The truth is often said in jest, and then saved in a shoe box.
In rummaging around for my passport and birth certificate this evening (both of which I found), I stumbled onto several notes from Jon. It should shock no one that I held on to these scraps. I am a pack rat to the nth degree, both literally and emotionally. I hold on to everything: every lesson, every card, every phone number, every insight, every frustration. I have learned to let some things go, but on many ways if they're rubber, I'm glue.
The first scrap was initially a grid that Abby began at Spring Break last year. Amidst the chaos of graduation, job searching, life changing, Ms. Type A herself helped give me some structure with a grid of options ranging from staying in Portland, moving to Chicago, or moving to another unnamed city, and alongside these options were their predictable outcomes as far as several years hence. Added to the grid was a column that read: "Moving to England/London with Jon". Guess who authored that option.
While written in jest, the scrap still makes me wonder how we went from transatlantic phone calls to this, and the only answer I can drum-up is not at all satisfying.(Oh, how fickle the heart.) Over breakfast with a 30-something friend of mine, we discussed our romantic expectations and the follow-through (or rather, lack thereof)we have experienced lately. "I'm not cynical about it anymore," she said. "I'm thirty-one. I don't have enough energy to carry that with me." Hope springs eternal.
I do care about Jon. I realized that in rediscovering his notes. At the very least I care for a positive memory. His sin being venial in comparison to some, I'm finding it difficult to be angry at him (while i'm certainly angry with him). Telling him as much seems useless since balancing that with sincere interest in his life is very difficult over email. I'll leave him to his own devices, I think. Besides, not everyone is looking to be personally challenged by their realionships. (I know, I don't get it either.)
I am trying to learn to let some things go, see?
Don't worry, I'm sure I'll save the email.
The first scrap was initially a grid that Abby began at Spring Break last year. Amidst the chaos of graduation, job searching, life changing, Ms. Type A herself helped give me some structure with a grid of options ranging from staying in Portland, moving to Chicago, or moving to another unnamed city, and alongside these options were their predictable outcomes as far as several years hence. Added to the grid was a column that read: "Moving to England/London with Jon". Guess who authored that option.
While written in jest, the scrap still makes me wonder how we went from transatlantic phone calls to this, and the only answer I can drum-up is not at all satisfying.(Oh, how fickle the heart.) Over breakfast with a 30-something friend of mine, we discussed our romantic expectations and the follow-through (or rather, lack thereof)we have experienced lately. "I'm not cynical about it anymore," she said. "I'm thirty-one. I don't have enough energy to carry that with me." Hope springs eternal.
I do care about Jon. I realized that in rediscovering his notes. At the very least I care for a positive memory. His sin being venial in comparison to some, I'm finding it difficult to be angry at him (while i'm certainly angry with him). Telling him as much seems useless since balancing that with sincere interest in his life is very difficult over email. I'll leave him to his own devices, I think. Besides, not everyone is looking to be personally challenged by their realionships. (I know, I don't get it either.)
I am trying to learn to let some things go, see?
Don't worry, I'm sure I'll save the email.