In Quest of Insouciance

Tears streamed down my face as I read the message:

"What did you expect?"

Even now, 9 years later, the terrible end to what was a potentially beautiful story still bothers me a bit.

Please Note: Dear Reader,

This story is for therapeutic means as I continue through this exercise in my mental health regimen. There will be some timeline jumps as I dissect this broad confession of my inadequacies in romance and a desire to seek better nonchalance in that area of my life. It seems that I also address my regrets directly at one point as you read, please do not be startled.

Thanks for sticking with me!

It was late 2011, I had just gotten my own apartment in Madison months prior. I worked hard as a Captioning Assistant for the hearing impaired, I was also a Night Auditor at the (original) Edgewater Hotel.

In addition to my work load I had been ramping up my artistic portfolio for 2 years prior, after 5 or so years of feigned interest in my own art. I hadn't really sold any pieces since I was 15 or 16.

My 24th birth year had been fruitful. I was able to send artwork to Egypt during the Arab Spring, a bunch had gone to the West Coast, and another painting of mine had been published for the first time. I was able to be creating all of the time, especially during the downtime in my positions. This was a remarkably productive and formative chapter in my life.

I was still fresh-ish from the last and final break-up I had with a manipulative influence that had furrowed over my head since he walked into and out of my life at various times from age 16 until 23.

This story isn't about that guy, at all.

It is about the stupid girl that was left in the wake.

How cringe-worthy, from the time I was 16 until I was 22 I was still a virgin. I had gone from 340 lbs at my heaviest to a svelte 175lbs, and yet I was never enough for this person I loved, nothing beyond a few random kisses to keep me hanging on. Manipulative.

At the ripe old age of 22 while broken up and single. I finally lost my virginity. This tale however is not about that guy either. He was nice, though.

Flash forward to the end of 2019, I was trying to woo this one fellow. It had taken me literal years to finally get up the courage and confidence to start a conversation with him after seeing him so many times in passing at a favored adult beverage dispensarium. As it turns out he had his own mixed bag of despair. I tried to be a light in his darkness, I thought up every interesting and cool date idea I could think of.

He would never respond.

Early last year, he asked me,

"Why are you so invested?"

Tears just streamed down my face.

"Why are you crying?"

I remember not having an answer to these questions, just quiet tears. In the moments since, I have pondered a good deal on it. They weren't terrible questions.

I had been trying so hard to find and have a real connection, since I was assaulted in 2018. Something that would bring light to my own mixed bag of dark despair, or at least distract me from it.

I hated that I had ruined this one potential relationship that had been, for me, years in the making.

You could say I am a long-game romantic... I liked the cut of his jib. What can I say? Years and years to get to utterance, who does that?

WHAT A SHY LOSER.

I jumped headlong right back into my mental health regimen of that time after this rejection point. Figuring that it was likely my "new crazy" that had ruined it, or some combination of my 1,001 to infinity flaws.

What I realized pretty quickly was that my actions in 2019 and subsequent rejection in 2020 were exactly the same as a mistake I had made once before, in 2012 to be exact.

Those tears weren't for just this one moment as it was happening in 2020. My mind hadn't automatically jumped back to my attack, nor did it bring up the years of hoping and wishing for something else with some other person in the less than way back. Rather than all that, my mind went all the way back to a rainy day in 2nd grade, as I stood there in the cold air of February being told off and rejected for being too forward, too invested, too willing to just do the damn thing, for having more emotional equity in the game than the other person had. I stood there and cried silent tears as I listened without speaking, meanwhile in my brain I was just a little girl in a squeaky purple Beauty and the Beast rain coat.

It was 1995, we learned cursive P and Q that afternoon, our teacher was a crazed football fan with a special fondness for the mental torture of 8 year olds. The rain whacked at the gated windows of the classroom that day. When school finally ended, I remember it all clear as day.

We were in our raincoats, then you asked me if I wanted to be your girlfriend and I said,

"Yes, but we are too young now."

Your name starts with AA, my name with AB, from kindergarten until 5th grade we were 1 and 2 in line.

You were my first friend and my only friend really after Connie had gone to Georgia years before.

Tragedy hit you, and you hit back, you took on your new life in Missouri, while I went on, to middle school, alone. The very same middle school you were also set to go to, had circumstances not dashed the original plans made. I didn't hear from you again after you had gone.

I didn't make friends easily in middle school at all. What made matters worse was by that time I had gotten sick and started packing on the pounds.

When I reached 8th grade I weighed over 300 pounds with the cholesterol of a 40 year old man, I often just stayed home to sleep. Sexy, I know. I had also secured a few friends, some of whom I am still friends with today.

Ours had become a non-existent story, long gone were Saturday soccer games, and going out to play, gone was my motivation and the intellectual competition I had grown so dependent on in my most formative years. No one could replace you, I needed that natural competition we had cultivated over the years. These were dark times that no 11-13 year old should have.

As one does, I carried on, albeit begrudgingly, high school came and went. I hated it. There were some cool people, some cool teachers, some cool classes, some cool teams, some cool activities. I fit in with everyone so well that I didn't actually fit in with any one at all. More than anything I just did not want to be in the physical school setting I hadn't wanted that since 6th grade.

To be honest the desire to attend had truly died for me at the end of 5th grade when I said good bye to you last. I had to grieve your absence. In the best way I can explain, it was like a "My Girl" moment, one day you were there and then you weren't. Even though I knew you were out there somewhere and hoped the best for you always. It was sad, and I went through that alone without understanding of what was happening in my brain. Grief is a fickle emotion that toys not only with the experiencer but also with the people that surround them.

Hmm, with the passage of time I eventually graduated from high school by some miracle in 2006. I had never associated my pure antipathy toward school as a coping defense from the fear of making other friends to love and lose without warning.

To be clear I do have friends, good friends that I am grateful to and love even when we do not see or speak with one another frequently.

Anywho, I skipped University until 2008, by then I didn't really want to go, I dropped out 2 weeks later.

I was making enough to get by from the service industry, to live, smoke and make art. I decided to ride the work experience train for some time, to build confidence, and finally open up to a world I had been keeping myself from.

I was on that train still when you messaged me in 2011. I was working 2 jobs, selling and sending artwork all over the world, out of the blue it was you who wished to talk to me. When you sent me that first message my heart leapt. I didn't realize how I had kept those memories in pristine mint condition in my brain. I didn't realize how any of that had affected who I had become. I didn't realize that hidden within me had been a desire to one day hear from you again.

I was stoked, and confident I was also completely stupid and 23. I had just had meaningless sex for the first time, and crossed it off my sex bucket list. Who wouldn't have gone on to check off: - In a city you have never been. or -With a childhood sweetheart. Plus all the other sex bucket list notions I could think of while we chatted.

Stupid and 23. This fact can not be emphasized to any real level of adequacy here.

The prospect of seeing you had awakened a different version of myself that I had not seen in so long. In the middle of the night betwixt counting money and making art we would chat. It didn't take long to make the plan to visit you. Hindsight is the worst but you should have told me not to come there, you should have waited another 5 years to contact me or something, anything, a butterfly in the universe, one small change might have altered the outcome of this terribly embarrassing tale altogether.

What 20 something doesn't love a good St. Patrick's day adventure?

As it turned out I needed to drive my mom to my brother's house 4 hours South that weekend anyway.

She and I left late that day, I had been so nervous and I wanted to be sure to pack artwork for you to see. I also had to work that day before having to drive an hour and a half just to scoop my mom, just to go back West the same amount of time before heading South for 4 more hours, I hadn't calculated for that, or the rush hour traffic.

When I finally arrived to drop my mom off, I was exhausted but I promised you I would make it there that night. I took a shower at my brother's house because I did not want to fall asleep on the road. I stopped for food, gas, energy drinks and a new pack of cigarettes. I was off to meet you in St. Louis. In my mind all of this was picture perfect, some idyllic rom-com I was getting to live.

How exhilarating!

That was when I got lost, somewhere on the back roads of Illinois I stopped at a rest area, I slept for a while because I was drowsy driving, after which I got back on the road, only in the wrong direction, I drove for about a half hour before I realized as I passed an exit I had already driven past and recognized in the dark of night middle of nowhere.

WHAT AN IDIOT!

You text to see where I was, it was quite late already. I corrected course and continued driving. I had never been to Missouri in my life. No matter how fast I drove through the desolate wasteland of Illinois the destination was still so far away.

Then I saw it, the bright shining Gateway Arch, I thought to myself I am finally here. Then I looked down at the GPS and low and behold I was still an hour and a half away. It was a nightmare, I was never going to get there. I drove through the night and by 3:30 or 4:00 in the morning I finally arrived at your house, with St. Louis in the rear view mirror rather than all around me.

I was already defeated in my pursuit and I could tell that you were generally annoyed because it took so long for me to arrive. I would have been very happy to sleep on your couch that night. I would have given anything for that not to be how our first time played out. It was not my style.

Whatever to all of that though, YOLO, amirite?

We had only been waiting since kindergarten for that kind of experience...

When we got up in the morning, we went for some lunch and launched in on the festivities. As it turns out you had gone to college, you had continued on the soccer path the whole way, we proceeded to get wasted in green, as 20 somethings tend to do on St. Patrick's Day.

We met some of the people who had surrounded you when you moved there. I wasn't trying to offend anyone by correcting the pronunciation of Menomonee Falls. I wasn't trying to be portentous or rude when I thought I didn't need a knife for my corned beef but also completely embarrassed as it turns out, when I did need that knife, you called me out for it. I wasn't trying to get so trashed over the course of the day that I ended up needing to find a cigarette towards the end of the night. I had locked mine in the glove box when I crossed the Missouri state line 12 hours prior, ashamed of myself by what you would think of me for having even picked up the habit. As I smoked your friend's cigarette on his balcony I thought to myself,

" Well, here it is, you have just ruined any sliver of a chance you had with this guy."

It had not been the first time that day I had, had that thought. When had I put so much stock in what men I am interested in think of me?

Why did I care so much?

There was no way I was going to take that drive all the way home to Wisconsin after drinks. I should have gotten myself a hotel room for the second night to avoid the embarrassment and perpetual blush that had been on my face since noon. You asked if I planned to stay another night. I asked if it was ok and promised that I would leave in the morning.

We switched positions, tried something a little different, but you were right I wasn't ready to come visit you. I wasn't good enough and I had already known that in my mind when I arrived. I was not even good enough for myself. Some people get really worked up by what others think of them, I can find no more brutal a judge of myself, than myself. No one can be more cruel and overly critical to my own soul than I am.

Nevertheless, I went to bed that night praying that I had not made a complete fool of myself. I cared what you thought of me. When I awoke in the morning before I left I wanted to show you my artwork.

I wanted you to see how I had expressed and transformed all of the pain that had been left to me from the last time we had seen each other, on through to this moment when we had met again. I leaned over to grab a painting, without realizing the distraction I had created, my pajama shirt slid down, and you cleared your throat and when I looked up at you, you just grabbed the collar of your own shirt.

MORTIFIED, ACTUALLY DEAD.

I fixed my shirt and slunk back, I am certain you sensed me screaming on the inside at myself for how pathetic I was in action.

What a complete and utter piece of trash, I was, there on your living room floor with a bunch of my most prized paintings, having just literally bared all.

LITERALLY BARED ALL.

Some might ask who would care? I cared. I wanted you to call again, I wanted to reconnect and find a way. If there was anything I was actually ready for, that thing was to just connect, to find the joys and pains in the process over the distance. To create our own equation for how life together could work.

As I left you said,

"Well, see you in another 15 years."

My heart sunk.

I got back to Wisconsin and immediately bombarded that man with communications. I wanted to know that I hadn't just put myself out in the world on this whim to flounder in the wind. I needed to know that I hadn't thrown away my only chance at this opportunity literal years in the making.

I had though, I had gambled on myself and I simply wasn't the best bet, I wasn't the winner's circle mare, the odds were not in my favor. I get it. Rejection is natural. Even so, it was heart breaking. I just didn't imagine the rejection would be so profound until the response that I did get in return to my ideas of Skype dates, or day trips to the middle grounds. What I got was a legitimate telling off.

"What did you expect? Did you think we would just drop our things and jump states? This isn't some fairy tale."

He had been right. I would have tried though.

How cathartic this has been.

The immediate thought after writing, is that I will coolly continue to handle romance in a state of insouciance, as I have over the last year. It is transparent now that I have not only over thought these encounters anteing more of my own emotional equity than my counterpart in the past, I have also actively applied too much pressure in pursuit of mythical or unrequited love trying to prove that I too was a worthwhile endeavor and life/ love interest. This pressure resulted in driving those potential partners away. Portraying a person with unwieldy expectations of love, when really I am a go with the flow type of comfortable lover.

As of today 9 years and a month have passed since I took that initial humiliating drive to Missouri.

I can only imagine the list of life things that have happened since then, that I will have, to share, in 6 more years if I ever hear from that 2nd grade kid again in this life. All of the joys, pains, unimaginable losses, and achievements nearly 2/3rds written in my history since that weekend. Even now I always hope the best for that 2nd grader where'er he is.

Is it the cringiest? Might not be however it was honest and genuinely embarrassing both times I made this terrible mistake with romance.

After having told all of you, dear readers that stuck in with me for this confession I do feel better.

Thank you.

The burden of my past blunders weighs on my shoulders no more. A course correction has been made on this ship. A quest for insouciance has been completed, old worries have been filed away.