My day started off so well until I checked my email and saw another rejection. It stung extra hard this time because I both know where I went wrong but also thought I still didn't do too bad otherwise, and then the double punch, they explicitly told me more people passed the first stage than didn't but whatever. I underestimated the importance of the impromptu phone interview, both in timing and in significance. When an interviewer asks abut why you want the job, say more than I just graduated and I need money. I wish I was joking but I panicked and truly these were very similar words to what I uttered from my mouth.

I've come to quickly realise I find it very difficult to feign excitement, I've been trying to rawdog these interviews thinking that by forcing myself to go in with little preparation I will get better at thinking on my toes... that and that I'm just lazy. However, no more, I will draft up a script to remember so that every question they throw at me I will have an answer for.

All I've been doing recently is watch Northernlion play the Chinese FMV game Road to Empress (its kino) and playing Minecraft, I'm living an identical life as to when I was a child a decade ago, only instead of homework I worry about, its the feeling of amounting to nothing and not knowing where to go in life.

The more I think about my future the more I think about doing a masters. But then, what though? It would be a mistake to pursue a masters without not knowing what I want to do. Should I go further down the biology path, or maybe go into that anthropology program I thought about a few months ago, but with what job prospects? What do I want to do? And why are masters so damn expensive?

At some point I've got to commit to something.

Only a couple years into adulthood have swept me off my feet, only I still have yet to land.

Ahh whatever, I'm still young, I'll figure it out, hopefully, HOPEFULLY, HOPEFULLY, HOPEFULLY.

***

(Minecraft is WAY harder than I remembered, 5 minutes for items to despawn is crazy punishing and I'm horrible at navigating, my diamonds man, my diamonds...)

It began with a clearing of the throat and a soft irritation in my pharynx. Maybe I ate something too quickly or it scraped on the way down. whatever it was it just didn't seem to leave. I thought nothing of it during the day, all things going as they usually do, as in doing nothing at all, until it got to night, the time when I usually work up a sweat before I shower. Only this time I couldn't bring myself to work out at all. It was then that it formed in my mind that I might have something, and that this something may have something to do with the fact that both my siblings are ill. I forwent any exercise and stirred in the shower. I drank some cold medicine before bed in anticipation, I had been sick the month before and even the month prior to that and I didn't want to be sick for a THIRD month in a row, not only that but I had some plans to go to out on Saturday.

Alas, I awoke that morning with a sharp stinging pain in my throat, a runny nose and a weariness that revealed at once, all was not well. The first and second days were spent sleeping, drinking medicine and watching videos, not really even listening, just having something to hear while I zone out awake. Even all the previous times I was sick, I wasn't this lethargic, but here I was unable to do almost any deeper cognitive thinking. I tried hard to get better quickly, paracetamol every 4 hours, lots of water, but the sickness just wouldn't budge, in fact it felt like it was getting worse.

On the third day I was much better than the days prior, mostly, I could think, and I found myself being utterly bored, too lethargic too move around but too conscious to accept doing nothing. As such, seeking some stimulation, I clicked upon the Minecraft launcher for the first time in 4 years and realised much had changed since I last played Minecraft properly.

Of course, I could not just play Minecraft properly and so I took it upon my self to get some mods and some shaders, and I thought, since I last played, I can kinda draw now, why don't I make my own skin? And thus, the first day playing Minecraft, and the third day being ill, I played almost no Minecraft.

While sometimes I felt bad that I did nothing all day but sleep and languidly play games, I was salved by the fact that is was all I could do, and after months of anguishing over my lack of drive to find a direction in life, these days of doing nothing with no guilt were nice.

Once I had finally recovered I took a walk outside to the park near my house as it was a beautiful day and noticed they cleared much of the tall grass and I wish I brought my camera with me, for now I guess I'll settle with this phone picture. Its not that my camera is particularly high quality or anything, in fact my camera is much worse than my phone, but pictures mean more when taken with a camera, something greater is captured even with lower fidelity.

While on my walk I stopped by this big tree on the side of the path, with leaves fallen on the ground and plenty of open space around it. There, I backed myself on the opposite end of the path and pulled out my notebook, instinctively I looked to see if anyone was to the left or right of me, and I quickly corrected myself, telling myself to accept that people will pass and to live past the fear of being percieved.

As I began sketching, surprisingly not too many people passed me by, one was an older man on the phone, who I nodded my head and exhaled from my mouth something that half resembled a greeting and in return he nodded back. Eventually I stopped sketching once I felt my legs start to buckle, though mostly recovered, I was ill not even a week ago, I've yet to regain my strength and stamina and so I went back home.