- Joined
- Jan 24, 2017
- Messages
- 172
- Reaction score
- 19
- Location
- Maple Valley, WA
- Website
- theydontcry.wordpress.com
So I need to vent about something crazy that just happened, like five minutes ago happened here at the library, and for reasons that will become clear, I cannot go venting about this on Facebook as it has too many high school classmates on it. (Weird opening, but you'll see.)
So here I am at the table at the library with my laptop computer pretending to be a writer, trying to re-do the opening of my memoir, trying to describe the feeling a few minutes before things went really wrong. We knew that things were off, and the future seemed really, really uncertain, and my wife and I were both silent.
So to attempt describing this feeling, I typed, "Numerous skylights brought white light in to the waiting area. I had never seen natural light look so sterile. Everything about this room was supposed to be comforting and modern, but the white light was making my toes curl as I think about a blank, strange future, the way I’d felt as a college freshman walking uncertainly towards a blue mail drop box on the street with a letter in my hand telling a girl who was attending a different college I hoped we could be more than friends. A different world was about to start when someone said something."
And to provide a little background on said girl. I'm 37, last saw her when I was 19, mainly because I was an idiot and sent said letter. And, I'm a sensitive person who doesn't let things go easily, and have been kicking myself for almost 20 years because if I'd known how to talk to girls when I was 19, I might be able to exchange Christmas cards and stuff. And, I've been happily married to someone else for almost 10 years now and have a son, but because I'm a sensitive goofball, I still think about this girl several times a week and my dumb decision.
Ok, so now you know that -- long time no see, lots of regret, ready to use that girl in a metaphor and so I type these words in to Scrivener, and...
She walks in to the library for storytime with her 1-year-old. Yes, it was she. First time since 1998 when she made it very clear that I was causing problems with her new boyfriend and "We had all prayed about this," which means a huge deal when a Baptist says it.
Needless to say, I closed the laptop screen. She stopped to talk, and was quite cheerful, wanting to chit-chat and catch up and talk about the upcoming high-school reunion and stuff like that, and I'm nodding and smiling and thinking, would the things on my word-processor screen please stop coming to life and freaking me out! Although it's nice to see that she's not still mad at me or anything.
Ok, that's kind of it. Thank you for reading.
So here I am at the table at the library with my laptop computer pretending to be a writer, trying to re-do the opening of my memoir, trying to describe the feeling a few minutes before things went really wrong. We knew that things were off, and the future seemed really, really uncertain, and my wife and I were both silent.
So to attempt describing this feeling, I typed, "Numerous skylights brought white light in to the waiting area. I had never seen natural light look so sterile. Everything about this room was supposed to be comforting and modern, but the white light was making my toes curl as I think about a blank, strange future, the way I’d felt as a college freshman walking uncertainly towards a blue mail drop box on the street with a letter in my hand telling a girl who was attending a different college I hoped we could be more than friends. A different world was about to start when someone said something."
And to provide a little background on said girl. I'm 37, last saw her when I was 19, mainly because I was an idiot and sent said letter. And, I'm a sensitive person who doesn't let things go easily, and have been kicking myself for almost 20 years because if I'd known how to talk to girls when I was 19, I might be able to exchange Christmas cards and stuff. And, I've been happily married to someone else for almost 10 years now and have a son, but because I'm a sensitive goofball, I still think about this girl several times a week and my dumb decision.
Ok, so now you know that -- long time no see, lots of regret, ready to use that girl in a metaphor and so I type these words in to Scrivener, and...
She walks in to the library for storytime with her 1-year-old. Yes, it was she. First time since 1998 when she made it very clear that I was causing problems with her new boyfriend and "We had all prayed about this," which means a huge deal when a Baptist says it.
Needless to say, I closed the laptop screen. She stopped to talk, and was quite cheerful, wanting to chit-chat and catch up and talk about the upcoming high-school reunion and stuff like that, and I'm nodding and smiling and thinking, would the things on my word-processor screen please stop coming to life and freaking me out! Although it's nice to see that she's not still mad at me or anything.
Ok, that's kind of it. Thank you for reading.