Why Did You Mess With Forever?

I had almost, not quite forgot how totally wonderful Oregon is. What a gorgeous day. It makes me wonder for a moment why I ever left. I strongly believe it was necessary for me to leave. Had I not, I would never have crawled out of the borderline sloth that was not only my modus operandi, but also my fate. Also, that thing with that chick was waaay out of hand.

A lot of people try to romanticize the whole unrequited love thing, but the reality is pretty grim. For example, I read a story the other day that went a little something like this. This girl liked a dude a lot, for a long time, but she never worked up the courage to speak to him. He was friends with all her friends, so she saw him all the time, but could never be normal around him, because her crush was common knowledge. She liked him so much and was so frustrated by this situation that it physically hurt to be around him. She found it hard to breathe, and was always fantasizing about even the simplest of interactions with him. Then one day he brought over his new girlfriend, and he looked so happy with her. For the next few weeks, she spent all her time sitting away from the group trying to avoid them, doing anything she could to get away. Eventually she decided to go to a college in another country. It was something she was interested in anyways, and the school was the best at it. Some irrational part of her wished he would want her to stay, but he was happy that she found something she wanted to do. So she left. For 5 long years she was at school, visiting on important holidays, but never seeing him. After a few years of not seeing him, she even stopped thinking about him every 15 minutes; it dropped down to once an hour, then to once a day, then once a week, then not really at all. Then she graduated, came back, and got to know him again, and while her little girlish crush was gone, she still cared about him a lot, and they started going out and got married and lived happily ever after.

What horsecrap. That's not how reality works. Up to the last sentence, it's plausible. Let's erase that last line and then inject a little reality into the story.

...Then she graduated, came back, and she never saw him again. He cut her completely from his life and he never even noticed, because their entire relationship was all in her head. It didn't exist. He barely even knew her name, and everyone kept poking fun that she liked him, so he avoided her, and was uncomfortable around her, and was glad when she left. He then forgot all about her and lived his life in the way he chose. And she was forced to take the harsh blow, and try to move on. There would always be a soft spot for him in her heart, and her heart would always pound when she heard his name, or saw a car like the one he used to drive, or thought she saw him in a crowd or on the street. But she never saw him again. Eventually, she learned to deal with the ragged gash he absently tore in her soul, and she started dating again. Eventually, she met and later married a wonderful man. And her unrequited love didn't die in a car crash, or end up in an unhappy relationship because he shunted her, he lived a nice life without her and didn't miss her or regret his decisions.

That's a little dose of reality. Life is not fair, or even-handed. It does not believe in karma. If you're pissed because your little fantasy world didn't work out like it does in romance novels and fairy tales, life frankly doesn't care. The world keeps spinning. Every now and then someone will get lucky, and the fairy tale will live for a time, but it's just that, just luck. But you will never make someone sorry for what they don't know they did to you. One day you just wake up and realize you're a loser, holding out hope for the longshot to come through when you know it never will. And that's when you think to yourself, "I gotta get out of here." Looking back, I suppose that is exactly why I left.
~Biggie