December 2025

Birthday. Alone. Not lonely. Not happy. Not unhappy. Learning to be alone today. Surrounded by millions in a city buzzing with life. In a way, we’re always alone. Perhaps the difference between being alone and loneliness can be found in this learned skill.

My fingers smell of cigarettes. I never expected they would be so difficult to obtain. I never expected something could be exactly as I had imagined and surprise me completely.

Camus’ cahiers¹ as an antidote to life. I try to look at him sympathetically and critically. Much of it resonates, some of it disgusts me. I try to look at him humanely. At times there’s this self awareness in his notes, a through line of realisations. Does that make it better? Does that make it worse? When he considers himself incapable of love, is that a punishment to himself or the people in his life?

1. “Laatste cahiers 1951-1959” by Albert Camus (trans. Tatjana Daan), De Arbeiderspers ↩︎