When I was a teenager I found it way too easy to believe I loved any girl that looked at me and caused that weird feeling in the pit of your stomach. I had no proper role model to teach me otherwise. If a girl started showing interest in me I would play it off with humor because inside I was ashamed of who I was, where I lived, and the fact that we were poor as dirt. We just learned how to act like we wasn’t. I guess it’s safe to say I came from a good mixture of faking it.
I wanted to be invisible. I wanted to be the secret admirer. As a matter of fact, when I was in Jr High I would save my lunch money for months just to have cash. I went to the local flower shop and sent a girl I was interested in a balloon and a flower. I didn’t sign it. The next day when they delivered it she was so happy. She was the new girl. I so bad wanted to tell her the gift was from me. If I did and she rejected me, I couldn’t handle it. If I did and she wanted to get to know me and the other kids made a big deal out of it - again… wouldn’t be able to handle it. As it turned out, another guy in our class told her he sent the gift. They were an item for the rest of the school year. This is the first time I’ve ever put this out there that it was me.
And this is not even the embarrassing part.
Later, in high school, after having gone steady (that term dates me doesn’t it) for about 2 years with my high school sweetheart - we broke up or as Ross puts it - we were on a break. I thought I had it in me to talk to other girls. Besides, talking to other girls is probably why the break happened in the first place. Nonetheless, I was single. Our football team was playing out of town and my aunt asked me to ride with her to watch our cousin play. I had asked a girl I had been talking to if she was going to be there. As luck would have it a friend of mine also drove over 2 hours to that game because my mom told him I would be there. He consumed all my attention the entire night. The girl, even though she was there with her friends - I felt like she didn’t think I was interested. Then, as if it couldn’t get any worse, my aunt arranged for her to ride back to my truck with her and I could take her home. At the last second a few other friends jumped into my aunt’s car with us. Now, I’m sitting in the backseat. A guy on my left and the girl I was trying to date on the right. My nerves were shot. I had spent the entire game having a conversation with the friend that drove all that way to see me and hardly spent any time with the girl. Now, I’m riding in the car and I have an audience. My humor went to level 15. I got the message 10 minutes into the ride that she had already decided I wasn’t her cup of tea. The more I thought about having to take her home in my truck the more nervous I got, and then the more comical I got. She was the only one not laughing. Here’s where the embarrassment still creeps into my brain to this day. I really liked her. I blew it. I made an ass of myself and couldn’t help it. I got up the nerve to ask her a few weeks later why she stopped talking. She said - you acted more interested in everyone else. I didn’t have it in me to even try to change her mind as to why I did it.
To this day - that haunts me. I really hope anyone who reads this is laughing. It’s one of the main reasons I hope time travel is possible before I close my eyes for the last time. I will go to that ballgame and tell my 16 year old self to remove his head from his ass.
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