how does freedom feel?

Well, the click at the other end of the line is still there, but it appears that I'm more or less free to live my life as I choose (despite the pressure). That line from the Carmen book rings very true. And all over smoking flowers and taking medicinal psychedelics... vaffanculo to my doubters and those too chicken to stand up for the drugs. As for those who blame my actions on the drugs: what the fuck is wrong with those people? I was always a prick, always critical, and coming out cost me my innocence, so now I'm hard. - I won my freedom ('dragged my way out' was how a friend put it 🤣), but that's only a half-truth. I'm free, but I'm still being surveilled.

That's not freedom. And I simply don't wish to share that xp with my privileged fairweather friends - that's a show of privilege on their parts, and my story isn't for their edification.

They're only into me now that I'm Māori - though, as I say, I don't class myself as Māori: I'm just the Pākehā who agrees with them. I may have some whakapapa, but ultimately I was raised Pākehā, with Māori culture around me. 😛 - Seriously, I'd rather move, but it's not something I can do overnight.

I didn't want to win Jane. I'd realised when my Dad died that our relationship was slightly odd. 😅

As I say, though, I saw her as a mother figure more than a romantic partner. She was there for me when my real Mum was off the deep end following my parent's divorce. I share those clips with lots of my friends, because I like musicals.