The Beginning

Summer, 8 years ago

Chelsea and I packed our bags and jumped in the car.  We were headed to the little town that I camped at every summer.  This time was different, we weren’t meeting my dad, we were 18 and could sign for our own lot. 

It was beautiful out, the sun was shining and we were telling stories and hopes on the 3 hour ride.  We signed for our lot, set up the tent and ran into some friends.  We couldn’t wait for night to fall.  We smoked some weed and drank beer and pretty much laughed our asses off.  Our site was the place for the party that night.  People, mostly boys, kepting showing up. 

Tyler was on of those boys that just happened to show up.  He was there with his friend Seth and somehow Chelsea and I ended up talking to them for part of the night.   Tyler was quiet so I spent most of my time bantering with Seth.  Mostly play arguing, but there was something about Tyler.  Some way or another Tyler bumped into me and that was when it started.  Slight contact and flirting and we had found ourselves new friends. 

The whole week we were there we hung out mostly with Tyler and Seth.  From the 4th of July fireworks at the beach, where we got kicked out to riding on top of Chelsea’s escort.  Before we left for home that week, I was infatuated with Tyler and his eyes.  The way he talked and the things he said.  He made me laugh and I think I actually called my boyfriend from a payphone and broke up with him just so I could kiss Tyler and not feel guilty.  And kissing was something we did a lot of.

The rest of the summer was much of the same.  We lost Seth to family vacations and he was replaced with Tyler’s friends or brother.  But Tyler was a constant.  He almost always made time to see us, though there was one occassion where he royally pissed me off and we didn’t talk much that weekend. 

Through the course of the summer he told me he loved me and I whispered the words back.  We bickered just so we could make out to make up.  Toward the end of the summer he pulled away and when it was clear he hurt my feelings he apologized and said that the summer was almost over and we needed to just be friends because we might not ever see each other again. 

Labor Day weekend we slept together for the first and only time.  Through the fall and winter Chelsea and I made a couple trips to see Tyler.  Well I wanted to see Tyler and I’m lucky my best friend supported me.  But by winter I had been in college for a full semster and started dating someone (he was a complete asshole but my boyfriend none the same). 

I planned to drive through the little town on the way to meet the boyfriend and I pulled my courage together and called Tyler’s house to meet up with him.  I wanted it to be a happy reunion.  We met at the beach.  We awkwardly hugged one another.  I still remember what he was wearing.  We made small talk and then it was time to leave.  He had a girlfriend, Lisa, and I drove away from him and that town and him.

I know you probably don’t believe me but he haunted my memories and dreams for years.  I missed him and wondered desperetely what happened to him.  And 7 years later it happened.  I had been to that town camping after that summer and never saw anyone.  But when Chelsea flew home from out of state we made a trip up there.  And when we turned the corner I saw his beautiful eyes staring back at me…

Loving 2 people at once

So recently someone asked if you could love 2 people at the same time.  I commented that yes you could and that I have feelings about this subject.  I’ve always been on the fence about soulmates and one person for everyone.  I’ve been lucky in love (that is so cheesy I can’t believe I typed that).  I’ve had 6 boys tell me that they loved me.  And while I said it back to all of them there are only 2 that I actually meant it.  Cameron (obviously) and Tyler.

Excuse me if I ramble…

I ran into Tyler again after 7 years.  He makes my heart flutter and I’m infatuated with the sound of his voice and his laugh.  I love his mind, the way he thinks and his honesty (not to mention his eyes…for the love of god his eyes).  In a lot of ways Tyler is like Cameron (or is it Cameron is like Tyler?).  They are both headstrong, arrogant and dominate.  Tyler has a lot more emotional range than C and I admire that.  He’s also motivated in ways that I wish Cameron was.  I know it’s not fair to compare them, but it’s hard when they are the two I love.

Over the months I’ve come to realize that no matter what, if Tyler and I stop talking today, I will always love him.  And I don’t understand that.  I hate not being able to explain it.  I know this because with 7 years of silence in between us we picked up where we left off.  There is a connection that was never broken.  But that’s not expainable! Logically, when you don’t spend time with someone you don’t know them any more.  How can you have feelings for someone you don’t know?!

One of the other boys to tell me that he loved me was my friend J.  I met J when I was 12 and I crushed on him forever.  We were just kids and he liked me too.  We flirted relentlessly but we never got together.  Over the years he turned into one of my really good friends.  We did try dating but it was awful and we never actually broke up, we just stopped talking for awhile and then one day out of the blue one of us called the other and we were friends again.  Our friendship is still like that.  We have gone a year without talking and we can pick right up where we left off.  But the feelings are different than with Tyler.  With Tyler my heart pounds when his name shows up on my phone.

Not to mention that I have mutual friends with J so we always have that in common.  Tyler and I have nothing in common except the one summer we spent together.  I know a couple of his friends now, but not enough to have a conversation about them.  Our conversations are about ourselves, our lives, our feelings and our thoughts.  Not much else, well maybe his family since I do have some recollection of them.

When I first ran into Tyler I wanted it to be my fairytale.  I wanted the romantic movie with the happy ending.  But when it was obvious that was never going to happen I began to wonder, were those movies made because real life doesn’t happen like that?  That these romantic books and movies are the by product of lost loves and the endings we wanted to happen but hardly ever do?  Shit Carrie Bradshaw even got her Mr. Big.

Am I settling with someone because it’s convenient?  Or is there just not one person for each of us?  That you choose whoever is there at the appropriate time?

Sometimes I wish that I was just that crazy girl that thought the world revolved around me.  Thinking everyone had me on their mind and if they didn’t something was wrong with them (you know the person I’m talking about don’t you?).  But I’m not, I was reading my journal and it breaks my heart a little to know Kik felt the same way as me.  I can’t say that he still does, but I know that for those 7 years and for the couple of months we talked he did.  Maybe it’s true, sometimes love just isn’t enough.  Or were we both just so afraid of change and the unknown that we decided to ignore everything we knew and just stay our course?

And so my heart hurts because I know we are both moving on with the paths that we chose.  But I wake up thinking of him and he invades my dreams at night.

Maybe in every life we are those spirits that are doomed.  So close, yet so far away.