I was born to laugh

[I learned to laugh through my tears-- "Born", by Over the Rhine: thanks to Mr. Sexsmith at Sugarbutch for this one]

This has been a challenging week. We started that actual hard part of Organic (memorizing amazing amounts of reactions and trying to create pathways for synthesis with very little time to process), and JB finally gathered his kahunas and told me that he doesn't reciprocate my feelings. To be honest, we'd had this discussion before via Facebook, and I could kind of instinctively sense it when I saw him, but just marked it down to British hesitance about PDA. Even Sunday, before he'd said anything, S asked me about whether he reciprocated, and I hesitated. Nonetheless, I can't pretend I was all right with it. Most of all, though, I was upset by how he pretended-- lying to me, and betraying his inner feelings-- that is what gets me more than the lack of feelings. I can completely get if feelings are not there (in fact, Sunday I 'broke up' with SJ. I didn't explain that I don't have feelings for him, though. He was taking it hard enough, and I'm not completely heartless.) But I never expecting anything to happen when I went back (hum. perhaps because we'd had that very talk before, albeit a long time ago?) Thankfully, though, I went over all this with him (I'm not sure if he understands how sad it makes me that he can't be true to himself, though.) So I've been hurting. I took off the Mickey Mouse ring I've been wearing on my thumb since I left England two years ago (I wore it upside down, since I hate Mickey Mouse, so that it looked like little monsters or even water molecules.) The skin under it is old-- so pale, and wrinkly. Vulnerable. I didn't even wear it as an emblem of whatever relationship we had, but I couldn't go on looking at it on Monday, so I pulled it off. Now, I think that I'm going to keep it off not so much because he hurt me, but more because I couldn't go on wearing a Mickey Mouse ring forever. It's time to grow up a little bit, like when I decided to stop wearing my pacifier-charm necklace.

The way I've been thinking in the last few days, though, has been surprisingly good. I've been thankful for the little things, like walking home at 9:00 from my MCAT prep class and being able to see fireflies all over my garden. Or sitting on the front porch steps in the sun, eating a peach and letting the juice slide down my wrist and under my watch, enjoying the way I twist my arm to lick the drops off. The way my arms feel in the water when I'm swimming. The neatness of my writing, and the way an organic synthesis problem comes together like a puzzle.

I've been thinking about how if I really felt all that strongly about JB if I would feel this good. It's kind of a lightness, a freedom... the thought struck me the other day: I'm done with all my Js. JF and JB are still my friends, despite hurt on either end, SJ probably won't speak to me again unless I see him or seek him out (doubtful), J is involved in his crazy life in sf, Ju never wrote back when I sent him an email explaining our break up also involved my queerness... No more Js. I'm liberated (not that I ever felt trapped, except perhaps a bit with SJ or Ju, and those issues have been dealt with.) So I got to wondering about my propensity to get infatuated with people. I've learned not to say that I love someone, since I recognize my somewhat mercurial nature. Every time I think I might possibly be starting to fall in love, something happens that lets me know that it wasn't that. Man, just today I remembered in high school saying that I thought I was in love with IR. Lord, what a fool I was. What I'm getting at is that this is not a new pattern. There's a cute guy in the new group of post-baccs, and I'm trying hard not to get too caught up and start getting obsessed with him because it might make things seem easier. He is pretty cute, though, and yesterday I saw him biking home while I was waiting at the crossroads to go to my MCAT class. (He makes me blush. Funny how sometimes I can be so flirty and out there [CM comes to mind, or AS, or AB. I really am a flirt.] and other times I can be so incredibly shy.) Achem. I'm getting side-tracked. My point is I'm very good at fooling myself. Funnily enough, though I still have every faith that one day I'll be madly in love. For a long time. We'll see.