Just by chance I happened to open an old diary from 1985 and it felt open on a significant page.  The end of a somewhat odd relationship with a girl who had Bi-Polar. At the time I was not aware of the devastating effect that Bi-Polar has on peoples lives and I had not identified my the nature of my own mental problems either.
I worked back through the diary and discovered that the relationship had lasted 6 months almost to the day. I suspect that there were many reasons why it did not work out but I have no doubt that one of them was simply my being far too needy. Also to be honest I was not terribly interesting company in those days and may well have seemed very boring indeed.  If I had been able to meet me then I would I think have found someone with very limited horizons doing a dead end job that was easily amused and incredibly naive and also in complete denial of their own nature.

What is strange to me is that I should find out 25 years later that she had taken her own life a few years after I knew her as I had always imagined her as the kind of person that would have succeeded at most things she wanted to do…

Life leads us down some very strange paths.