Dear diary…

On perception and reality.

Dear diary,

Firstly I have missed you. You will know that stuff is going on when I don’t write these dear diary pieces. When it’s all kicking off and it’s too contentious to write, I shut up and busy myself with what your 90’s Body Shop choices say about you.

I’ve been thinking a lot about perception and reality. And the chasm between the two. First bitchfest of the day is about an old colleague of mine. She was awful. Utterly unpleasant. I can’t even begin to describe how much she hated me and wasn’t afraid to show it. I respected her for that. Imagine being so straightforward? She never smiled in my presence, often sat silently, judging in the Monday meeting. She found my exuberance annoying of that I am sure. So I became bigger and more technicolour, raging against her. She was the epitome of demure and mindful.

Anyway, one day after I did something that annoyed her more than ever before, she emailed me and told me to ‘find some time in her diary and book a meeting room’. Now you’d be forgiven for thinking she was my boss, but she wasn’t. She was my peer. But I did it anyway, begrudgingly. A form of self flagellation?

The meeting made me cry. Not in her presence I hasten to add. She went through a list of all the things wrong with me and why I did not deserve the role I had and how she COULD HAVE WORKED IN LONDON IF SHE’D WANTED TO BUT HATED LONDON AND THE PEOPLE THERE SO HADN’T. All I could think about was Sartre and the concept of living in Bad Faith, the insanity of the ‘could have’ when one hadn’t. I didn’t voice my concerns thank f*ck.

Maybe she was right (definitely not about the London thing ha ha). I can see now she might have had a point. I remember trying to defend myself, pointing out the experience I had. She replied with a line that I ridiculed her for later that evening after watching Russell Brand perform stand up (that recollection hasn’t aged well, huh?), “perception is reality Holly”. I think I probably didn’t get what she meant. It was word salad to me.

Anyway. Moving on to another cringe inducing memory. This time it’s a playground one. A mum friend informed me that another mum from the school had been describing me as ‘chaotic’. I felt sad and seen but smiled anyway. These days I am almost past the point of necessary playground friendships and baulk at the obsessive way I tried to force kinship with women who just happened to have sex in the same 12 month period as me. The parental playground hub is just a more ancient version of the one we endured as kids. Trying to foster friendships with people who are geographically similarly located and of the same age. Bonkers isn’t it?

But this mum who described me as chaotic, I wanted her to like me. Despite her clearly finding me irritating. No one ever describes another person as chaotic without finding them irritating. It’s a grand euphemism isn’t it? I wanted to tell her that I’m not chaotic, I’m not, I’m not, I’m not. She didn’t know me well enough to make this judgement call. Except perception is reality. She saw me as chaotic and therefore I was chaotic. (I am a bit but also not, too).

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And then, we come to another person, or people who have been discussing me, outlining my personality. I recently learnt that my ex