Out of Sight, Out of Existence

You live surrounded by things you keep forgetting exist.

Half a bag of flour. A jumper you loved. A note you wrote to yourself that once felt profound and now feels like it was written by someone else entirely. Craft materials you hid from the kids (especially the glitter - am I right?).

You don’t lose things in the traditional sense. You misplace them into nonexistence.

Tucked away = gone forever.

Moved behind something = never seen again.

If it’s not in front of you, it might as well have fallen off the edge of the world.

Fancy a slice of toast? Don’t dare walk away. Not even to the other side of the kitchen.

You’ve learned to leave things out. Keys in the bowl. Charger by the kettle. Reminders on the fridge & alarms on your phone. Not because you’re disorganised, but because the second you put something away, your brain crosses it off reality’s guest list.

The fridge is a graveyard of intentions. The drawer is a portal to the void. You’ll buy three of the same thing because you forgot the first one, not because you’re careless, but because you genuinely couldn’t recall its existence until it appeared again like a ghost.

And it’s not just things.

You forget conversations. People. Texts you meant to reply to days ago. Plans you were excited about. You forget someone until they message, and then you remember all at once - love, guilt, urgency, panic - like hitting every emotional key on a piano in one chaotic chord.

You don’t mean to drift. You just do. You live in the moment you’re in. Not because you’re enlightened, but because the rest disappears. The moment ends, and so does the mental bookmark that came with it.

Even emotions vanish.

One day you feel okay. The next, hollow. And when someone asks what changed, you genuinely don’t know, and you can’t find the thread. You had it, and now you don’t.

Some days, you write things down to prove to your future self that the past happened. You leave messages on mirrors. Set reminders not for tasks, but for truths:

You like this song.

You’ve done this before.

You’re okay.

You start to realise it’s not about memory. It’s not even about attention. It’s about visibility. Presence. Tangibility. If it can’t be seen or touched or actively recalled, it fades. Like mist. Like breath on glass.

So your world becomes one of post-its and piles. Notifications and routines. Not to organise, but to anchor. To make things stay. To make you stay.

And some people don’t get it. They think it’s forgetfulness. Carelessness. Avoidance. But it’s not. It’s just how your mind maps time. If it’s not happening now, it doesn’t exist. If it’s not visible, it’s gone. If it’s not reminded, it’s not remembered.

You live in a constant game of hide and seek with your own life. And sometimes, you win. Sometimes, you find the thing you forgot you loved, still warm under a pile of something else.

Sometimes it’s a friend you haven’t messaged in months who texts you first, and you reply like no time has passed. Sometimes it’s a half-finished idea scribbled on the back of a receipt that suddenly makes sense again. Sometimes it’s just a single clear thought in the middle of the chaos:

I am still here. I am still me.

Not everything comes back. But not everything has to.

You just need enough to work with. Enough to remember who you are, even if it’s only in flashes. Enough to build a life that makes space for things to stay visible, even if only for a while.

And maybe, this time, you’ll leave the light on.