ahmet turan abi

they address you like this. in the format of first name + last name + abi. it felt weird to me. at the same time, the fact that people whose voices sounded like they were 50-60 years old were calling me, a guy whose voice sounds like he is in his twenties, "abi" also felt weird to me. since i know your age more or less, i said to myself, "ahmet turan must be one of those people whom even his elders call abi, it's more like a nickname than a title." then, the fact that i made such a deduction with such limited data in my hands also felt weird to me. 

when i explained to them that the ahmet turan number they had was old, they didn't understand. they kept saying, "is it the wrong number?" and i would say, "no. the number is right. i am wrong. or rather, your timing is wrong." saying it like this makes it sound like i know you. when i say, "ahmet turan changed his number, i took over his previous number," it gives the impression that i entered a number auction and it was handed over to me, or like i am your nephew and you left it to me as an inheritance. they don't understand the situation. they hang up the phone without understanding the situation. i figure they probably understand later when they think about it with a clear head and tell their friends and family. i wonder if people have mentioned me to you. 

also, when people asked, "am i speaking with mr. ahmet?", i experienced/caused a lot of confusion, thinking, "am i ahmet or are you ahmet?" many times i wanted to say, "i am also wondering which mr. ahmet you think you are talking to." 

when i changed my number and found out that my... our, number had an old owner, i initially thought you were a dead person. because you hadn't updated your number at banks and other important places. i got excited. i thought that by changing my number, i would change too. i thought i would become you. however, as far as i know, turkcell doesn't offer such a service. i thought i would have a character arc or something, like taking over your life. or rather, i daydreamed about it. because i was in a very bad place and whatever i am lacking, a random citizen probably isn't lacking those things. since i was jealous of that ordinariness, that flatness, dreaming of taking over your life felt funny to me. or rather, it felt funny when it was about "someone", not me. the idea of "someone changes his number and plans to take over the life of the old owner" felt funny. of course, when that someone is me, it becomes sad. 

if i had been the screenwriter of a tv series at that time and these things had happened to me in the middle of the show, i would have been inspired by this event and sent the main character of the show on such a journey. this would be the cure the main character found for his inability to be normal, his inability to stop living in a fantasy world and exist in the real world. he would leave everything behind and go to malatya, and start working as a driver for esenlik market. every week a relative of at least one staff member dies, the battalgazi municipality sends a text message. he would go to their funerals. he would pay his bills on time; he would pay his 5.760,25 ₺ ttnet bill without passing the due date. elitefest has started, he would go to that. he would be an mhp supporter. what else, he would take his wife to get an mri (i was closest to contacting you at that moment, but i couldn't muster the courage, thinking it would put me in a very weird position if i wrote from facebook: "hello, i am the new owner of your old number, your mri turn has arrived"). then denizbank was offering a credit card, he would get that. he would buy things on installments and live happily ever after with his family in malatya. 

i have the capacity to be very happy. i could be the happiest. at least in izmit. i claim this even though i am not confident about anything else. happiness-sadness; this spectrum is very wide in me. but i am not, somehow. somehow it just doesn't happen. the thing is, if i were you, even if i had a normal spectrum, i would be happy. at worst, i would just be sad within that narrow spectrum. everything wouldn't hurt my insides this much. i wouldn't lose my soul to sadness. it's going to be a quarter of a century. i have nothing in my hands except my own palms. it never had anothers hand either. it had only my palm. these aren't the problem. time passes. life is a one-time thing. i am afraid i will spend another quarter of a century with empty palms. that's it. 

because i am who i am, and the world is what it is. the world is a planet weighing thousands of kilos. the world will not change for me. as for me, i am only sixty kilos and would you believe it, changing me is even harder. i can't stress this enough ahmet turan abi. what i'm getting at is, if i were you instead of me, and my surroundings were malatya instead of my current surroundings, it wouldn't be like this. 

i am departing from your number, and now we have no connection left. which we never had anyway. i will no longer receive the sms death notices of the relatives of the people working at the battalgazi municipality, i won't know what the malatya mps are doing. i will be deprived of esenlik market's internal corporate announcements. i am saying goodbye to these things more than i am to you. esenlikler.