Ten years out, back on, and none of the words are the same
Posted as back_after_ten_years
- Looking for
- somebody to be a beginner alongside, again
- Experience
- Eight busy years in my thirties, then ten years of nothing.
- Around
- south east, London
I stopped in my early thirties for the usual reason, which is that two small children arrive and every other part of your life goes into a cupboard for a decade.
They are teenagers now, the cupboard is open, and I have discovered that the scene I knew has been comprehensively rewritten. Everything is on phones. Nobody puts up notices anywhere. Half the words are new and the other half have changed meaning slightly, which is worse. I asked somebody what a term meant and got the sort of look you give a tourist.
Forty four, south east, and by the standards of my thirties I was experienced. By current standards I am a novice with strong opinions, which I am aware is the most annoying combination available. What I want is one person to work it out with. Switch, and I was firmly on one side of that before and am genuinely not sure now, which I find interesting rather than worrying.
What I have not worked out is how to meet anybody. In my thirties you turned up somewhere and got talking. Now it all appears to happen through a screen first, and I am told that is safer and I believe it, and I still find it a strange way round.
Practical: I have my own place, the children are with their father alternate weekends, and those are the only nights I can be unreliable about what time I get home. I will admit that I feel forty four on this board. Everyone in the photographs looks about twelve. If you are also somewhere in the middle of your life and slightly startled to be doing this again, we would probably have plenty to talk about.