Letting Go---Part I
"What time is it?" a friend asks me as we sit in the damp, mildewed atmosphere of the old choir room.
Inside my pocket, the tiny black face of a ladies' watch ticks away the seconds while we wait for our professor. As I dig through my pants, I feel the sharp, stubby springs that once anchored a watchband poke me in the thigh and fingers. Thumbing the trinket, I pull it out of my pocket and cannot help but notice how out of place it is. After all, I always prided myself in living on the cutting edge of fashion, and yet I sport a cheap department store timepiece that doesn't even have a band any longer, but is worth infinitely more in my mind than a Rolex. It is curious to know that everything in life has its own value in which its net worth, make up, and durability are all completely irrelevant. This value which people attach to a certain item is its story.
"Old man Brady still has four minutes," I reply, giving a sigh as I hope quietly that our professor never shows up. I gaze down into the glass face I hold in my hand, and am reminded of another face, albeit one that isn't metallic. Looking into my small makeshift pocket watch is like looking into the past, and all I can see is her face. She gave me this watch on Valentine's Day.
Its story goes even further back than that, but that was when it came into my possession. It was the watch she was wearing when I showed up half an hour late for our first date. It was the watch she was staring at when I looked at her and first realized I was in love with her. And then, of course, it was the watch that she gave me as a Valentine's Day present. She was always giving me things to help me keep track of time. It seemed like the theme of our entire relationship. Everything we ever were was attached to the seconds ticking away. Either we were counting the seconds until I would leave the frontlines and return home to her, or counting the seconds until we would both ready to be together after a fight, or counting away the seconds until I left her for good. Toward the end, we were counting the seconds before our next fight, but in retrospect, we only fought so much because I was leaving and we were both afraid. I was afraid that I was in love with her, and may never be with her. The hell if I know what she was afraid of, but I know she was afraid; I could feel it.
Suddenly, a man who would be in shape if round were considered a shape waddles into the room. "Sorry, folks." Professor Brady is a man who is never on time. I, of course, have no room to talk, but Professor Brady makes an art out of being late. Of course, I'm sure he used to make up some pretty good excuses, but I'm sure that at some point he either ran out or stopped trying. Completely bald and sporting a thick moustache, he is just a bowler hat shy of being a larger-than-life Mr. Potato Head. Even with his uncanny resemblence to a spud and complete inability to keep a schedule, Brady is a fairly nice man. To be honest, I wouldn't rather have anyone else in the world teaching me how to sing. He may look like a train wreck, but the man has the voice of Pavarotti and knows how to create that in others. All these things would be wonderful to know if Professor Brady had any relevance whatsoever.
I put away my watch, and grin at the irony that it brings me. I haven't been late to anything in the past four years... ever. I suppose that isn't ironic in its own right, but what I find ironic about it is that the small piece of copper or silver or whatever it is has changed me nearly as much as she has. In the four years I have had looking at my time with her through the lens of hindsight, I cannot help but realize how much better of a man I am because of the time I spent with her. It isn't that she made me punctual, it is that I have never been a man who has ever been able to love someone romantically and be able to maintain an affection for them when they break me down to my lowest. Yet, four years after the fight that ended all hope of a friendship between us, I still pray for her daily. I suppose that's strange; my roommate keeps telling me to let the whole thing go and forget about her. I keep telling him that he'll never understand until it happens to him. I guess that everyone, at some point in their life, comes across the one person who will influence them more than any other person ever will. The lucky ones, of course, are those who spend their lives with that person. Then again, if I am anything, it is most certainly not lucky. After all, I never have even believed in luck. I believe that there is, and should be, a reason for everything. Even if I had not believed that before I knew her, she would have convinced me of it. I remember we used to talk and everything we said, we had to back with a reason why we felt that way. Those were some of my favorite times.
Brady is droning on about someting at the front of the classroom. Something about time signatures, I think, but I have been on autopilot for the last hour. Sure, I've been singing, but I have no clue what I've been saying. Beyond the fact that we're singing Latin, a language of which I don't speak a word, I just haven't been paying attention. Then again, not paying attention is my strongest point. After a ten minute lecture on what we're doing wrong, Brady finally calls an end to the class.
I check my watch; I still have fifteen minutes before I'm supposed to meet Derek, my roommate, on the quad. I decide that I'll go to the student center and buy a postcard. I know, I've been attending North Carolina for the past four years, and so I really have no use for a postcard, but I can't help it. In all honesty, it is a compulsion I have had since my first week on campus. Every single week I walk into the student center, buy a postcard, and write a short note to her. It seems futile, considering that I haven't spoken to her since I arrived on campus, but I still do it. I stopped sending them to her two months into my first semester freshman year; and consequently, I have a large shoebox sitting under my bed, bursting at the seams with a weekly chronicle of my life over the past four years. I own at least two of every postcard that the university has printed in the last four years, and each one is addressed to her. I know that she doesn't care anymore, and that she probably got rid of the ones that I did send her, because she never even so much as acknowledged getting them.
I give a little smile as I pick through the postcard rack, noticing a new photo that I don't have. Things always seem to go better when there is a new postcard to be bought. I drop a dollar on the counter, pick up my change, and walk out into the sunlight. It's so beautiful today. The sky is a Tar Heel Blue, and the clouds remind me of the cotton that used to grow near my house. The cool breeze against my skin is like the soft caress of an angel, and it reminds me of her. I sit down under a tree out on the quad, look at my watch to note that I still have about seven minutes before Derek shows up, and start writing.
Dearest,
Just thought I'd drop you a little line to see how you were, and to let you know how my week has been. This week has been really great. I got my scores back from when I took the LSAT a month ago... I did great. Getting into law school is going to be so easy. Next week is the University Chorale show. I miss our talks. I miss your eyes. Hell, I just miss my friend. I still pray for you every day.
Love always,
me
Derek shows up close enough to on time for me not to get on his back about it. I'm still sitting here, staring at my postcard, debating with myself as to whether I should send it to her. After all, it's addressed to her and everything. It would be so easy to send it off to her. What would it hurt, after all? If she replied, I'd know it didn't fall on deaf ears; and if not, I only have to face the silence that I've gotten from her for the past four years.
"Hey, douche!" he spouts as he plops down beside me under the tree. "I can't believe you got another postcard. I mean, I would have thought that after four years, you would have gotten over it, but you're sick, man! You got balls, though. I will say that; when you set your mind to something, you just don't give up. The world needs more people like that."
"Perhaps, but then I would cease to be special." In all honesty, it really pisses me off when Derek walks up to me and immediately spouts off wisdom. It always happens right after his philosophy class; it's like he hears something in class and it's so good that he has to repeat it as much as he can to as many people as possible before he forgets it. She never was that blunt with her philosophical jabs. I loved that about her; she would always creep under my skin with her sweet nothings, and then coldcock me with something both profound and classy.
"Dude, do you realize the money you have wasted over the past four years? I mean, the stamps alone must have cost you a fortune!" A pallor sets over him, and I am suddenly very frightened becuase that means he has an idea. "I'm going to cleanse you of all this, man. This isn't healthy. I've been your roommate for four years, and you do this every week. You're going to stop sending these things to her, and I'm going to see to it."
I just don't have the heart to tell him that I stopped sending them over three and a half years ago.
Inside my pocket, the tiny black face of a ladies' watch ticks away the seconds while we wait for our professor. As I dig through my pants, I feel the sharp, stubby springs that once anchored a watchband poke me in the thigh and fingers. Thumbing the trinket, I pull it out of my pocket and cannot help but notice how out of place it is. After all, I always prided myself in living on the cutting edge of fashion, and yet I sport a cheap department store timepiece that doesn't even have a band any longer, but is worth infinitely more in my mind than a Rolex. It is curious to know that everything in life has its own value in which its net worth, make up, and durability are all completely irrelevant. This value which people attach to a certain item is its story.
"Old man Brady still has four minutes," I reply, giving a sigh as I hope quietly that our professor never shows up. I gaze down into the glass face I hold in my hand, and am reminded of another face, albeit one that isn't metallic. Looking into my small makeshift pocket watch is like looking into the past, and all I can see is her face. She gave me this watch on Valentine's Day.
Its story goes even further back than that, but that was when it came into my possession. It was the watch she was wearing when I showed up half an hour late for our first date. It was the watch she was staring at when I looked at her and first realized I was in love with her. And then, of course, it was the watch that she gave me as a Valentine's Day present. She was always giving me things to help me keep track of time. It seemed like the theme of our entire relationship. Everything we ever were was attached to the seconds ticking away. Either we were counting the seconds until I would leave the frontlines and return home to her, or counting the seconds until we would both ready to be together after a fight, or counting away the seconds until I left her for good. Toward the end, we were counting the seconds before our next fight, but in retrospect, we only fought so much because I was leaving and we were both afraid. I was afraid that I was in love with her, and may never be with her. The hell if I know what she was afraid of, but I know she was afraid; I could feel it.
Suddenly, a man who would be in shape if round were considered a shape waddles into the room. "Sorry, folks." Professor Brady is a man who is never on time. I, of course, have no room to talk, but Professor Brady makes an art out of being late. Of course, I'm sure he used to make up some pretty good excuses, but I'm sure that at some point he either ran out or stopped trying. Completely bald and sporting a thick moustache, he is just a bowler hat shy of being a larger-than-life Mr. Potato Head. Even with his uncanny resemblence to a spud and complete inability to keep a schedule, Brady is a fairly nice man. To be honest, I wouldn't rather have anyone else in the world teaching me how to sing. He may look like a train wreck, but the man has the voice of Pavarotti and knows how to create that in others. All these things would be wonderful to know if Professor Brady had any relevance whatsoever.
I put away my watch, and grin at the irony that it brings me. I haven't been late to anything in the past four years... ever. I suppose that isn't ironic in its own right, but what I find ironic about it is that the small piece of copper or silver or whatever it is has changed me nearly as much as she has. In the four years I have had looking at my time with her through the lens of hindsight, I cannot help but realize how much better of a man I am because of the time I spent with her. It isn't that she made me punctual, it is that I have never been a man who has ever been able to love someone romantically and be able to maintain an affection for them when they break me down to my lowest. Yet, four years after the fight that ended all hope of a friendship between us, I still pray for her daily. I suppose that's strange; my roommate keeps telling me to let the whole thing go and forget about her. I keep telling him that he'll never understand until it happens to him. I guess that everyone, at some point in their life, comes across the one person who will influence them more than any other person ever will. The lucky ones, of course, are those who spend their lives with that person. Then again, if I am anything, it is most certainly not lucky. After all, I never have even believed in luck. I believe that there is, and should be, a reason for everything. Even if I had not believed that before I knew her, she would have convinced me of it. I remember we used to talk and everything we said, we had to back with a reason why we felt that way. Those were some of my favorite times.
Brady is droning on about someting at the front of the classroom. Something about time signatures, I think, but I have been on autopilot for the last hour. Sure, I've been singing, but I have no clue what I've been saying. Beyond the fact that we're singing Latin, a language of which I don't speak a word, I just haven't been paying attention. Then again, not paying attention is my strongest point. After a ten minute lecture on what we're doing wrong, Brady finally calls an end to the class.
I check my watch; I still have fifteen minutes before I'm supposed to meet Derek, my roommate, on the quad. I decide that I'll go to the student center and buy a postcard. I know, I've been attending North Carolina for the past four years, and so I really have no use for a postcard, but I can't help it. In all honesty, it is a compulsion I have had since my first week on campus. Every single week I walk into the student center, buy a postcard, and write a short note to her. It seems futile, considering that I haven't spoken to her since I arrived on campus, but I still do it. I stopped sending them to her two months into my first semester freshman year; and consequently, I have a large shoebox sitting under my bed, bursting at the seams with a weekly chronicle of my life over the past four years. I own at least two of every postcard that the university has printed in the last four years, and each one is addressed to her. I know that she doesn't care anymore, and that she probably got rid of the ones that I did send her, because she never even so much as acknowledged getting them.
I give a little smile as I pick through the postcard rack, noticing a new photo that I don't have. Things always seem to go better when there is a new postcard to be bought. I drop a dollar on the counter, pick up my change, and walk out into the sunlight. It's so beautiful today. The sky is a Tar Heel Blue, and the clouds remind me of the cotton that used to grow near my house. The cool breeze against my skin is like the soft caress of an angel, and it reminds me of her. I sit down under a tree out on the quad, look at my watch to note that I still have about seven minutes before Derek shows up, and start writing.
Dearest,
Just thought I'd drop you a little line to see how you were, and to let you know how my week has been. This week has been really great. I got my scores back from when I took the LSAT a month ago... I did great. Getting into law school is going to be so easy. Next week is the University Chorale show. I miss our talks. I miss your eyes. Hell, I just miss my friend. I still pray for you every day.
Love always,
me
Derek shows up close enough to on time for me not to get on his back about it. I'm still sitting here, staring at my postcard, debating with myself as to whether I should send it to her. After all, it's addressed to her and everything. It would be so easy to send it off to her. What would it hurt, after all? If she replied, I'd know it didn't fall on deaf ears; and if not, I only have to face the silence that I've gotten from her for the past four years.
"Hey, douche!" he spouts as he plops down beside me under the tree. "I can't believe you got another postcard. I mean, I would have thought that after four years, you would have gotten over it, but you're sick, man! You got balls, though. I will say that; when you set your mind to something, you just don't give up. The world needs more people like that."
"Perhaps, but then I would cease to be special." In all honesty, it really pisses me off when Derek walks up to me and immediately spouts off wisdom. It always happens right after his philosophy class; it's like he hears something in class and it's so good that he has to repeat it as much as he can to as many people as possible before he forgets it. She never was that blunt with her philosophical jabs. I loved that about her; she would always creep under my skin with her sweet nothings, and then coldcock me with something both profound and classy.
"Dude, do you realize the money you have wasted over the past four years? I mean, the stamps alone must have cost you a fortune!" A pallor sets over him, and I am suddenly very frightened becuase that means he has an idea. "I'm going to cleanse you of all this, man. This isn't healthy. I've been your roommate for four years, and you do this every week. You're going to stop sending these things to her, and I'm going to see to it."
I just don't have the heart to tell him that I stopped sending them over three and a half years ago.