We were starving. It was two o'clock, Sunday morning, and we hadn't eaten since around six o'clock the previous Saturday evening. Breakfast wasn't until eleven o'clock. This constituted as "starving". There was really only one option. We didn't have a car, and it was late. The only place that was open, and in walking distance was "Mrs. Lee's", at the corner of Cheltenham and Penrose, about a half a mile away.
We had been regular customers since the previous October, but recently decided that "Mrs. Lee's" was off limits. Another group of students had gone there the previous week, and antagonized the locals. This resulted in future commuter buses of students having rocks thrown at them. The college issued a bulletin that recommended student not to go there. Mrs. Lee's made a pretty decent cheesesteak hoagie. They were damn amazing late at night. They wrapped them in aluminum foil, then rolled them in paper. When we got them back out at the dorm, the delicious smell of cheese and steak filled the entire floor. Now, we couldn't go there.
Of course, our decision to follow the school's advice, not to mention listen heed our own better judgement, was made during the light of day. It was a strictly rational decision. Even as we mourned the loss of our late night cheesesteaks, I didn't quite believe we'd actually live by our decision. I knew that logic and reason were largely useless at two in the morning after working on boring art projects all night. So it wasn't even three days later that were confronted with our decision. We rationalized that it was most unlikely that we'd die. And if were careful, we could make it in and out quickly. We decided that we'd walk up to the store front, and if there were a lot of people there, then we'd back out. If it seemed quiet, then we'd proceed. Most likely, we wouldn't be harmed.
There wasn't much we could do to prepare ourselves. We'd either get our hoagies or not. And if we were attacked, then there wasn't much we could do to defend ourselves. We gathered our money from loose change and stray dollar bills. We typically took only our money and badges. In case of mugging, we never took our wallets. It was an unusually warmish February night, so we put on our light coats, grabbed our school badges, and took off towards Mrs. Lee's.
"Shit. I don't have any pockets" said Josh. "You're not going to change are you?! Lets go!" I said. "Yeah, fuck it, I'll just hold it with my money".
I wondered if we were walking out of the dorm for the last time as we went down the stairs and past the guard desk. I imagined the news stories about our deaths. Years later, we'd be reduced to a rumor that some students were once killed getting hoagies. When we got on the street, we made some nervous conversation.
"Did you throw out that Hustler?" I asked. "No. Why?" Josh answered. "Well, we're risking our lives here. What if you die, and your mother finds it? She'll be traumatized. Is that what you want her thinking about for the rest of her life?". "Yeah, I never thought of that". "If I make it back, and you don't, then I'll be sure to throw out your porn." "You're the man. I'd do the same for you!"
Our joking made light of the fact that we really were at considerable risk. At least a third of the college students that went to Mrs. Lee's got mugged at knifepoint at some point during the year. And that was before a bunch of our peers went there and caused trouble.
"Who was involved in that?" I asked Josh. "Neil and Paul, and the big goober they hang out with", he replied. "I can't even tell you how much I hate Paul, that stupid fucker. I wish he'd die!" "He is a dick. I knew lots of guys like that in high school". "Why would they cause trouble in there?!" "I heard it was some sort of racial thing".
Our conversation drifted off as we neared the plaza. We tentatively approached the bend and looked to our right to survey the situation at Mrs. Lee's. It seemed pretty quiet. It was quarter after two by now. We decided it was safe. There were a couple of men about fifty feet away standing by the liquor store. They were laughing loudly and didn't seem to pose a threat.
Usually, there were a couple of homeless guys hanging around asking for money. We always gave them something. We figured that this was some sort of protection. On this night there weren't any homeless guys. It seemed unusual since it was such a warm night.
We walked inside. There were several black guys in the back where orders were taken. The woman we always assumed was "Mrs. Lee" was at the register. As we made our way to the back, the black guys looked toward us, and stopped talking. This wasn't too unusual. There was always an underlying racial tension at the Mrs. Lee's scene. We were "rich white art students", after all. And we were on their turf. Cheltenham was on the outskirts of North Philadelphia, and largely depressed, and very poor. The art school was on the edge of Cheltenham in Elkins Park. Head in one direction, and it leads to Jenkintown, Abington, and Fort Washington. The other direction was the hood.
A frequent fixture of Mrs. Lee's was loud rap music. All of the workers, except Mrs. Lee, and most of the patrons were young and black. At Mrs. Lee's one could almost always hear Public Enemy and NWA loudly decrying the ills of the black man, at the hands of white people. It scared the hell out of me, but I tried to ignore it. It would be years before I listened to rap music avidly. At this point, I thought it was inciting black people to kill white people, and it added to my already considerable anxiety.
On this night, the rap music was loud, as usual. We pressed our way to the counter and struggled to have our orders heard over the music.
"I want a cheesesteak, no onions!" I shouted over the music. "You want onions?" asked the cook. "No onions!" "Okay, chief. No onions! What about you?" He motioned towards Josh. "Cheesesteak, no lettuce, put ketchup on it!" Josh shouted "No lettuce?" Asked the cook. "Right, and put ketchup on it!" "Ketchup?! Okay ten minutes chief."
Josh's main complaint about Mrs. Lee's was that they always screwed up his order by forgetting the ketchup. I didn't have any complaints because I kept my order simple. I always told Josh he should he should keep a bottle of ketchup at the dorm. He claimed that it wasn't the same. The ketchup wouldn't be hot if it was applied after we got back to dorm. If it was applied at the time the hoagie was made, it would be hot, and would mix with the steak juices and cheese.
We tried to act casual as we waited for our order.
"Did you hear who Cybele is fucking?" Josh asked. "No. Not Phil anymore?" "No. She's doing that crazy guy with the red hair who was on the phone that one time." "Mr. Mike?! No way!", I replied with contempt. "Yeah, somehow Mr. Mike got in there." "I don't get it. Here we are at two in the morning getting hoagies, while Mr. Mike is doing Cybele"
It took longer than usual to make our hoagies. Or at least it seemed that way. After a couple minutes of glancing over toward us, the black guys got their orders, and went outside. Our anxiety eased, but we still wanted to just get the hell out of there, and back to the safety of the dorm room.
Finally, our orders were ready. "I know he fucked up the ketchup" Josh said under his breath. "Don't worry about it!" I shot back. The cook handed over our hoagies, "Here you go, gentlemen". Then we picked up some drinks, and a couple bags of Munchos. We paid Mrs. Lee at the counter and slipped out the door. We cautiously looked around, then proceeded around the corner. Then we heard shouting, "Hey! Hey, white boys! Stop!"
"What the fuck is that?!" I asked quietly. "Nothing. Keep walking", replied Josh.
"Hey you two! Come back here!" shouted the voice again.
"Should we look?" I muttered. "No. Just keep walking".
We weren't anywhere near the dorm yet. Then we heard the sound of running footsteps.
"Fuck this! I'm running!", and I took off down a back street. Josh followed closely behind. We took an alternate route back to the dorm, hoping that if we weaved down back streets, we would lose the guy. I looked back and we were actually being chased by two black guys. I started to run faster. I yelled to Josh, "Split up! We should split up!". Then I turned into a yard and ran into the blackness. I eventually made my way through another couple of back yards and then crossed on to Delmar Street. That seemed to do it. I lost them. There was no sign of my assailants… or of Josh. I was just happy to make it back to the dorm alive, and with my hoagie.
I went up to our room immediately. I had no idea what happened to Josh. I wanted to eat my hoagie, but it didn't seem right until he got back. He appeared a couple minutes later.
"Where the fuck did you go?!" He shouted at me. "I cut through those yards", I said. "Fuck, they followed me all the way to the corner of Beechwood. They didn't stop until I could see the dorm."
We ate our hoagies in relief. They were good, and they were well-earned. We stayed up for another hour or so, and discussed the chase. With our stomachs full, we decided that our Mrs. Lee's days were over. The next day we got up and went downstairs for Sunday brunch in the cafeteria.
"I can't find my badge", said Josh. I didn't say anything. "My badge is GONE!" he said. "You had it last night. Remember? You had it with your money when we went out" I reminded him. "Its gone! Its gone! Whyyyyy me?" He declared. "Maybe you lost it while we were running?" "I think I left it at Mrs. Lee's. I don't remember even having it while I was running. You fucker! You told me not to change, and I just walked out with it in my hands!" "That shit wasn't my fault. You could've changed! I just wanted to leave." I replied.
After brunch, Josh walked down to Mrs. Lee's, and asked if they had his badge. Mrs. Lee was there again. She handed him a lost and found box, but his badge wasn't there. I never made up my mind whether we were being chased because those guys had Josh's badge, or whether they wanted to steal our hoagies. The following weekend, we made another late night run to Mrs. Lee's. This time it was without incident.
posted by Ant In A Hailstorm at
4:12 PM on Monday, January 1, 1990
0 Comments
1989: Lauren
The Day After April Fool's
On April 1, 1988, Amy and I went to the park. We went to the place where we usually went, but it was very awkward. She was miserable about her ex-boyfriend. I figured that we would do something for the whole evening, but by 7:30, she wanted to go home. I got upset. Then Amy said that she thought we were spending too much time together. The conversation ended when we agreed that there was "something going on" that both of us understood, but neither of us was going to talk about it. I have no idea what she was referring to. I thought that the thing we agreed not to talk about was the fact that I had feelings for her. I went home very upset. I called Casondra. We talked for a long time. The next day we went to the park and spent the whole day together. It was April 2. I met Lauren for the first time on that day.
I started to see Lauren more often towards the end of the summer. I was spending a lot of time with Casondra, and sometimes Lauren would join us. Lauren had been Casondra's best friend since they were around six years old. Prior to this summer, I knew of Lauren only a little. I had heard her name the previous year but I never knew who she was exactly. When I finally met her, I thought of her as an upper-class girl was too good for me. Either she was too good for me, or I assumed that she held the belief that I just simply was not good enough. I saw myself as somewhat lowly from a socio-economic standpoint; far too common for the likes of Lauren Dyer. Lauren seemed very "preppy" and sophisticated, and also elitist. I felt intimidated by her, quite frankly. I also felt that Lauren disapproved of Casondra being friends with me because of my "low status". I perceived her as cold and somewhat indifferent towards my existence. I didn't consider her looks at this point. Somehow, my feelings of inferiority regarding Lauren stood in the way of looking at her as a pretty girl. Consequently, I didn't think too much about her at all.
My initial impressions of Lauren started to change a little after spending some time with her. My first real conversation with her took place one summer afternoon. I asked Casondra if I could call her, ostensibly to ask about her experience going to a psychic. I didn't have any other intentions at this point. The three of us; Casondra, Lauren, and I, got together a couple times that summer. One evening, we watched The Princess Bride at Casondra's house. Both Lauren and I cracked up at the albino in the "pit of despair". This bit of shared laughter was the first time that I felt Lauren and I made a connection. She seemed open at this moment. When she laughed she looked directly at me, as if to confirm a shared experience. As we got to know each other better, she would always share her laughter with me in this way. Consequently, even if we were in a group, I felt as if we were having a private experience.
Over time, we became more comfortable with each other. Nevertheless, Lauren was an infrequent person in my life for many months. It wasn't until the fall of 1988 that she became a regular part of my life. This was more due to the circumstance of her friendship with Casondra. Frequently, Casondra and I, and a couple of other people would make plans, and Casondra would invite Lauren. This is how Lauren formed most of her friendships through high school. Casondra frequently met new people, including me. Then she would invite Lauren into the group.
The Beginning
Lauren was thin, and taller than most girls. She was about five-foot ten-inches tall. She had long light brown straight hair that draped down over her shoulders. Her face was small but perfectly symmetric. She had smallish blue/green eyes, and a small nose. In her family, she looked like an oddity. She had a sister, and three brothers. They all looked somewhat unusual. Each sibling had combinations of all of the unattractive traits of both parents. On the contrary, Lauren stood out as a natural beauty. I always thought she looked like a combination of Molly Ringwald and Dick Van Dyke Show-era Mary Tyler Moore.
She was active in school activities. She was on the yearbook committee in senior year. In the past she had run track, and played field hockey. She was also a very good student. She took mostly advanced classes. I didn't get the sense that she enjoyed the school work, but she did it. She was somewhat interested in music, but nothing I knew much about. She liked cult folk singer Billy Bragg, new-wave synth-pop act New Order, and another synth group Yaz. Later she grew to like Elvis Costello. It didn't seem that she liked a lot of music, but she was extremely passionate about what she did like.
Lauren's family life was something I never understood. The family was Catholic, and it seemed to be somewhat important, although I didn't see much evidence of religion in Lauren. She went to church, but beyond that, I don't know how she felt about Catholicism. Once she said that she "had problems with some of the church's teachings". Her parents were still together, and there were five kids. An older sister and brother, and two younger brothers, all close in age. Her older brother and sister were away at college by the time I knew Lauren. I got to know one of her younger brothers a little though. He was nice and liked to hang around when I was at their house. Lauren's mother seemed nice to me. She and Lauren didn't always get along but I was never exposed to that. On the other hand, I never met Lauren's father. I saw him once or twice, but I was never introduced to him, never had a conversation with him, and Lauren rarely spoke about him.
I started to develop feelings for Lauren in late October 1988. A bunch of us went down to Oakland one afternoon. There was no particular purpose to the trip other than for Casondra to check out Carnegie Mellon. Fletch and Chris were also along. For some reason, the three of them went off, while Lauren and I waited behind in the car. This was the first time we had ever been alone together. We ended up discussing some of the troubles we had individually experienced the previous year, and how difficult it was to be "moral" with all of the challenges present in high school. This discussion was the first time we really connected. It seemed like we spent the rest of the day in our own private world, even though we were with our friends. Everything that happened during the day to all of us seemed to be shared between Lauren and me privately.
My life changed after that day. I began to see Lauren in a very different light. Instead of the assumptions I had made about her in the past, I began to see her as a person in her own right. Instead of the distant, preppy girl, I began to think of Lauren as a sensitive and caring person. She was most certainly sensitive, but I had no particular reason to see her as caring. I simply assumed that part. I also found out that she was a thoroughly optimistic person, which was very appealing to me at the time. She was a very moral person and had retained her morals despite all of the regular high school temptations. Lauren possessed a spirit of joy and fun that I found infectious and even addictive. My high school art teacher once described her as "having a light within" that shown whenever she came into a room. Plus, and perhaps the biggest factor in all of this, I came to recognize that Lauren was beautiful. Lauren had "grace", even at the age of seventeen. Her presence made me feel weak, yet ecstatic as well.
As time went by, we found that we had much in common, particularly in the ways we viewed the world and in our basic moral beliefs. Furthermore, she thought I was funny, unique, creative, true, and genuinely nice. I can't overestimate the importance of how she viewed me. I had initially thought of myself as 'not good enough' for her, even as a person, let alone a friend or more. Her approval felt validating.
Robin and "The Lauren Test"
I met a girl named Robin that fall. She was in one my art classes. She took an interest in me for some reason. I rarely went out of my way to talk to girls. The only time I made any effort was when I had some prior information about them that made my effort seem more likely to be worthwhile. Robin did not strike me as being anything special, and I didn't know anything about her, so I didn't think of her at all. However, she began to speak to me. We became friends, and I found that she was a pretty comfortable person to be around. She was, by almost all accounts, very pretty. Although, I didn't find her as attractive as others did. Nevertheless, I found her to be soulful and deep. We had a couple art classes together, where we used to talk about some very personal things. I think she had feelings for me, even other people said so. She asked me out a couple times, and we did hang out a couple times. Casondra and Fletcher were really encouraging me to "go for her". I kind of liked her, but I wasn't sure. I had feelings for her, but I was afraid that I wasn't attracted to her enough.
Complicating any potential relationship with Robin were my developing feelings for Lauren. The truth was that I really wanted Lauren. It took me some time to admit this to myself. When I finally acknowledged my feelings for her, I decided that I wasn't going to do or say anything. There were a variety of reasons for this decision. First, even though I felt very good about being friends with Lauren, I still saw myself as "beneath" her. I simply thought she was too beautiful and sophisticated and upper middle class for someone like me. The bottom line was that I knew Lauren would reject me if I let my feelings be known.
The second reason for not revealing my feelings follows from the first. I was very happy with my social situation and I didn't want to ruin that with the complications that I assumed would arise if I made my feelings known. I feared losing my friends because I had the nerve to "like" Lauren. I imagined all of my new friends being so disappointed with me that they would no longer want to know me. In particular, I felt that Casondra would disapprove of me being with Lauren. Casondra had a friend named Will that had moved to North Carolina in the early summer. Casondra and I had become good friends shortly after he left. I always assumed that Casondra liked him better than me, if no other reason than she had known him first and for longer. Casondra occasionally spoke of Will's interest in Lauren, and even referred to them as "Lauren and Will" sometimes. I assumed that Casondra wanted them to be together. I never knew the exact nature of Lauren and Will's relationship, or if there even was a relationship. Nevertheless, I was terribly afraid that I would ruin my friendship with Casondra if anyone found out that I had feelings for Lauren.
A third reason to not say anything was that college was only eleven months away. It simply did not make any sense to me to start anything. However, it wasn't so much that I had a problem with college starting the following year, as I assumed that Lauren would have a problem with it. For all these reasons, I decided not to say anything.
Even though I had to come to a decision about Lauren, I still held out some hope that she and I being together was a possibility. Therefore, even if I couldn't tell her how I felt, I didn't want to jeopardize any potential relationship with Lauren by having Robin as my girlfriend. Additionally, I knew that if Lauren decided that she had feelings for me, then I'd want to drop Robin. So I started to act kind of irritable around her, just enough to put her off. There was another girl, named Lynnette, who was also said to like me. I also liked her, but it was much the same kind of situation as with Robin. I wasn't sure that I liked her enough, and I knew that she would fail what became known (to me) as the "Lauren test". Meaning, I compare the person to Lauren, and hypothetically imagine which person I would choose.
I have often referred to the early fall of 1988 as my first and last full remission from depression. In hindsight, I think it was dysthymia, with occasional moments of great happiness. In November, as I started to further conceptualize and realize my feelings for Lauren, I started to slip into a more significant depression. It happened in a very strange manner. On the one hand, after the traumas of the previous year and my subsequent change in outlook, I thought that I was never going to get depressed again. On the other hand, I was starting to feel pain over Lauren, and was letting the situation develop in much the same way as it had with Amy, except that Lauren didn't have a boyfriend. My best attempts at optimism were gradually overtaken by a nagging misery. At first it was just a day of depression every once in a while. Then it grew to two days of depression and then back to kind of feeling good again. Unfortunately, over the following three months, the amount of depressed days grew markedly over the "normal" days. I didn't really sink until the end of January, when everyday was, once again, a bad day.
Even though I was starting to grow more depressed through the fall, for the most part, things were good. Christmas was a great time. I went shopping with Lauren a few times, and it was very nice. Even though we had been close ever since the end of October, we were really close friends by Christmas. I was really hooked by Christmastime, but I was not overwhelmed by my feelings yet. I gave Lauren a couple of tapes. I didn't know much about the music she liked, but I managed to give her tapes she didn't have. Lauren gave me home made chocolate pretzels for Christmas. For years afterward, chocolate pretzels always reminded me of Lauren and the Christmas of 1988.
New Year's Eve was a disaster. Casondra wanted to go to Oakland and Shadyside to go to clothing stores, and she wanted me to drive. Casondra didn't drive, and by this time I was starting to think that Casondra was asking me to hang out with her simply because I had a car. I refused to drive, but was still part of the plans when it was decided that we would take a bus. Lauren also came along. On the bus, Casondra started to talk about some guy that Lauren used to like, or that used to like her. I got very irritated with their "girl-talk". I started to grow angry with Casondra as the bus ride progressed. Then we walked to all of the clothes stores that Casondra liked. We also walked all the way to Shadyside even though it was freezing and. I was in an awful mood by this time, which Lauren obviously picked up on. She tried to cheer me up, and she was partly successful. She got real close to my face, and smiled this wry little smile and tried to coax me into a better mood. That night the three of us were supposed to get together at Casondra's house. In what would become a habit, Lauren canceled at the last minute, so it was just Casondra and me for New Year's Eve.
Oklahoma and Winter 1989
The winter was long and dark. It was overcast everyday for almost two months. I slipped into a very stagnating depression. It lacked the sense of immediacy of my previous depressions, primarily because there wasn't anything actually going on outside my head. There was much more pain, however. Life seemed brutally monotonous. I went to school during the day, home at night, and then hoped I would see Lauren on the weekend.
After Christmas, our little group got together a lot less frequently. Chris had other friends he liked to be with, for one thing, as did Fletch. Casondra, Lauren, and I went out together a few times, but I almost always hated that combination. Casondra would inevitably start to say things about guys, and other girl-talk issues, which always angered me. Also, we could never think of anything to do. I usually felt irritated because I thought that Lauren and Casondra would rather be somewhere else.
After some time, I began to make plans with just Lauren alone. I enjoyed being with just her. We didn't really do anything when we went out but I just loved being with her. Frequently, we would go to a movie at the Super Saver cinema. We saw a lot of movies together. We took particularly delight in the violence of "Die Hard", and were bored to death with "The Accidental Tourist".
I was a complete wreck by February 1989. I was very depressed, and constantly thinking about Lauren. I did not know what to do. We were still great friends and we went out frequently. Only at those times when I was with her did I not feel depressed. I actually felt great when I was with her. There I was with this beautiful girl beside me. It was amazing to me. I felt like the envy of all men. Sometimes I think that I simply did not want to know the truth about Lauren's feelings. I figured that as long as I didn't know, there was always a chance that she did like me. So I continued to think it best to not say anything. I was simply too afraid of the consequences of the inevitable rejection.
Lauren and I spent a great deal of time together that winter because we were both involved with the scenery for the school production of Oklahoma. This was something that Lauren wanted to do. She asked me to take part as well, and of course, I said I would. We spent nearly every afternoon after school, for roughly two months, working on the scenery together. I was always in the art room. Every afternoon at around three o'clock or so, she would meet me there. We used to work on art projects together for awhile, and then go to the auditorium where we worked on the scenery. We spent a lot of time goofing around and laughing. We also spent a lot of time complaining, in a very judgmental manner, about different people we knew, and generally being pretty negative. Initially, Lauren was a very upbeat person to be around, but apparently there was a lot of negativity just below the surface. I think that my initial perception of Lauren as seeming elitist and too good for me was essentially correct. However, now I was considered okay by her. So we were able to share our judgments of everyone. One of the things I liked best about Lauren was that she seemed to dislike people for all the same reasons as me. She didn't like people who did drugs, or drank, or were stupid. Sometimes, we acknowledged our negativity and would attempt to stop it. Those attempts didn't last too long.
On the surface, Lauren and I were friends. That was the bottom line. I basically suffered in silence, while occasionally receiving both positive and negative signals that Lauren had feelings for me. Sometimes she would say something, or do something, which would make me think that she liked me. I would become very hopeful and happy. Then, at other times, I would perceive rejection, or she would do or say something that made me think she saw me as only a friend. I went back and forth with this information for months, analyzing her words and actions, hoping to find a clue that would give me a definite answer without my having to actually take action.
My feelings for Lauren were a constant burden. Knowing that I was never going to do anything, I simply wanted them to go away. I thought that they were inappropriate. I certainly believed that I was somehow condemned to misery and pain. I often sat in my classes and just stared into space, or sat with my head on my desk. I looked forward to the time I would spend with Lauren, but the rest of my life was constant melancholy.
In March, this depression just grew worse. On my birthday, Lauren and Casondra made me a cake and had a little party for me. It was nice, yet also sad simply because of the situation I was in with Lauren. For some time I could not stand to be near Casondra. If she came in the room, I would get so angry with just her mere presence that I had to leave. While she never said anything directly to me, people told me that she was really hurt and confused by the way I was treating her. I decided that I should try to start making an effort to be nice to her again. It wasn't that I really didn't like Casondra; it's just that I grew very irritated with her personality. After some time had passed, however, we sort of became friends again. Casondra has a very trusting and forgiving personality, albeit naive, thus, she didn't hesitate to resume a more normal friendship. Things weren't okay between us for many months, however. I then knew that if I spent too much time with her, she would drive me crazy. I tend to think that my negative feelings toward Casondra were an outlet to a lot of intense feelings in general, most having to do with her best friend, Lauren.
Prom
In any other set of circumstances, I would have been against the Prom. I thought it was a silly tradition promoted by the makers of prom dresses. However, if Lauren had been my date, I might have thought differently. This is just one of the areas in which Lauren's influence seemed to make me want to be more normal. Lauren seemed to represent the possibility of having a normal life. All of a sudden, I wanted to be more conventional. I wanted to take part in things like the prom. I wanted to wear nicer clothes. Lauren represented a better life to me; something that I always wanted but never felt was attainable.
I would have loved to have asked Lauren to the Prom. However, I assumed that she was already going with Will. It seemed that it was somehow his divine right to go to the Prom with her. I don't even know if she wanted to go with him, but it was somehow assumed, or so I thought. I later found out that he asked her, and she said she'd go, because she didn't have anyone else to go with. I knew he liked Lauren, but I didn't know much beyond that. Casondra once told me that Lauren was a virgin, and that Will really wanted to have wild passionate sex with her. Now that they were going to the prom, I filled my mind with images of this reality. I didn't know how likely it was that they'd have sex, but I was consumed with it nonetheless. I always thought Will was a total asshole. So the idea that he was going to have sex with Lauren drove me to new levels of angst. I barely thought of Lauren sexually. I thought of her as a precious and virtuous angel. While I was extremely attracted to her, I just couldn't imagine her in a sexual context. I thought this was the right approach though. It made me more convinced that I liked her for "the right reasons" since sex wasn't one of them.
The prom was in late May, and by early May, I still wasn't going. Since I wasn't going with Lauren, not going to the prom at all was fine with me. However, under a strange set of circumstances, I ended up with a prom date. It was an unlikely peer-pressure situation. A bunch of us were in the art room talking about the Prom, and I said that I wasn't going. Then this girl sitting beside me, Gretchen, asked me to go with her. As I was one the spot, I did not feel that I could say "no" in front of all those people.
As the prom got closer and closer, I became increasingly anxious. I dreaded that day like nothing before, and apparently for good reason, as May 26, 1989 went on to stand as the worst day of my life for many years. I spent the afternoon hanging out with Fletcher at the park. He didn't know anything about my feelings for Lauren at that point. Then I went home and got ready. I drove over to Gretchen's house to pick her up. Her parents took pictures of us. It was awful. Gretchen was part of the "hippy" crowd at school. She was okay, but I didn't relate to her much. Somehow we struck up a slight friendship sitting next to each other in an art class. Now I was going to the prom with her.
I first caught a glimpse of Lauren as I pulled up to the Westin William Penn in downtown Pittsburgh. She was walking from the garage to the hotel. I could see that she had a long white gown that revealed her shoulder. I saw Will walking beside her. And then I saw Casondra and her date, and Fletcher and his date. They were all together.
Lauren always looked nice, but I had never seen her dressed up. Her hair was done a little differently for the evening, with a slight curl. She looked more beautiful than I had ever seen her. Seeing her with that asshole Will was sheer torture, the ultimate joke of my life. I could never understand why I had to go through all that torture when I was such a "good" person.
I barely saw my "date" the whole night, not that I cared. We were together at the same table during dinner. I was at a table with all these people I didn't particularly like, while all my friends were together at another table. I felt extremely rejected as a result of this circumstance. After dinner I puttered around the designated prom area talking to anyone that would talk to me. I even spoke with my best friend from elementary school for several minutes. We hadn't spoken in years. I talked to Amy. And I talked Lynnette. More than one prom date interrupted my conversations that night. I spoke to Lauren little throughout the evening. We danced once though. It was nice but I couldn't help but pretend that she was my date, and that I was dancing with my date.
Following the prom festivities, we had "After Prom" in the high school cafeteria and gymnasium. Again, I did my best to talk to anyone that would humor me. After I exhausted everyone I knew, I ended up sitting alone, in the corner of the cafeteria, in front of a TV that was playing videos of highlights from the previous year's football season. I didn't really watch the picture as much as I just stared at the screen and considered how I was going to endure another four hours. I sat there for several minutes, until this girl in one of my art classes sat beside me and asked what I was doing, and why I was there. Good question. I asked her if she thought I could fake being sick and go home. She thought it was worth a try, so I found the prom supervisors in the nurse's office and told them that I was sick. Fortunately, they believed me and let me go home. I told my date I was leaving. I walked out the back door of the gym and pulled off my tie. I started to cry before I even got to my car. I then continued for the duration of the ride home, and for another two hours at home with my startled parents. They didn't know anything about Lauren or what I had been going through. I told them throughout the night what had been going on for the past few months.
Prom was actually a two day event. There was the "prom" itself, which lasted from around 6pm to 11pm. Then "After Prom" lasted until 6AM. That was the organized part. Then everyone was supposed to go sleep somewhere, and then get together the next day as well. I assumed that Lauren and Will would be having sex during this "sleeping" period between After Prom and the next day's activities. While I was invited by my prom date's friends to be with them the next day, I instead accepted an invitation from my actual friends. We went to Moraine State Park for the afternoon. Even though I was not Lauren's prom date, I ended spending most of the afternoon with her. I don't remember Will being around at all. I got the sense that Lauren was irritated with him, and was trying to avoid him. Somehow, I later found out that they didn't have sex that night, or any other night.
There were only a couple weeks left in the school year following the Prom. Ironically, I looked forward to school being over for every minute of my school career until it actually came upon me. I knew that school being over was ushering in the changes that would separate me from Lauren for good. As it happened, graduation itself was uneventful. I dreaded hearing Lauren's name being read out from the podium. It was final then. I watched her take her diploma. Her parents took pictures.
Summer 1989: The Right Time
The next time I went out with Lauren was on her birthday, June 29. I took her to a new Chinese restaurant in Cranberry. Then we drove up to Moraine and sat on a bench by the lake, and walked around a little. I had my Dad's Acura Legend, a gift from my uncle, so I felt very upper class and cool… pretty girl, nice car. It all seemed quite okay. The time spent at the lake seemed very romantic. It was a moonlit night, all the typical stuff, except Lauren was not my girlfriend. In these moments I sort of pretended that she was my girlfriend. Or, what I would later refer to as my "pseudo-girlfriend". She was exactly like my girlfriend, except there was no kissing, nothing physical. In other words, she wasn't my girlfriend.
After leaving the lake, we drove back home on Route 19. We passed a place that had hundreds street signs lying around. We got it into our heads that it would be fun to have a street sign. So I parked the car nearby, and we snuck into this place with the signs and we carried a couple signs away. When we heard a door open we quickly got in the car and drove off. I made a small tear on the back of the driver's seat while trying to fit the sign inside the car. Once we drove off, we realized that we didn't know where we were going to put the signs. One of the signs was a big interstate sign and couldn't easily be hidden in one of our bedrooms. Finally I remembered a location that I thought would work. We drove to my elementary school in Bradfordwoods. There was a log cabin on the grounds, which was slightly lifted off the ground, that I thought would be sufficient for temporary storage of the signs. I placed the signs underneath. Within minutes, the police showed up and asked what we were doing. I was quick enough to say that we had just graduated, and had come to reminisce. I went back to the log cabin a couple weeks later and the signs were gone.
A rather annoying development concerning Lauren and a friend of mine, Alex, came up shortly after graduation. Alex was in my band. He was a born-again Christian, and he played bass. I found him to be arrogant and smug, and more or less a hypocrite concerning his Christian beliefs. Also, due to his ambivalence about our band, I came to see him as my protagonist. Basically, I didn't like the guy, but I tolerated him for the sake of the band. Somehow, Lauren and Alex started to become friendly. They lived only a couple blocks away from each other, but as far as I knew, they had little knowledge of each other. That all changed when Lauren went to the Arts Festival with a group of people that included Alex. I was very aggravated by this. Later, at a graduation party where our band played, Lauren was very friendly and even flirtatious with Alex. One evening, at Alex's house the subject of Lauren came up. He was interested in her, and was wondering what he should do. He didn't know anything about my background with Lauren yet. Nevertheless, I thought this was the most ridiculous predicament ever. Lauren and Alex together seemed like the ultimate joke on me. Fortunately, their fledgling relationship died shortly thereafter. I have no idea why. I didn't do anything to either encourage or discourage them. Nevertheless, I was happy was it was over. The lesson I learned from this little episode was that no matter how strange things were in my life; I should expect them, in all probability, to get much worse, in ways that are inconceivable.
I was very depressed for the rest of summer as I continued to dread going to college. I eventually came to see that Lauren was hardly ideal. It took a long time to start looking at her objectively. I realized that she was often cold to me. She almost never called me. If I called her, she would call me back in her own time, which was hardly ever prompt. She rarely, if ever, initiated a call. I sometimes thought that if I never called her, I would probably never see her or hear from her again. She also got in the habit of canceling plans at the last minute. She would either be sick or something would come up. That's what she always said. Despite these concerns, I considered Lauren to be my best friend. Therefore, it upset me that Lauren was so content to rarely see me. On the other hand, she was beautiful and I would put up with anything just to be with her. Even my objectivity was tempered by an overwhelming drive to simply be with her, have her as my girlfriend, marry her, and make her the mother of my children. I still felt that no girl could compare to her.
I decided that I had to tell Lauren how I felt before we went to college. I'd been through eight months of hell and I just had to get it off my chest, if for no other reason. I had begun to tell people about this "problem" I was having a couple of months before. Fletch, in particular, gave me hell for not saying anything to her. He called me "stupid". Two weeks before we had to leave for college, I told Lauren how I felt. I planned it out that I would tell her on August 19. The date had no relevance other than it would be an opportunity to be with her, and there was never going to be a "right" time.
It was a rainy night. We went to the park under the auspices of watching the storm. After we had gotten chased out of several places by the police we found a spot with a decent view of the sky. We sat in silence for several minutes as I pushed myself to start telling her. I couldn't believe what I was about to do. Eventually, I mustered up all of my courage and I told her that I liked her, as more than a friend. She acted very casual about it and she said that she kind of knew I liked her, and she said that she had feelings for me also. Unfortunately, she did not want a relationship. She told me that she was an awful person, and that she didn't want a long distance relationship. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. She was telling me that she was a terrible person, and she didn't want to hurt me, or ruin our friendship because she was so horrible. There wasn't much back and forth about her position. However, what I did not realize at the time, was that her answer kept me in the same position I had been in. I simply didn't know if we had a future together or not. I held on to the few little nuggets of encouragement she gave me. So while saying something to her at all at least had the effect of moving out of one phase, it did little to abate my feelings for her.
The end of August was a crazy time. Getting ready for college was a seriously depressing matter. I had the idea that I was never going to be coming home again. I don't know why I thought that going to college was such a dramatic cut-off, but I did. Despite some initial awkwardness, Lauren and I resumed our friendship as if nothing had been said. We didn't speak of the conversation in the pack until almost three years later. I felt very unstable during all of this time. Everything seemed different, but in no way better, now that I had told Lauren how I felt. Yet, as I mentioned previously, my feelings for her did not decrease. In fact, her ambiguity only served to make me think that she was more or less my girlfriend, even though that was not at all what was decided in our conversation.
College
I saw the transition to college as undoing everything good I had in my life. I attributed both the loss of my band, and the loss of Lauren to this transition. I used to think that all I needed in my life was either a band or a girlfriend. If I had either one, that would be enough to make me forever happy. I thought that I was definitely on the verge of maybe having both, if it hadn't been for college. I was not quite sure what the reasons really were behind Lauren's rejection. I assumed that there was more to it than what she actually said. Her ambiguity about what her feelings meant allowed me to think that maybe if it wasn't for college, she would have been my girlfriend. Or that we would eventually get together someday in the future. I was perfectly willing to wait the four years until we graduated.
Lauren had been through a lot of turmoil over where to go to college. She was turned down by all of her top choices, and ended up going to her fall-back choice, Allegheny College, in Meadville, Pennsylvania. She dreaded going there because she thought it was a school where boring people went and that there wasn't going to be anything to do. She didn't like the idea of having to live with the supposedly "superficial" people who went there. I hated this idea too, and desperately hoped she would decide to transfer, maybe even to Penn in Philadelphia. The last two weeks we spent together were nice. It was mostly solemn, but I felt it was my last chance to make an impression on her.
Then the last night at home, Fletch, Lauren, and I went out to Parish Hill in the park and hung out for a while. When I drove Lauren home, I walked her to the door, where she hugged me. I'll never forget how she hugged me. It was actually the most passionate hug I had ever felt, not to mention that it was the first time Lauren had ever hugged me. After I got in the car I cried all the back to Fletcher's house.
I went to school in Philadelphia, at Tyler School of Art. During the drive to Tyler I started writing a letter to Lauren. I already missed her immensely. I sort of knew that writing her was futile, but it made me feel as if I was sustaining a connection with this person that was basically exiting my life.
I was able to make friends at Tyler rather quickly. However, I really missed Lauren, and thought about her almost constantly. I met a girl named Karen, with whom I established a close friendship; in many ways similar to the one I had with Lauren. When I first met Karen, she was very warm and open. The experience of being with Karen really enlightened me to how dissatisfied I was in my friendship with Lauren. The relationship with Karen was rather unstable unfortunately. When that friendship was doing well, I tended to think of Lauren less. Karen even passed "the Lauren test". However, when things turned bad with Karen, I retreated into thinking about Lauren.
Humiliation
Aside from my sadness over Lauren, I was initially very happy at Tyler. This initial euphoria was broken rather suddenly during a phone call with Alex, who was attending college at Penn State. I told him that I had some news to tell him that was very good. I was referring to my talk with Lauren. Despite the "rejection", I saw it as very liberating that I at least mustered up the strength to tell her and get it off my chest. Then he told me that he already knew what the news was about. I was shocked. It was inconceivable that he could know about that talk. He told me that he found out from this guy, Dave Stragan, with whom he was friends. As it turned out, Casondra was dating Dave. When I put it together I was disgusted and humiliated.
Apparently, Lauren called Casondra at college and told her about our talk. Casondra then told Dave, who proceeded to tell Alex. I was mortified by this. For one thing I was surprised that Lauren actually called Casondra and told her. They were "best-friends" though, so I could it as reasonable. What was most upsetting was that Casondra did not consider my feelings when telling Dave, whom I barely knew, but definitely did not like. She knew what a big deal it was for me to finally tell Lauren about my feelings. I couldn't believe that she would have such disregard for me. The fact that Dave actually told Alex was simply an embarrassment. I hated it that my life turned into some sort of gossip page. A week or so later I confronted Casondra with this. It was pathetic. She said she couldn't remember telling him, or that maybe she told him "in her sleep". I couldn't believe it. I was so mad at her. I decided to eliminate her from my life. I didn't follow through with my decision though.
This little situation dragged on for a few months. I regularly dwelt on what kind of person Casondra was. Later, I was told that she had mouthed off about Lauren and I at some party. This made me even angrier. It was unbelievable that she did it twice. I wrote her a letter about how angry I was with her. We were friends in name only. For the most part I avoided her during breaks. It would be a couple years before I could bring myself to be friends with her once again.
In late September, I went home for a weekend visit. This was my first visit home since going to college. On Saturday, I drove up to see Lauren at college. She gave me a big hug when she saw me and held on for a couple seconds. She looked good. We spent the afternoon talking and generally having a good time. I played her a recording of a song I wrote with Karen. This was my little attempt to show Lauren that I was spending time with a girl.
As the semester progressed, I grew more and more frustrated with Lauren. I thought that we had a special and important relationship, and it simply seemed like she didn't care that much. I called her every couple weeks or so, but she never called me. She was never far from my mind. When I was out at different places in Philadelphia I would be thinking how I wanted to tell everything to Lauren. Once, when I was at an art museum, I bought her a pen that looked like a totem pole. I sent it to her along with a letter. At first I wrote to her a lot, but I think she might have written back maybe once. Everyday I checked the mailbox hoping to find mail from Lauren, but it never happened.
The next time I saw her was at Thanksgiving. We got together a couple of times. She was very depressed. I don't know why. She would not tell me what was bothering her. But since it was during a bad phase with Karen, I was very drawn to Lauren once again. The last night of the break we had plans. She blew me off and went out with other friends. I didn't even know she had other friends! I went back to Tyler feeling very confused about Lauren, as usual.
Disillusionment The next opportunity I had to see Lauren was during the Christmas break. Her school had a trimester system which meant that she had been on break since the second week of December, and would go back to school after New Year's Day. I didn't get home until nearly Christmas. I was in a very bad situation with Karen by this point, and I was really looking forward to seeing Lauren. She had a job at Kaufmann's at the mall. I went in to surprise her one afternoon. We got together shortly thereafter. We got along real well and all of the old feelings came back, as if there had never been a Karen. We exchanged Christmas presents on Christmas Eve. I gave her one of the projects that I did at Tyler. I almost immediately regretted that. And she gave me a Teddy Bear. I had once told her that I liked Teddy Bears and I'd like to have one. She remembered. She wrote a message attached to the package:
"Wishing you the merriest of Christmases and the happiest, most joyful New Years yet. You are one of the best friends a person could have and I love you for it! Hope you like your present – as far as I am concerned, nobody can have too many "friends" – so remember that when you take this one to Tyler!"
Her little message washed away any grievances I had felt about her not ever calling or writing me during the previous four months. I used to refer to this phenomenon that Lauren was able to erase any anger I had with her with as little as a kind word or a certain look, as "the puppy dog syndrome". It was the same as when you have a cute puppy and it shits on the floor. At first you get pissed off, but then you look at how cute the puppy is, and all is forgiven.
On New Year's Eve, Lauren and I had plans. She canceled the plans at the last minute to go out with other people. That should've told me something about her, but it didn't. I was depressed and sad and angry. But my objectives regarding Lauren didn't change.
I went to visit Lauren at college during my break in January. Prior to Christmas, I made her a cassette tape of the Pixies two albums. There was some extra space on the tape, so I added an extra song, the Pixies performing Neil Young's "Winterlong". It turned out that she really loved that song. She specifically told me that she really liked the song, which had added significance considering the lyrics. The chorus of the song was "I've waited for you winterlong, you seem to be where I belong". I thought it was possible that I was the person for whom she was waiting. I didn't get too caught up in this idea, but it seemed possible. The other song she was into at the time was "Alison" by Elvis Costello. It had a chorus of "Alison, I know this world is killing you". My interpretation of the song was that it was about a girl who had changed for the worse. Later, I thought that might be why she related to the song. In the case of both songs, she may have simply enjoyed the melodies.
As it turned out, Lauren wasn't doing very well. She wouldn't really say why. She was sulky and quiet and obviously distressed about something. Eventually, she muttered something about how she didn't really like anybody, and that she had to change her personality, and that she didn't know any interesting people, and that she joined a sorority because everyone was doing it. That was all the detail she gave me. Then she proceeded to fall into my shoulder where she cried for about a minute. I did my best to console her, but it was over as soon as it had begun. She quickly pulled herself together and clammed up. We didn't have much to say the rest of evening. I was concerned about her, but in general, I thought the visit was good. I should say that it was a bad visit because she was obviously in pain and we didn't talk about much of any consequence. However, the visit felt good to me, because in her own way, Lauren confided in me, and even cried. I thought that I must be very important to her.
Later that same week, due to the serious distress Lauren was in, and my zealous wish that maybe something would happen and we would end up getting married, I went to visit her again. This visit was not good at all. At the time I thought she wanted me to visit again, but now I'm not so sure. As usual, we didn't have much to say. We were sitting in her dorm when her roommate came in and said something about Lauren having been drunk this one time, and how "John" had to carry her up to her bed! My heart sunk!! What could I say? Lauren? Drinking?! This was worse than death. All of my concepts about her were shattered. She was no longer the heavenly creation I thought she had been. She was actually drinking! And she was so drunk that she had to be "carried". And if she was that out of it, then what if "John" took advantage of her? What if she wanted that? Had she become an entirely different person at college? It was just unfathomable.
We did not speak about what her roommate said. It was a big deal to me, but it just wasn't going to be discussed. I didn't know how to discuss it, quite frankly. I was relatively disgusted with her at the time, and didn't feel I could say anything useful. After I left her college, I drove down to McConnell's Mill. I pulled down to the mill, got out of my car and walked over to the rapids. Then I proceeded to scream for about an hour. I cursed out everything that caused me so much pain. I yelled "fuck you" to the water and addressed it to nearly everybody. I basically had a tantrum, or a breakdown, or something. I thought that I was getting out all of my anger. I was determined to not allow myself to get screwed over again. I resolved to live by my own rules. My whole life seemed like one betrayal of trust after the next. It seemed as if no matter how bad things were they always had to get worse. I wasn't going to take it anymore. I decided that I must not allow myself to trust other people. As a side note, my friend Bill also went to Allegheny College. I never asked him if he knew anything about Lauren there. I didn't want to know. I always got the sense that he knew things. When I would talk about her, he never said much. I used to take that as a sign that he knew things that would blow my mind if he told me. Mel vs. Lauren Following this episode I largely distanced myself from Lauren. I felt abandoned by her and I didn't see any point in making the kind of effort I used to make. I went through another couple of up and down months with Karen, and then I actually started to date someone. Her name was Melanie, or "Mel". We were friends, but had grown closer over the months. I had some feelings for her, but by no means were they as powerful as those I had for Lauren. The situation with Mel was very similar to what had occurred over a year before with Robin. This time, however, I wasn't going to make the same mistake. I decided that being with Mel was what I should do. She was a girl that liked me, and wanted to be with me, and was available. I knew that I didn't have feelings for her that extended much beyond friendship, but I thought that perhaps that was okay. We were together were roughly five months.
I thought I was "over" Lauren while I was with Mel. The first few weeks with Mel were great. I was convinced that I was finally through with Lauren. Mel and I started dating a few weeks before the summer break. I didn't know what Lauren would be doing over the summer, although I was concerned that if she was around, I might have a hard time staying focused on Mel. As it happened, Lauren decided to accept a position as nanny with some family in Maryland, so she was away for most of the summer. We got together once, in early June, before she left. We went out to dinner. We didn't have much to talk about. The events of the previous winter had placed a boundary between us. Additionally, our lack of communication throughout the year had significantly weakened whatever bond we may have once had. Nevertheless, I felt very cool during our meeting. I had a girlfriend after all, and was feeling like I finally had some power over my feelings for Lauren.
In July a family vacation in Ocean City, Maryland was planned, and I was allowed to bring Mel along. I had been looking forward to this vacation for a long time. My enthusiasm waned significantly just days prior to the trip when I received a postcard from Lauren. She mostly wrote of her experiences being a nanny. She said that she missed me and that she hoped we could get together when she got back at the end of summer. This was all it took to get me to thinking about her again. I hid the postcard from Mel, so she had no idea I had heard from Lauren. During the vacation I thought about her a lot. I kept daydreaming about how nice it would've been to have Lauren with me instead of Mel. All of the old feelings came flooding back. One evening Mel remarked that it seemed like I was "a million miles away" from her. I thought, "Not a million, but maybe a couple hundred" (i.e. with Lauren). Mel had failed "the Lauren test". That vacation was basically the end of my relationship with Mel. We broke up month or so later. My feelings for Lauren weren't the only factor in the end of that relationship, but they were significant nonetheless.
The Strike Of 1990
Two weeks before I went back to Tyler, Lauren came back from her nanny job. We saw each other several times. I immediately fell back into the same pattern as I was in with her all along. Sometimes she was great to be around, and sometimes she was very cool to me. I went through all the same routines: periods of feeling great like she liked me, and then feeling totally rejected when she was acting indifferent to me. The highlight of those two weeks was going to Kennywood with her. This was an amazing time. I rarely have fun, but I certainly had fun on this day. It was really something else. We rode on all of those rides and our bodies kept on smashing against each other, and she didn't even make an effort to prevent it. I kept on thinking how this was the person I wanted to be with. I wanted to be married to her. I constantly thought about how nice it would be if she were my wife and we lived together and so on.
Once again, Lauren made a huge impression on me. I was very confused. I didn't know what to do. I just tried to make as much of a positive impression as possible. Lauren never knew me as a very depressed person. We were both rather sarcastic, and we both tended to make fun of people, but I never acted depressed around her. Going back to Tyler was painful because I didn't want to leave Lauren. As had been the case the previous year, I thought that if only it wasn't for college, she would most definitely be my girlfriend. When I got back to Tyler, I found myself with a lot of free time because the teachers were on strike. The strike lasted from the beginning of September until the middle of October. At first I enjoyed all of the free time to goof around and play music, but after a couple weeks or so, I started to think about how the strike was going to affect me and Lauren. If the strike went on for too long, my winter break would be completely eaten up, and since she was on a trimester system, our winter breaks already didn't overlap much. The other possibility was that the entire semester would simply be canceled. This meant that I would end up graduating a semester later than Lauren. That seemed like a fate worse than death. I always hoped that Lauren and I would get married or at least begin a real relationship after college. If I graduated a semester after her, all of that would be impossible. That was how I was thinking at the time.
Around the end of September, I went home for about a week. I was very depressed almost the whole time. All I did was think about Lauren. I began to write a journal about my problems concerning her. The point of this was to dissect my problem and then come to a conclusion about what I should do. I ruminated about all of the facets of my predicament for page after page, and reached few conclusions that were of any use. The bottom line was that I wanted Lauren. I decided that she was the best, and that she offered me the greatest chance for being happy. I tried to be realistic, but my feelings about her were so intense that reality was out of the question. I always thought that the best thing I could do was to try to make a good impression on her so she would realize that I was the best even though we wouldn't see each other for a long time. On the other hand, I decided that I needed to be open to the possibility that I could meet somebody else, although I deemed that to be rather unlikely.
Eventually the strike ended and things got back to normal. My ruminations about Lauren went about as far as they could go, and there was a general decline in my thoughts about her for awhile. My feelings had declined a little, at least until I saw her at the next Thanksgiving. When I went home for Thanksgiving in 1990, I was once again bitten by the Lauren bug, so to speak. I don't remember why, or what happened. All I know is that once again she made a huge impact on me. When I returned to Tyler, I was consumed, once again, with thoughts about Lauren.
Journal Excerpts – Fall 1990 "Ever since summer I have thought about Lauren way too much. A lot of times I don't know why. I guess more than anything, I have conditioned myself into thinking that she is the best person for me. But I'm not so sure. There isn't anyone else who can compare to her, but why is this? Why is she an exception? I guess because I have very high standards, but already she hasn't lived up to my standards, but in my mind I have forgiven this fault. She is very pretty. I'm sure this has a lot to do with it… the old 'puppy dog syndrome'. But it is this and her overall personality. She seems very sensitive; she is pretty thoughtful and kind. She is also independent and very self sufficient (?). She has very good values, and has aspirations in life that I like. These are all positive things I suppose, that is if they are all true. I feel like whenever I am with her I always want to be with her. I have always felt like I would want to marry her. I guess the bottom line is no matter what, I want to try to make it happen cause I don't see me changing my feelings on this. But of course we are hundreds of miles apart in college. The time we have together is limited. So I guess my only hope is that she transfers to a school near me, or wait until we're out of college. Irregardless waiting is necessary. So I have to find a way to put this into perspective. I can't let my thoughts be so motivated towards her and the many aspects of this situation; they usually always bring me sadness."
"This strike makes me very mad. I could go on about all the injustices of it but they all relate to one thing, that is, of course, Lauren. I won't get to spend as much time with her because my vacation will get cut. This hurts me a great deal. Why? Because, by not being around her I cannot leave an impression on her, and it will be easier for her to forget about me. It startles and scares me how similar my relationship with Holly is to my relationship with Lauren. It bothers me. I don't know what to do. In the long run, it is probably better to lose the time now rather than in 3 years and have to go back to school when she is out. But it is hurtful nonetheless. I have such a one track mind. It scares me even how I relate everything I do, everything I see and everything that happens to me to her. When I talk to her or when I'm with her it rarely makes sense to me that this or here is the person who is the object of so much of this writing. That is why I think the problem and much of the pain I feel is me or some weird thing I've created. I don't get it. I wish I could make some sense out of this all. I wish I could just get away from it all, or maybe even find someone who would appear in my life and who I would really fall for and it would work. I guess that is very unlikely."
"I suppose she is as close to what I am looking for as I'll get for now. But the pain is not worth it for the moment. As long as I don't know, that's what is most crazy, she may not feel a damn thing for me, just like Holly. If this was happening with Holly, I would be so far off base and I wouldn't know. This could be the same. If I only knew that there was any hope in this situation, well of course I'd feel great, and thats the whole point isn't it? If I go out on a limb and ask her once again, I'd have to accept her answer as the truth. It seems like the last time I taught myself to think there was some hope, or that she didn't mean what she said, and for her reasons said it was impossible. It was so easy to lapse into this mode once again. I'm even, I don't know what to do." Breakdown Pt. II I saw Lauren occasionally during Christmas break 1990, but not enough, as far as I was concerned. She gave me a Christmas card that said "there is much to be said but it need not be because I think you know how much you and our friendship means to me. I can only hope that I can count on having you and your support in the future… especially when all of my psychoses and phobias and abnormal personality pathologies kick in". Later, she also gave me a book, Richard Bach's Jonathon Livingston Seagull. On the inside cover she wrote "one of my favorite books for one of my favorite people", and of course, "Love, Lauren". I melted as usual. I asked her if she really meant that. I really was shocked since she always seemed to avoid me, ignore me, act indifferent to my company, and never return my letters. She said that of course she meant it, why else would she have written it?!
Just prior to New Year's, I had another breakdown. As with the prom experience, again this breakdown was related to Lauren. One Friday evening, my friend Bill and I went to see "Dances With Wolves". I was supposed to go out with Lauren that night, but she was acting weird and couldn't make up her mind, and then she decided that she didn't want to do anything. I was really pissed off with her and hurt. She often did things like that. So I decided to go out with Bill. After the movie we went to King's. When we were leaving, we ran in to Casondra, Fletcher, Chris, and Lauren, the old group from high school. Lauren acted innocent, like it was nothing. I felt completely betrayed.
The shock of seeing my friends all together, and Lauren with them, sent me over the edge. When I got home I collapsed on the couch and tried to cry but I couldn't. No one was home, so I just wailed into the pillows, and screamed in pain. My dog freaked out and jumped all over me. It was some sort of breakdown, or possibly a panic attack. I felt trapped and suffocated. I was scared as all hell, and I didn't know what to do. I thought about suicide even. That really frightened me, because I had never been so low that suicide entered my mind. I didn't seriously consider doing it, but I did dwell on the whole notion as a possible way out. I decided that I had to tell my parents what was going on. When they came home, I told them what had just happened. I sort of confessed to them how upset I was and how awful I was really doing. I told them that I thought I needed "help". The following Monday, an appointment was scheduled with a psychiatrist my Dad knew.
Despite my anger with Lauren, I still thought that we had plans for New Year's Eve. She had said "we have to do something this year". I said I wanted to. I thought that we had plans. In typical Lauren fashion, she started to waver as the day approached. Nonetheless, we still had plans to do something. It had always been my dream to spend New Year's Eve with her. We didn't know what we were going to do, but we were going to do something. She said that she would call me around 5:00 and let me know. I spent a terrible day waiting by the phone for her call. The she called and said she wasn't going to do anything. She broke our plans at the last minute, another Lauren trademark! I think she eventually let it slip out that she did something with people from college, but I'm not sure. I spent the evening with Bill and Scott.
Skating And Avoiding
Following my breakdown and the New Year's incident, I decided to not call Lauren for a while, and just see what happened. I didn't hear from her for over two weeks. I was truly infuriated with her. However, she eventually called and we made plans to go ice-skating. This was the last time that I felt that amazing feeling I used to always feel when I was with her. I couldn't skate, so we ended up holding hands the whole time. We laughed a lot and had a great time. There I was this beautiful girl. Maybe that was really what she was about. Maybe all the crap I went through with her was just a misunderstanding. Maybe the truth was that Lauren thought I was "one of the greatest people in the world" and she really did have feelings for me. As we skated around, I imagined that everyone was thinking that she was my girlfriend. She really doted over me. She even tied my laces for me! I might have seen her one more time before the break was over but I can't remember. I remember that at one point over the break, she complained that she never received any mail! Of course, I was shocked. I even reminded her that I sent her mail every semester, but she never returns my letters. Such were the ambiguities with Lauren. Nonetheless, I was still hooked, especially after the skating date. But of course, when I got back to Tyler, I wrote her a letter, and she didn't return it. I didn't call her or make any effort to contact her for the rest of the semester.
When I got back from Tyler for the summer break, I made up my mind that I was not going to call her. I figured that if I meant anything to her, then she would call me. This summer was turning out to be much the same as the previous one. Once again, I had a girlfriend, and Lauren again chose to take a job in another state. Lauren went away with her friends to work for the second summer in a row. This time she and her friends got a job in Rhode Island at bed and breakfast.
I waited her out, and prior to going to Rhode Island, Lauren called me. I think she called in June. However, I was sort of cold with her when we spoke. Honestly, I thought that she fucked up our relationship by not returning my letters and not being very nice to me when we did get together. I didn't have anything to say to her. At this point, I really wanted her to go away and be out of my life. Over the summer she sent me a letter and a postcard. Both were conversational accounts of the events that summer. She expressed the hope that she would be able to see me before going back to college.
Towards the end of summer, I began to think more and more about Lauren. I don't remember much about the content of my thinking. I was certainly debating whether I should once again say anything to her about my feelings for her. That was always on mind. I thought a lot about how we interacted with each other, and about how we communicated with each other, and who contributed what to our situation. I realized that she probably did not have a clue why I was kind of being cold with her. I felt resentful towards her. Being cold towards her was almost my way of fighting back against the years of frustration I had endured with her. She had no idea about any of that. I thought that maybe I was screwing myself and ruining something good. My Dad even suggested that she was confused about me, and that was one of the reasons why she went away during the summer. I doubted this, but what did I know? He always maintained that from what he could see, Lauren really liked me a lot. He said that he could tell by the way she said "Hi" to him once when they ran into each other. I wrote a long letter to about all of this stuff, but I decided not to send it. Instead, I sent her a shallow note, in response to her postcard. Excerpt from the letter never sent:
"Sometimes I think you lead me on, sometimes I think that just you. I don't understand how you see me in your life. I think you hide yourself from me. It almost as if you've had a split personality since college. You always say you really care about me and we're such great friends, but it seems kind of obvious to me that you can't tell me things that really matter to you. You internalize things so much, and you often act so indifferent to me. I wish I wasn't writing this in a letter. I wish we were face to face. That would be easier. So many times I would want to bring this all up, but I've always told myself that I shouldn't cause any more trouble or confusion that you already had. I didn't want to cause you problems or burden you. You seem to have acquired an 'I just don't want to deal with it' attitude over the last couple of years, and I have tried to comply with this. But the truth is, if I can't be myself with you, then what good am I in your life anyway? Many times I would decide that you just did not care about me, and I would try to convince myself that I did not care either. Gradually something would happen that would change my mind and confuse me even more. I just wanted to believe something. I never knew what to think".
The Letter That Was Sent Starting in the fall of 1991, I started going to school in Kent State, Ohio. I transferred to Kent State somewhat arbitrarily. I knew I didn't want to follow through with an Art major at Tyler. By this time, I had simply lost my passion for creating art. Bill was thinking about going to Kent State, so I decided to check it out with him. As it turned out, he transferred to Penn State. Nevertheless, Kent State seemed okay. It was also not too far from Lauren at Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania.
I didn't have much of a social life at Kent State, so I tended to go home on the weekends. Often I would spend time with Casondra, with whom I had resumed a friendship. One weekend, sometime in the middle of September, I asked her about Lauren. I thought that Lauren would probably call me when she returned from her summer job, however, she did not. By this time I was very confused about what I wanted with Lauren. In a way, I got my wish. I had managed to act indifferent enough towards her that she did not call me. It was likely that I may never have spoken to again. On the other hand, that wasn't what I really. As always, what I really wanted was for Lauren to be my girlfriend, and for us to be married someday.
I wasn't sure why Lauren didn't call me. It could have been that she was sick of me and wanted me out of her life. But I didn't know. I tended to discount that angle, and I started to think that maybe I had blown it. I began to dwell on the possibility that maybe Lauren actually liked me, and by my actions, I had driven her away. Of course, that didn't make sense either because she left every summer, never returned letters, and even acted indifferent to me most of the times when we were together. I decided to ask Casondra if she knew anything. Casondra did not have much to say because Lauren had pretty much blown her off in the same way as she did me. But Casondra did talk to her before Lauren returned to school. She said that Lauren thought that I wanted her out of my life. I couldn't believe it. I actually succeeded. But that made me feel worse! I didn't really want that.
Lauren could have been out of my life for good, but then how could we be married? I didn't know how to handle this situation. I couldn't get what I really wanted, I couldn't stop having feelings for her, and I didn't want her out of my life completely. I was so afraid that maybe she did really like me, and that I was blowing it. Maybe she didn't like me, but I didn't know. That's how she treated me a lot of the time. I had a hard time determining how the treatment from her would be different if she hated me. Yet, I was "one of the greatest people in the world" to her. All I did was get very confused. I began to ruminate about her intensely. Then I decided that I would write her a letter and figure it out once and for all. I figured that if she didn't want to deal with me any longer, then she could simply throw the letter away.
I spent three days writing my letter. I wrote it, revised it, and then wrote it again. I told her that I still had feelings for her, and that they had not gone away since that night in park when we last talked about it. It was a long letter. I expressed all of my confusion regarding her behavior. I said some things about how I thought she had not treated me very nice, and that I did not know how to understand those things. I went in to a lot of detail about how I saw what was going on, and my feelings for her. I also wrote about how I wished I had been more open about my feelings. Then, around October 3, I mailed the letter. For the next couple of days I was obsessed with whether I said the right things, or whether I said too much, or whether I should have even bothered. I figured that writing the letter was a good thing in the end. It solved a lot of problems for me. Most importantly, I knew that I had done everything I could do. It was in her hands. If she decided not to reply, then I would know where I stood. If she did respond, then I could deal with that and maybe we could straighten a few things out. A week or two went by and I did not hear from her. I began to think that I was not going to get a response. I wasn't happy about it, but it was a bit of a relief to think that it was all over after three years.
The following excerpts are from rough drafts of the letter:
"A couple of nights ago I saw Casondra and I asked her if she had heard from you. I was wondering since you didn't ever call me or my parents to get my address. Of course she said that she had heard from you. You may be surprised to know that I was hurt that you did not call me. She told me that you said that I didn't want to be friends with you anymore. I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm telling you this stuff in a letter. I debated for a long time whether I should try to talk to you in person or give you a call on the phone. But I decided this was best because I'll be able to say exactly what I want without any interruptions (such as call waiting or police cars). If anything in this letter seems confusing to you, please give me the benefit of the doubt. I'm trying very hard to say what I mean but it is difficult. I'm sorry you feel the way you do. But Lauren, I care about you more than almost anyone. I can obviously understand, though, how you came to your conclusion. But in all honesty, I thought it was you who was trying to 'diss' me. I felt that way for the past year. It seemed to me that you were taking me for granted. Many times you did return my phone calls, or call when you said you would. Many times you break plans at the last minute. Of when we were together you would seem indifferent to me. It seemed like you trying to drive a wall between us. I thought that I tried very hard to reach you, but it was as if you trying to be inaccessible. And especially since you never responded to any of my letters, I thought you were trying to give me the hint".
"Sometimes I think you lead me on, sometimes I think that just you. I don't understand how you see me in your life. I think you hide yourself from me. It almost as if you've had a split personality since college. You always say you really care about me and we're such great friends, but it seems kind of obvious to me that you can't tell me things that really matter to you. You internalize things so much, and you often act so indifferent to me. I wish I wasn't writing this in a letter. I wish we were face to face. That would be easier. So many times I would want to bring this al up, but I've always told myself that I shouldn't cause any more trouble or confusion that you already had. I didn't want to cause you problems or burden you. You seem to have acquired an 'I just don't want to deal with it' attitude over the last couple of years, and I have tried to comply with this. But the truth is, if I can't be myself with you, then what good am I in your life anyway? Many times I would decide that you just did not care about me, and I would try to convince myself that I did not care either. Gradually something would happen that would change my mind and confuse me even more. I just wanted to believe something. I never knew what to think".
"I have no idea what I hope to gain by writing this letter. I have no idea how you'll react to any of this. Its all so confusing to me. Please believe me that it is not my intention to cause trouble, but I am trying to deal with what has been given to me. I suppose we're going to have some crazy talk someday. You mean the world to me and I care for you like I've cared for no other (in my long 20 years)."
Day Of Reckoning Around two weeks after I mailed the letter, Lauren called me. The call started out very awkward, with a lot of small-talk. Then she started to talk about my letter. She said that she was sorry for hurting me, and that she never meant to hurt me. She said that she knew she had taken our friendship for granted, and that she was sorry about it. She said something like, "You know how much I care for you, I mean I love you!" She also said that she had feelings for as well, and that she always had. But then she followed all of that up with saying that couldn't "go out with me", or be in a relationship. The conversation ended with an agreement to pay more attention to our relationship. I told her that I respected her feelings about not wanting a relationship. However, after the call I was laid awake most of the night thinking about what all of it meant. She said that she loved me. What the hell did she mean by that?! I didn't know whether she meant it in the friend way or the romantic way. I kept thinking that she had to mean it in the romantic way because, if she meant it in the friend way that would have been very misleading, especially given the context of the conversation. I mean, I figured that if I knew someone really liked me a lot, and that I didn't feel the same, and I didn't want to lead them on, I would not tell that person that I loved them, even if I did love them as a friend. I thought that would be very confusing. But on the other hand, she didn't want a relationship. Well, as usual, I was confused. I fantasized a lot about the eventuality of us "hooking up", maybe even at Thanksgiving! I had a few dreams about it that were very realistic, and thus quite painful. I decided that I would just play along as her friend, and wait.
Two weeks after the phone call, I called Lauren. I figured that I could do that because that is what friends do. We talked for a little while, but we didn't really have anything to say. It ended up being rather frustrating, and I felt sort of pathetic. I imagined her motioning to her friends that she was irritated that I called. Then after the call I imagined that she was bitching to her friends about what a nuisance I was. This type of thinking didn't help me. I thought about her almost constantly. I was pretty depressed about the whole thing. As Thanksgiving neared, I began to get angry because again, Lauren had made no effort to be in touch with me. She said that she was going to write me a letter. But everyday I checked the mail thinking that maybe I'd get a letter from her, and of course, there was no letter. It was ridiculous. How could she go and say that she loved me, and agree that we should pay more attention to our friendship, but then make no effort to be in touch with me? I figured that if she had told me she hated me, the treatment would be much the same. It seemed as if Lauren would say one thing and then act in the opposite manner. It had always been that way. I would be upset with her, then she would say something nice to me, or write something nice to me in a Christmas card, and I would forget that never acts on her words. I couldn't take it anymore. The trouble, and all of the ruminating, and all of the misery had simply become too much for me to handle. Some friends had been saying that I should simply eliminate her from my life. My friend, Josh, was especially adamant that I should rid myself of her. I was very confused about what to do, but I eventually decided that it didn't matter. I decided that the bottom line with Lauren was that she caused me pain. I could not deal with the kind of relationship she wanted, nor could I get the one that I wanted. I had to make the pain go away.
I decided that I would tell Lauren I could no longer be "friends" with her, on November 29, 1991. I referred to this day as "The Day Of Reckoning". I dreaded the coming of that day. I made plans to meet Lauren at the little hospital church we used to go to. We discovered the hospital church at Passavant just prior to Christmas of our senior year in high school, and had gone there numerous times just to be somewhere quiet and talk. I decided that we should meet there simply because it was 'our place', and convenient.
I couldn't sleep at all the night before the conversation. I was awake all night, and then I spent the following day agonizing about the event. I constantly debated whether or not I should go through with it, and just ruminated on and on. I sort of had the attitude that it was the "right" thing to do. I thought that Lauren was simply bigger than me. I could not handle it, so I would run away as an act of courage, for my own preservation.
When I arrived at the church, she was already there. I looked through the window at her for a moment. I thought about how I could change my mind right then. All of the old thoughts about maybe being with her someday came back. Yet, this time I had a stoic attitude about what I had to do. This time I was determined to follow through with my decision. Oddly, as I deliberated for a couple seconds, I felt sorry for her. She had no idea what I was about to say. Then I walked in. We sat there for a second or two, and then I started with my mission. I told her that I could no longer be friends with her. I told her that the way she treated me caused me too much pain, and that I couldn't deal with it any longer. I was a little bit shaky, and on the verge of tears. Then Lauren started to cry. She said that she was "so sorry", and that she never meant to hurt me. She said that she knew that she was indifferent to others, and kind of cold, but that was just how she was, and that she couldn't change. I immediately felt like I had wounded an innocent dear. I felt guilty, but I also felt like the winner. Then she said goodbye, and left. That was the last time I saw her. I waited a few minutes, and then I too left the church. The next day I saw Bill. I told him what happened. I felt awful, and I said that I thought we both lost.
Casondra continued to maintain a friendship with Lauren on some level, so I would occasionally hear things about her. Following college, Lauren moved to San Francisco, and lived with some guy named "Scott", who I believe, was a boyfriend she met at college. That is as much as I know. At one point I told Casondra to not mention Lauren around me if at all possible. I didn't want to know anything about her. However, even as much as six and seven years later, if the subject of Lauren came up, even casually, it would still cause me pain. I have no idea if she is married, or where she lives, or if she ever comes back home for visits. To this day, I still dream about her though. I still have dreams where we meet again, and we end up getting married and I'm able to live the life that I always wanted.
posted by Ant In A Hailstorm at
4:17 PM on Saturday, April 1, 1989
0 Comments
1988: Two Amy's
Making Friends I had never been a social person. I didn't think there were people with whom I could fit. So I didn't bother. I was 16 years old and didn't have any real friends. I decided that I was missing out. I was too picky, too shy, and too afraid of rejection to try to make friends. But I knew I had to overcome those issues on some level.
In the beginning of 11th grade, I made a concentrated effort to meet people. I tried to speak to a girl in one of my study halls. She was a beautiful girl, small, and alluring. I sat several seats away from her and tried to figure out how to talk to her. My opening came one day when she wore a shirt that said "Rehoboth Beach". I asked her if she'd been there. She said she had. I told her that I had been to Ocean City, Maryland. That was pretty much it. I could tell she didn't want to talk to me any further.
There was one guy I knew named Pat Sunseri. He seemed scary and unpredictable but always wanted to talk to me. I thought he was crazy. He had crazy dart black eyes. He had a big mop of hair, and then one day he came to school totally bald. He scared me, so I tried my best to avoid him.
I finally started to make some social in-roads toward the end of October 1987. I met Amy Peterson in 10th grade. She was new to our school. She had punk hair and wore either punk clothes, or ragamuffin clothes, and often had her violin with her. She sat in front of me in Biology. We struck up a little friendship during that class. The next year, in 11th grade, her chemistry class was in the room beside my Algebra 2 class. After the class she waited for me then we walked down to the cafeteria. Lunch was the worst. I sometimes sat at my friend Bill's table, but I didn't like his other friends too much. I felt uncomfortable with them. Sometimes I had lunch by myself. Striking up a friendship with Amy really helped out my lunch issues because I was able to start sitting with Amy and her friends.
I felt mostly comfortable with her friends. They were misfits. They didn't fit into any clique or crowd for one reason or another, but had somehow found each other. I met Stefaphie Jacob, Brad Everhardt, and Amy Peterson at lunch. I met another guy, Xavier Dal Lago, a couple weeks before at the same study hall as the Rehoboth girl. He also sat with Amy and her friends. We all sat on the floor outside the cafeteria, away from everybody else. It seemed like we all had similar opinions about school, and just life in general.
I grew to be pretty good friends with Brad, and especially Xavier. My friendship with Brad was mostly based on the fact that we liked some of the same music, and we liked to go to the same record stores. Beyond those things, I didn't like him very much. I found him to be arrogant and crass. Xavier, on the other hand, was a quiet and thoughtful guy. He and I could really talk, and we seemed to see eye to eye on most topics.
Amy I I started to like Amy after a couple weeks. It seemed that liking a girl was the normal thing to do. For years, I had resisted the urge to involve myself with any girls. My experiences with girls had been so bad in the previous years, that I swore them off. However, I figured that it had been a while and that I should try to be normal. Amy and I had a nice friendship. She was a sweet girl with a gentle personality. She was also an incredible violinist. I went over to house one time and we "jammed”. I brought my guitar and played some chords while she wailed away on her violin. I thought she was gifted. Sometimes I'd call her on the phone and we'd talk for a good hour or so.
Amy was the first girl that I was interested in that had problems. She had a terrible self-image and frequently put herself down. She also had a drinking problem. She used to frequently get drunk, and not for any other reason that to get drunk. I didn't know much about her drinking. I knew she drank, and that she drank more than what would've been normal. It didn't bother me much, however. I used to joke that I was going to try to make her a pot user because pot was better and safer to use than alcohol. I tried to seem experienced in this area. In reality, I couldn't even inhale.
Until the end of October, there wasn't much out of school socializing with my new friends. There were a few occasions where we'd get together in small groups. At the end of October, we all made plans to go out one night. The plan was to get some pot and stay out all night and smoke it and have a good time. By this time, I was starting to think that Amy liked me too. I thought that I was getting those "vibes” from her at least. I really had no idea what to look for in terms of "vibes”. This was my first experience with a more or less mature girl. My previous encounter with a girl had been when I was thirteen, and things had changed a lot since then. Nevertheless, I thought everything was working out for me. It seemed like Amy liked me and that I would be normal and have a girlfriend pretty soon.
The Bust
We made our plans for Monday night, November 2, 1987. The next day was an in-service day at school so we had the day off. The plan was that we'd each tell our parents that we were staying the night at the other person's house. None of our parents knew each other, so none of them checked us out. Brad picked me up at my house at around 7:30, then we all met at the baseball field where I played in the Pony league. We got some pot from a guy named Jeremy. He was one of the high school drug dealers. We tried to smoke it but I wasn't feeling anything. That didn't surprise me because I didn't know how to inhale. Nobody else was feeling anything either. I thought it was strange that the pot smelled so much like oregano. It turned out that Jeremy mixed in oregano to increase his supply, and none of us were savvy enough to know any better.
After a half hour or so, Amy, and a girl named Julie who was invited by Brad's girlfriend, and I walked down a path behind the outfield. We walked several hundred feet into a nearby orchard where we sat on the ground and once again tried to smoke the oregano. I had Amy on one side and Julie on the other side. Julie was kind of cute too. She was my sister's age though, so for some reason that was off-limits. Amy leaned against me and would touch me to emphasize a point, and generally acted as if she might have had feelings for me.
After another half hour or so, Xavier came down the path and said that Brad had to go pick up his girlfriend. None of us trusted Brad to come back for us, so we all piled in his car. I had brought a guitar up there so we could play and possibly sing, I don't know. It wasn't really even my guitar. It was a guitar my Dad borrowed from work. With full intention of returning to the field and spending the night there, and because there was no room in the car, I left the guitar at the field.
A change of plans happened when suddenly Brad remembered that we shouldn't all be in the car when he picked up his girlfriend. He thought that it would look strange to her parents if they came outside. So Brad dropped Amy and me off at in a parking lot about two miles from the baseball field. We were supposed to wait there until he came back. We waited around for awhile, and then grew impatient. We thought that Brad abandoned us. We weren't too far away from my house, so we started walking towards there. It seemed like the whole night had been a waste. Nevertheless, I was getting to spend a lot of time with Amy, so I didn't mind too much.
When we were about a mile from my house, Brad went speeding by us. We didn't think he saw us, but then he stopped a few hundred away and turned back and picked us up. As it turned out, his girlfriend wasn't home when he went there, so we had to go back. But this time, we were going with him. Now it was 12:30. We then went to Brad's girlfriend's house in Warrendale and waited outside for her to sneak out. We sat outside of this house for the over an hour waiting for her to come out. The original group of nine or ten had now dwindled down to just Brad, Amy, Xavier, and me. The three of them were smoking as we waited. Then we saw a pair of headlights coming towards us. My first thoughts were that it was probably a police car. I had no reason to think that, other than pessimism. Of course, it was a police car. We had all ducked as he drove past us, but the cop was still suspicious enough to pull up behind us.
We were in Allegheny County which had a midnight driving curfew for people under 18, so I knew we'd be in some amount of trouble. The cop came up beside us and ordered us out of the car. He then had us drive over to a nearby parking lot, where he and his buddy searched both us and the car. I had put my sandwich bag of pot in the crevice of the back seat, and so did the others, except Xavier. The cops immediately checked out the back seats and found our bags of oregano-laced weed. For some reason, they never had Xavier empty his pockets. We all denied knowing there was pot in the car.
It was 2:00 by now. The cops called our parents and told them what happened. Brad couldn't drive home because of the curfew, so Brad's mom came and took him, Amy, and Xavier home. I didn't live too far away, so one of the policeman decided to drive me back to my house. During the short drive, he asked me some odd questions, such as "what is the color of your house?" and "what it the house made of?" When we got to my house, the cop walked up to the door with me and rang the doorbell. My dad was in his underwear when he opened the door. The cop stepped inside and explained what happened. I looked like shit in my torn jeans, ragged coat, and tie-die t-shirt. I smelled like cigarette smoke as well. The cop explained that we were found outside a house in Warrendale, and that they found bags of pot in the car. After the cop left, my dad asked me if I was using pot. Of course, I lied to him! I looked up at my dad's sleepy eyes, and I felt his disappointment with me. I saw how much he trusted me and loved me. I just couldn't say that I was using pot. Technically speaking, I wasn't using pot. It was mostly oregano, and besides I couldn't inhale. Nevertheless, I suffered enormous guilt for months afterward, and attributed all of my ensuing misery and depression as a deserved punishment for my lie.
That next day was very stressful. I assumed that the truth would eventually be known. Brad, Xavier, Amy and I didn't have an opportunity to come up with a "story" until nearly noon, so I figured that maintaining the lie about what how pot came to be in the car, was going to be nearly impossible. My Mom spoke with me during the day. I took a stand that must have seemed quite illogical. On one hand, I claimed to have not smoked pot the previous night, yet on the other hand I said that I thought smoking pot was a good thing and that I would do it if I was with people I trusted. I didn't really think there was anything wrong with smoking weed, and I wanted to be open about that. I didn't do myself any favors as far as my parents were concerned.
The whole experience gave me an enormous amount of anxiety and fear. At the very least, I knew that I shouldn't smoke pot again for at least another two months during which the chemical THC supposedly remained in your system. I was sure that I was going to be found out, and that it was only a matter of time. In the afternoon, the Brad, Xavier and I tried to work out a plan for a grand lie that we could all use. The lie was that we went to the mall and picked up a couple friends of Brad's, then drove them back to their homes in Warrendale. They must have left their pot in the car. Amy wasn't involved in the lie because she had temporarily "run away". Instead of going inside her house, when dropped off by Brad's mom, she merely went in the garage for a few moments, then took off again, and went to hide out at Dunk 'n' Donuts.
As it turned out, the lie was never necessary. Aside from a couple discussions with my parents, there was no follow-up with regards to me. Apparently, Brad's mom talked to the police a couple of times. The issue gradually went away. I was never punished by my parents, nor was there any inquiry as to who the pot belonged to. The only casualty was that guitar. The following day, I went up to the field where I had left it, but it was gone. Once again, there was no mention made as to the whereabouts of that guitar. My dad didn't even bring it up. I have no idea what happened to it. This was something else I constantly felt guilty about.
The Signs Were There
After the big "drug bust”, I started to worry even more about what I was going to do about my feelings for Amy. I was very worried when she ran away. This merely served to heighten my feelings. I decided that I had to do something. It was starting to drive me crazy. I thought about her all the time and our little run-in with the police seemed to make us closer. I really thought that I had a good chance. I thought that all the "signs” were there.
We got out of school early on Friday because of snow. I went over to Xavier's house after we got out and I also invited Amy to come over. Xavier went upstairs while I sat in his family's living room waiting for Amy. When she got there, we both sat on the couch; the yellow couch. I sat there nervously, then I said "How about you and me get married?” I said it like a joke, and Amy laughed a bit. Then I started to get serious, and told her that I liked her. She said that she didn't feel the same way about me. I debated with her that she should like me. I tried to explain why she should like me, and why we'd be good together. It must've become exhausting to her. Then she said that she was really crazy about this guy who was in the Youth Symphony with her. I decided that this was the reason why she couldn't be with me. If it wasn't for the guy in Youth Symphony, then she'd probably like me!
Following our discussion, I started to spiral into depression. I wrote Amy a couple of letters that made the same points I had already made when we talked. We talked on the phone once or twice, and we even had another all-out talk about it. I thought that my persistence would pay off. Ultimately, there was really no point in any of it, however. She didn't have feelings for me. She was also obsessed with someone herself. Amy's best friend at the time, Stef, explained that Amy was determined to be with Ben, the Youth Symphony guy.
My life was going into complete emotional disarray. I was more miserable than I had ever been. I spent a great deal of time, and probably also some good-will, talking to Stef, Xavier, and Brad about my troubles. I felt too depressed to anything. It drove me crazy that I still had to maintain a somewhat normal life that included going to school and having gym class. I wanted to just lie in bed and hide. I did manage to stay active with my music though. I wrote a ton of horrible songs about my predicament. I played my guitar constantly.
I held out some hope that Amy would be my girlfriend until Dec. 12 when Xavier and I went to see the Youth Symphony play at our high school. Afterwards, we were invited to Amy's house to hang out and watch movies. She put in The Beatles "Yellow Submarine”. Before too long, the lights went out and there were Amy and her "boyfriend” cuddling on the couch. I couldn't believe it. I was nearly in tears. Xavier and I left soon after. My longing for Amy continued a little even after the concert though. It didn't really sink in that the whole thing was totally futile for another couple weeks.
Amy II I was hoping that the new year would bring me better fortunes. For some reason the changing of one year to the next makes me think that things will go better, even though I'm still the same person. I was feeling very reckless as 1988 started. It had been two months since I had done any drugs, but now I was feeling miserable and self destructive, and I longed for escape.
During the fall, I became friends with another Amy, Amy Madden. We started out talking a lot about my problems with the first Amy, Amy Peterson. We also talked about her problems with her boyfriend. It seemed that she gave me really good advice and had a lot of wise things to say. Whereas I was a novice to dating and girls, it seemed that Amy was very experienced. I really admired her.
Amy Madden was someone that I used to lust over. I thought she was very pretty. She had shoulder length blonde hair, a round head, and a small, perfect nose. Most noticeable were her eyes. She had light blue eyes, with dark pupils. I used to think of them as ‘cat eyes' because they were somewhat translucent and piercing. I used to see her in the halls when I was in 9th grade. She frequently wore very short skirts that showed off her taut legs. I loved her body. She was about 5'2”, and built like a gymnast. Sometimes I'd see her making out with different guys in the hall. Their hands would always be cupped around her perfect ass. In 10th grade, she was in the same Biology class that I also shared with the first Amy. She sat in the row in front of me, two seats to my left, but I didn't speak to her the entire year. I was simply too afraid.
I was somewhat surprised to find her among the same group of misfit friends with whom I associated. She had struck up a friendship with Amy Peterson in Biology class the previous year, and their friendship was renewed in 11th grade when they shared Chemistry. At first, I wasn't sure what to make of her. However, she really extended herself to me. She was friendly and warm, and very open. Almost from the moment we started to really talk, it seemed like we were best friends. There was an instant connection. Somehow I didn't see her as the person I used to long for from afar. I found Amy to be deep and soulful. She started to hang around different people because she had become dissatisfied with her old friends. She was looking for people that were deeper and more interesting. However, there was now awkwardness among my new group of friends due to my situation with Amy Peterson. At the same time, Amy Madden and I started to develop our own friendship separate from those people. Some new people started to sit in our little "misfit” group, and we didn't like most of them. So we started to lunch by ourselves, at a bench on the other side of the cafeteria. I didn't think I'd ever fall her though. Even though I had previously lusted after her, I figured that as long as she had a boyfriend, I would never see her as more than just a friend.
In the beginning of January 1988 we were both feeling destructive. I was feeling particularly dejected after what I had been through with Amy Peterson, and she was equally depressed about her boyfriend. I didn't know why though. I hadn't done any drugs since the "drug bust” in November, but now that I was out of that mess, and feeling very crappy, I decided I was ready again. LSD was starting to become popular at school, and I knew someone who get me some. So Amy and I decided that we were going to try it. We were going to get together over the second weekend of January. Even though I did not give any serious thought about having feelings for Amy, I saw this event as possibly leading to something. As it turned out, our supplier did not come through.
In the meantime, Stef arranged it so that I could meet a friend of hers, Casondra. Casondra and I went out on the same Friday night as Amy and I had planned on trying LSD. It wasn't really a date though. I had no idea what to do with her, and I certainly had no money, so we drove around and talked. I was fascinated with her almost immediately. At one point the issue of drugs came up. Casondra said that she didn't "need” to use drugs and that she thought it was foolish. At that moment I felt utterly pathetic. I don't know what it was, but I immediately decided that I was never going to do drugs again. The way Casondra phrased her comment, combined with my hope that she would be interested in me romantically made this decision seem like the only viable option.
I was elated after meeting Casondra, and I thought she was some kind of gift from God. I was hoping that she would be interested in me. Unfortunately, Stef let me know that Casondra liked me only as a friend. At the time, I thought we were ideal for each other. Ironically, she started to see this very uptight conservative type, whom I thought was an asshole. I saw him as my antithesis. It was a very amazing turn of events which made me even more resentful and pessimistic. I can hardly blame her for not wanting me. I looked like hell, and I was dressed like a bum. I also had way too much hair. And I was hardly emotionally stable, which I'm sure she could tell a mile away. Nevertheless, my decision to not do drugs remained intact. From this point on, there was a constant struggle with my friends over this issue. They all did drugs. All of my friends did drugs except Bill, who wasn't part of that crowd. One by one, I tried to get them to stop doing drugs, and in every case, I failed and eventually and lost my friends.
Xavier
My method of dealing with people who caused me trouble in one way or another was to eliminate them. I figured that if the person did not exist, then he/she could not cause me to feel any pain. I would pretend that the person did not exist, even though he/she might be right in front of me, or even talking to me. Stef, on the other hand, was a different story. She was Amy Peterson's best friend. We became very good friends over the fall. While I basically liked her, I also found her to be irresponsible and sometimes inconsiderate. Above all, she was a liar. I used to think I had a 6th sense that could detect when people lied to me. Often I would check out the stories people told me when this little sense picked up a lie. I found out that more often than not, Stef was lying to me. I can't remember what she lied about, but it seemed important back then.
Xavier began to like Stef over the fall. He thought that she was giving him the signs. I guess she was really leading him on because it seemed to me as if she liked him too. One night, in late January, Stef invited Xavier to a party. They went to the party together. Xavier thought this was going to be his big moment with Stef. Instead, she started making out with some guy right. Xavier felt humiliated and devastated. I found Stef's behavior to be so reprehensible, that I could no longer justify my friendship with her. I took a stand and eliminated her from my life, largely out of loyalty to Xavier. It was painful, but I felt that it was necessary at the time.
By this time, Xavier was my "best friend”. I talked to him every day and we often got together after school. He was my closest confidant.
Where My Asshole Lives As Amy Peterson became less of issue, Amy Madden and I spent more and more time discussing her problems with her boyfriend, Brad (a different Brad than my friend Brad). There was some talk about Casondra and my feeling about that situation, but my problems really started to take a backseat to Amy's issues. Basically, I didn't have any really big problems. We spent all of our time during lunch talking exclusively to one another.
I found Amy to be "cute” in a very addictive sense. She wasn't beautiful or even "pretty”. Rather, she was very cute. When I used to lust for her in the 9th and 10th grades, I always dreamed of getting to know her. Now, I was pretty much her best friend. Amy wasn't "popular” girl in school. She was lower middle class. Her father had committed suicide a couple years previous, and now her mother alone had to support Amy and her older brother. They lived in a three bedroom apartment in a complex where all of the divorcees lived.
She was having a lot of problems with her boyfriend by February. I was somewhat honored that she revealed so much of her personal life to me. I pretty much became her therapist, I suppose. Unlike a therapist, however, I started to have real strong feelings for her as the situation with her boyfriend got worse. I sort of knew better, but I couldn't help it. When I saw that her relationship with Brad was in such a precarious state, I saw it as my opening. We were together so much during the school day that a lot of people thought we were together. I started to feel like the envy of everyone. She seemed to value the things I said to her, although I have no idea how I could've helped her considering I was totally ignorant about relationships. It didn't take very long before I was fatally hooked. I was "in love” with a girl with a very serious boyfriend.
The first time Amy and I went out together, just the two of us, was one night in early February when her boyfriend ditched her. She got pissed off and decided to call me.
"What are you doing?” "Nothing much... just watching TV”, I said. "Do you want to go out? "I thought you were going out with Brad tonight” "That asshole blew me off. Fuck him. I'm not going to wait for him”. "Well, what do you want to do?” I asked. "I don't know. I'll pick you up. How do I get to your place?”
I explained the directions to her. About thirty minutes later she appeared in my driveway in her mom's Datsun hatch back. I got in the car, and she took off. I just went along. All she wanted to do was vent. I was hoping she'd jump me. But she just wanted to talk and complain. We drove all through the North Hills, onto the main roads, then to the back roads, and on and on. She pointed to a side street and said "That's where my asshole lives”. I was a little shocked by her phrasing. Then she said, "That's what I call my boyfriend now, because that's what he is”. Oh.
We ended up at Arby's drinking milkshakes. She got quiet by this point. I had been fielding her complaints for a couple hours, and was starting to lose my objectivity. At times, I tried to defend her boyfriend. I did this only because I was trying to convince myself that I was not trying to get them to break up so she could be my girlfriend. After sitting in the Arby's for about a half hour, Amy was ready to go home. It was 7:30. I went home and called Casondra. We talked for a couple hours about nothing in particular.
A couple weeks later, she called me around 10:00 on Sunday morning. She had another bad night with Brad. They fought all night long. Again, she wanted to pick me up and talk about it. I had to study for a test the next day. The test was on "The Grapes Of Wrath”. We had over a month to read it, but I procrastinated largely because I couldn't get my mind off of Amy long enough to concentrate on the book. I never did read the book, but I had the Cliff's Notes. I was hoping to study those and at least get a C. Instead, I couldn't turn down the opportunity to be with Amy.
This time we drove to the airport. We sat by the international arrivals gate and talked for hours. I didn't get home until almost dinner time.
Vivid Imagination
Amy really became the focus of my life by late winter. My feelings for her were enormous and my ruminations became very painful. I started to have vivid visual ruminations about Amy and Brad having sex that were shear torture. Amy frequently missed school. She either pretended to be sick, or just didn't show up. Those were some of the worst days I had. I always made a point to check the school bulletin to see if Brad was also absent. I knew that they used to coordinate. If he was out too, I'd spend the entire day visualizing about them have wild sex. It drove me crazy.
I was always thinking about her. I even started to think about her problems as if they were my own. It was excruciating being friends with a girl who had a boyfriend. It felt like a rejection that got worse with each passing day. It became increasingly difficult for me to listen to her problems with Brad. She sought my advice on whether she should break up with him. I always resisted answering in the affirmative because I was so biased. I was very afraid that my true intentions would show and that I would lose Amy as a friend. Consequently, I usually pressed her to try to talk things out with her boyfriend. By early April I could no longer do this. I had to be honest. Brad treated her like shit, so I said that she should break up with him.
April Fools Day Immediately after they broke up, Amy and I spent a lot of time together. I was basically her best friend by this point. She sort of lost her other friends because she spent so much time with Brad. We spent a lot of time talking. I thought that it was only a matter of time before we got together romantically. One night, we went to the park. We went to the place where we usually went, but it was very awkward. She was very miserable. I figured that we would do something for the whole evening, but by 7:30, she wanted to go home. I think I got upset, and then Amy threw it out that she thought we were spending too much time together. I don't remember much about this anymore. The conversation ended when we agreed that there was something going on that both of us understood, but neither of us was going to talk about it. I don't know what she was thinking. I thought that the thing we agreed not to talk about was the fact that I had feelings for her. I went home very upset.
For the rest of the spring and into the summer, my life was Amy. My emotions were wrapped around her finger. When she was feeling alright and treating me nicely I had a relatively good day. If she was in a bad mood and treated me cold, then my day was a total disaster. For the rest of the school year, our friendship resumed as if normal. It was different, though, because we often didn't have a thing to talk about. She was still occasionally seeing Brad. She harbored notions that he would change and they would get back together. He took her to his senior prom. Another night of hell for me! And he also took her out on her birthday. I asked her first, she even said "yes”, but I got dumped in favor of Brad. We spent one great night at the Arts Festival. We had a really good time, but it was never that good again. A couple days later, Brad took Amy to the Pink Floyd concert at Three Rivers Stadium. I went with Bill. Amazingly, with my binoculars, I searched the whole stadium and found them. She was giving Brad a neck massage! It doesn't pay to be a voyeur...needless to say, I had a shitty night!!
I dreaded the end of the school year because I would no longer be having lunch with Amy every day. I had grown very despondent during the latter half of the spring. Things with Amy were alternately hot and cold. I had a brief uplift in the middle of April when I started listening to Poco. For the most part they are an optimistic band. Many of their songs related to Amy's life more than my own. I found this to be soothing. I listened to those songs through her ears and it actually made me feel better. At this time, even though I was very depressed, I still had an optimistic outlook deep down. The combination of Poco and nice weather brought this out for one brief moment. Shortly thereafter I slipped back into a more potent depression. I started to grow scared at how depressed I could become. Every time I thought I had reached the bottom, there was always a new bottom around the next corner.
The school year ended as I hit new heights of depression and anxiety. Amy and I went out a few times. A couple times we went to drive-in movies and a pretty good time. During this time, Amy started to renew her old friendships and join activities where she could meet new people. She was trying to build a new life for herself. I was upset about this because I wondered why I wasn't good enough for her.
I got very upset if she went out on a date. I always wondered why she would even consider going out with anyone but me. I figured that I was not being rational, so I tried to be supportive, even though I was going crazy internally. I liked her more than ever, but I was getting nowhere. I started to think that my feelings for her were unhealthy, and I just wished that they would go away.
Marshmallow
At the end of June , once again, we went to the drive-in movies. This time, however, it was a disaster. We weren't getting along especially well. Amy said she had some pot. She asked me if I would mind if she got high. I went crazy! I was so mad. I couldn't believe that she would ask me that, knowing full well all the problems I had dealing with friends I had who smoked pot. I told her what I thought as calmly as I could. She was angry with my attitude. I was very hurt and angry. I didn't know what to do. I guess I tried to ignore the fact that Amy smoked pot. Her boyfriend got her into it. I just tried not to think about it. She disappeared into the car for a long time. She was getting high. I was sitting outside watching the movie almost in tears. Eventually we both got in the car. She said that she wished I would just loosen up because we could really have some good times together. This sent off a buzzer in my head to the time when she said that she became a "marshmallow” (promiscuous) when she was high. It seemed as if she was making an overture towards me. That night I got no sleep as I wrestled with what action I should take. All night long I lied in bed thinking about it, and eventually decided that having Amy as my girlfriend was more important than my stand on drugs. So I decided that I would smoke pot with her the next time we got together. Of course, this decision contradicted everything I believed about the world and about myself as a unique individual. It just goes to show how desperate I was at the time.
The next time we went out we went to the park. Amy brought some pot and I attempted to smoke some. It was very weird. As usual, I couldn't inhale. I kept saying that I didn't feel anything. She got upset that I was so uptight and, I guess, "uncool” about the whole situation. We left the park and got a drink at Roy Rogers. We hardly spoke the whole time we were there. Then I took her home. When we got to her home we started to talk. We quickly reached the same impasse we reached two months earlier about that "thing” we weren't going to talk about. I said that I thought we needed to talk about the whole drugs issue and that "thing”. She said that she didn't care, or that she couldn't care, and that she had her own problems, and she didn't want to deal with mine. I was pretty shocked considering how much time I spent with her talking about her problems, and investing myself into her problems. She suggested that we don't see each other for awhile.
Two days later I went on a fishing trip with my Dad. I didn't really want to go but I also hoped it would do me good to get away. We had to drive 12 hours north into Canada. I was very miserable the whole time. I couldn't stop thinking about Amy. I was constantly ruminating about her having sex with her boyfriend. That whole "marshmallow” thing drove me crazy. As it turned out, I didn't really get away at all during the whole trip. I took Amy with me, and her boyfriend and all of my stupid friends who I longer spoke to. That's all I thought about the whole time. One night, I went on the boat by myself, and screamed my lungs out! That felt good.
Shooting Bottlerockets Off At Jim's
I got back from the trip on July 2. I called Amy and we made plans to just go out and have an okay time, no pressure. She picked me up at my house and said that she was invited to a little party her friends were having and that we were going. I didn't want to go at all. I didn't know any of those people, and I didn't want to. We got to the party and these guys were all sitting around drinking beer and watching TV and joking amongst themselves. I hated every minute of it. I didn't belong with those people. After about an hour, I asked Amy to take me home. Right before she dropped me off she broke our plans for the 4th of July. She said "I hope you're not mad but I want to go shoot bottle rockets off at Jim's”. He was one of the guys at the party. She said I could come along, but I declined. After this, I decided that I was finished with her. I obviously did not want to be just a friend. I thought that she was taking me for granted as a friend anyway, so she was eliminated.
The summer of 1988 was the beginning of a remission period. I was still very upset about Amy, but I wasn't profoundly depressed after I accepted defeat and moved on. I saw this time in a typical Christian sort of way. I thought that I was entering a rebirth, and that all of my suffering was to be rewarded soon thereafter. I felt as if I was coming out of the dark. My social life was very tattered but I still had a few good friends. Over the summer I met a few new people who would become very important for the next couple of years. I thought that, finally, things were getting better.
The 4th of July was a watershed. I didn't have any plans because Amy ditched me. I spent part of the evening with Brad who I was still friends with every so often. For the rest of the evening I walked around the neighborhood and just kind of brooded and thought about my life and what I should do about Amy. I ended up lying in the middle of a street a couple blocks away, staring at the sky. I prayed that things would get better for me. The next day, I went out with Casondra. We went to the park and spent most of the day together. It was a good day.
posted by Ant In A Hailstorm at
1:54 PM on Thursday, April 28, 1988
0 Comments
