Era: Paris First Wave 2019–2020
Steven returned from a second US stay, which ended in October 2019 per the context document, in early 2020, this time to Paris rather than Lyon. The March 25, 2020 journal entry is the first documented Paris entry. It is also the first day of France’s COVID lockdown.
How he arrived in Paris
During his final master’s year, Steven began going to Paris weekly for courses, Thursday and Friday, staying weekends with friends. He discovered techno parties and ketamine. He decided to settle in Paris, which required a CDI. He found one quickly. This was Ipso, described as “le fameux ipso”, a medical software company where he worked as a developer.
He loved the work. He also immediately found an apartment. He writes in September 2020 about the Paris arrival as a moment of “sentiment de toute puissance, que j’ai malheureusement bien trop vite pris pour acquis”, a full package delivered at once: dream job, beautiful apartment, and an electric social life. More, he notes, than anything he had worked hard for.
The Ipso departure
He quit Ipso for reasons he describes as “complètement aberrante” in retrospect. The context document says he told himself he could find another job easily and did not anticipate lockdown. The journal says it “a en quelque sorte déclenché l’ouverture d’une boîte de Pandore” and sent him into his own depths. He calls it a self-inflicted descent: “J’ai aussi tendance à penser que je me suis infligé ça à moi-même… je savais très bien au fond de moi-même ce qui pourrait arriver.”
The timing was catastrophic: he quit just before France went into lockdown. He had just installed himself in Paris with a beautiful apartment and a vibrant social life. COVID froze everything.
Lockdown and descent
The March and April 2020 journal entries are written from inside the lockdown. The city is silent. He is at home, not working, consuming ketamine in micro-doses (“sous K, à la lueur de ma bougie”). One entry describes the KERNEL PANIC moment, finding a New Year’s 2014 photo while searching his phone, hands sweaty, with Mateo.
By April 6, 2020 he is tracking his sobriety, 4 days without “dures” and 2 without “douces”, bored, trying to get himself to work on his app and apply for jobs. “MON DIEU CE QUE C’EST BORING À ÉCRIRE.”
The descent into depression, which he would not acknowledge as depression until September 2020, began here. He spent several months in what he retrospectively calls “déni assez prononcé”, believing he had total conscious control of events.
Neo-hedonism emerges
In this period, March 2020, he also declares: “I AM A NEO-HEDONIST.” It arrives mid-journal like a revelation. He describes his mental state as “quantique”, in superposition, not fixed, requiring continuous capture to reveal. He notes that “la vie aura toujours plus d’imagination que toi”, a phrase he quotes again years later.
The techno-queer scene
Parallel to the professional and psychological track, Paris gave him access to the queer community and the techno scene. He writes in context: “quand je me suis installé à Paris et que j’ai intégré une communauté queer, je me suis senti en sécurité et j’ai pu lâcher du lest.” This was the first social environment in which he felt safe being fully himself rather than performing safety.