Camouflage

I spent yesterday dressed in a black ninja suit, a matching balaclava and pair of goggles.
In the rain, amidst a horde of testosterone-fuelled adolescent boys. And girls, trying to be equally tough, or stupid, depending on how you look at it. Here’s some of the things I learned:

- You are not allowed to climb a tree and stay there for the entire game. My plans at being the sly sniper were therefore nipped in the bud.
- Injuries sustained by paintballs are 2 inches wide and concentric in design.
- They turn into dark purple bruises that can be proudly exhibited to friends and family.
- Even when you put your hands in the air as a gesture of surrender, some people will still shoot you. In the back.
- There is no court martial on paintballing camps. All the idiots go home free at the end of the day.

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Today is the first day of my summer holiday and I have a terrible vacuous feeling, coming with the very likely end of my relationship. All the hope and expectations attached to it are now dissolving; all the memories, bad and good, are to be stored away.
My response sways between staying in bed in the dark for a few weeks, and cleaning the flat in a giant wave of denial.

It’s losing hope that makes it so bad.