Experience: the Most Unforgiving Teacher

Facebook friends. The majority of them are not “real” friends, but people with whom we’ve spent a very limited amount of time in a very specific context, or people with whom we haven’t spoken in years, or people we don’t even know and the only reason they made it onto our friends list is because they have lots of mutual friends. And, sadly, sometimes members of that last group aren’t real people at all.

My point? Being friends on Facebook is not that big of a deal, so it’s kind of a big deal when someone unfriends you. Like, “_______ is friends with that rando we once sat next to in 12^th grade English yet he unfriends ME?”

How about when the unfriender is someone you dated seriously? And he doesn’t unfriend your sister? And his sister, his brother, his mother, his grandmother, and his cousin don’t unfriend you? And the length of your break up almost exceeds the length of your relationship?

And the unfriender untags himself from every last photo you ever took as a couple, but not the ones you took as friends? Or the ones of himself and your sister? Or the ones taken by you of himself with your friends? Such discriminate destruction.

Why now of all times? What’s it matter anymore? The wound isn’t fresh. We’ve both been seeing other people for over a year. You never posted more than maybe twice/year anyway, so did you make a special effort to log on, click “untag” some 300 times, go to my profile, and…delete? If you really didn’t want me in your newsfeed, either unfollow me or remember to delete my sister, too, and ask your family members to do the same.

It could have happened months ago for all I know, but I didn’t discover it until Christmas Day.

So I’m confused. Why are you trying to erase the past? You can’t undo what happened.

You broke your promise.

Yet I don’t regret the time I spent with you because you made me a better person.

I’ve always thought of opposing emotions as two sides of the same coin. As fate would have it, you showed me happiness for the first time. I thought it was the shiny side, but until we failed and that coin flipped to its dark, rusted side, I had no idea. I was plunged into a darkness so complete, a sadness so deep, it took me years to flip over. And it required a lot more strength than I started with. (A reformation process we will not get into here.)

But…thank you. I am extremely happy with the love I’ve got now because I have a full understanding of the whole coin. I didn’t when I was with you, and I’m sorry.

During that coin flip, you taught me a few things. 

You taught me to appreciate the light, and to never take him for granted. And so I will never stop trying. I’ll never stop holding his hand, and I’ll never get used to him. Because relationships only thrive if you continuously pour effort into them.

You taught me how much it hurts to lose. And so I never want to lose him.

You taught me how to communicate, and how to settle disagreements effectively. You taught me of the importance of very clear, “I feel X when you do Y because Z” statements, because we never used them. Any psych majors reading this?

Unbeknownst to you, you taught me the pain of cheating. 

You showed me all of my mistakes, and gave me infinite motivation to never make them again. The memory of loss continues to make me want to be the best version of myself in my new relationship. He deserves nothing less.

So, goodbye, my Facebook friend. You’re just somebody that I used to know. Less than that rando in English class.

Ready, Set, "I Do?"

Hiya. Yours truly has survived the summer and fall from hell. Miss me? You must have a teeny bit if you’ve bothered to keep checking a blog for updates after 8 months of silence. My apologies for that.

What’s changed? A lot. In addition to applying to and accepting admission from a professional school, I recently celebrated one year of left-circling.

Woot woot stable college relationships! More elusive than unicorns. I consider myself…

Excuse me while I go vomit.

Don’t get me wrong, I love my knight in shining armor. Even when his man-dress complements said armor.

But you know, I’m not sure why college women make it their ultimate ambition to secure one of these guys by graduation. Isn’t the whole MRS degree a bit outdated?

Because when graduation happens, then what? Maybe his noble steed will take you both off into the sunset. Maybe you’ll get married and make cute little heirs to the castle. 

….Or maybe you’ll both pursue graduate-level education. Because, unlike in years past, settling down doesn’t necessarily immediately follow post-Bachelor’s. Many careers demand at least a Master’s, or more.

I have a friend. A singular friend because I’m a loser. Just kidding.

I have a friend (let’s call her Jennifer) among my seven friends who’s told me to my face she’s jealous of my relationship. She has a rule that she must be married by age 23 or else the world is going to end. Since we’re both 21 yet I’m the one in a relationship, clearly I am going to beat her to it.

Wrong. It’s 2014. It’s not a race to say, “I do.” 

Well, I got on a shuttle this morning. The shuttle was headed to the airport, to a plane, to my hometown, to my family.

Airports are funny.

When I was eleven, my family was at one of these funny airports getting ready to go on some exotic vacation at an exotic locale where we were guaranteed to have loads of exotic fun. Obviously, these kinds of trips took place before two daughters with college tuition happened. Prior to my sister and I being so expensive, however, I remember proudly telling my mom that “airports are sad.” (This was during my raccoon-eyes-all-black-wearing phase when I used to think sadness was cool. Sadness was deep. Sadness was something only grown-ups could pretend to understand.)

I guess I expected her to ask why I held such an opinion, but instead I got a slap on the wrist and a very stern, “No, airports are HAPPY.” What little brat doesn’t think traveling to Aruba is the absolute best thing ever? In trying to be deep, I came across as ungrateful. A common mistake.

Retrospectively, I understand my mom’s viewpoint. I think her statement goes beyond that one vacation. I’m 10 days shy of the age she was when she got engaged to my dad, which was Christmas Eve of senior year of undergrad. To her, airports represent the times when my dad came home to her, and eventually me, too. My sister, three years my junior, was much luckier and has known him since birth.

Military family.

But as for me, airports have been predominantly sad places. In my childhood they represented moves out-of-state and away from friends, a new house, and a new school. Essentially a new life when my old one was perfectly fine.

In college, I honestly thought airports would morph into happy places. A trip to the airport would mean trading up dining hall mush for home-cooked meals, an annoying roommate for my adorable pet bunny, and a condom animal balloon-laden hallway for a private bathroom.

This was true until the “home” I left became my parents’ house. Once Gramps took my spot at the kitchen table and my spot in the car, once exercise equipment and a rather large stuffed moose crept into my room….It kind of just became too painful to go back.

I tried to exist in two places my first year away. Yet the dissonance between my home-self and my school-self became too much. So the night before my six-hour drive into sophomore year, I severed my last tie to home and decided to fully dedicate myself to no place.

I built a fine little floating life. I had my classes, my human research project, my professors, my clubs, my job, my sorority, my friends…all things I could enjoy nine months out of the year and live without for three. 

That is, until I fell in love.

A love which has made this past year so incredibly amazing.

A love which makes me want to make ties again.

As I stepped into that airport-bound shuttle this morning, Jennifer’s words came to mind. They brought tears to my eyes, and on the wrong leg of my journey. The tears were supposed to be reserved for leaving my parents’ house, not heading towards it. 

I wasn’t crying because I wasn’t absolutely thrilled to see my parents after half a year. I was crying because my happiness was tinged with the sad realization I wasn’t going to see my other half for an entire month. I was crying because in college it’s impossible to not exist in two places, even when you try your hardest to stay unattached. Love will do that to you.

Frankly, I can’t wait to finish my education. Maybe then I can stop drifting from place to place, packing up and moving back and forth half as often as my semester schedule changes. Maybe then I can form attachments without wondering when either of us has to tear them apart.

Sure, that trip down the aisle and those two little words sound really nice right now. But it’s more because, as college women, we really just want a little stability after 4 (or 8!) years of turbulence. There’s no standard-issue timeline, and trying to create one for yourself will only lead to anxiety when you don’t meet it. 

Unless the neighbor pops the question to me within the next 10 days, I am not going to be like my mother. That’s okay.

No one should feel that kind of pressure on top of everything else. Get a diploma, and then may you direct that noble steed, with or without a knight, any which way you please. Sunset, pasture field, another 4-6 year gauntlet (er, I mean, post-Bachelor's degree)—it’s up to you.