Love, Sadness, and Other Nonsense

I hate ex-girlfriends. Anyone else with me on this?

I don’t hate them PERSONALLY. I think I’ve had good fortune in dating some fantastic people over the course of these last several years. Pretty much every girl I’ve ever dated has been something of a force for good in my life. But seeing them AFTER we’ve broken up… well, frankly, I’d often rather engage a patch of poison ivy in a close-proximity staring contest.

Again, here I have to clarify something – I do maintain contact with my ex-girlfriends. For the most part, I think, we’re friends, and I’m grateful for that friendship. Sometimes I get a case of the “whatmittabins,” but those pass like a twenty-four hour cold (with less mucus… usually).

It’s when the exes move on that things get tough. See, as a rule, I don’t like dating, and therefore I don’t do it very often. It usually takes me a LONG time to get over someone else. And if that someone else isn’t as averse to spending an evening or two with someone of the opposite sex that they barely know, chances are that someone else will move on a lot faster than I will.

I’ve had some doozy experiences. I dated a girl who was in a play with me once, who then went on to date one of the stagehands while we were still involved in the exact same production. I also dated a girl in college who, after we broke up, continued to bring her new beaus to hang out in the university in plain sight of the reference desk where I worked. And I’m not too proud to admit – I had a hard time with this. But I got over it, eventually, and all I have to say to these women is this: If you find someone who treats you better than I did and makes you happy, then GOOD ON YOU.

I find, though, that it doesn’t take a big dramatic experience to spark some of those special feelings of loneliness and neglect that come with encountering an ex. Sometimes all it takes is a glance.

Everyone has a “one that got away.” Fishermen do. Cops do. Sometimes morticians do. My “one that got away” was my high school sweetheart – and, as is so often the case with romances, she was one I let get away. I saw her at Saturday’s Fourth of July parade, with one child in her arms, and another scampering a couple of feet in front of her. I think we made eye contact, then she was gone – didn’t even say a word to each other. And still, I got that kind of cold pain that comes only when seeing one you used to love. Or getting punched in the chest by Frosty the Snowman.

It’s been now nine years since I broke up with this girl, and a glance still leaves me feeling cold. There’s a lot of power in a simple human connection – a single look, a brush of the fingers – that can totally rock one’s emotional world. Kinda surprising.

I’m sure there’s a poem in that somewhere. Of course, I’m also sure that poem’s probably already been written.