I was in therapy for 10 weeks because for months prior to the 10 weeks I had not felt great, and then things felt worse, and I wanted to be better for you, and for myself. You can read all of the entries in my therapy journal.

I am thinking about the need to post vulnerably online, and my inability to share that vulnerability with someone else in the physical world. I am thinking about how memoir has overtaken fiction in the world, how I have never been able to write fiction but have always been able to write myself. and always wanted truth from that. and how I think I've failed, that there is betrayal in always imagining an audience, that if the audience exists beyond yourself, you change (you are observed, thus you are changed). I think I have lost because of this.

We are obsessed with Me and You and Everyone Else. What we really need is some FICTION. A good story. There can still be truth, of course. It's more exciting if there is.

What do I do, when I've only ever written about myself? When I've always written about myself while thinking of others? How do I stop thinking of others? How do I stop thinking of me? How do I read myself for me? How do I become the sole member of the audience?

I want to learn. I want to learn.

What I love about the lottery is it’s a small tax to be able to dream for a few hours. To live completely outside of reality, an imagined future where millions land in your lap. Today I bought a lottery ticket. I bought that ticket to dream. It was a £63 million jackpot in the EuroMillions, a jackpot not to be sniffed at. I thought about everything I’d do with the money. I would like property, it seems to be one of the main things that people buy when they have millions. It’s expensive and hard to get, and primed to be worth even more in the future. My best friend and his brother have just moved in with one another. The house is fine. I’d tell them that I won the lottery, as well as my family. I wouldn’t tell anyone else. I’m full of fears. I’d tell them that I’ll pay off the rest of their rent so they can move in with me. I’d look for a large house, detached, with a garden. Preferably 4 bedrooms: one for me, one each for them, one spare room. I’d want a basement. Ever since I was a child I wanted a basement. I said, once, that I would know that I had made it (succeeded) in life was that I had a basement. That felt very English. No one in England has a basement. Everyone in America has or has had a basement. I had a basement at one time, in an old house, but mushrooms grew out of it, and if you were down in it for too long you’d feel your lungs begin to collapse. I don’t count that as a basement. It was not a symbol of success. That house would be in London, but I’d want a countryside place too. This would be one for holidays, for escapes, for family gatherings. It’s cheaper to get large properties in the countryside, sometimes. So, that’s what I’d do. I’d buy a couple of shop fronts, next to each other, in the nearest town. I’d make them into bookshops. I’d hire college girls with academic aspirations and strange beautiful faces and I’d give them good wages. I’d let them read or do work. I wouldn’t really need the place to be profitable. It probably wouldn’t be. I’d buy the whole building, so the homes above the shop fronts would be mine too. I’d make them into cheap accommodation for artists and bands to stay in. Lowlifes. It would be some way of giving back to the arts. It’s something I’d think ‘I wish I had this when I was a lowlife’. I’d let them trash the place. Then I’d get sick and tired of paying the cleaners fee, because I’d know the cleaners resented the pre-cum doused condoms and spilt lines of coke, the skid marks up the toilet seat and bath, even when I paid them well. I’d start to get nervous about what they thought of me. That they’d report the place to the police. I would become paranoid. I’d kick the artists and the musicians and the cleaners out. I’d let a millennial couple move in. The husband is a graphic designer, but it’s for an agency that pays well, he’s not freelance. She walks dogs. Before I got to the countryside, I’d want to sort my home life out first. My city life. I’d need to furnish the house. I’d give my best friend and his brother a large sum of money and tell them to furnish their rooms how they please. I’d do the living room. I’d like a fireplace in the living room. I’d spend money making this happen, if the house I bought earlier didn’t have one, because of some idiotic oversight. An oversight that can definitely happen when you speedily try to buy a house. I wanted to get the deal over with, but I was forgetting about the fireplace. I’d buy a whole new wardrobe. I don’t love my clothes. All of them could go. I’d sit outside of my current house selling them all. If someone was lovely to me I’d give them something for free. The only people who go past my house are middle class parents, to the pre-school at the end of the road. It’s in a church that has been destroyed, there is nothing Holy about it now, it is painted white and scaffolding sits over the roof. It used to be very beautiful. The parents wouldn’t want any of the clothes. I’d beg them to take them. Some would take pity on me. I’d get rid of everything. I’d start anew. I want to buy clothes from Enfant Riches Deprimes. They’re currently selling a tie for $1,000. That is objectively stupid. It has a Star of David on it. I asked Claude to tell me how much it would cost to buy their new collection in full. Claude couldn’t work out how to scroll down the webpage, but the 20 items it found totalled $37,000. That’s objectively stupid. I’d probably buy most of it. I’d go to a pub in my new clothes. I’d probably look like a beg, like a twat. I’d give the bar staff a disgusting tip. I’d put £1,000 behind the bar as a tab, I’d let anyone use it. I’d be there with a girl I used to date but I don’t want to date her anymore we’re just friends and it’s better that way but I think she’d like the me with money so it would be fun to do this with her. It would make me feel interesting and fashionable, because she is interesting and fashionable and dark and mysterious. We’d wait until close, or until all the money was used up, and then we’d leave. I’d be beautifully drunk. I’d put her in a taxi home, because I’d fear she’d be robbed, or kidnapped, going home alone, and I don’t want to go home with her, we’re just friends, it’s better that way. I’d give her the money for the taxi and some more for a tip. I’d threaten to torture the driver in an extremely graphic way if he touched her or if anything happened to her. She’d smile at that, and he’d avert his eyes and drive on. I’d go home and jack off. Some things would never change. I’d have to buy a nice old car. New cars are all ugly. My Dad wants to be a taxi driver, so I’d buy him a nice new electric car. He doesn’t really understand technology, it makes him angry. He calls Alexa a ‘stupid cow’. He really, really shouts at it. It makes me worry. So I couldn’t get him a Tesla. I don’t know any other electric cars. I’d upgrade my Claude plan to Max and ask it what car would be best to buy my Father. It would tell me, and it would be right. I’d buy my Mother anything she wanted. My sister too, although she doesn’t ask for much. She’s got it pretty sorted out, it seems. My brother is obsessed with money. He think he’s going to work hard enough to be a millionaire. He think it’s possible. He doesn’t believe in the lottery. Currently to make money he sells AI prompts so people can deepfake beautiful rich looking boys and girls to sell their products or their courses. He’s selling success. He’s got the right idea. I asked him how much he made from it so far, after he excitedly told me about it. ‘£7’, he told me. ‘Maybe a bit less, after fees’. ‘That’s from just 2 people buying prompts’. He said that it’s proof people will buy anything. They could’ve bought a lottery ticket with that money. They could’ve been dreaming. I’d go to a hospital for private healthcare. I’d make them check every part of me. Recently I haven’t been able to breathe well. I pick my nose and blood comes out of the left side nostril every time. I think when it begins to happen in the right nostril I’ll be concerned. I get strange shakes and anxiety attacks. I’m very nervous about my health. They’d attach a million wires to me, they’d prod and probe me, they’d take my blood, I’d feel faint. They’d tell me everything is normal. They’d tell me my heart has a slightly offbeat rhythm, but it’s not actually going to affect me. I’d tell them my Dad has the same thing. They’d tell me that that makes sense. They’d take a large sum of money from me. I’d feel better. I’d probably go insane. I don’t feel very good at the moment. It’s nice to dream. I wonder if this situation happening in reality would push me over the edge. Sixty-three million pounds. The ticket cost me £2.50. It felt, for a few hours, that I had that £63 million. That it was just waiting for me. The numbers were announced. I checked my ticket. Nothing. It was worth the money.