Everything I had was in one place. Friends, arrangements, the people who would quietly tell me whether somebody was worth meeting. Then I fell out with somebody well liked and within a month I was not exactly barred from anything, I was simply not included in anything either. That is what a monopoly does. The platform is not the problem. The absence of a second one is.
Thirty eight, east London, switch, ten years in. I am not going to relitigate the argument here. I was partly wrong, they were partly wrong, and neither of us behaved well in front of an audience.
What I have learned since is that a city where everybody serious is in one place is wonderful right up until you are on the wrong side of it. Somewhere with three real platforms I would have moved across and started again. Here, moving means the small quiet corners with a hundred people in them, which is exactly where I now am.
So this is a long advert on a quiet board, which is a fair description of starting over. I want one person who takes this seriously, either direction, ongoing, with an actual structure to it.
Not looking to be told to apologise to somebody who does not want to hear from me. Not looking for anybody who wants the gossip. And not looking to rebuild an entire social life out of one relationship, which was arguably the original mistake.