26th Birthday

It has become wearisome tradition that each year on the anniversary of slipping from ‘twixt my mother’s thighs I write a narcissistic and self-pitying summary of the year since my last birthday. Even though this blog has recently been less populated than a Fukushima hamlet, I feel compelled to continue the trend.

An amusing aside: in last year’s birthday entry I predicted that by my 26^th birthday I would have transformed into a bitter hermit. I annotated it with a picture of a heavily bedraggled bearded old man:

Well, shit.

So, to my 26^th year. A year in which so little happened to me that isn’t depressive or devoid of entertainment. This is going to be a blast.

I took a 3 week trip to China and Thailand, where I variously horrified locals with my disarming western stench, was molested by overly-sexed trans-women, and spectated on the ejaculation of a turtle from a bodily orifice I will never find attractive ever again.

Despite quitting the gym due to lack of funds, I’ve continued to nurture my substantive dream of being able to make my pecs dance. I am pleased to announce that my pectoral muscles can now shimmy like a pair of inebriated scallops.

I had sex once.

I took a selection of gaming consoles to a homeless shelter in London and wrote an article about it. In my head I was some kind of charitable wizard, sweeping in with gifts of technological wonder to rescue these poor unfortunates from the doldrums of their blighted existence. In actuality I was an ignorant middle-class white guy with dubious morals.

I quit online dating. Then I started again. Then I quit. Then I started again. Somewhere in the middle I scuppered a promising relationship, and only realised months later that it was entirely my fault (sorry, Ruth).

I featured in a mini-documentary on a major gaming website that looked at the relationships between depression and video games. Here I am, putting on my best intelligent voice! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4kLdNHiSVjU

As you’ll have already noticed, this post isn’t terribly funny. To be honest, it hasn’t been a terribly funny year. This was the year I came out of the depression closet (an abstract space decorated with skinned cats and perpetually out-of-order vending machines). I’ve almost certainly never been this unhappy thus far in my life. I’m now 26, and I’m single, jobless, living at home, fatter than I’ve been in years, and suffering with a mental illness. It isn’t my finest hour.

This is why I’ve all but abandoned this blog. Although it’s always had a fierce depressive streak, it was always intended to be funny. Self-deprecation is my finest talent. But when that self-deprecation is rooted in very real and profound self-hatred, it becomes increasingly difficult for me to laugh about it.

I am deeply depressed. In the past year I have realised its true extent. I am lonely. I am hopeless. I am broken. There is little more in the world that I hope for more than for the age of 26 to be the year in which I turn it all around.

I would also quite like to get my picture taken with Grumpy Cat.

Shelter Bowl: Gaming in a Homeless Shelter

A couple of months ago I took a selection of video games consoles to a homeless shelter in London. The idea was to write a really worthy piece about the power of gaming. What happened instead was that I had one of the most hilarious, terrifying, and heartwarming days of my life.

I usually wouldn't post this here. It's an article I've been paid for on an entertainment site. But the article is very much in the style of these blog posts. And it's probably better than anything I've written here. In fact, it's one of the best things I've ever written.

Please follow the link below if you'd like to read it. And if you're feeling really kind, please share it along.

Shelter Bowl: Gaming in a Homeless Shelter

Man Boobs: The Video Game

I've recently bought a swanky camcorder and other kit, in the vain hope that developing my video skills will make me more employable. This is the first thing I've made with it. It's a feminist satire, I guess. It's very silly.

Social Interactions That I Don't Understand

I’m not a very good human being. By that, I don’t mean that I’m a bad person. In fact, I am morally rather middle-ground. I will contentedly drown a kitten, but I won’t film it on my phone. Rather, I have never been able to master the quotidian social interactions that collectively make us well-adjusted human beings. Things like:

1   Encountering Someone You Know in the Street

With the prevalence of social media, this can be a problem for anyone with a tendency to add on Facebook anyone they’ve ever briefly met at a party/bought a car from/ejaculated into. Indeed, it’s a problem that can sometimes be solved simply by crossing the road or vaulting into a front garden. The difficulty arises when through a quirk of geography a fleeting encounter becomes inevitable. My face begins a complex launch sequence of approximated appropriate shapes. First, I must pretend not to see them until the very last second to avoid staring intensely at their approach as if I plan to hit them with a thunderous clothesline.

"GOOD TO SEE YOU AGAIN."

At the moment of contact, my repertoire consists of an erratic nod as if I’m suffering from dropsy, a taut smile indicative of a wandering butt-plug, and a torrent of sweat that steams from my armpits like alfresco urine on a cold winter’s day. Combined, it’s possible that I suffer a small stroke upon every encounter.

2     Kisses as Greetings

What I formerly believed to be the exclusive jurisdiction of chick-flicks and wankers, this touchy-feely greeting has sporadically, yet firmly, muscled its way into my life. It raises so many questions: single or double kiss? Which side should I start on? Will the recipient smell the Chilli Heatwave Doritos I ate for lunch?

Are there people out there who think me rude for neglecting to press my quivering lips against their flesh and call them darling? For all I know I should be kissing my kitchen fitter, smooching the self-checkout supervisor, and puckering up for my... Proctologist? (Excessive alliteration is another social barrier I don’t understand). Of course, if I misjudge kissing propriety I risk the screaming disdain of women. Which leads me to...

3     Sex

I’ll keep this brief, due to its personal nature and the fact that I’ve had barely any sex to complain about (I’ll leave that up to my unfortunate partners). My record speaks for itself. The first girl I ever kissed proceeded to throw a pint glass at my head. All of the women who have ever been unfortunate enough to have me love them promptly hooked up with my best friend of the time. My last few dates have ended with frosty silence/drug abuse/accusations of homosexuality. Sex remains an unfathomable enigma to me, the machinations of which instil a terror great enough for me to exile myself to a life of loneliness, regret, and masturbation to increasingly bizarre forms of pornography.

4      Not Talking About How Much I Hate Myself

A slew of internet searches and randomly encountered dating profiles have told me that I need to have confidence. This flies in the face of my usual technique when I run out of things to say: draw the conversation toward some negative aspect of my person.

“Sorry, when I’m nervous I sweat like a panful of well-prepared asparagus.”

“Oh man, I’m really bad at self-deprecating metaphors.”

“Have you noticed this weird rash on my face?”

“I think I have Weil’s disease.”

This isn’t limited to everyday conversations. I do it on dates. I do it in job interviews. If the opportunity arose, I’d probably do it during sex. My personality is constructed entirely on a foundation of self-hatred. As to why I can’t help but spew it at others, perhaps I’m just trying to be funny. Perhaps I want to push people away. Or perhaps I’m hoping that, one day, I’ll be able to believe the people who tell me I’m not as bad as all that.

Games vs. Depression - Mini Doc What I Am In

I'm well aware that this isn't something I'd normally post here. But it's my blog, so what are you going to do about it? The above video is a mini-documentary about how video games can help people suffering with depression. I feature in the video as the 'expert,' a term I'm dubious about. I just about qualify as some of the video is based on an article I wrote a few months back. There's not a lot of research in this area, so I probably am as close as you can find to an expert, really.

Anyway, please check it out. Not just because I'm in it, but because it's a brilliantly made film full of sad and inspiring stories.

We need to remove the stigma of mental health issues, and talking about films like this are a brilliant way to do so.

Vapid Attempt at Generic Enhancement

Do you remember when Ozzy and Kelly Osbourne released a cover of ‘Changes’ which was possibly the worst thing ever? Just in case you don’t, here’s a reminder:

Now you’ve towelled the blood from your ears, I should inform you that this song is the official theme for this blog entry. The excruciating execution, half-hearted sentiment, and misguided intentions match the forthcoming content uncannily.

I want to affect some kind of a change in my life. I call this my Vapid Attempt at Generic Enhancement, or VAGE. A life of sitting in my room watching my waist expand, my fear of sunlight burgeon, and my bin fill with coagulated tissues isn’t agreeing with my current state of mind. It’s like being locked in a cell with the one person I despise the most. I’m trying to convince myself that I hold the keys to improving my situation – that after 135 job applications I still have the power to find work; that my career as a writer can still take off; that I can conquer what is, suitably enough, the catalyst for VAGE – loneliness.

Recently I attempted to solve this by re-establishing contact with a girl whom I dated for a short time last summer. At the time I blamed her for the demise of the relationship – it coincided with the onset of a serious bout of depression, and I believed that she used it against me. It was ugly.

Now I realise that it was far more my fault than hers. Although I was genuinely struggling with depression, I used it as an excuse because I get scared in relationships. My longest lasted 3 months. I’ve never been in love. The medication I’ve been taking wreaks havoc with my sex drive. I don’t know how to be with someone. I let this fear get the better of me and I looked for a way out.

I got it into my head that she was the answer to my loneliness. My urge to apologise was genuine, but I also believed that I could revive our relationship. She had been kind, understanding, and, something so rare for me, we clicked. So I was surprised when she didn’t reply to my message. I pushed it further, forcing a polite reply or two, but nothing more. I don’t know what I expected – anger, perhaps, or cold disdain. Perhaps a part of me expected her to fling her underwear over my face. In fact, she reaffirmed what I already knew – that she’s kind and understanding. But that doesn’t mean that she wants to know me anymore.

This is the problem with VAGE – like Ozzy and Kelly Osbourne crooning at each other, it makes me insufferably misguided and painfully annoying. It’s a kind of selfishness I can’t escape because, despite knowing better, I can’t shake the belief that it’ll lead to my happiness, just like I always believed that losing weight would fix my life. It might be the case that this girl would make me happy – in so many ways, I believe she was good for me – but that doesn’t matter. By pursuing these blinkered ideas of how to fix my life, I’m only going to bring pain to myself and, far worse, to others. And I want to believe that I’m a better person than that.

How to Grow a Depression Beard

There are many ways to deal with the cloying symptoms of depression. You might talk about it with friends or family; take your mind off it by going for a nice walk or punching a goose; moan about it incessantly on Twitter/Facebook/your personal blog. 

Here is a (totally serious) guide to an alternative form of therapy: growing a depression beard. There is no better way to inform the world of your depression than by growing an unsightly, pungent bush of hair. Ladies, do not feel left out. Remember - a beard doesn't have to be on your face.

Stage 1: Escape Puberty

The infancy of a beard is shrouded in uncertainty. Will it grow in ginger? Will you be mistaken for the Yorkshire Ripper? Legitimate concerns, all. The pubescent phase of the beard is commonly reached within weeks of launch, and this is your only chance to turn back. If you look like a serial killer who should be dressed exclusively in animal semen, I encourage you to persist. If it grows in ginger, I insist that you shave.

Stage 2: No Going Back

By this stage the headlong descent into being a dishevelled outcast is as undeniable as the whirlpool of treacled despair sucking you into its fathomless maw. Now is the time to dress only in black and practice frowning, weeping, and stamping on kittens. Just like Queen Victoria. That picture right there? That's me smiling.

Stage 3: Delusions of Masculinity

This is a perilous stage in the genesis of a depression beard. When it blossoms into full-bodied, glossy adulthood, you might begin to feel kinship with your facial atrocity. You might even start to like yourself. This simply won't do. Take a few minutes of every hour to remind yourself of your shortcomings - your underdeveloped triceps, your unevenly haired buttocks, your incapacity to love - until the onset of Stage 4. No one feels good about Stage 4.

Stage 4: Pube Face

Here, weary journeyman, your quest is at an end. You have reached the zenith of the depression beard. In fact, you are now more beard than man. Children flee from you in the street. Baby possums attempt to suckle your face. Your jaw is indistinguishable from your groin. You are now wearing depression upon your face. Never again need you explain your affliction - not just because people will guess with a single glance, but because all humankind will shun you from its dwellings. You deserve it. Freak.

A SERIOUS NOTE TO END ON
This was, of course, a tongue-in-cheek take on depression. I should take this opportunity to thank all of my friends and family who, be it with bafflement, kind offers of help, or by simply ripping the piss out of me, have taken news of my depression with aplomb. In the past it has caused me to upset people, let people down, and sometimes kept me from being the good person I strive to be. It also led me to grow a horrific beard. To all those people, I apologise. The beard might now be gone, but to all my friends and family who are still with me, I thank you, from the very bottom of my heart.