You know that feeling when you’re in a room full of people and everyone seems to be vibrating? Like they’re all tuned into some low-frequency hum that you just can't hear? I think maybe I spent my entire twenties trying to find the volume knob for that. I was at university, supposedly in the prime of my life, studying fine arts and living on nothing but caffeine and cheap cigarettes because that was the "vibe" we were all cultivating. You sit in those crowded, dim kitchens until 4 AM talking about semiotics or the way the light hits a particular brushstroke in a Caravaggio, and your brain is just on FIRE. It’s better than any drug, honestly. But then the person sitting across from you leans in, and they have that look—that sort of heavy, expectant hunger—and you just... feel nothing. Not even a flick of interest. Just a blank page where the reaction is supposed to be. It’s weird how you can absolutely adore the way someone’s mind functions but feel a total lack of pull toward their physical self. I remember this guy, Elias. We were in the same studio block. He was brilliant, truly. He could deconstruct a piece of installation art better than our professors. We’d spend hours at the pub or walking through the city at night, just trading ideas like they were currency. It felt like we were one person sometimes, just two halves of a singular, complex thought. He’d get so close to me that I could smell the faint scent of linseed oil on his sleeves, and he’d touch my arm to make a point about some obscure theory, and I would just... look at his hand. Like it was a tool. Like, oh, those are fingers. They perform a function. But I didn't want them anywhere near me in the way he clearly wanted. I guess I didn't want anyone near me like that. I think maybe you start to wonder if you’re broken after a while. You listen to your friends in the dorms recount these messy, visceral stories about someone they met at a club or a guy from the lit department, and they’re so ALIVE with the telling of it. Even the bad experiences have this weight to them, this heat. I’d sit there and nod and try to mimic the right expressions. I’d say things like, "Yeah, he sounds like a lot," or "Wow, I bet that was intense." But inside, I was just thinking about the painting I wanted to finish or a book I’d started. I don't know if this counts as being cold. I think I just don't have the right hardware installed. It’s like everyone else got the full package and I just got the logic board. So you try to perform. You find someone who checks all the boxes—someone who knows your niche references to 90s experimental film and shares your disdain for commercialism—and you decide that this is it. You tell yourself that the physical stuff is something you’ll just... learn. Like a second language. I remember staying over at someone's flat once, the air in the room feeling thick and heavy with expectation, and I was just staring at the peeling wallpaper. They were talking about their "needs" and their "connection," and I was just analyzing the structural integrity of their bookshelf. It’s almost funny, if it wasn't so exhausting to live through. I felt like a total fraud. A very articulate, very well-read fraud. Now I’m in my late thirties and the "struggling artist" thing isn't a personality anymore, it’s just a financial disaster. I’m working three different freelance design gigs just to keep my studio space, and honestly, the intellectual stimulation doesn't sustain you the way you thought it would when you were twenty-one. You realize that while you were waiting for that "spark" to finally ignite, everyone else was building lives and having families and, I don't know, actually FEELING things. I spend most of my days alone now, surrounded by canvas and screens, and sometimes the silence is so heavy it feels like it’s pressing on my chest. I think I chose the ideas over the people, and now I just have a lot of theories and a very quiet house. I don't know if I’m describing this right. Maybe I’m just jaded or maybe I’ve just been tired for fifteen years straight. I see people on the street, or at the gallery openings I can barely afford to show at, and they have this... electricity. It looks like a lot of work, to be honest. But then I go home and I think about those long nights in the university library, and I realize I was chasing a ghost. I wanted to be understood, but I never wanted to be *held*. And now that I’m at the age where everyone is "settled," I feel like I missed a crucial memo. I have these incredible, deep conversations with colleagues or friends, but it always ends there. There’s a wall. I put it there, I think. Or maybe it was always there and I just never learned how to climb it. Sometimes you wonder if you just haven't met the "right" person, but that feels like a lie you tell to make yourself feel less like a ghost. I think I’m just built differently. Like some kind of architectural error where the architect forgot to put in the heating system. I can appreciate the aesthetic of a person, I can understand the brilliance of their mind, but the actual... wanting? It’s like trying to describe a color I’ve never seen. I used to think I was special for it. I thought it made me more "focused" or "pure" or some other pretentious nonsense. Now I just feel like I’m missing a limb that everyone else uses to stay balanced. It’s past 2am and my phone is dying and I’m just staring at this text box like it owes me an answer. I don't know why I’m even posting this. Maybe I’m hoping someone will say they get it. But even if they do, what then? We can sit in separate rooms and think about each other? THAT sounds about right for me. I’m just... I’m so tired of the flatness. I thought the intellectual life would be enough to fill the gaps, but the gaps are getting wider. I’ve spent my life being a spectator of other people's passion and I’m starting to think I’m just a very well-educated shadow. EVERYTHING feels a bit gray tonight. Just gray and quiet.