Dear Diary. Today the people from my acting class arranged to meet in a bar.

I sent them a message asking if it would be ok if I invited some friends. No one replied so I took this as a yes.

So I sent a message to a Whatsapp group of 117 people:

At 5:30 some of us are meeting at La Garrina Wine Bar for wine. Everyone is welcome to come.

In my imagination, all 117 people would show up, a great throng of assorted people, from all different backgrounds — a hipster with a unicycle, a goth girl in ripped black clothes, chavs in tracksuits and trainers, an old wisenend woman in a Japanese kimono — and they'd all chat away to each other outside the bar like long-lost friends. I'd smile and think, I did this. The waitresses would run about preparing all the chairs and tables while the bar owner would be watching in disbelief while saying, "Praise be, it's a miracle."

I arrived at the bar on time, at 5:30. No one else was there yet. So I sat down at an empty table.

A waitress came over. "What can I get you?" she said.

I had a think. I was at a wine bar. "Wine?" I said, tentatively.

"Is dry okay?"

I wanted to say, "How can wine be dry? It's a liquid." Instead, I said, "Sure."

So she went inside. She returned with a glass of wine. I sat alone with the glass of wine while cool young people fraternized around me.

117 people, I invited. Where was everyone? Where were even the people from the acting class?

I checked my phone. Two new messages. Both messages were from women from the acting class. Both women couldn't come.

I was alone for half an hour when two people finally showed up. One was Gordon, a 56-year-old bald man from Plymouth. I'd met him in the acting class. The other person was David, a guy I'd never met before.

David was a former music journalist from London. He was now a "digital nomad". He had lived in New York and South America but now lived in Girona because he liked it here.

We talked for about two hours. I told them I have autism. David looked uncomfortable. Gordon said he didn't really know what autism was. I tried to explain but couldn't really, which maybe itself is a symptom of austism.

I then told David about my old rugby teacher, who, at the age of 76, is now making raps about drugs. David told me about two more old rappers called Pete and Bas. I wrote down their names in my notebook.

David was the first to leave; I think he was disappointed no women turned up. Gordon and I walked together back to our apartments. I'd had two glasses of wine by this point. Maybe that's why I blurted out to Gordon, "I have a blog. I'm writing about things that happen to me. And people I meet."

"Oh," said Gordon. "Am I in your blog?"

"Yeah, I wrote about when we first met."

He seemed oddly pleased. Maybe he thinks he's going to be famous.

The poor fool. He doesn't know that no one reads this blog.

Dear Diary. It's my 37th birthday today. The trouble with having an imagination is that you imagine ways your life could be better. I wasn't on a cruise ship, wearing a tuxedo and sipping from a martini. I wasn't standing at the top floor of a glass skyscraper being applauded by my employees. Instead, I spent my birthday at home, with my girlfriend and two kids. I would have had a big birthday bash with friends but I have no friends to celebrate my birthday with. Thankfully there are more pathetic ways to spend a birthday, but not many.

I thought I could salvage my birthday by spending time in the presence of attractive women at least. There was a Bodycombat class at the gym at 8 pm, and hot women often go. I got ready to go, but Girlfriend pulled out a cake and started singing Happy Birthday, and by the time we all ate the cake it was too late to go.

So I went rock climbing instead. I say rock climbing, but it's actually bouldering, which is not as impressive. I got there late and the guy at the reception said they were closing in 45 minutes, so there was no point in me going in. I went in anyway.

I was the last to leave the bouldering centre. They had to pull me back down with a stick and a hook.

Dear Diary. Today is Mother's Day here in Spain. I forgot. Girlfriend was annoyed. I then compounded my error by failing to do anything to make up for it. I didn't get the kids to make a card for Girlfriend for instance. I didn't go out and buy flowers. I only thought of these things in the late afternoon, and by then it was already too late; there was no time for cards or flowers by this point. I'll have to do something tomorrow.

One year Girlfriend got me a mug for Father's Day that says "You are a great dad. We love you Daddy" and I still look at it fondly in the cupboard, especially on hard days when my belief in myself as a good parent flounders. It's a shame I didn't think of an equivalent present for Girlfriend this year.

We went back to Ludivers today. 6-year-old and I entered a Street Fighter contest. 6-year-old got knocked out in the first round but I made it to the final just by leg sweeping over and over. Then I lost in the final to a guy who actually knew how to play Street Fighter. It's a shame as the prize was a T-shirt and I need more T-shirts.

We went home for lunch. After lunch 6-year-old watched the first part of the film Harry Potter: The Chamber of Secrets. The trouble is, he's only six years old and so I had to explain a lot to him. But Girlfriend hated this and kept saying "SHUSH!" In the end, she turned the film off.

In the evening I took 2-year-old to the playground and there was an old woman there who couldn't catch her dog. It was a tiny little dog, like a chihuahua. The dog was running around and around no one could catch it. I beckoned it over and stroked it. Then I grabbed its collar and handed the dog to the old woman. The old woman thanked me. So at least I did one good deed today.

In other news, one of the toilets in our apartment is blocked. Girlfriend blames me because I used the toilet last. When I flush it, the water rises to the top and there are bits of poo floating around like tiny Dementors. Tomorrow I need to buy a plunger.

Dear Diary. I went to another social meetup last night. It was a bunch of people playing pool in a sports bar.

I arrived two hours late because I ate dinner with my kids and put them to bed first. So by the time I got to the sports bar, everyone was almost ready to leave.

I recognized most of the people. There was the German girl Denise, the bearded Italian man Alessandro, a woman from London I had met two days ago named Beatrice, and some other people.

There was also a new guy.

"So what's your name?" I asked him.

"Cum," he said.

"I'm sorry?" For a moment I thought he said 'cum'.

"Cum," he said again. "My name is Cum. I'm French."

Okay then.

They had all just finished a game of pool.

"Anyone want to play?" I said.

"Sure," said Alessandro.

Alessandro, by the way, looks exactly like Leonard from The Big Bang Theory, if Leonard had a Karl Marx-style beard.

I put a euro coin into the pool table. The balls came clattering out.

"I'm bad at pool," I said, picking up a cue from the wall.

"That's okay," said Alessandro. "We're all bad here."

And he wasn't kidding. On Alessandro's first turn, he hit the black ball into a pocket.

"OH MY GOD," said Beatrice, the woman from London. "ALESSANDRO, THAT MEANS YOU LOST!"

We decided to carry on the game anyway, since all the other balls were still on the table. And it turned out I'm not as bad at pool as I thought. I was able to hit balls and make them go where I wanted them to go, more or less.

"You lied," Beatrice said to me. "You know what you're doing. You're good at pool."

Beatrice had a big moth tattoo on her the center of her chest.

"Well, they don't call me Paul for nothing." I said. "Get it? Paul? Pool?" I didn't really say that. I wished I had though. But I didn't, because I've only thought of it just now.

"Where did you learn to play?" asked Beatrice.

"From Fantasia," I said. "You know Fantasia? That Disney film with Mickey Mouse and all those brooms?"

She nodded. "I didn't think Fantasia had pool in it though."

"Well, it does," I said. "Kind of. There's this scene where Donald Duck is playing billiards, and it shows you how to use angles to bounce the balls off the table."

Then I finished the game by potting the final ball into the pocket from the other side of the table.

"Does anyone want to get something to eat?" said Beatrice.

We all started walking together to a restaurant.

I noticed people had paired off into couples. A German girl and a Colombian guy were boyfriend and girlfriend, and Denise was with a guy. The first time I went to this social group was almost two months ago. Everyone was just friends back then, but now they were already pairing off into boyfriends and girlfriends. What's the next stage? Marriage? Babies? Will I be invited to their baby and toddler play groups, games of golf, and barbeques at their giant surburban houses? Will the men sit around in a smoking room, sharing stock tips and reminscing when we used to be young and play terrible games of pool?

We got to the restaurant. It was a Catalan tapas restaurant.

"So the best thing about this place is the burgers," I said. "Because they come with a syringe? A syringe full of cheese. And you have to squeeze the cheese out of the syringe yourself."

At the same time I was saying this, I overheard Beatrice saying, "I hate the burgers in this place. They come with a syringe with this processed American liquid cheese. It's disgusting."

The German girl ordered a burger. When it came, there was no syringe. Just a burger.

"You're lucky," said Beatrice. "They forgot to put the syringe with the disgusting cheese."

"But the syringe is the best part," I said. "If you don't have a syringe with cheese, then how can you draw a smiley face on your burger?"

Sitting opposite me was the Colombian guy. His name was Enrique. We were getting on well so I decided to tell him I have autism.

"So I have autism," I said to the Colombian guy. I suspect this will be a thing now, me telling people I have autism. "I think my whole family has it."

He looked thoughtful and said, "I worked with autistic people. At university. I was studying robotics."

"Oh yeah, I'm sure lots of autistic people study robotics," I said.

"No, it was with children," he said. "We were making a robot that taught autistic children how to read facial expressions."

Just then, Girlfriend called me. I answered the phone.

"Where are you?" she said in an impatient tone.

"I'm in a restaurant," I said. "I'm leaving now though. I'll be home in fifteen minutes."

She hung up.

So I said goodbye to everyone, paid for my beer, and left.

By the time I got home, Girlfriend was already in bed fast asleep. So I guess there had been no need to rush home after all.

Dear Diary. When I was 23, I realised I had traits of autism. I was clumsy; I'd been bad at sports at school. I walked awkwardly. I would watch my reflection in shop windows to practice walking more naturally. I was bad at socialising. I'd had no close friends at university. No girlfriend. I needed long periods of time alone but at the same time craved human interaction. I had stimming behaviour: I often picked my lips until they bled as a way of comforting myself.

I went to an autism specialist to get a diagnosis, but he wrote "Paul does not have strong features of Asperger's disorder but could have traits of it. However, he is able to function reasonably well in the community and is able to hold down a job."

I kept myself on a rigorous gluten and dairy free diet for ten years, because I'd read evidence that gluten and dairy makes autism worse. I stopped only after becoming a parent, because the demands of parenting made me too tired to care about the diet anymore.

And I guess I stopped thinking of myself as autistic. Autism wasn't in my thoughts anymore. I guess I started thinking of myself as just socially awkward instead.

But last week this changed. Girlfriend was watching a new Netflix show called Life & Beth. It's a show based on Amy Shumer's life, and her relationship with her husband, who has autism. I started watching it too, particularly an episode where her husband takes an online autism test and discovers he probably has autism.

Girlfriend asked if I wanted to try an online autism test too.

"Sure," I said.

So I took a test. I scored 74 out of 140, which meant I had "a high probability of symptoms of autism". I wasn't surprised.

I realised I should probably learn about autism, so I've started buying books. And the first one I bought, it's a total joy. I've cried several times reading it. It's called Unmasking Autism. The book claims that many autistic people can blend in by acting normal (which has been my own experience), but this comes at a high price, since any friendships they make are superficial (because they never reveal their true selves). What's more, they get exhausted and burned out from pretending to be normal all the time, and they have to suppress behaviours and hide interests that would otherwise make them happy. The author (a transgender autistic) argues that it's better for austistics to "drop the mask" and to show people who they really are. It's a beautiful sentiment: just be yourself. This means instead of autistic people having to fit in, it's the world that needs to adapt to people with autism.

Finally, a book that says I don't have to pretend to be normal anymore. It's okay to just be myself. I'm glad I live in this era of understanding and compassion. I grew up in the 1990s, which was an era of sneering hatred and anger at anything different. Even the word "gay" was an insult back then.

Thanks to reading this book, I'm now an ardent supporter of rights movements like the LQBT movement. I "get it". I know what it's like to be different. Everyone should be free to be themselves, whether you're autistic, spastic, gay, trans, or an albino rhino. You should never have to change yourself to fit in. Also, if the people bullying me at school for being autistic were the same people bullying transgender people, then I'll gladly stand side by side with transgender people, so we can all trample the bodies of the bullies with our boots.

I'm still forcing myself to go to social events, by the way. This evening I played basketball with two people I've never met: a Spanish girl called Cecilia and a Brazilian girl called Gabriella. Cecilia's an accountant who moved to Girona for her work (she said she wouldn't be living in Girona otherwise) and Gabriella's a tomboyish software manager. With only three people we didn't have enough for teams, so we played 21 instead. I scored the least amount of points, because I'm not very good at basketball, or any team sport for that matter, but I still enjoyed spending time with people. I no longer shy away from social situations: I seek them out with open arms instead. Because I understand you have to face your fears in order to grow.

Dear Diary. Today's Sunday so both kids were home. The morning started well, with me reading 6-year-old the latest Dog Man book for an hour. At the end of the book I cried, as I do at the end of every Dog Man book. And as always, I hid my tears from 6-year-old. What made me cry this time was that when Petey the cat has the choice to be good or bad, he chooses to be good, and all his friends hug him. Ever since I took drugs in Ibiza, I've chosen to be good too, like Petey. I don't think Petey the cat has taken drugs though.

Then the morning got worse. I tried to tidy the house but everywhere the kids went, they left a trail of destruction in their wake. 2-year-old wanted some pineapple juice. I gave him a cup of pineapple juice and he dropped it, spilling it all over the floor. Meanwhile, 6-year-old was shouting "Daddy! Daddy!" from another room. I almost very nearly shouted back, "FUCK OFF!" but managed to control myself.

By the way, there's something you should know: I upped my dose of testosterone a few days ago. Now I feel more angry than usual.

Then 2-year-old wanted to water the plants. I gave him a toy watering can filled with water. But instead of watering the plants, he cheekily tipped water on the floor instead. I was tempted to tip a bucket of cold water over 2-year-old's head, the same way people spray their dog with a hosepipe as negative reinforcement for when the dog bites someone. Fortunately, I controlled myself. But I couldn't stop myself from swearing: "OH for FUCKING JESUS SAKE."

Then I had an idea.

"I'm going to the beach," I said to Girlfriend. "And I'm taking 2-year-old. If you and 6-year-old want to come, you can."

Girlfriend agreed that the beach was a good idea, so we packed our stuff and set off in the car. I snapped at Girlfriend when we started driving and the boot wasn't closed properly. I snapped at her again when she failed to point out a turning.

The kids quickly fell asleep in the back seats. For the first time today, I started feeling calm.

We got the beach. It was same beach I went to yesterday. Same sand, same dunes, same shimmering blue water lapping gently at the shore. No naked man like yesterday though.

The kids loved the beach. 6-year-old ran into the water up to his waist. Pretty soon he was feral, crawling through the sand on his belly like a worm. Meanwhile, 2-year-old was half toddler, half sand person.

"It was a good idea to come here," said Girlfriend.

We disagree on a lot so it was nice to agree on something for a change. I lay back and listened to the gentle waves washing against the sand. I think one of the reasons the beach is relaxing is the continuous sound of waves stops any thoughts from forming. Thoughts like: my brother's wedding is next week and I haven't finished writing the best man speech yet.

On the way we stopped at Burger King. The sun was burning down, despite it being only April. My phone said it was 30°C. We ate inside for the air conditioning. Both kids had a kids meal. Girlfriend and I shared a combo meal for 9 euro.

That night, I lowered my dose of testosterone.