Part 3: One Day They’ll See…
That I was the One Who Got Away….
Con’t.
As I mentioned before, my ideas of love were mostly informed by juvenile literature and the few PG rated movies I was allowed to watch.
Oct 25, 1994- How I wish Gilbert or Theodore would just come up to me and KISS me! Wouldn’t that be cool. We would stare at each other until someone said “are you gonna kiss her, or just stand there like an idiot?” And he would long and passionately kiss me!
Dec 14, 1994- Today was…WELL…All I want for Christmas is a boyfriend. All the girls except me (and the “immatures”) have one. This is my wish list: Theodore, Gilbert, Andy
First let us stop and appreciate that I called a group of girls in my class “the immatures.” And then went on to list the three human beings on my Christmas list.
Then we must note, for the impressionable children reading this, that my polygamous and sort of adorable boy-craziness would eventually evolve into something unhealthy.
Sometime in sixth grade, I got tough with God and declared that I could not be happy without a boyfriend. My pining took on a religious quality: I had a hole in my heart that only a boy could fill.
I hate to laugh at my depressed middle school self, because she was really, truly miserable.
But it was like my melodrama had reached its pinnacle, and just when it couldn’t have gotten any more overwrought…my steady rivulet of hormones turned into a busted water main. There were hormones spraying into the street and all the little Emotion St. kids were just bathing in them, whooping and hollering. And pining.
August 21, 1995-Now. About my depression. I’m happy sometimes, but when I’m not happy or stressed my mind wanders to oblivion and I find myself depressed and blind. If only I could fill that space in my life where Linus, Rocky, or Theodore belongs. Once I have that place I can get back to my normal personality.
The best part is that I don’t even feel ashamed of the fact that it’s the amorphous idea of romance I’m committed to, not another human being. As long as they know how to deliver embraces and flowers.
If a psychologist had said to me, “Do you think you’re just in love with the idea of being in love?” I would have been like, “Hell, yes.” (But with more exclamation marks and in all caps).
August 24, 1995- So tonight my parents began to understand my life. Open house. They followed my fast, freezing schedule. They understand everything now. Except one things. BOYS. Man, Linus is so incredibly fine. Man, I wouldn’t mind making out with him. He has a temperament very similar to my own. Then there’s Rocky. Wow. Mr. Hollywood himself. Brad Pitt watch out. We talk and argue. I want a real relationship. Not like with Theodore, We never even talked after we “went together.” I want someone who will cuddle me, bring me flowers on my birthday. I want a true boyfriend. And I can’t be totally happy until I do. (Linus #1, Rocky #2, Theodore #3, and Gilbert #4)
Occasionally I did have moments of focus, and even glimmers of self-awareness. Medically inaccurate and dramatic, but aware.
June 8, 1996- I don’t know. I just made an alarming discovery. I think I’m in love with FERRIS BUELLER [remember these are pseudonyms, I wasn’t that kind of crazy]. Can you be in love in 7th grade? Andrea and Colin don’t think so. Zac does. Well, what I’m feeling is called lovesick. I feel like if I don’t hold him close I’ll scream. I don’t have the courage to tell him, because I know he doesn’t like me. AAAUUUUGGGHH! I’m an estrogen freak. I’m a pubescent with a hormone overdose. My estrogen level rises every time I THINK about him. More than anything I want him to love me. The reason he can have me is because he doesn’t want me. I hate that. He’s so cold. He’s playing my emotions like an accordion. SQUEEZE, STRETCH, SQUEEZE, STRETCH. I have feelings, you know! Sigh!
The only thing that would eventually be more agonizing than not having a boyfriend would be some of the lackluster manchildren I ended up dating when I finally filled the Tarzan-shaped hole in my heart.
June 9, 1999-…The night would have been perfect except that Biff was a jerk. He asked me if I wanted to pay for my meal or not (it was so awkward). Then he asked if he could meet my parents instead of taking me home, because he wanted to spend the night at his friend’s house…
This, 15-year-old Bekah, is dating, that thing you’d been aching, longing, yearning to do for so many years. Rather than tenderly responding to your every emotion, your first asswipe high school boyfriend would require you to leave the tip at every meal (and occasionally suggest that you pay for the whole thing, since he drove), and ask your parents to pick you up half way between your house and his. On the side of the road.