Sandy and I got off on the wrong foot. I can’t put my finger on why it happened like that, but our introduction was awkward and we were out of sync from the beginning. I was really excited to meet her, and maybe that’s what ultimately lead to my disappointment. My hopes were too high and in just a matter of days, reality had sent my dreams spiraling to the ground in a blaze of failure. We eventually were able to salvage our relationship, but it wasn’t until after years of space and maturity before I was able to look at Sandy in a different light.
I remember during my first week of middle school, I felt like everything was a total blur. I started middle school the week after Thanksgiving and I had to transition from being a 6th grader in elementary school to a 6th grader in a middle school in the span of a week and a half. I no longer had recess, I had to maneuver my way from class to class across a campus, and I had to keep track of the names of all these new classmates that I had never seen in my life. I got so confused that I was no longer sure that I was speaking the same language as everyone else. I remember the first time I tried to order food from the cafeteria, I asked for a “pop”, and the lunch lady looked at me like there was something wrong with me. After an awkward moment, I said “a coke?” and then she finally responded to me by telling me that they didn’t sell soda, but I was already humiliated.
I became friends with a guy named Dante, who’s name sounds like he would be on Jersey Shore, but he in fact is very much not like a character on Jersey Shore. We got along pretty well and coincidentally enough, we had the same birthday. He didn’t live in my neighborhood and we weren’t within walking distance, but we decided we should hang out anyways. Since this was 1993, we didn’t have access to Google Maps or a GPS, so we were stuck trying to discuss directions over the phone. He had no idea where I lived and since we were kids, giving him major cross streets didn’t help him much, so we decided it might be best for him to give me directions to his house from our school. Dante had a really strange way of giving me directions, though. He started by telling me to drive down the street our school was on, which seemed reasonable enough, but then he would tell me that “if you keep going down the street, you’ll hit a dead end and you will die, so you’ll have to turn on to this other street instead.” After a few more minutes of trying to direct me to his house, his mom decided to intervene and was able to figure out where I lived. She picked me up, we hung out, we had a good time, and we still keep in contact to this day. The end. Eventually middle school stopped feeling like a blur, but it didn’t get much better after that. I made some good friends, but for the most part, I was uncomfortable, I was bummed out, and I pined for the old days.
It wasn’t until college that I could finally feel comfortable with Sandy. The expectations were gone, and I could see why so many people saw that she was beautiful and chill. I realized that I didn’t need to be in love with her. I tried to force feelings when they didn’t need to be forced and we both suffered because of it. Moving at the age of 11 had really filled me with angst and Sandy was just such an easy target to dump all that angst upon. I wanted her to save me from it all, but it didn’t happen until much later, and it didn’t happen all at once. It was a process, and it was a process that didn’t involve her at all. I didn’t give an apology; there was none needed. San Diego isn’t my true love and it’s neither of our fault, it just was never meant to be.
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