One, two, three, four, five. And it just goes on.

I find myself repeating those numbers almost every single day. It was a method that I learned a few years back and have been using it ever since. Nothing else seemed to be working, yet this one did. So I stuck with it.

Every time I feel anxious, or if I’m about to have a panic attack or something like that, then I slowly count to thirty. Taking a pause every time to acknowledge that I’m actually breathing. I’m not going to lie, it helps a lot. But that doesn’t mean that it helps all the time.

Though no one else can usually hear me, to refrain from making it worse, if I’m in a public place then I whisper it to myself. If it’s noisy then I cover at least one or both of my ears, it blocks out the noise easier. I obviously have been given weird looks, which never helps. But a guys gotta do what a guys gotta do to hopefully stay alive, right? Right.

Getting up from bed, after spending the last ten minutes staring at the ceiling. I went to the bathroom to take a shower.

I made the water cold, it wakes me up better. If I showered with hot water, then I would just feel even worse. I got a small amount of sleep once again, maybe an hour? Two hours? Three if I was lucky, but I’m not really sure. I’ve always struggled with sleep, but I’ve learnt to get used to that. Not sleeping at all is better than sleeping and having nightmares.

I finished my shower, got my clothes and dressed. Then went to my kitchen to get some food. I lost most of my appetite recently, well, it’s been that way for a short while now. But nothing good will come if I just stop eating, so I have to eat to keep myself healthy. I’m already thin as it is, what if I cause people to worry?

Huh, funny. It’s not like there’s people in my life to worry about me anyway.

I finished my breakfast and got a hair tie before going to the mirror and tying my hair into a high ponytail. I’ve always gotten comments about my long hair, especially the colour. But I don’t really care much, or I do, maybe that’s just an excuse. Since it does bother me, though I act like it doesn’t.

I packed one of my backpacks with some things that were useful to me before leaving, then made sure I had everything. After grabbing my tag and bag on the way and slipping it around my neck, I walked to the door and left my apartment.

. . .

While walking to my location, I was contemplating whether or not I should call a taxi. I chose not to, I’m aware that usually you only exchange a few words or small talk. Still, I’m not good at talking to others, never have been. Not going to be anytime soon, probably ever.

It was still fairly early. Almost 7am. I start work at 9, but I wanted to catch the sunrise so left earlier anyway.

I work at a small ice cream shop by the beach. It’s in the middle of being popular and not being popular. Some days, there are a lot of people while on some other days it’s pretty quiet. God how I hate the days where there’s a lot of people.

It doesn’t help that I hate the beach. It’s great for taking pictures and stuff like that since it’s really beautiful sometimes. But considering that there are always tons of people there, the fact that it always reeks and the seagulls. The fucking seagulls. Probably one of the most annoying creatures to ever exist on this planet. Nothing will ever change my mind about that.

Roughly an hour later I arrived, finally. Well, since it was still early I ended up going to the bridge across from the shop. It’s a long stone bridge that crosses over sea.

Since it was only just past 8, there were hardly any people. Only some in the distance but that didn’t bother me too much. It was cold this morning, but it’s probably going to get hotter.

I looked at the blinding sun that was to my left. Blinding, literally. I took out the camera in my bag. I made sure there was no dust on the lens. Pointing it in the location that I wanted to take the picture, I made sure the lighting was right and then took it.

I looked at it immediately after.

Huh, not bad August.

After that I just strolled around the area that I knew from head to toe, until I had to start heading back to the shop at least.

I hope today is a quiet day.