I’m not kidding.

The whole thing started out innocuously enough. A girl that I vaguely knew in Grade 11 posted a pleasant panorama of the seaside vista, accompanied by the only slightly annoying caption of, “DubrovTICK”.

But things weren’t quite right in my gut - and I don’t mean that metaphorically.

Maybe I haven’t been drinking enough water. Maybe I was wrong about the virtues of kombucha. Maybe I shouldn’t have been living exclusively off dried apricots and coffee for the past couple of weeks. There’s no real way to know if or how I could have prevented the destiny that awaits me.

All I know is my fate is this: If I see one more image of the medieval architecture, the breathtakingly blue ocean or the luscious surrounding forest of Dubrovnik, I will legitimately shit myself in stunning fashion.

There’s no explaining it, but that’s just the way it is. When the guy from my first year English elective posts a quaint little shot on the shores of the Adriatic Sea, I clench.

When Jimmy no-name from LAWS2700, whose only discernible personality trait is ‘drugs’, gets around the former maritime trade hub, I sweat profusely.

When my girlfriend who hasn’t texted me in two weeks posts a bikini pic with some guy she met at a hostel I enter a state of panic and put every fibre of my being into keeping those glutes locked tight.

I have reached a state of catharsis. I pray for the sweet release of the photo that will set off the Hiroshima of shits. I know what awaits me.

I am become death, destroyer of worlds.

Hopefully Contiki change their route next year so my gut can return to a state of relative normalcy.