Monday, August 10, 2009

but these feelings won't go away...they've been knockin' me sideways

"sideways" -citizen cope

really good song.

for some reason i don't much feel like using proper capitalization. so i'm not going to. i'm also, apparently, going to end end sentences with prepositions. hope you can handle it ;)

so, as is customary with me, i just finished a movie and i'm feeling quite pensive and reflective...tho this subject has been troubling me for some time. i guess the movie was the final push to get it in the blog. i just watched sex and the city: the movie, or whatever it's actually called. i've seen the whole series and figured i should probably see the movie too. (pause for reaction.) yes. i've watched every episode, and now movie, of sex and the city. they are witty, funny and entertaining.

moving on...

lately i've been thinking a lot about love...and whether or not i've ever been in love. two weddings in eight days and a movie all about love will do that to you. and if not to you, then it definitely has done it to me. love seems to be one of those emotions, at least being in love, that you can't really pinpoint until it happens to you. it's a very personal experience. i mean, i see it all around me...both in movies and in real life, but i'm not sure if i know the feeling personally.

i've never been the type to date a lot of women. in fact, i'm very much a monogamous, one woman at a time type of guy. i can't even really "like" more than one person at once. it's the way i'm wired. i mean, i have my multiple little crushes and "oh she's cute" here and there, but once i really start to like someone, i only have eyes for them. when i'm in a committed relationship, this quality suits me well...tho it makes me susceptible to heartache as well. me and my recently pointed out passionate-ness.

in addition, i've only had four relationships. the first was in high school and lasted roughly 13 months. the longest one by far, but i think i was still too young to really understand it all...at least at the time. the next was my senior year of college, lasting a month. followed by another at the end of my senior year, lasting only a month and a half. the last, and most recent, lasted about six months. all very different, and from all of them i've learned things and tried to apply what i've learned in my next relationship. tried to at least.

i don't think i was in love in my first relationship...i don't even think i knew what love really was yet. i cared about her a lot tho. a lot. i'm not sure, but i seem to recall she liked me and from there we started dating. i obviously did like her too, but it wasn't a situation where i pursued her...at least not very hard because she already liked me. this is how i remember it anyway. she's also the only one i've been able to stay friends with. she still means a lot to me...tho i don't see her nearly as often as i used to...and so does her family. i recently ran into her sisters. it was a very pleasant surprise and made me realize i hadn't seen them in a long time. life happens tho. for everyone. and when we broke up, it was hard to maintain an ongoing relationship with her, let alone her family. like i've said before, life gets in the way of life.

my next relationship only lasted a month. she was someone i had a little crush on, and liked for awhile but then she started dating one of my friends so i was like...oh well. then one random night we were hanging out with some friends and she and i were the only two in my room. a few joking and sarcastic comments later and we were kissing. what?! still not sure how that all came to be. that relationship fizzled out quickly tho. she was a lot of fun, but i didn't want to date her anymore. she said i started acting differently but hoped it would get better. at least she wasn't too surprised...or something. i've talked to her very little since, and know i wasn't in love.

later that school year my housemates and i hosted a toga party. he hosted lots of parties, but i remember this one being different because i didn't see as many familiar faces. i ended up talking with a friend of a friend. one of those situations where you know who the other is, but really don't know each other at all. i did always think she was cute tho. so we talked for awhile, drank beer and probably danced some too. after awhile tho, our togas were just getting to be more hassle than they were worth. so we ducked into my room real quick, so i could change and she could take off her toga (she has jeans and a t-shirt on underneath...perverts). i changed in my closet and when i came out, we kissed. again, not sure how it happened but it did. i guess that room was just magic. so we started dating and at graduation i met her family and she met my mine...at least my dad. not sure why only him tho...maybe...idk. then it got to the point where i didn't want to date her anymore. nothing "happened," i just got to that point...again. she didn't see it coming tho, so where the time before it was no big deal, this time it was. she was upset. so we haven't talked at all since, and i'm pretty certain i wasn't in love with her. i sometimes wonder tho why i got to that point. she was great. of all my relationships, this is the only one where i'm not sure why we broke up.

my most recent relationship was probably the most "real" relationship i had. i say that because i was too young in high school to fully understand dating and what it means to be in a relationship. we actually met freshman year of college in writing 101. first day of class we were paired together for a writing assignment. i thought she was super cute. we weren't really friends, because we never really hung out, but we knew each other. sophomore year i tried to ask her out to a movie, i think, over instant messenger (bad idea!) and she kind of freaked out. how could i like her, and want to ask her out, when i didn't even know her very well, if really at all!?!

we hung out the summer before our senior year, with a mutual friend, but nothing came of it dating wise. this mutual friend tho, is one of her best friends. this mutual friend also ended up marrying one of my good friends from high school. at that wedding, we talked and hung out at the reception, having not seen in other in quite some time. we traded numbers and decided to hang out more often, on purpose, rather than randomly when our friends get married. after a few months of "hanging out" we realized we really had been dating and were now in a relationship. i met her family, they were great. she met mine. she got along really well with my sister, which was great. it all seemed to be going well. really well. we went to vegas with her sister and her boyfriend. all the while tho, my friends weren't sold on her. i said it was because they didn't know her yet.

then i got to the point of "i don't want to date her anymore." this time tho, i stopped and really thought about things before acting upon my emotions. i decided that maybe i get to that point too quickly without knowing why or trying to fix what caused me to think that. a week or so later we broke up. again, for the fourth time, i broke it off. i expected her to be upset, but she lashed out with more of a personal attack on my character which i wasn't ready for. still not sure why that happened, if it was all just part of her being upset but that stung. i knew i wasn't a "terrible person" but was i a "terrible boyfriend?" i've not dated anyone since, so i don't know for sure. i don't think i am, but that's one of those things where it's really hard to judge yourself. again, we don't speak. we see each other about once a year when our mutual friend has a get-together and we're both invited. it's cordial but we generally stay clear of the other. don't think i was in love with her. i did try to give it another chance, when i thought it was over, but the fact that it ended so soon after that leads me to think it wasn't love. plus i didn't ever wonder why i broke it off, and don't miss her. i don't say that to be mean, but i would think i would long, and ache for someone if i had been in love with them.

ok so wow. i just detailed my relationships and why i don't think i was in love with any of them. i didn't mean to do that. i meant to talk about love and whether or not i've truly been in love.

i was reading this book once about the languages of love. there are five. and how we all feel loved in different ways. it talked about how love feels too. how you wake up and think of that one person, and how they're the last thought you have before you fall asleep. and how it hurts when the love is unrequited...not returned? i know what i mean, even if i can't spell it correctly. so using what i read in this book, along with my prior relationships and how i've felt recently...i think i may have been in love. or if it wasn't...it was a lot like love.

or maybe she's just the one that got away...tho doesn't that, in itself, imply greater feeling than just liking someone? rawr. i don't know. i do know that i was really, really, really into this girl for almost a full year...ok maybe 8-10 months. we never dated. never went on a date. we were just friends, hung out in groups a lot, and occasionally would hang out just the two of us. i never made a move because, all circumstances considered, waiting felt like it was the best option for moving from a friendship to a worthwhile dating relationship. maybe i missed my opportunity to take my shot, and if i did...i have no idea where it was. needless to say she was really hard to get over. by far the hardest girl to let go of. i've liked girls in the past, for months on end, and then i just realize it's not going to go anywhere and move on...but this girl was different. i kept waiting, and waiting for "the right time" to arrive...

i started to see her less and less. at first it was intentional because we got into a fight over something trivial. then i didn't see her for even longer for no apparent reason. it was in this time i eventually got over her. i tried previously, tried like hell, but to no avail. so i finally was over her and while this was happening i made friends with a new girl. we shared a mutual friend and that's how we met...or met for real. i'm sure we had met while in college, but we didn't "know" each other. anyway...i asked her out on a date. it went really well. and surprisingly i was really into her...to mean after what i had just put myself through with this other girl, i was surprised at how quickly i was "back up on the horse." we kept hanging out, but didn't go on another date. then after a few weeks we had the DTR (determine the relationship (talk)) where she told me i was great, but she didn't want to date me. i kind of thought that was coming but was hoping for something else. oh well.

so now i'm over the first girl, and have just been let down gently by a new girl. over both at this point. then i learn the first girl has a boyfriend now. what!?!?! i was over her, i thought, but definitely not ready for her to be dating someone else. then it bothered me, that this news bothered me so much. i was over her...wasn't i? ahhhh!!!!! that was a month or so ago, maybe a little longer, and so i figured by now it wouldn't bother me. wrong. anytime i come across her facebook and see all the cute and lovey messages between them, i have to close the web page. i can't look at it. it hurts to see someone else getting to do what i never got to.

i maintain i'm not into her anymore and i really feel that is the truth...at least i'm not actively pursuing her like before. so what are these feelings? love? was i in love? i don't know for sure because i never got to test my feelings. and i won't know. if it wasn't tho, it sure felt a lot like love...at least what i think love should feel like. all i know is these feelings keep knocking me sideways...so much so that i can't make sense of it all. and honestly, as much as being shut down totally blows, not knowing (what your own feelings mean and not knowing hers) is even worse.

not everyone will be able to make sense of this, and that's ok. i think i've made my feelings clear, and really i just needed to let this out because it's been bouncing around in my head for too long. as with the last post tho, i wonder what will happen if the person i'm talking about reads this. i don't think this girl has any idea just how into her i was, unless someone else told her, because i never laid it all out like this. i tried. sort of...twice. i wrote letters that i never delivered. maybe they were just therapeutic to write, but when i saw her, to give her these letters, the timing never felt right. maybe that was for the best, maybe it was just never meant to be but it feels like she's the one that got away. and that hurts...to say and to feel it to be true.