kai "say you’ll stay (jazzy jim remix)"
I thought I had mentioned this before, but I can’t find it in my blog archives. In any case, I swear it seems like sometimes my iPod can read what mood I’m in. On my 2 hour trip back from L.A., it kept pulling up all these down-tempo, super-chill, and melancholy, reflective songs, and while this cheesy song by a Filipino American group may not really fall into this category, it is attached to a somewhat melancholy memory.
Me and some of my friends from college decided to take a trip to Vegas our senior year during winter break. (I remember having to stay behind to try and rustle up some letters of recommendation for medical school from professors who surely had no idea who I was. While everybody else drove down to L.A. then to Vegas, enduring various adventures involving a flat tire, I caught up with them by plane.) I was hopelessly infatuated with my friend A, but she already had her eye on my friend E. I remember wallowing in mawkish despair the entire trip. A bottle of Crown Royal figures into the story somewhere. There’s also the somewhat amusing episode of me going down to the casinos completely blasted out of my mind to play the slots. I was so drunk that I didn’t even notice I was dropping coins onto the ground instead of into the coin slot until a casino attendant came by and pointed it out.
Anyway, after the fact, I realized that this was when A and E, I think, really first hooked up. The memory I have attached to it was the drive back from Vegas to L.A. We rode in two cars, and A and E were in the lead car, while I was in the car behind, and somewhere between Baker and Barstow it started snowing. I remember watching the car they were in wistfully while this song was playing.
I dunno, I guess it’s stupid. But I think I may never have gotten over that episode. I don’t know if this is a healthy way to think about things, but the way I look at it, I think it’s much easier to deal with and process specific terms of rejection. Like if she thinks you’re an asshole, or there’s something she can’t stand about you, or if she just doesn’t think you’re attractive. I mean, I can speculate, and maybe all these things or none of these things are true, but I just remember this general sense of insuperable hopelessness, like, there was absolutely no way I could grab her attention. I mean, I just seem to always wallow in the friend zone, and I remember feeling like there was absolutely nothing I could do about it.
As time goes on, I’ve experienced a few more rejections, and really, nothing has every worked out. I realize that a good part of it is self-imposed. I have a seriously rough time trusting people in general, and as I grow older, I find it harder and harder to make friends, much less with trying to pursue romantic relationships. I just can’t seem to open up and let people into my life, and what is worse, it seems like I’m losing touch of the people who are already in my life, close friends and family included.
As B has warned me, I’m setting myself up for a self-fulfilling prophecy. If, ten, or maybe even five years from now, I find myself friendless and alone, I suspect I will have no one to blame but myself.
Christ, this is extraordinarily depressing. And yet, like many times in my life, I find myself just staring hopelessly in anticipation of the impending train wreck.