You ever just… move your whole life, like, pick it up and plunk it down somewhere new, for a job you *thought* would be a big deal, a real step up? I don't know if this counts as a confession, really. It’s not a secret exactly, just… something I don’t talk about. I’m 53. Fifty-three. And I moved to this city, what, six months ago? Eight? Time kinda blurs. New role, new company, all the bells and whistles. And I figured, you know, I’d meet people. Like, I’m good at my job, I’m… okay. I’m not a monster. But it’s impossible. Absolutely impossible. Everyone here, they’ve known each other since kindergarten, or uni, or their kids go to the same private school and their parents played golf together. It’s like a brick wall. Like, I’ll try, you know? Happy hour invitations, sure. Weekend coffee, absolutely. And it’s always pleasant. Everyone’s perfectly nice. But it never goes anywhere. It’s like a conversation you have with an empty chair. They talk *around* me, not *to* me. Or they just… stop inviting me. And it’s not even a big deal. It just… is. Sometimes you just… scroll through social media, seeing people you barely remember from high school having these vibrant, busy lives, and you think, what am I doing wrong? I’m supposed to be at the age where I’ve got my posse, my crew, my people. Instead, it’s just me and… my phone. The only consistent human interaction is with my mum. Bless her heart. She’s getting… fuzzy. Every call is like pulling teeth to remind her who I am and where I am. And then the guilt starts. Why aren’t you closer? Why aren’t you there? And I try to explain, again, about the job, the move, the whole thing. But it just sounds like excuses. Even to me. It’s like I traded one set of problems for another, and I don't know if this one is… better. I don't know if any of this is making sense. You just… sit in your new, perfectly nice apartment, in your new, perfectly quiet neighbourhood, and you watch some streaming show you don’t even care about, and you wonder if you made the wrong bet. On everything. On the job, on moving, on… being this person. Because who *is* this person? This person who can’t make a single friend past superficial work pleasantries. This person whose mum is slowly fading and who isn’t there to hold her hand. This person who sits alone on a Saturday night and thinks, oh well. It's fine. It's just… fine. It's always just fine. And that's maybe the worst part. That it doesn't even feel like it *should* hurt more than it does.