The Boy I Could Never Love

Who Are You?

Over the years, those twenty-five minutes of homeroom, saw me gush about guys and cry when they broke my heart. Talk about my family and working on my grandparent's farm. Tell the latest in a long list of events I participated in, and complain about the idiots we went to school with.

I questioned if it ever bothered him, specifically the stuff about boys. I didn't keep many, the one freshman year and a guy I met at camp after the first broke up with me, but when asked, my friend told me he did not mind. Thinking that meant he finally got over me, I kept on keeping on.

I enjoy hearing myself talk, it can often come as one of my downfalls, but I tried hard to include my friend in the conversation. That first year though I mostly ignored her when I could help it, showing just enough interest to not appear rude. I made it look like I wasn't paying attention to him as talked at her. In case he still burned a flame for me, I wished to avoid confusing him.

When my friend did have something to say, I listened. I even asked questions to incite topics I believed might interest him. Though, rarely did he offer more than the question asked. Often he sat silently, listening to me prattle on.

My questions made me realize I never took the time to get to know him. The want of a friend left me uncaring of who that friend actually was. We enjoyed each other's company, but our relationship lacked substance. Deciding to do it right this time, I tried to learn what I could.

My friend didn't make it easy. His take on people thought to share experiences and get to know them that way, facts were boring. It is one thing to hear about but another to experience. He seldom talked about home except for the love he held for his family, that they treated him well, and how he could not afford to do things.

What his parents did for work I could never really get him to tell me. Trying to figure out what they did for fun gave me a headache. He felt home and school should remain separate, but slowly I learned about him. He liked the color blue, art, and the Patriots, but seemed uninterested in playing sports. The idea of spending extra time at school held no allure so my friend rarely participated in clubs or events, and wolves were his spirit animal. He also believed in god and visited his dad on the weekends.

In many ways, we could not live our lives more differently. Beyond drawing, he liked to write stories that consisted of mainly dialogue. Though combining the two came as little interest to him. My suggestions for such brought him shaking his head. The stories he wrote didn't match the pictures he drew. Advised that either pictures or written detail about what existed in the world of his story would help his work met with further resistance. When an argument about it became heated, we agreed he would stop showing them to me.

He never seemed interested in any girls at school. I know because I asked. He told me our school contained nobody that appealed to him, but I believed he just never admitted it. By then I felt him over the idea as my friend never expressed that it was me he still wanted.

I received my first life lesson on romantic partnerships freshman year. My mom advised me to think about what a person brings to your relationship. Her goal to get me to leave the guy currently dating me backfired.

If I thought to leave my boyfriend, I wanted a reason, and a better option sounded like a good one. I hoped seeing me happy would help lessen the blow and keep me from going back to him. That guy really could convince me to do anything, and I knew it. I saw committing to another as my only way out.

Taught the biggest thing one could offer the world stood their skillset, I started looking for people with a fair amount of intelligence who didn't mind getting their hands dirty. Ingrained in me from the beginning as the daughter of a carpenter and mill worker and granddaughter of a lifelong farmer retired from shipbuilding kept me unquestioning how working retail or busting tables stood entry-level employment, and you better be in school if you worked at McDonald's or Burger King. Better yet, just don't do it.

A common statement I grew up with holds all kinds of controversy today. Fast food is not a career choice. The only people who remain in the industry are retarded or don't have skills. (Pause for dramatic effect.) Nowadays, I know a job is a job and fast food puts food on the table and a roof over your head. Also, the word retard exists as the only swear in my house. Just writing it makes me nauseous.

However, an impressionable 14-year-old kid, with almost no friends, possessed no way of offsetting a statement like that. The only person I knew flipping burgers for a living was my cousin who no one in the family held much use for. They even used her as an example to drive the point home. Hearing the people I cherished most say something so brutal sat like a tub of lard. Nevertheless, those words made me continue to overlook my friend, no matter what I felt about him.

His goals stood simple as they remained nonexistent. A strive to exist as his best self led me to judge his inhibition as no way to live. His skills stayed limited to being kind and enjoying art, especially drawing. Add his love for family, and that pretty much sums it up.

As I said, he didn't involve himself in sports or clubs and only came to one school event where his parent didn't attend. My teachings never allowed me to entertain the serenity he brought me reason enough to accept him, and his lack of presence helped me to disregard him. Yet, despite his intensity, my life felt happiest with him in it.

The classic statement, I wish I knew then what I know now, plays in my head. My father's family suffered as alcoholics but my mother's lived as high-strung workaholics that barely scraped by, and never seemed satisfied. I love them dearly, but the-work-that-separates-the-men-from-the-boys mentality saw them hurt more than anything.

I will take happiness over financially stable any day. Even in bad health, being happy offers the best medicine. A statement they wouldn't agree with. Medicine is the best medicine, my grandfather once told me. This being the man I idolized

What lesson were you taught that you no longer adhere to?
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