you experience it is up to you.

Tag: storms

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