moon river

Relationships are weird.

I don’t mean just the romantic kind. It’s the general idea, the incessant drive, the rumbling need for people to come together in one moment in time and share a piece of their lives, their memories and their hearts, to bond, to connect, and then just up and leave, as the tidy currents of life would only have it, that all seems a tad... odd.

Doesn’t it?

When J flew away to his Big Corporate Job about four months ago now, I didn’t fully realise what it entailed. So we won’t be skipping and singing along the streets in repugnant British accents anymore, and we won’t argue over who hates the other more or who's the bigger bitch nor will we embarrass ourselves our mothers by orgasming over the gorgeous colors of Club Monaco’s shirts and skirts. So we won't mimic sexually depraved shenanigans to the horror of our friends or whore ourselves on the dance floor to the dismay of too-cool-to-mess-their-hair indie posse. Nor can we mock, gag and plan devious ways to shun folks with shiny pants and moustaches only to come up with stupid t-shirt ideas we think are absolutely brilliant. So we won’t be able to have shitlong conversations over beers and tears and lattes and laughs. After six years of friendship and all that we have gone through, it is a little silly that being a continent and ocean away would mark the end of it, I thought. Besides, as proud 21st century unsociable geeks, practically 50% of our relationship can be recorded through the intricate nanobite world of the interweb, it’s not as if it’ll be that big of a difference anyway.

I thought…

The funny thing about being away, every relationship I have is re-evaluated. And by extending my distance from them, I seem to have found space to better feel them. And it feels like going through a big cleaning for the harsh winter. Like assigning old frocks to different boxes – the ones I don’t really need, the ones for the deep freeze and the ones that I’ll always keep, all year-round, through the seasons. Like an inventory for my heart strings. To know what’s waiting for me when I come home. To seek out the ones I want.

I’ve known Jules & Mary since I was seven years old. Despite having briefly ‘drifted apart’ during high school, and though we don’t see that much of each other anymore, every time we get together we somehow manage to pick up right where we left off. And the only things that seemed to have changed are the careers, the cars, the boys, the locations. We still laugh at the same old jokes, at the same old memories, and we even manage to love one another more for the little pieces we find out through all these years.

It’s astounding, really. To find these people you can be yourself with. Who just get it. Like E. A feisty little woman with enough sass to sell and still be able to kick your ass to the moon. But also so sweet. And innocent and caring and just and honest. Whom I wish I had spent more time with...

And what about those who are bound to you by blood? Who are inexplicably and irrevocably true and strong and unconditional. These people to whom you owe so much yet never comprehend why, or know how to ever repay. These people whom you have no choice in the picking, whom you learned to know and hate and understand and love, who build and feed and comfort you, for the sheer reason that they are referred to as ‘family’. Who are indefinably yours. Whether you want to or not.

But... there are also the others.

The ones who after all this time together somehow still don’t quite understand. Unfortunately. And though you still care and love them dearly, no matter how hard you try, they will never get it and will always hurt you by it. Unintentionally. So what to make of these people, those years past and these pieces of you blown in the wind? How can you get them back? So you can take them and give them to those who would care. Because there is such a depleted amount of where that came from...

And isn’t it a little self-delusional to think that there would be people who would care? That aren’t all these relationships just another accessory to reaffirm your illusions of self-importance and your meaning in the world? Simply through the feeble validation of others? Aren’t all these friends and lovers, connections and conversations sought out to comfort & endorse your subjective beliefs & opinions, and pat yourself on the back? To make you feel less trivial somehow? Anyhow? And at any cost?

As much as I hate thinking of people like some appropriating piece of clothing one can store and wear and throw and give away, for sentimental reasons or self-preserving purposes, the truth is I can barely keep myself together let alone someone else in my out of whack wardrobe.

Yet…

There is that yearning again…




And then there’s the moon...
And my Seventeen-Year-Old Self...
Who believes that the trivial is meaningful…

Enough.




Human nature to survive, by any means possible, is stronger than one may think. And completely, utterly fucked up weird, if you ask me.

Which, of course, no one did.