This is a sequel.

And if I’m being honest, I thought this would be a sequel I was going to write a lot later but I think that’s a function of an unbridled optimism that probably needs to become bridled, but I’m getting a little ahead of myself.

Objectively speaking, 2025 was a bad year for me. My anxiety reached new heights. I had my heart broken just a smidge. Generative AI had begun to become even more invasive in every aspect of society to the point where I was not given the opportunity to opt out, and while I would not know the full extent to which the stupidest iteration of technology would make my life miserable, there were exactly two things that it did for me.

1) It made me okay with making art again. Good art. Bad art. Mid art. At least it would be mine, at least it would be human (more detail in the hyperlink above).

2) It got me off the apps.

See, in the aftermath of failed attempts at trying to engineer meet cutes and a sideways confession, I found myself on Hinge and Bumble, and let it be known that both Hinge and Bumble are terrible places. I don’t know which hell metaphor is the most apt (there’s an argument for all of them), but I could tell that the mental state was not particularly stable when I was swiping through a dirge of profiles. However, I am an introvert and the alternative would be going to bars and being social, so the apps were the compromise, the half measure, the attempt.

And that was until the apps added the same dumb sparkles you see everywhere with the same dumb fucking question “do you want to use AI to improve your profile?”

The answer was a resounding FUCK NO, and I uninstalled the apps right then and there and realized I would not find what I was looking for in the black mirror I kept in my pocket.

This eventually led to finding seemingly the only queer speed dating event in all of St. Louis, at least one that seemed expressively friendly to non-binary folks, so I went to one in the summer. And I didn’t hate it. It didn’t produce any meaningful matches, but I didn’t hate it, and I said to myself if there was another event, I’d probably go to it.

And then there was another event in November, so I went to the bar on a cold night far too late and sat at the bar watching episodes of Goosebumps while the lesbian speed dating event wrapped up and I nursed a hot apple cider asking silly questions like “what’s scarier: Piano Lessons That Kill You or being known?” Of course, the correct answer is being known.

I met someone that night. And for a few months, we dated and it was great. It was not without its complications, but it was great. And I saw a line. I saw a little farther into the future and I liked what I saw.

And then I asked the question if she saw the same thing, and it turned out the answer was no.

There is a version of the story that could have existed. That would have still been tucked away in the recesses of my mind. Still an inkling and in formulation. One that would need more expressed permission to divulge more specific details. That version no longer exists and that’s okay.

I can’t say it’s how I wanted the story to go, but that’s life innit?

Sometime last year, I started listening to the Front Bottoms on repeat. I latched onto this lyric in particular: “I’ll take what I am given / I’ll take what I can get / but we both know that I’ll need more.”

Maybe we call that foreshadowing? Maybe we call it narrative appropriateness? Who’s to say at this point?

I’m taking this week to be abstractly sad. Because as with every relationship, I did learn something about myself and about what I want. And it sucks. And it stings. And it’s bittersweet.

But I am better for it.

I told my therapist back in December about all of this, and I noted “even if it doesn’t work out, I at least I have hope.” And somehow, throughout all of this weirdness, I do still have hope.

The older I get, the less I believe in “The One.” The less credence I give to the idea of soul mates and true love. And that’s not because I’m not a romantic. I, unfortunately, am un-repentantly one. But I don’t think love like that just exists ambiently. I think it’s built. I think it’s forged. I think it’s less found and more fostered. I think this is all a convoluted match game of expectations, and since it is in fact a game, you have to play.

I think when Hinge/Bumble asked “do you want to use AI to improve your profile”, I read “do you want to filter yourself,” and again, my answer was a resounding FUCK NO.

It’s weird being a writer. It’s weird being open on the internet. It’s weird trying to tell your story when your story is only a sliver of the whole grandoise tale. It’s weird being perceived.

But unfortunately, we exist and therefore can be perceived. And so, we live, we learn, we refuse to return to the apps and instead mentally prepare ourselves to go back and be outwardly socially long enough to find the spark of something that doesn’t quite exist yet in a world that is vaguely hostile, and then write about it.

So wish me luck as I venture back into the world armed only knowing that I do in fact have to live in the world, as exhausting as it may be.