August 31, 2019:
Then at last, the friends that weren't.
A large part of my happiness in that period flowed from the strength of my peer networks. I had my activist circle and my musician circle, both groups thought highly of me, there was positive feedback, and, from the musicians, a certain uninhibited joy. It was the only period when I've received so much approbation. Approval has not been my usual mode.
But the musicians were unreliable, which I learned to my cost. I left my home, the city I loved, my activist friends, the sunshine, the vibrant colors, for a cold gray expensive city where I knew no-one while my musicians reneged. There'd been promises of bands and recordings and partnerships, yet in the end they bounced, partly from family responsibilities, partly from sheer selfishness.
Leaving me heartbroken in a place without sunlight where even absent depression the world is gray; without peers, without employment, without funds. Forced to cohabit with one after another dishonorable flatmate who stole or who behaved with such egregious disrespect that it was a nightmare to be "home". In a flat crawling with roaches owned by dishonest racist landlords, in a city I disliked and still dislike, in the aftermath of mental breakdown.
Here is where the photos change. You can see that I'm trying, also that I'm gasping, strangled by depression, struggling to cope.
Where at last the friends that weren't are nowhere to be seen.