The Comedy of Errors in College Relationships

Happiness

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 22:09:48 -0500

My grandma asked me to tell her about a time in my life when I have been the happiest. I couldn’t think of one particular instance immediately but I told her that so far in my life, even on the worst days, I have been happy every day of my life. I have woken up smiling even when the night before I went to bed exhausted and drained. Sure school work, friendships, relationships are all hard but no matter how much they have stressed me out or made me question myself there has not been one day that I haven’t been excited by my own passions, dreams, and future goals and I think that’s a beautiful thing.

Photo

Thu, 12 May 2011 02:50:32 -0400

A Love Story.

Thu, 12 May 2011 02:48:00 -0400

Here is the story that has sparked the idea of the title of the comedy of Errors of relationships, about a high school romance, a huge fall-out, the loss of my innocence and then a re-visitation of my past. All names have been changed but everything I have written has happened just like a dream…

Part I

Jay.

I fell in love with him the moment we met, originally at Katie Kupstis’s sweet 16, his blue eyes held me like an electric shock. Hands running through his thick light brown hair, the side had a silly blonde streak, natural, which everyone thought he dyed, and a pouty mouth. I was very attracted to him. As the school year began, junior year, I was excited with the endless possibilities the school year would bring. Looking down at my class schedule the first day I was memorizing the number of the next class I had to go to, 3^rd period chemistry (blegh). As I rounded the corner to E-18 I looked up and there he was doing the same thing. He looked at me and my heart was beating out of my chest and I felt a little shaky, and then he held the door open for me (swoon), this was the start of something.

Everyday I woke up excited to go to class and see his face and watch him yawn and bless him when he sneezed. I would pick out outfits envisioning how he would admire me and fall in love with my amazing style. I was smitten and I just wanted one opportunity to talk to him, and that day finally came on Halloween. I had dressed up as strawberry shortcake and wore a silly pink hat and he had not dressed up for the holiday. Luckily the seat next to him was empty that day and I was able to move up and sit beside him. After our linebacker of a teacher had groaned on about compounds and elements I asked him about why he hadn’t dressed up and he looked at me and smiled and my heart stopped for a moment. He laughed and said he didn’t have anything to wear and I told him that I could fix that and placed my silly pink hat on his head. I think he kept it there because he liked me too, but then he removed it a little later to keep his cool. After that we spoke everyday and stayed up late at night talking. We talked about everything, what we wanted, how we despised the snobby kids at our school, our parents, siblings, dreams and from there, built a friendship. After a month of this he asked me on a date to the movies. That night my heart was beating out of my chest, I couldn’t wait until we sat next to one another but I was so nervous every part of me was shaking as I waited for his mother Eileen to pick me up, I thought my heart would literally jump out of my throat. Later I would learn that Jay was just as nervous and as his friend Sam stated, “he was about to piss his pants he was so nervous”. We both walked into the movie theatre not sure whether to hold hands, walk side by side, not really sure of anything but he opened the door for me and that was a good start (+5). Then he stepped in front of me and bought us two tickets to see the movie (+10) “The Pursuit of Happiness”, a much more appropriate movie than “Bruno” which was the movie I wanted to see, but who wants to have their first kiss while watching two hairy men tackle each other naked? The Pursuit of Happiness was a much better suited choice anyway and it allowed for me to lean my head against his shoulder when the movie got emotional, easier for him to tilt my chin up and kiss me.

The rest was history and led to a year and a half relationship. We became inseparable and after 3 months one February night in a foggy red 1984 Volvo, Jay stated that he was in love with me, he was genuine and the feelings were so mutual. We became best friends and I loved him with every fiber of my being. Our love, some call it puppy love, was so genuine and pure. We were just kids and there were no mind games to be played, no other options to lure us away from one another, no past heartbreak to build a wall between us. We were on the same page, every thought connected and nothing was hidden. We talked about everything and my time with him always felt cut short, everything stopped when we were together, nothing mattered more to me than his lips on mine, my head buried in his chest and his arms tightly wrapped around me, protecting and sheltering me. Every secret was safe when I told it to him, every kiss we shared, every intimate moment was sacred and between only us. But as the months progressed and reality broke the barriers of the fort we put up around our puppy love, we soon realized that there was more to love than just the emotions that came with it. Our opinions about life differed and we started to fight about everything. Money, cars, jobs, politics, parents, time, chivalry, which movie to see, when he would stop watching the Mets game and start paying attention to me, anything. But those fights seemed worth it compared to how much we cared about each other despite our differences. No matter how much our love for each other amounted to, it was evident that we weren’t right for each other and that thought crippled me. I was so young, I wanted to marry him, I didn’t want to ever love another, I was comfortable with him and I trusted him and worried about him and there was nothing worse than when we fought, I only wanted to fix it and crawl back into his arms. But as August approached and our senior year was a month away we had to talk about the inevitable, College. As realistic people we had ideas of college in our minds and we both agreed that it was important to be on our own when we left for most likely separate Universities. The most important thing to me was that whatever happened we would always stay best friends, I don’t know what I would do if jay weren’t in my life, I loved him so much it hurt my heart. He whole-heartedly agreed and the pain in my chest subsided for the time being as he held me while I cried. But having an expiration date on a relationship took its toll on us and Jay stopped trying and I felt suffocated.

Mon, 09 May 2011 12:24:00 -0400

"I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’ll never understand or forgive myself. And if a bullet gets me,..."

Tue, 03 May 2011 22:18:51 -0400

““I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’ll never understand or forgive myself. And if a bullet gets me, so help me, I’ll laugh at myself for being an idiot. There’s one thing I do know… and that is that I love you, Scarlett. In spite of you and me and the whole silly world going to pieces around us, I love you. Because we’re alike. Bad lots, both of us. Selfish and shrewd. But able to look things in the eyes as we call them by their right names.”
— Gone with the Wind”

I had a dream last night that I was running...

Sun, 01 May 2011 18:44:00 -0400

I had a dream last night that I was running. I ran so fast that my feet felt light on the pavement and I almost floated above the ground. Everything felt clear, I could breathe without losing my breath and gravity was pulling me towards an exciting destination. But once I was finished running and the spring breeze settled on my bare arms I realized where I was. I ran all the way to your house and walked inside. You greeted me with a warm embrace and a passionate kiss and the next thing I knew we were in your bedroom and you were taking off my shoes. I draped my ars over your shoulders and we pressed against each other without question and then you carried me to your bed and you held me so close to your chest and I felt so safe. There was nothing else that needed to be said, you were genuine and you wanted me the way I wanted you and everything was ok. But I woke up and I realized I was clutching my pillow in my own bed, wrapped in my fluffy white duvet instead of your arms, securing myself with this fantasy of being with you. But as my dream faded away from me as they always do when I wake up, I realized that it wasn’t you that I was longing for. I was longing for the idea of you, the fantasy that I made up in my mind that you were, or at least had the potential to be. Although I dream of you and the way I wished you would be with me, this dream I made up on my own. Again I am on my own without a soul to care about me the way I want and I am free to float and chase dreams the way I used to chase you.

I can't sleep.

Wed, 27 Apr 2011 00:51:52 -0400

I lay awake at night clutching my pillow. I’m thinking over the words I want to say to you, the words repeating through my mind when I see you, think of you, when I’m desperate to talk about you. I want you to grow up. I want you to say how you feel, to me, not vaguely through some form of communication that could lead me to believe you are thinking of another. Or maybe you are. Maybe I’m crazy for believing in you, for believing there could be an us. But if there could and if you could give yourself to me, put aside all the bull shit, all the mind games, the attention you seek and the girls you keep hanging on your long string of words, then give yourself to me. Don’t tease me with your words, don’t pull me with your coy smile. I don’t want any of it if I can’t have you. If I can’t have you, if love isn’t what you are looking for I just want to know. Please let me go because I’m in misery chasing after the dream that is you. I lay awake at night grasping the idea that it could be me. My inner frustrations, my wants and desires, my hope that you could have been the next great love for me has me holding onto something that possibly was never there. Maybe what I felt was a part of my imagination. Why do I care? Why do I care about you? Every time I promise myself I can go days without speaking to you, without seeing you, and I do, you pop back in and make a special appearance. You make it seem like you could care less and then you care again. I know you aren’t ready for someone like me, I know I’m too good for your immaturity and your own weaknesses so why can’t I let it go. Let it go! I’m screaming this in my head almost every day now. I know once summer hits me I’ll be seeing new people, new faces, learning new stories and experiencing new thoughts from new boys. But I want to know yours. You keep me on the outside looking in and your front is so deep I need heavy tools to dig you out, cut you away, and a translator to learn you. I want to learn you, all about you, I want to get down to the bottom of it. I’m never positive that I am reading you correctly, I’m usually a fast reader, a great analyzer and with these ideas I can learn how to take care of such a soul but I know you not one bit. I have dreams of big things and I want all of them, I’m open about them and while I have been humiliated, burned, loved and laughed at, I get up from each fall and bounce back higher. Nothing ever slows me down, yet it speeds me up and people say I’m strong for that. Its not strength that I have its desire to use my time to get what I want. I want love. I want success. I want health and laughter and happiness and adventure and experience. It seems as though you have pressed pause for yourself and I can’t fault you for that, but I can! I see your potential and it frustrates me! You always seem to frustrate my very core I can’t stand you! But I want you all the more. I lay awake tonight with a hope that you will catch me before I’m lost to you forever. I’m dreaming up the possibilities that could be us and I’m hating myself for being vulnerable and weak in my like for you when I know you lay awake tonight dreaming of other things, but mostly not of me. I can’t sleep and you are on my mind, let me go.

Waiting It Out.

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 22:30:10 -0400

I am currently taking out my frustrations on the male population at my school and the lack of options it brings to me on a recent situation with a boy I like. Before you read any further know that I probably wouldn’t care about this boy at all if I had more options around me, but I don’t, so being impatient I am over analyzing every encounter, desperately seeking for signs whether he likes me or not, questioning my intuition and pretty much freaking out about an immature little boy.

You know that feeling you have when you have a crush in high school? You look across the cafeteria to search for that person and once they make eye contact you look down and blush? Well taking a few steps back from our mature dinner dates and in depth text message conversations, a certain boy and I are in this stage. We are in limbo, neither dating nor liking anyone else, at least for myself, that’s how I feel. We obviously show signs of liking each other but we aren’t hooking up, we aren’t really talking, but every time we do and he looks into my eyes and he smiles at me there’s a rush that I feel that keeps me holding onto the thought that maybe once the summer passes we can give into these feelings and maybe he would give me a shot. But the thoughts in my head keep reminding me that if a guy likes you it shouldn’t be this hard, if someone likes you and wants you they will make it their business to get you, no matter what it took. My logic rushes in again quickly yelling at me, “Run away! He is up to no good! He’s messed up! He already told you! What more do you want? If he really wanted you he would let it be known so move on, get over it, it’s not meant to be!”, I find myself truly hating my inner thoughts since my heart just wants to love.

That’s all I really want; to find someone amazing and love him and him love me back, but I guess that’s too much to ask in college, I guess wanting love is unreasonable, crazy, psycho, irresponsible, and apparently I am too old for my 20 years of age. I just want love and have no options because the boys in college are able to do what they please since they have all of the options in the world and because the girls don’t they lower their standards making it easier for boys to get away with this. But I will just repeat to myself over and over that I must be patient and wait it out because when the dust clears and the garbage is collected a piece of buried treasure waits for me.

You love the chase, i hoped that wouldn’t be the case, but...

Fri, 22 Apr 2011 21:51:18 -0400

You love the chase, i hoped that wouldn’t be the case, but now I’m giving you space so I can move onto a new face.

I’m sitting in the center of the cafeteria watching people pass...

Thu, 07 Apr 2011 21:52:26 -0400

I’m sitting in the center of the cafeteria watching people pass me by, walking to their classes, their rooms, houses off campus, or off to a meeting. All the while I can’t help but to look up to see if my crush is walking past me. A few weeks ago I started dating this guy that I was talking to for a month earlier. I felt he had potential to be someone I could seriously consider but after a week of dating and a couple of cuddling sessions later I realized there was more on his mind and he wouldn’t let me in. When I asked him what was on his mind, where he thought this could be going? He panicked and ran away, saying that he wasn’t on the same page as me and he wasn’t ready for something serious with me. Initially when I asked him what he was thinking I was proud of myself for acting quickly and not wasting time with my own intentions. But now as the weeks have passed and my feelings for him haven’t faded I wonder if I made the mistake. If I hadn’t said anything maybe I wouldn’t be sleeping alone, maybe he would have been cuddling in bed with me and he would have let his walls fall down and give me a chance. Or maybe he would have been stringing me along, never opening his heart, constantly talking to other girls and I would be left wondering again, “Did I do the right thing?”.

We talk here and there, he’ll text me out of the blue showing he is thinking of me whether I believe it or not but obviously we aren’t on the same page. For now I guess I will stay his friend, wishing we were something more, wishing he will let me in but I can’t help but feel frustrated and fully unsatisfied.

Did I do the right thing?

Technology Nation.

Sun, 03 Apr 2011 19:37:00 -0400

I’m sitting alone at my kitchen table and I can’t help but think what would I do without all of the technology to keep myself from realizing I’m alone. Without this laptop I couldn’t check on that boy I like to see which girl is writing on his wall now. I couldn’t check on the people I don’t speak to anymore, seeing what they’ve been up to, wondering if they truly are happy or if they are just posing for pictures people are taking of them. Where would we be without our technology? We would actually have to speak to the people we care about instead of looking into their lives through a blurred lens. I think technology has made us lazy in our relationships with the boys we want and the friends we have. Maybe we need to put in more effort or we’ll just end up in a relationship with our cellphones.

Song lyrics for the songbird

Sat, 02 Apr 2011 11:45:01 -0400

Oh you’re a Rockstar

A little fame whore

You think you’ll get far

You always want more

You aim to sleep around

shoot your feelings off the ground

But they don’t see it

The help your calling for

You think all those girls wanna be with you

Associations what they want with what you do

Your Reputations following you

But you said to find out

Baby you’ve proved it all true

I know what you’re about

Do you

Know what your doing

The chaos you are ensuing

Why don’t you swallow me whole

That way I don’t have to fall.

Nicholas Sparks inspired me, so I decided to write...

Sat, 02 Apr 2011 11:06:00 -0400

The days pass from weeks to months and I still search for you in every guy I come across. You were the first person to teach me something, make me think about myself, question my path. I wanted to learn from you, I still do, but the distance of California to New York separates us. We don’t speak anymore but I think about you constantly, and your words stay fresh in my mind. There was just something about the two weeks we spent together. we were complete strangers but from the moment I looked up and saw you at the airport I felt your eyes on my own like magnets, I couldn’t look away. Making up anything just to say one word to each other was what we would do and everyday I got to walk next to you while we traveled Israel was a bonus. I would find myself looking for you on the bus, waiting for you to walk through the door, waiting for you to sit across the table from me, and you did. Like a quick dream you only have for the minute before you wake up, you appeared in my life and right out again once we parted. We were like magnets, fate pulling us towards one another while keeping us a safe distance, barely touching. You were 22, I was 19, and we were both on the verge of a shift in our lives. When the plane landed in New York to return home to reality you held my face in your hands. I stated, almost on the verge of tears, “I’ll see you soon right?”, he lived in Cleveland and was making the move to L.A. to become a screenwriter. He replied, “of course”, to comfort me, and maybe to keep me from crying like a baby that I was, he gave me a hug that meant goodbye, rubbing my head like the sad puppy dog I was for him. He walked one way, and I another towards my father’s arms. Gravity brought us together and pulled us apart but there was something there, I know he felt it. Maybe not now, maybe not within the next few months, but in a few years I feel like we will cross paths again. I can feel it in my bones that I will see him again, I believe in it. And when I do, I won’t let him walk away. He made me feel like I could find the man I am looking for and there will always be a place for him inside my heart as I look for a carbon copy of him in any boy I come across. But maybe, if I am lucky, I will see him again on a summer day.

“I want to taste and glory in each day and never be afraid to experience pain; and never shut...

Thu, 31 Mar 2011 22:35:01 -0400

“I want to taste and glory in each day and never be afraid to experience pain; and never shut myself up in a numb-core of non feeling, or stop questioning and criticizing life and take the easy way out. To learn and think: to think and live; to live and learn: this always, with new insight, new understanding, and new love.” -Sylvia Plath

“We all have that boy; he’s the boy we try to pretend we aren’t looking for as we...

Thu, 31 Mar 2011 13:00:34 -0400

“We all have that boy; he’s the boy we try to pretend we aren’t looking for as we make our way to class. He’s the boy that we lie about and claim to not care about anymore. He’s the boy that gives you the cliché butterflies, complete with the weakness in the knees. He’s the boy we’re thinking about as we read this. I think every single girl has this boy, and every single girl will remember him forever- he’s not the one for us, but he’ll always be somewhere in our hearts.”

"If you want your life to be a magnificent story, then begin by realizing that you are the author & everyday you have the opportunity to write a new page."

Mon, 28 Mar 2011 22:19:40 -0400

Everyday someone is waiting for something. Today I was waiting for him to text me, like I waited the day before, but no text came. I wait for people to make a move, to reply to my comments, to laugh at my jokes, to smile when I smile at them, to approach me when I am sitting alone, to respond to my email, to respond to my actions. I wait, but so do they.

Why do we wait for people to move us and to guide us in our lives? Aren’t we the main characters in our own life story? Why don’t we make our own days and nights and situations? Would we look to desperate sitting in a cafeteria alone or could that be better than sitting alone in your room searching facebook, searching twitter, using any source of technology to protect yourself from actual contact with people. Even when we sit alone we use all different shields to protect us from the glare of strangers. You can simply pull up your laptop and no one will approach you, plug in your head phones and listen to your ipod or even pretend like you are on the phone. Why are we so afraid of each other and what started all of this fear? Who are we without our human interactions? I find myself happier in times when I am around other people, making new friends, experiencing a new day everyday. I strongly believe that people need to start taking charge of their lives and stop allowing their fears of their pasts to haunt them.

I’m done waiting. Waiting on him, waiting on people in general. I’m going to write my own stories from now on.

Intimacy

Mon, 28 Mar 2011 14:12:00 -0400

Intimacy. We all want it whether we are willing to admit it or not, it’s something that makes or breaks a relationship and takes the relationship to the next level. It’s a deepness that meaningless sex can’t possibly reach. Intimacy is the privilege to know what the other person is feeling without saying a word. It’s a level you reach when you are comfortable knowing that the other person won’t screw you over and screw someone else. Intimacy doesn’t need to be spoken about, it’s just there. When you are fearless in the relationship you build because once you reach this point you can lose it all when something goes wrong. Intimacy is a vulnerable place where the other person can see into your inner thoughts where you let very few in and this is the level that causes couples who break up to resent one another. The intimacy is what separates you from other girls he sees, it’s almost like a wall they can’t penetrate. Other girls may be attractive to him but he doesn’t trust anyone quite like you and that’s hard to come by. But when did intimacy become something we have to ask for? Are we becoming more experienced in our relationships by knowing what it feels to be intimate with someone or are we stunting our growth in relationships by knowing when this feeling could be approaching and therefore stopping it right in its tracks?

This is what all the boys are afraid of and what all the girls are looking for when they ask, “what are you thinking about?”. We search for intimacy almost because it’s an unsigned, unspoken contract. It’s being on the same page as the person you care about without having to state it directly. But without intimacy people are allowed to make their own rules and break them as they please. Without intimacy there are so many ways to mess with a person’s head and therefore confuse the shit out of whomever we date. We can say we aren’t looking for something serious, we just want to have fun and we can do whatever with whoever we please.

The moment you are lying in bed with a guy cuddling and he tells you how he feels regarding anything, well that’s golden and I say, hold onto that as tight as you can without suffocating the poor guy. We may think we can sleep around gaining experience in bed but after the deed is done and he gets dressed to leave you realize you feel something for this person you weren’t prepared to feel. Then the crazy kicks in and most girls cling due to insecurity. Don’t be a stage 5 clinger in this case, you made your bed so sleep in it, but if you can’t handle the factor that he won’t develop feelings for you I say go for it. You are only young once but if you are like me and you start to imagine his last name with your first I would recommend not sleeping around because you’ll just be that girl who’s crying on her way to class looking sad and pathetic. But the point is, why are we so afraid to fall and even trip sometimes over a person? These emotions are necessary to build character and knowledge within ourselves as college students. These heartbreaks, while unfortunate, are the feelings that lead us closer to the one. Let’s face it, without heartbreak Taylor Swift songs wouldn’t exist, Mark Zuckerberg wouldn’t have created facebook, and love wouldn’t be this amazing thing that’s hard to come by. So maybe we need to stop searching for this intimacy since it’s something that develops over time, maybe we just need to start living.

“No matter who broke your heart, or how long it takes to...

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 12:54:49 -0400

“No matter who broke your heart, or how long it takes to heal, you’ll never get through it without your friends.”

We all want to be missed.

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 12:35:00 -0400

I was looking through some quotes while in the library procrastinating my work and found this one by Bob Marley :

“You may not be her first, her last, or her only. She loved before she may love again. But if she loves you now, what else matters? She’s not perfect - you aren’t either, and the two of you may never be perfect together but if she can make you laugh, cause you to think twice, and admit to being human and making mistakes, hold onto her and give her the most you can. She may not be thinking about you every second of the day, but she will give you a part of her that she knows you can break -her heart. So don’t hurt her, don’t change her, don’t analyze and don’t expect more than she can give. Smile when she makes you happy, let her know when she makes you mad, and miss her when she’s not there.”

This quote inspired me about a boy that I know and about myself my freshman year of college. I think this sums up what most girls in college feel if they have experienced a relationship or two. We come to college possibly having just ended a year and a half relationship with someone who was our first. Someone whom we loved with all of our hearts and now have caused us to become damaged goods for a year or two and this broken heart fuels our attitudes on relationships in college. We think, how can we love again? But we do, and when we are ready we do with all of our hearts but we see the same effects of a broken heart in the boys we hook up with. Their attitudes actually hurt us vulnerable girls because they literally won’t give any girl, no matter how deserving, an inch into their head or their heart.

My freshman year in college I thought I could never love as innocently as I loved my high school boyfriend. Puppy love is exactly the term for what we had and while we never had sex, he was my first for much more. My best friend and confidant, I trusted him with everything I had, judgement aside, and that was the most intimate I had ever been with anyone before. The intimacy we had is something I have yet to encounter again in my college career and something I have been looking for lately. Two and a half years later, and a band aid relationship I had to cover up my heartache my freshman year, I want a boyfriend. I admit it. I don’t need someone to be there for me, I have grown independent and strong over the past two years but it would be nice to have that best friend again, that person I can tell everything to. That person who relies on me for advice and a comforting hug. I miss it and I miss being missed. Thats all a girl wants anyway, to be needed and missed. For all the girls out there who want this and are going through the garbage of guys to find it, stay strong, don’t change what you want because a guy won’t give you that intimacy, wait it out until you find the person who is ready for what you have to give and ready to give you all of them.

Where for art thou Romeo?

Sat, 26 Mar 2011 22:44:39 -0400

A play my EN 343 Shakespeare class had to see today has sparked some thought within me about how every girl is searching for her Romeo. Romeo & Juliet, I’m sure most of you are familiar with this famous play, represents Romeo as a whiny little boy who is swayed by love in just one glance as he changes his feelings of absolute obsession over Rosaline to falling head over heels with Juliet. If we are all looking for this Romeo figure, we’re all doomed. Romeo isn’t the man that we want, he’s only pretty from the audience but once you get close to him as you leave the theatre and say “good job” he’s a lanky greaseball type who could possibly be gay. We need to stop looking for Romeo, and frankly stop looking in general. Love will come and find us and not by an instant definition of where you will go with that person in the next month, year, or future in general. I don’t know when the day came that made me so worried about the future but it has been effecting my present and there will be no future unless I haul myself out there not worried whether I will get hurt, whether a boy will be sick of me after a month or whether he just won’t be good enough. Wasting time is much different than not trying something out. We must find out these things for ourselves by trying, not by allowing a guy to make a fool of us, but to seek the possibilities in which shoe fits. So if you are afraid to continue a casual relationship with no title, a thing you have with a guy, or if you are just hooking up and you’re afraid you will develop feelings for someone who isn’t emotionally available, I say, breathe and trust the process because every experience leads you closer to your “Romeo” who isn’t as perfect as we want him to be, but is perfect for us.