Sauteed veggies with Spam wrapped with dried seaweed for breakfast. This was my only rice meal for today. It’s unintentional but I eat less these days as I forget to have lunch and will remember to eat by 3 pm. Then I will be too lazy or tired to eat dinner.

I started the day with a neat desk but it didn’t help with productivity. I only edited 3 stories and I had zero story to write as all my interviews remain pending. 😫

I rode my bike and then had my walk. Spent two hours outdoors and smelled the oncoming rain. Only that it didn’t rain. 😑

I know I will regret this later tonight when I have trouble sleeping but I treated myself with milk tea on the way home. It has been quite a while since I had been inside Moonleaf.

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While I was having my walk along University Avenue, I was thinking why I always thought I was an extrovert while I was growing up when all the while I exhibited introverted behaviors.

Yes, I was loud and was a chatterbox even until college. I was always surrounded by friends and was pretty sociable. But I really craved time alone and was quite happy wandering around by myself, taking walks around the campus, walking into the woods up the mountain, poking my head into book shops, writing and reading, being introspective. I would tag along with my mom to her trips but would be happy just being in the car looking outside the window, dreaming, creating stories in my head.

When I was transitioning to highschool and every summer vacation thereafter, I would just be content creating my routine around the house if I was not spending time in my grandparents’ house with my cousins. Doing chores, reading tons of books, watering the garden, using the ham radio, watching movies… It was boring but I didn’t give myself a chance to be bored. I made myself busy just pottering around the house.

So yes, I was an ambivert; I thrive when I was with people but I am also quite happy alone. However, I realized that the older I get, the more introverted I become. I can spend two weeks inside the house without going out. But that’s already a stretch.

It works for me as well because a journalist must genuinely like people to be interested in what they say because that’s where the stories come from. A journalist must love talking to people. However, a journalist must also be able to work alone because writing is a solo effort. I can spend the entire day being just inside my head as I draft my articles, especially if they’re long form articles.

I was thinking all of these because it struck me now that I am beginning to enjoy the NOW, this moment–this solo life. That I don’t need to consider somebody else in my decision-making. Yes I do miss the companionship and the conversations with a partner but I am now starting to appreciate the aloneness. It would be difficult now to give up this stability that I’m starting to feel. I think I am getting a little bit grounded.

It has been exactly five months and two days since he left. It’s still there.

But I am getting the hang of this. I am getting better. And growing more introverted is helping me a lot.