December 7, 2011
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Game Face
My college debate partner had a crush on me. We spent a lot time together researching and writing arguments and doing practice rounds. We traveled for tournaments and spent entire weekends with each other. It took the guy months, but finally he asked me to a movie. It went something like this.
"So, that John Lennon movie is out and I bet you want to see that. Maybe we could go after the tournament?"
No explicit date language. No profession of love. But, you know, his eyes were all shiny and moist and this normally very confident guy was suddenly very nervous.
"Sure, that sounds good," I said.
Keeping it breezy. Hoping that I wouldn't have to tell him that I wasn't interested in him in That Way.
So at the tournament a judge took a fancy to me and flirted with me and while hanging around with us (after handing in the ballot, but still, um, yeah) he said, "So what are you doing tonight?" (He was a graduate student at a nearby university.)
"We're going to a movie," I said. "Would you like to come along?"
And I could see my dear, sweet debate partner's face holding it together, but there was just the slightest indication from him that his heart was breaking.
So we all went to the movie. I sat between them. I went on to date the graduate student for awhile, but my partner and I never talked about him again. "I need to go," I would say after we were done working, and we never talked about where I was going or who I was seeing, even though we both knew.
This weekend my daughter's high school is sponsoring a debate tournament and my former partner will be there. He is a teacher and coaches another high school's team. I already know how this will go. We will smile and hug and reminisce a bit. And we will never talk about the night that we almost had a date and I invited someone else to come along.
Comments (14)
heartbreaker!
oh, but maybe you SHOULD bring it up!?! might be fun.
Maybe it'll be a non-issue. He could be happily married w/children and just genuinely happy to reminisce with you.
Poor guy, people braking hearts all over Xanga!
I would totally pretend like it didn't happen. I was in debate in high school and through college. But I was the one crushing on the captain of the debate team. I've always had a soft spot for dorks...
It was over 20 years ago, so I have no doubt that he is over it!
And it's the length of time that makes this memory so interesting to me. It's a very sharp memory. In my mind I can see the exact change in his face - tense and then the slightest of softening under his eyes as he looked at me. I mean, jesus, I can't remember shit anymore, but I remember things like this very clearly?
@trixiebelden - I know, right? I love dorks. Really, if I were to summarize the characteristics that attract me the most, I like smart, funny, and cynical.
I guess what I was trying to say above is that there is no story arc to this memory. It doesn't end, "and then I got pregnant with my boyfriend's baby and my partner married me and helped me raise the child as his own," or even, "we then went on to win Nationals" or "I asked him out and he turned me down flat." There's just nothing more to the story. So why remember it so clearly?
Dude. That was mean.
what a great story. and super weird that you remember these specific events - do you generally trust your memories? or do you think that over time your brain puts stuff in there that may or may not have happened because you want to remember it but the details are fading away? i've found that at 40 my brain makes a lot of shit up out of thin air.
it's good to know there are good stories about college that don't end in vomit.
@tomblog9 - I didn't drink much in college, so I trust my memory at that time more.
I think my memory is less than perfect. What I do trust is when I remember some things clearly, but not all things. I don't remember the end of the movie, for example. I remember going back to grad guy's room (he was an RA), but I don't remember anything else about my partner that night. We must have said an awkward goodbye at some point? Also, this is the first time I have ever shared this memory. I think stories that we share repeatedly actually lose some authenticity because we change details in repeated story telling.
I wrote a short story once about a woman whose child died and she tried to recreate every day of her child's life. She bought 8 huge binders and put 365 pages in each binder and then tried to write down just one thing for each day and could not do it.
I love a story like that. I hope it goes/went okay!
My best friend back in my home town is a dude, and when I visit he pretty much puts everything else on hold and we hang out together, everyone kind of gets that when I'm around it's me and him... so he was meeting a friend of his for drinks, and I said, "If this is a date, I'll go hang out with someone else, it's fine." No, he insisted, not a date, they've been friends for awhile and, I asked him again, and he insisted that it wasn't.
The second we walked into the bar together, the look on the girl's face... doh. He didn't even get it right away. So I tried to play it off like no one knew what was going on, and I even tried to get away but she insisted that I stay. It was the most awkward date I've ever been on. Months later she asked me if he was interested and I just told her that he wasn't but that I enjoyed our date - luckily she had a good sense of humor about it, even if there was a little of that heart crushing thing going on.
And I could see my dear, sweet debate partner's face holding it together, but there was just the slightest indication from him that his heart was breaking.
I'm a nerd. Been there. That slight indication was the facade of complete hurt inside. Things evolve, and time is salve. But it's no consolation back then.
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