the first week of my first relationship. my thoughts:
i am impulsive because long term planning scares me. i’ve tried really hard these past few months to feel optimistic about the course of my life, but there’s still an evil little worm that burrows it’s way into my mind everytime i’m jolted just a little too much. i decided this week to let myself wonder what it might be like to kiss this boy. he assaulted me with selfies and i screamed because for my own sanity i have refrained from becoming giddy at the new prospect, but oh god now i can see his face and his goofy ass angles and oh there goes his lips. what would it be like to kiss him? how optimistic am i allowed to be? should i expect greatness? and now i am just beside myself with horror at all the unbridled, cheesy thoughts i had about it. even now i’m cringing. yeesh. i am such a hater.
my best friend just got out of a long term relationship and is mourning and denouncing romance as a whole. i feel like i betrayed her having a boyfriend now, no less my first, when she’s trying so hard not to reminded of it.
in one week of you throwing all this open affection towards me i feel as though i’m pummled by warmth everyday. but i feel so much more like a snowman. and the warmth sends me into panic. why am i melting? why do i want it? what’ll be left of me after? and then i conclude disastrous truths about the fate of our blossoming friendship and the hurt i will impart and why you’re not man enough to be with me. which is cruel. and judgemental. and also so, so premature.
my niece (the one i talk about all the time) is in mutual love with a boy at school. they talk and play together all the time, and scream in joy when they see them, and stare at each other smiling in the dark during naptimes. she understands love better than anyone. i know this everytime she’s play-given me medicine to refine her nurse bit, but also to demonstrate some of the love we’ve all given to her. love is simply returning care back and forth. i’ve been worrying alot lately about if i’m worth it, telling myself that i should assert my independence in this relationship, because i should always protect myself in everything i do. i worry that i’m selfish, that i’m just clinging onto anything i can get because i’m starved and maybe a little pathetic, and yet i’ve already prepped myself by saying that i’m strong willed and formidable and you very easily saying okay, and that’s why i like you so much, and then i melt all over again.
the past two days we’ve been falling asleep over the phone, whispering things as closely into the mics as possible so it can feel like we’re really next to each other, and it feels like i’m microdosing little moments of intimacy. and it feels like when my niece and her best friend as staring at each other at naptime and smiling. and i realize why i freaked out a little bit last week. i don’t know what romance looks or feels like. i’ve accepted it probably wouldn’t be a part of my reality for a really long time. but i know what love looks and feels like. and whether my niece and her friend are best friends or soulmates having found each other so soon, what i do know is that i’m surrounded by friendship, and this is the closest i feel in one, i think. and then i think, i’m glad i made sure this was casual, but i also know that you truly really really like me, and it makes me happy getting to just giggle and trade stories and interests with you over calls every night. and also, you’re not shy about not holding an interest (i.e. your dislike of Journey) so i know you can’t be lying when you say you like me so much, or that you think i’m beautiful despite having hardly any clue what i look like, or that you think i’m funny when sometimes i feel really boring. so i will admit when it makes me feel good, because it does.
there’s also the matter of getting to know you, too. so far in two years you’ve remembered a fair bunch about me but i’m learning that you have a great memory, you love art history (big impressionists enjoyer + fauvism ally), greek deity hierarchies, arguing about semantics (i studied a shitton about linguistics in college), dinosaurs (mostly the ankylosaurus ((for ramming shit)), and world building, yet you think yourself as much dumber than you truly are. i also think about how much i hate the aesthetic of romance, so to speak—the part that requires having to show off what love feels like instead of just simply doing it. i thought of the abject bravery it takes to hold onto and loudly show off a crush towards someone for such a long time. i don’t what else to do but shrug it off me. i shouldn’t get such a big head. i shouldn’t let bias cloud my judgement. but than, what is romance if not just bias itself. what’s friendship, if not bias too? is bias inevitable? well, no, and especially not for me. but whatever. i realize it takes a real bout of courage to shamelessly love someone from afar and simply enjoying the warmth of stumbling in the pit of possibility. i think you’re much braver and prepared than i thought. i learned the other day you can swim (i hope one day you teach me c:)
point is: i’m going to approach this like a toddler in the playground, because this is sincerely new for me, and i need to scaffold. and thank you for understanding and wanting to be with me for it anyway. one day i will see you as more than a sweet, stupid boy. i hope. <3
