I was beginning a double lay page the other day when I was struck with an idea. I would make one page be all the major heartbreaks I have had in my life and the other more minor heartbreaks. Let's just say the pagers are crammed with pictures. I had my time of being, well, easy in high school and may have slept with quite a few people but when it came to relationships that were serious there were barely a dozen. Most of my relationships were fast and hard and crashed the same way. I easily become attached to guys I am with but these are special ones, ones that really took a piece with them when they left and that I will never forget.
I'd like to take this opportunity to discuss some of these people and perhaps give you a little insight into my life. The pictures in my scrapbook are dated, some by when the photo was taken and others by the date when my heart was broken. I will try to get some of them up so you can see who I am talking about. I will start with what I consider my major heartbreakers. Lord I pray my mother never reads this. David I know you will read this so just read it all the way through before you get angry. Maybe you will get a little insight into who I am and why I am the way I am.
May 1996~ Shawn Moody. This picture was taken at my graduation from 8th grade. Wow, that name brings back soooo many memories. When I first moved into my home in West County with my mom I met Shawn. A year older than me and such a stud. Well I thought so. The thought is almost laughable now. He was the same as me, an insecure, moody, reckless teenager. We were at first just friends as we met when I was eleven. I had a puppy crush on him and played with my dolls and named one Danielle Moody. I wanted him to like me as much as I did him but I thought that would never happen. As we started to get older and his hormones kicked in it became much different. As I look back now I see there was a lot of manipulation on his part, but apparently that’s normal for hormonal teenage boys. Nothing serious happened, just a lot of heavy petting and making out. Unfortunately I did sleep with him a few years later because I thought I was still so in love with him and life would be grand. I quickly found out he wasn't nearly as great as I thought he might be and gave up on the dream of little children running around our house. Thank g-d. What a mess that would have been.
November 1997~
I almost cry just thinking his name. Josh Dehne. G-d emotions just fly over me when I think about Josh. My stomach gets tight and I get that queasy, but good, feeling. In the grand scheme of things Josh was by no means my biggest heart breaker, but he was definitely the first one to do it on such a large scale. I met Josh, who lived an hour away in Illinois at the time, through a friend I went to high school with. I spent the weekends at her house and Josh and I got to be very close. When Lisa, my friend, moved into St Louis I was heartbroken. I thought I wasn’t going to be able to see Josh anymore. My mother decided to let me stay at his house on the weekends. She would drive me out there on Friday after school and his father would drive me home on Sunday evening. Well things got interesting staying with him that much.
I was very comfortable and close to his family. We got along well and I felt like I belonged when I was there. He made me laugh like no one really has been able to since. He made me feel like someone really cared about me, not because of how I looked or anything, but because he loved who I was. That meant more to me than anything in the world then.
There are a few incidents I vividly remember but for the sake of a PG rating I will tell a tamer one. He got me drunk for the first time ever. We went to a friend’s house and started to drink Brass Monkey. I didn’t know what it was I just knew it tasted awful and it was better the faster I drank it. Unfortunately the faster I drank the more drunk I became. I became belligerent and demanded a sandwich. He walked all the way to the gas station and bought me a sandwich and some condoms…oh how he tried. I thanked him for the sandwich, shook it vigorously to try to figure out what kind it was, and then threw the pieces around the room as I pulled out the meat and cheese and devoured only those few pieces. Josh gave me the oddest look, but I’m sure I deserved much more after that episode. I laugh when writing that because it was funny to me afterward remembering and funny now not only remembering but also realizing what he put up with from me and how loving he was about it all.
Josh had dropped out of school and joined LCP, Lincoln Challenge Program, a program for teens in Illinois. He did remarkably well in the program. He was gone for quite awhile and I missed him everyday. We wrote often and kept in touch. I drove all the way to Springfield with his family to see him graduate and I was so proud of him. I am not even sure where everything went wrong. Maybe we fought, maybe we just stopped talking. All I remember was that my heart was truly broken for the first time. Now as I have with many of the people I was extremely attached to I go back to those I loved. After he got out of the military I saw him a few times. I actually drove down to Oklahoma to see him and spend a few days. That was the first time I slept with him and such a huge mistake. I thought it would make everything better and maybe heal the hole he had created and it didn’t. I left early because I couldn’t stand seeing him anymore. As I got older I called him periodically and kept in touch. Last summer, 2003, I was in Vegas where he now lives.
May 1999~
The one who got away. I don’t even know if I can say, or write, his name. Ok, Phillip Kogan. Lord, oh lord. This boy caused me more trouble than I can fit in a blog. We went to elementary school together and had serious crushes on each other. When we got a little older we got back in touch, actually a month before my 16th birthday. This was as fast and as hard as I have ever gone for someone and it ended faster and harder than any relationship ever has with me. It was my fault and I will blame myself till the day I die for it. But I guess I am getting ahead of myself here.
I always thought he was the one I had lost my virginity to. Unfortunately I later found out, about 16 months ago actually, that it was in fact not him. Wow, talk about your shocker. I think I wanted it to be him and convinced myself it was him so that the pedestal I put him on had reason. I was head over heels in love with him. I quickly found out what jealousy and anger really were and became so obsessive over who he was with and why. We went to different schools but besides that we were together every minute of everyday. I stayed at his house or at his sisters with him and he stayed at my house often. We were damn near inseparable. Everything was done together and we really loved each other. We truly thought we would get married and stay together forever. It was a fairy tale romance and I couldn’t see myself with anyone else. Sometimes I still cant. My mother won’t let me live it down.
I went into a severe depression and I don’t even know where it came form. Maybe somewhere deep down I knew I wanted other things for myself, I knew I hadn’t lived all I wanted and experienced all I wanted. I wish I hadn’t, I wish had stayed where I was. My mother hospitalized me for my safety and while I was there I tried so hard to push him away. I was testing the strength of our relationship but it backfired so badly. He found someone else while I was gone. I told him to go out with her and see what it was like. He liked her a lot a wound up staying with her. I got so angry and so jealous. I really didn’t know what to do with myself. I became obsessive to the point where there were laws against my actions. I tried to stay in his life through his sister and things became worse. Finally, after a year of going crazy and completely out of my mind (including leaving my mothers house and becoming the promiscuous person I was) I decided I need a life change and enlisted in the military to get away from everything.
To this day I think of him often, very often. There are many things that remind me of him. I daydream about him and dream about him in my sleep. Other women have told me that this will likely happen for a while. He was my everything and I fucked it up and really had no closure. I still dream about seeing him and what it would be like. Would he forgive me for everything? Could we be friends? Could we be more? Sometimes I think I would give everything I have today to be with him again. Other times I think I am crazy to even imagine it. All I know is this man will stay a part of me until I finally give in. I am not ready to give in yet.
October 2000~
R.A.W. That’s what the tattoo on my hip says. Robert Adrian Woodward. Oh how my heart aches for him. Yes, still to this day. And the fact that I spoke to him recently probably doesn’t help. But again I am getting ahead of myself. So, I enlisted to get away from Phillip and ran right into Robby. We met while waiting to go to our company for basic training. I think we both needed someone and we found that in each other.
We were hoping we would be in the same platoon so that we could see each other often. We weren’t. I should have taken that as a sign. Instead we talked as often as we could, which wasn’t very often. He came to the Jewish services on Fridays just so he could sit by me and talk to me. We traded notes and letters, all of which I still have, and got caught often. We were both given warnings, and then Article 15’s (a much more serious reprimand) and Company Grade Article 15’s and oh lord it was a mess. We enjoyed having extra duty together though. As punishment in the beginning they made us work in our free time around the outside of the barracks. Well duh, there is no one to watch you out there. We talked and played and enjoyed each other’s company. Someone started a rumor that we had sex behind the dumpster and we were watched closer after that. I’m sorry but behind a dumpster??? No, no, no, on the third floor where the rooms were empty between the wall, lockers, and bunks thank you. J Not a dumpster, EW.
One I will never forget. We were sitting on the stairs in our barracks talking. A very very very serious no-no. His drill sergeant came into the stairwell and he jumped up and so did I. The drill sergeant said as you were and Robby began to fly up the stairs as I ran for my room. All of a sudden it clicked in his mind (he was new at not so quick usually) what he had seen. As we were both called back we knew it was going to be a bad day. Do you know what muscle failure is? If you don’t, you don’t want to know. They had me doing exercises called Stationary Iron Mikes. A couple thousand of them. I was outside of one door to the office and Robby was outside the other door, catty corner so we couldn’t see each other but heard each other through the hell we were put and the screaming of the drill sergeants. My drill sergeant decided it was enough for me and asked me to come upstairs to his office. I had to go by Robby to get there and was told not to even look at him. I did and I mouthed the words “I love you” as I walked by. Drill Sergeant Edwards saw but didn’t say anything he just told me to hurry up. Going up the stairs was horrific. I thought my legs would melt into the steps by the time I got to the third floor. We ‘chatted’ and he told me to stay in his office until formation. When they started yelling for formation I got up and headed for the stairs. I fell down an entire floor of stairs because my legs couldn’t hold me anymore. It was the worst physical pain I had ever been in. Apparently I didn’t care because that little incident I reported earlier, about the empty third floors rooms, yeah that was just a week later. Unfortunately that was the only time I was able to be that close to him for any amount of time.
I was shortly flushed from the Army system and sent home. Because we had talked so much about getting married and living together wherever he was stationed I came home and had his initials tattooed on my right hip. I planned on joining him in Alabama when he went to his training. I got down there and lived with the Green’s for a few weeks and found he was staying in Texas for training and not coming to Alabama at all. He quit writing and calling and I felt like crap. My friends said it was ok and I could always explain the tattoo as if I was an over zealous cheerleader who couldn’t spell. (RAW as opposed to RAH!!) That didn’t help.
For four years I have been searching for him. I found him this week. We talked for an hour and said we would speak again later in the week. We haven’t. I don’t think I really expected him to call like he said he would. We both have missed each other, he was very happy to get to talk to me again and we talked about how much we regretted the decisions we made about our relationship and leaving each other. Apparently he has been in Germany, Korea, and other places with the Army. He got married and has a kid. Wow that could have been me. But now they are supposedly separated as he is living with his family again in Mississippi. I wanted him to come to Saint Louis just so I could see him again. I want to know if there is anything there or if I just miss that time and part of my life and use him to cling to it. I hope I do get to see him. It seems that every time I get to see someone I still seem to have feelings for after missing them for awhile I get over them more than had I not seen them. Maybe then I can move on from that part of my life. Maybe I can stay in that part of my life. I just want to know for sure. What is that they say…relationships formed in stressful environments never last? Well, I want to see if they are truly right.
Every day of my life~ He really doesn’t have a time frame for me. We met when I was in the seventh grade. The mighty eighth grader enamored me and oh goodness he was so cute and those lips…delicious. Mr. Joseph Abrams, come on down. Somewhere in the back of my mind I still hold out hope. I can’t even put into words the relationship we have. It is truly … one of a kind. At least for me it is, I am sure everyone has his or her Joey. And mine is so good. I love Joey in a way I really have never loved anyone before. It is on a totally different plane of being. Sometimes that makes me wonder if I really love him the way I think I do.
Joey lived in Saint Louis for only a year I believe and at that time it was just an older guy I was really into. He moved back to Atlanta with the other half of his family and finished high school there and is now going to UGA. The majority of the time I spend with Joey is on holiday breaks and summer time. I think I have spent less time with him than anyone I have been in a relationship with but I feel so much more connected to him than anyone I have ever been with.
I remember one time he was in town; it would have to have been in the summer time and definitely before Phillip but after Josh. He came in his dad’s car and we went out. I actually can not remember how long we had really been talking to each other and going out. I think maybe he just called me one day and we went to a movie and hung out. We have some friends in common, maybe it was through them. Anyway, we went out. He said he didn’t want me to leave yet; it was around 10:30. I told him to wait outside down the street with his lights off and I’d be right back. I went in kissed my mother good night and locked my bedroom door. I then went directly out my bedroom window (which was used often after this as an escape route) to his car. We drove around a little still talking. He told me how he noticed me when I was in seventh grade and thought I was so cute. I thought he was just trying to get laid. Eventually we parked and were getting pretty serious. I told him no I didn’t want to sleep with him. He asked if I was a virgin and I lied and said no, I wasn’t afraid but it was that time of the month, another lie. He backed off and we drove around talking some more. I didn’t get in until after 2 in the morning. A few years later we were talking about sex, as we often comfortably do, and he asked when I lost my virginity. I told him it was with Phillip (as this is what I still believed at that time). He got angry. He knew that night we were in the car was before Phillip. He never really did like Phillip anyway so I don’t think that helped. “So,” he asked me, “we could have slept together and lost our virginity to each other and the a perfect and special night but you didn’t why?” The way he said it broke my heart. He said he would have rather lost his virginity to me than the person he would up sleeping with. It would have been better, much more special he said. I admitted I had been afraid and he let it go. We haven’t talked about it since, and this was many years ago, but I still remember. He had wanted to lose his virginity to me and mine to him and was actually ‘upset’ about it years after the incident happened. The fact that he remembered what happened that night shocked me. This is just one example of Joey and how he touches my heart and doesn’t even realize it.
When he isn’t in Africa or Alaska or wherever he goes this summer or winter break he still comes back to Saint Louis to see him family. We used to have this unspoken rule that if one of us was in a relationship when he came in it was like it wasn’t there. We kept to ourselves and spent as much time together as we could but it became increasingly difficult for me to sleep with him while in a relationship so we ended that about a year and a half ago. That doesn’t mean I don’t miss him though. I miss him terribly, just lying in his arms and feeling so safe and cared for.
So that those I am in a relationship with don’t freak out I explain it as if he was an older brother. I think I get that analogy from the safety and caring I feel around him, much like when I am with my brother. But there is so much more to it than that. We still talk about being together. He agreed that if he moved to Saint Louis we could try it, if we weren’t previously entangled with someone. It may be awhile before he gets up here if he ever does, so I don’t know how I will feel about it when it happens. We both agree we would probably kill each other and it would never last, but we have both endured a lot together. We talk often and keep current in the others life, well as much as we can. And we still love each other. He tells me how cute I am when I tell him how often I think of him and how I miss him. I know he still loves me, he has told me, but I am not entirely sure he loves me the way I love him and that breaks my heart everyday.
Ok, now for those of you who have stuck through this and read it all congratulations. David, if you have stayed with me and read this please be assured that none of this takes away how I feel about you. I love you very much, and maybe someday I can add you to this list J Just joking. The thoughts and dreams I have about other people are normal and healthy, and while usually private not so here. This is who I am and all of these people have helped me become the person I am today, the person you love. I know and respect the boundaries of a relationship…ahem…and would not do anything to jeopardize ours. I know you are terribly worried about Joey and maybe even now Robby but they are no more a threat to you than you are to yourself.
Being able to write all of this down and articulate my feelings was a wonderful type of therapy. I now know that although these people will always mean something more to me than most, that is all they likely will ever be, someone that matters to me.
1 comment:
d, listen, its kim. I really miss you, and think i need to just grow up and forgive or forget, or come to grips, or whatever, because, ya know what? some things are far more important than my pride, and being your friend is one of them. I tried to email you, but got a return to sender, i guess i wrote it wrong. Anyway, e me if you would. I dont like the idea of you being almost alone up there. And, while you are into theraputic writing, you know, i read this, and laughed and cried along with you, cause i know these things like few else do. I know how they really make you feel. anyway, i hope I hear from you soon.
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