I can't understand these random thoughts myself, but sometimes when I am reading these philosophical texts I find my mind suddenly wandering back to a certain point in time. Generally these points occurred during the time in which I was trying to pry Will out of my life with a crowbar and simultaneously trying to shove Charlie into the box of "boyfriend" or "lover" or some such thing to replace him. Why these specific moments come back to me clearly and suddenly when I am reading, say, Bertrand Russell's expositions of Wittgenstein's theories, I do not know. I obviously cannot fathom the logical connection, so there must be a word setting off the trigger, or a mood evoked by the words. At any rate it disrupts my concentration so I figured I should write about it.

Allow me to stress, up front, that this in no way on earth implies that I want to re-visit these times.

Basically, the weirdness that is coming back to me now involves me sitting in the Fordham library, behind the circulation desk, around 10 o'clock at night waiting for Charlie to arrive from exotic Manhattan on the RamVan. I am thinking about him walking across the dark campus in the rain, wondering what he will be wearing, hoping he looks gorgeous and impresses my co-worker Stephanie with his charm. I am trying to concentrate on some book or other, trying not to think about how much I want to kiss him and how much I want to get the fuck out of the library so I can spend all night focused on his lips. I am trying not to be such a ditzy girl, losing her breath at the sight of The Boy, trying to keep my head on straight, trying not to smile just thinking about him and there he is, striding towards me in a hooded sweatshirt I am seeing with new eyes. His brown puppy dog eyes are smiling at me. We leave together in the rain. He is holding the umbrella, one arm around my waist. He stops suddenly and kisses me, saying, "Hello." How fucking romantic, I thought then. How fucking easy, I think now. And I wonder how someone I found so utterly beautiful on the outside could have been so utterly vacant on the inside, even when he told me he had the deeper feelings that I had longed for bouncing around inside his skull -- except that they weren't for me and they weren't for me to know about when we were together in real life.

I guess it still amazes me even today, seeing the things I used to be and wondering how I got out of that space at all. And maybe a tiny piece of me wonders what I will think when I look back on my Now from a span of a few years. Will I feel just as stupid, looking at who I was? Or will I see growth, change, assertion? I trust that my relationship with CF is much more deep and meaningful that my tango of idiocy with Charlie, but I wonder where the difference lies. I wonder how I could have been so deceived by appearances, by the feelings that made my head whirl with jealousy and lust and depression and rage. I wonder why I never felt that confusion with CF and I wonder why the other was false and the lack of it is true. I mean, isn't that backwards? Isn't love supposed to be romance and a sick feeling in your stomach, at least at first, fading to contentment and affection? Perhaps I have it all wrong. Don't mistake me, however -- I wouldn't trade CF for anyone. I just wonder what it is (or was) in ME that made me think that Charlie could be the one to match me. Lust, I guess. That's all there is to explain it, isn't there?

And speaking of lust and stupidity, when I read Russell and stumble upon certain lines like, "Everybody, in fact, accepts innumerable propositions about things not experienced, but when people begin to philosophize they seem to think it necessary to make themselves artificially stupid," I think of Steven. How many years ago was it that we fucked each other in the back seat of his pregnant girlfriend's car? He may have been the first to break my hard little heart, the first to make me feel like I could be in a relationship full of passion. But he lied to me, I lied to myself, and then we lied to our significant others about each other. Was it worth it? Well, I did eventually get out of my stupid relationship with Will because of him, and I did learn that cheating really is wrong and bad and stupid... but was it love? God, I was consumed by him. I believed him when he said he would get out of the backwater town in which he lived, believed him when he said he loved me, believed him when I saw the angry young man and the patient self-taught math geek and the fucked-up jaw that was broken by random hoodlums. Jesus, his life was a soap opera. He pulled me right in. It was what I wanted. I wanted to feel alive, and he definitely gave me that. Breathless. But god, did he scare me, on so many levels. And I don't know where he's gone now or what he's doing, but I wonder about him when I see a curly-haired blond boy on a bus. I could compare him to Justin Timberlake and make him mad, or to Ryan Philippe and flatter him, and when I see either of those two pout I still occasionally think of Steven. But why? Why why why? Why do I care what happened to him after all this time? It's not because I'd like to get involved again, that's for sure. I guess I just wonder what happens to people after we lose track, deliberately or accidentally. What is he doing? Did he fulfill any of his aspirations? Does he care? Is he still arrogant and angry and passionate? Does he still force himself to learn higher mathematics, just because his father told him he couldn't? Is he still hanging on to Andi because she's all he can get? Is that pity I feel for him? I don't even know him anymore. Obviously. But I still wonder about him sometimes, and I wonder if he ever wonders about me.

CREDITS:
powered by d*land