Thank you, AG

The key to experiencing endings is to accept that life is a phantasmagoria of evolution;

that with each change, you are deeper into becoming.

There are so many words I could dedicate to this home, but none could quite capture the full depth and breadth of my time here. 2026 is arriving faster than the turning tide, and I'm in the ether where the past, present and future tumbles together - limbo, this period between 25th to 31st December. It's been a testing week within a testing month within testing period, but I'm still alive and kicking, and, for all intents and purposes, still in the fight. Ready to accept miracles. Pulling this entry back to my current scene: this glorious L-shaped grey sofa that has housed a plethora of my physical and emotional states. I sit here, alone, with the cats scattered around our dusty living room (our = yes; dusty = moving debris is prevalent and unyielding), realising that 28th December 2025 will be the last night I am able to personally claim ownership over this minted property in London. It's been a wild ride. It's been a tragedy, a comedy, a romance, a coming of age. It's been the dream. I've been living the dream these past four years, and now the universe has rang the bell to chase other dreams. There are other, bigger, better, more marvellous dreams, awaiting me outside this beloved doorstep. 

I've managed goodbyes in my past by postponing the truth - by convincing myself that places and people are always revisitable, reclaimable, and never really lost ("It is not Goodbye, it is See You Again"). I've always honed my energy towards the next stage, choosing instead of do my internal farewells when I return with some perspective. However this time I'm agonisingly aware of it all, every passing, executed 'last'. I've noted that yes, last Wednesday was the last time we would sit on the carpet and eat dinner and watch Netflix (Culinary Class Wars); last weekend was my last proper sleep on my carved wooden bed in the front room (when it's quiet, you could hear the tube humming as it passed below); last night was the last time Ahmad would curl up in his favourite bowl (his cat tower was in that corner next to the store). It's a complex sense of loss, because I do not have a right to this place: it is not revisitable, reclaimable, and is a site that by all means will be lost to me. I was here as a guest; but I had ownership of its keys. I was here as a guest; but I had a hand in making this a home. I was here as a guest; but this was a place where I shaped a family. 

The beauty and calamity of this goodbye is that it is said with so much love and hope. I am aware that as far as farewells go, parting ways with something you'll miss is a true privilege. And so, what a privilege it has been, AG. I have not taken you for granted for one second. Thank you for being the landing (and launching) pad of my early thirties. Thank you for all that you have witnessed and enabled. Thank you for making me so blessed. Thank you for being home. 

And thank you, M, for allowing me one of the best phases of my life.