Unworthy Fondness

Recurring thoughts from the past don’t seem to phase me much. I’ve learned to just let it pass and get on with my day. For some reason, this one in particular plays in my head constantly or it did, at least. Let’s take it back to 6th grade where I thought I met the boy of my dreams, or at least I thought. Let’s call him B. It may just seem like I am about to tell you tales of puppy love, but it wasn’t just that. I’ve known what I wanted since I was young. I knew love was something that made me feel warm and gushy inside. I knew soulmates existed, I also knew I had all my life to find one when the time is right. School and growing up was the main thing to focus on. When I met B, it was like I met my best friend. He was sweet, warm, he seemed sensitive, he was also helpful. Most of all he seemed to have his mind. B was nice, but I’m sure he was raised to be nice, of course. He was just nice to ME. We would almost find a way to be near each other, or look at each other, whether it be walking in the halls, partnering up in class, or making silly faces at one another. I would sometimes catch him staring at me when I was near him. He brought natural feel-good energy, to what was becoming a good friendship in my head. I started to develop feelings. I felt like I was on cloud 9, and wanted him to know how I felt about him, without actually saying it. Bear then moved to a different middle school, which wasn’t far away just down the street. That caused the friendship to be put on halt, but since Facebook had become a thing we reconnected there, but it wasn’t the same. I decided to focus on my studies like I should have been doing. But when B had gotten a girlfriend, that’s when the steady stream of embarrassment and acts of desperation happened.

Firstly, every girlfriend he had I would request their friendship, and follow them on other social media. It’s hard to say how incredibly ashamed I am that I was stalking these poor girls because they dared to do what I managed not to do. Fast forward to summer, right before 8th grade. Now in my school, it was a thing to write a Facebook post on the person's page, you wanted to say hi to. So….. this is where we run into desperation, try to follow along. Remember how I said I wanted to tell him, I like him without actually telling him. Well my friend at the time, let’s call her Lee. Lee came over to my house, and as we were chit-chatting I came up with a way to tell him. So I told Lee to act like she “hacked” into my Facebook account to write a post on B's page saying I like him. I made it seem like Lee was the one telling my business, but in reality, I was orchestrating the whole thing. Stupid, right!? I know! So we did that, and he didn’t say anything. Moving on to later in the year, a schoolmate came up to me, and said: “ did you know Lee was writing all over his page about you liking him”. I was performing and was acting all shocked like I didn’t plan the whole thing. FRAUD! I know, I’m appalled, myself.

By some miracle, B decided to come back to the school district, which put us in the same high school. I decided to buck up and tell this boy how I felt. Ironically we had 3 classes together, which made me happy but Nervous because of the whole mess of the summer before. So I mustered up ways to talk to him and decided to try my hand at the direct messenger. Messaged him once, he didn’t respond. I was like okay, maybe he didn’t see it, but he did. Then months went by and I decided to try again and nothing happened. At this point, I felt sad and rejected. Not once, but twice rejected. I felt as though I wasn’t good enough. I was a fluffy child, and that carried on throughout middle school and high school. All of his girlfriends were pretty and slim. I felt that maybe he was different, that maybe he wouldn’t care how I looked and only cared how I was, personality-wise. So I got frustrated, and deleted him off of every social media, took him a month to realize I had unfollowed him. And that was that. Graduated high school and never looked back.

Looking back on those moments, it did feel embarrassing like how, I could focus so much time and energy on something so childish, and mortifying. I wasted my time. It seemed like having a boyfriend in middle school and high school was all that I wanted. I was in my head a lot. I fell in love with the idea of him and me, because most of it was in my head. It may have been embarrassing, but I wouldn’t change one bit of it. Rejection can make you do one or two things, retreat and be withdrawn. Or boost your confidence. Approaching him made me vocal, no pun intended, which allowed me to speak my truth.