Walking around and listening to strangers talk about memories I was not part of for an entire evening made me feel like a spy of some sort. They showed me where they once hung out, if the places still existed & who went there with them and who always drank too much, who got into fights… it was mostly a sweet conversation. I asked nothing, they were good storytellers. I was asked a few questions, but mostly they ran things amongst themselves. It was a very different trip this time. I had not realised it was a year ago since I was here last. I did not fight back the tears when I remembered how different it was, because it was dark no one would see me crying. The sea breeze in my face was bittersweet almost like it was calling me home. I was more than tempted to let that siren pull me under. I shook my head & focused on the task at hand. Understanding the façade that has been created. The one HUGE difference you find between neurotypicals & neurodivergents is NT lie & ND do not. There is some societal pressure to embellish oneself to seem better than the person in front of you. ND do not have this urge. We may want to please you so you will like us, but that would make us SMALLER than you, not GREATER. NT will fluff their resumes, interests, Netflix watch list, amount of people they have slept with/people they have dated, planets they have travelled to, money they have… anything that makes them seem better than you. Or at least equal if you are somehow much higher in some imaginary standard that they have. ND often see all this as arbitrary & rather pointless. Being who you are is the goal for all ND. We fight for that right. I could not care less if you never finished the eighth class. Education is best learned through curiosity. You do not need a degree to say that you know something. Staying eternally curious about the world around you is the most attractive trait I have ever found in anyone. Why would you want to stop learning after you are done with school? And then boil yourself down to a piece of paper because you think it matters. Or worse… that I think it matters. Why are the greatest ones so self-conscious? It is the rest of us that look up to you. I wish I could stay here forever. Trondheim is not mine any more.