More journal excerpts – September and October 2026

The absence of quiet here in the fourth-floor Lavender apartment at just after 6am is not an issue, as I explained in my last excerpt. The sounds are welcome. And it’s nice to see my partner with others he relates to the same as me. He feels free to express exasperation with people he is closest to. A measure of his closeness. Fun to observe how they respond, fun to enjoy a reprieve from his exasperation too.

It is 7am and dark outside. Angry rain clouds are blocking out the sun. I expect, like yesterday morning, a brief downpour, maybe for twenty minutes, and clear weather for the rest of the day. In the meantime I find out I don’t need to understand what people are saying to enjoy a cooking program on television. Food speaks for itself.

Nepal has shown that humans have no control over nature. Nature wins in the end. That said, the impact of natural disasters on communities is food for troubled thought.

At a party yesterday, watching a bunch of kids play basketball in a cramped space, the sportsman in me, still alive and well, wondered how he’d go trying to sink a few three pointers. The old man I have become told him not to be silly. Ten years ago the sportsman would have prevailed.

I don’t force myself on the world. I am more successful these days at enjoying the world around me without ego-driven comparisons. Less affected by the muddy reality that positions me unfavourably beside those who excel at their craft. More inclined to revel in the sheer enjoyment of being and doing, no matter at what level. Comparison with others is a downward spiral. It replaces fulfilment and a life well-lived with a wasteland of striving and dedication that amount to nothing, not recognising that it is the striving and dedication that nourishes my soul. Satisfaction and a sense of achievement are low-hanging fruit. All I need to do is adjust my gaze.

Maintain anger and outrage at your peril. Allow them to influence your behaviour, and become a social pariah. Allow them to influence your decisions, and find destruction and calamity heaped upon you. Be guided by what you love, by what is positive in your life, and see yourself prosper. Needless to say, include yourself in what you love. What is it about the inhabitants of rich countries like Australia that makes them prefer anger and outrage over happiness, over contentment? Affluent societies are steeped in the ingredients of contentment.

What do I become when everything material is stripped off me, and I am left with enough only to afford basic needs. Let’s see. Libraries are free. I’ll have books to read, and I’ll be able to listen to music. A notebook and ballpoint pen are near enough to free. Physical exercise doesn’t cost anything. Nourishing food doesn’t need to be expensive. The only excess I’ll crave is a piano in my home. And then my life will be complete. Like it is now, but without all the stuff I possess which I don’t really need. What about my indulgences of travel and trekking in spectacular mountainous regions like Tiger Leaping Gorge? These belong in my compendium of luxuries, to be enjoyed a few times every year. Occasional luxuries don’t define me. What does are the recurring moments of my everyday life, moments that cost nothing, moments that require no material supplements.

I want to allow people the freedom to observe me, assess me, judge me, without forcing input into their heads. Such manipulation, successful or not, prevents me from learning valuable things about myself. And what if I achieve this sort of success! It’s nothing but a pyrrhic victory, of no value. Whenever I think I have fooled people, I feel a fake. How is that a win? How is that success? Be honest to others even with silence that neither deprecates nor applauds myself. Let my actions or the unprompted attestations of others be the only inputs to the world about me. As long as I try to manipulate the world, the world will deny me its riches.

Love of possessions corrupts. They are like the desire for things that have no innate value, like accolades, approval, nice clothes, shapely body. I am no saint. I am guilty as charged. I depend on the world to find me not physically unattractive. That dependency nurtures my self-image. I try not to judge, but I cannot help feeling sad for me, for this person who sees the truth of this but looks away.

I am no longer going to be ashamed of being a bit emotionally needy. I have been ashamed of it for as long as I have been alive. I have been reluctant to express it. I have sought self-sufficiency to cover up for it. It has been a good thing in many ways. It has served me well. I have looked after myself physically, mentally, financially. I have a long-term partner with whom I enjoy mutual devotion. I am as important to him as he is to me. But I am hesitant about seeking, even hoping for, automatic social inclusion because of my sexuality. I feel I’m regarded as something worse than normal because I am gay. Fortunately, my neediness does not tarnish my acceptance of myself as a normal human being.

For what it’s worth, here’s something. Homophobia is like racism. Like all forms of bigotry, I suspect. There is a conscious component, above ground, on a personal level easy to deal with. Openly bigoted people play no part in my life. The subterranean, subconscious component is harder to deal with. It is expressed by distance and denial. People insist they are not homophobic, but they are worried about a gay man getting too close to their children. Yes, it is so often the children that open a legitimate outlet for homophobia. This particular bigotry, this particular wilful ignorance, is cruel. It shuts out that gay relative, consigns them to the outer, to minimal, managed, maybe covertly scrutinised participation in an extended family, especially when the children are present.