The reason I’m not going to be a professional writer is simple. Although I’m more honest in my blogs than in real life, I will never be as honest with my blogs as I am to myself.
This is not to say I embellish, because if I learned anything in my journalism/creative writing courses in college, it’s that there really isn’t anything worse than an author who intentionally deceives the audience. Well, I suppose plagiarism is the greatest sin, but I’m not insecure enough to resort to that, so it’s immaterial.
I work roughly an hour from where I live, and once my coworkers learn this about me they all display the same type of confused reaction, like you commute that far? And I tell them yes… and it’s no big deal… I don’t mind it… and so on.
The fact is, I really don’t mind it. I promise. The two hours I spend driving to and from work are usually some of the best of my week. I’m not sure I could reasonably explain it to someone who spends, let’s say, ten or fifteen minutes to get to work, but for me the drive always serves its purpose. The first twenty minutes there’s usually traffic, so it requires some loose sense of focus, but after that it’s 40-45 minutes of smooth sailing. Just me and my car. Me and the road.
Often times I mention how relatively outgoing I am, an extravert by design, conflated with the reality that there aren’t that many people who know anything of consequence about me. There’s a reason for this: I’m excessively private, which is why most people I meet trust me right off the bat. They tell me the you aren’t going to tell anyone, right? types of things without having to ask.
With me, I have a one-track mind most of the time, and the one thing on my mind isn’t something worth discussing with anyone. Even in writing. Because it’s a girl, and as a 24 year-old man-in-the-making I don’t get respect from either side of the sexes for talking about a girl like she means something to me.
Guys never want to listen to another guy with a broken heart, because in this survival of the fittest neanderthal climate, that’s some bitch shit. Girls are a little more understanding, but if she likes me I’m not going to mention another girl, and if I like her, too, it doesn’t benefit me. It just makes it look like I’m hung up over something that happened a long time ago.
Which isn’t true, but it kind of is.
Christmas Day 2013 was the last time I texted Her. I think I wrote “Merry Christmas!” and that was it. I’m not even an exclamation point kind of guy… only to the people I love. Anyway, that was the last message either of us have sent.
On January 6th, I auditioned to become a dealer at the casino I’m now working at, and a few weeks ago I bought my dream car that I’d wanted since I was 19. (It’s a Subaru STi.) It’s been almost seven months since I’ve spoken to Her, the longest layoff since her and I broke up back in 2009. It’s been five years and she’s still on my mind. Every day. That’s what no one is supposed to know. That’s what I spend my existence trying to cover up, because no one wants to hear that shit.
So instead, I talk about gambling, or meaningless women I’ve slept with, or what have you. Whatever it takes to lubricate a 20-minute break. In a perfect world, it’s silence, but that rarely happens. Which is why I rely on my hour drive.
Seven months. And I can tell you, with confidence, that there has yet to be a drive to or from work that I haven’t thought about Her. On the one hand, I’ve been seeking the perfect combination of words to restore life back where I want it with her; on the other, I’m envisioning the realistic possibility that there will be no fairy-tale ending to this love story. It will just end like everything else.
If life was easy then people probably wouldn’t complain so much.
I’m not complaining. I’m just acknowledging the truth. When I was in high school a girl in my english class asked me if I’d rather be completely happy while not knowing anything, or be sad and know the truth about everything. It’s basically ignorance is bliss in the form of a question. But, I’d say the same thing now that I did then: Of course I would rather know than not know. Of course I would prefer wisdom over ignorance, and nothing says I’m not allowed to be happy, anyway. I’ll be happy, eventually. I know it. Some things just take time.
The great mystery is that I don’t know. I am ignorant to my life’s possibilities. Though I have a solid career in store, and though I have just about everything I could want at this stage of my life, I realize just how transient these cosmetic fixes are. None of my possessions bring me any happiness after a certain amount of time… in the end everything is sort of like getting a hair cut. It looks good for a few days, but then I get used to it and it wears off and after awhile I need to get another one.
Future Bets 