A new form of expression

I decided to finally try making some comics with my wonderful art skills. Photoshop FTW.

Thin Line - Part 5

If it had all ended at that campground, I imagine things would have been much better for the both of us.

The night after leaving the campground, Dan and I decided to head up for our own camping trip to McCulloch Lake, which we did oh so often. Our camping trips mostly consisted of us acquiring a large supply of alcohol, setting up camp in the bush, lighting a fire, and getting super hammered. Good times.

While it was always at least Dan and me, we usually brought along others. On this particular trip, Laura decided to tag along. As the night went on, Laura revealed a stunning fact to me: I was single. She had seen Jessica at the mall that day and Jessica had told Laura that we were broken up. Up until this point, it wasn’t really official, so I was a little shocked to hear it.

Well, might as well start hitting on the messenger.

As the night went on, I put my best drunken moves on Laura which eventually got me in the tent and making out with her, but not much further than that. Of course, this would eventually lead to us hooking up again a few months later and ultimately starting a near 5 year relationship. As with many things, that’s a story for another time.

Surprisingly enough, when Jessica found out that I had hooked up with Laura, she proclaimed me a cheater and denied ever having said that we were broken up. It pissed me off, but I knew that it helped her cope so I just let it go.

We fought more and more over the next few weeks. School started up again and all of my slightly younger friends headed into their final year of high school while I began my first boring year of university. A few times, I showed up at the high school to see friends and did my best to avoid her.

One time, I punched her locker hard enough to leave a dent and scare the crap out of the people on the other side of the wall. I’m not proud of it, but it felt good.

We eventually started exchanging hateful emails. I cried a lot.

My lowest moment was calling her and asking for all of the stuff I ever gave her back just because I knew it would hurt her. She eventually changed her number.

Eventually, we both coped. For awhile, we even became friends again. But that exploded shortly after she related a particularly frustrating story to me.

Wait, let me go back a bit first. I had already lost my virginity before dating Jessica. All through the relationship, I was trying to push to go farther but got nowhere. The farthest I ever got with Jessica was my hand under her shirt. So, when she told me that the weekend after we broke up she gave some guy a hand job? I was a little pissed, to put it lightly.

There was more fighting, more crying, and then we were enemies again. There were a few more attempts at friendship, but they always collapsed under the weight of our emotional tension.

I was looking through my old emails and I found the last email Jessica ever sent to me: “You're an asshole, and you always were.”

I think that pretty much sums it up.

Thin Line - Part 4

For the first two months, everything was amazing. I’ve never been as happy in my life. It was this euphoric state that I’ll never reproduce, and really, I don’t think I’d ever want to. Like any high, you always come down. The higher you are, the farther you fall.

It started with little things. I’d do something to embarrass her. She’d care about what other people thought more than what I thought. All of the little differences between us that we’d overlooked for so long started festering and bubbling to the surface.

We started arguing all the time. Angry yelling matches on one or two occasions.

I recall one particular incident where Jessica and I were driving around in my car. I noticed she wasn’t wearing a seatbelt and asked her to put it on. She refused. “I’ve never worn a belt before.”

“Well, I didn’t notice then. Put it on now.”

“No.”

And this went back and forth for a little while before I stopped the car in the middle of the road, put on the e-brake and refused to move. Super childish, I know. What was worse was she was even more obstinate than I was. In the end, I just gave up and took her home. That was right before the end.

Not surprisingly, we had a spectacular break up. It’s only fitting, considering how the relationship started.

Before things had started to go bad, I had agreed to go camping with Jessica and her family. At the time, it seemed like a great idea. By the time it rolled around, I was dreading it. But, I sucked it up and went out to the campsite to set up.

For the couple hours I was there, everything was really awkward. Jessica and I weren’t really talking all that much and her family just tried to pretend nothing was wrong. Thankfully, I had concert tickets for that night which got me out for a few hours.

The concert was amazing (Econoline Crush. Woo!), but didn’t end until well after midnight. The campsite being at least an hour away, I just said “Fuck it,” and stayed at Dan’s place.

Dan and I went out for some after concert grub and started talking about Jessica and how shitty things were getting. I knew Jessica and her family would be out for awhile the next day, and it was then that I decided to just head to the campsite the next day, pack up, and head home.

And so I did. But not before the family arrived back, just as I was packing the last of my stuff into my car. I think I can safely put that up there in the top five most awkward moments of my life.

Jessica and I argued for a bit before I finally just left. I don’t remember if it was explicitly said, but we both kind of understood that the relationship ended there.

I got in my car, drove away, and left her behind me.

Thin Line – Part 3

A few months after the “Nuthouse” incident, as it became known, the school had a dance. By this time, things had died down considerably. Sarah and Jessica and AJ had gone their separate ways and the drama had passed. It wasn’t something that came up anymore save for the occasional Crazy Sarah joke. Sarah had even made her peace with the culprits. One thing that hadn’t changed was my pure, unadulterated hate for Jessica.

I showed up to the dance with Sarah and Mike (who are now engaged). We were “lei-ed” at the door, some lame play on words for their Hawaiian theme, and made our way to the dance floor.

Mike and I acted like jackasses for awhile and Sarah did her regular awesome dance routine that always amazed me. The night went on like this for awhile. And then Jessica showed up. Everything took on a much more somber tone when I realized this. The feeling deepened when she came over and asked to talk.

So we talked.

And somehow, everything was OK. I don’t recall what was said, but somehow it was OK.

A slow song started to play. She asked me to dance. I agreed.

This is a moment in time that has been burned into my memory. We danced, holding each other close. We fell into each other, swaying side to side to no beat in particular. The song ended and we kept dancing, holding each other closer still. I pulled back and looked into her eyes. We kissed.

When we finally broke apart, my first thought was that I’d somehow betrayed Sarah. I immediately went to her and told her what happened and asked her if it was OK. She was fine and said it was no problem, but to this day, I still think she was a little hurt.

Suddenly, I was dating this woman who I had despised only hours before. It was quite odd. Not only was I dating her, but I was completely in love with her. Within a week, we had both professed this love to each other.

At that moment, I thought we would be together forever. Nothing could tear us apart. I was right, nothing did. We handled that just fine on our own.

Thin Line – Part 2

I never thought I could loathe someone as much as I loathed Jessica.

One of my closest friends in grade 12 was Sarah. She’s a story all on her own, but suffice it to say, I loved Sarah and I still do.

At the time, we were hanging out after school every day. We were sitting around watching some stupid show and being goofy when the doorbell rang. Sarah’s mom answered the door.

“Sarah? Can you come here?”

Sarah walked over to the door which was just out of my view. A few moments later, I heard the heartbreaking sound of her crying and I went over to see what was happening. A cop stood, framed by the doorway and back lit by the flashing lights of her cruiser. Sarah was crying. I was so nervous and confused. I didn’t really know what to do or say. I stood silent and watched.

Sarah put on her shoes and followed the police officer to the back of her car and disappeared.

“What’s happening?”

“Sarah is being taken to the hospital for psychiatric evaluation. Someone called the cops and said she was suicidal.”

What the fuck? Who could possibly think that? Sarah was one of the happiest people I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing. Sarah’s mom didn’t really know anything more and she needed to get going to the hospital. I left, confused and upset.

The next day at school, Sarah wasn’t there. I called her the first chance I got. She had returned home late the night before and was too upset and tired to call me. Not surprisingly, all of her results came back as totally normal and she was released. Through some restrained tears, she told me how she ended up there.

At the time, Sarah and Jessica and AJ had been friends, to a certain extent. They would hang out occasionally and would pass notes to each other during classes they shared. Apparently, they had been having some sort of argument and Jessica and AJ were mad at Sarah. In one of her notes, Sarah had written something along the lines of “this class is so boring I’m going to kill myself.” In what can only be described as pure concern for their friend’s mental health, they called the police to report her “suicidal” state.

Now, I rarely get angry. I’m generally a very calm, rational person and it takes a lot to put me over the edge. In the last 10-15 years, I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve been angry. This was one of those times.

I was so furious that I couldn’t think straight. I was in a sort of rage induced daze. Nothing seemed real. I went outside and punched a brick wall. It didn’t make me feel any better.

I went to my creative writing class. I just needed a way to express myself, and for the first time in my life, I turned to poetry for release. I sat down and poured my hate and hurt and love onto the page. It is by far the best poem I have ever written. I wish I still had it. The next time I saw Sarah, I gave her a copy of the poem.

She cried, but in the good way.

As time went by, my anger and rage subsided but my abhorrence of Jessica never waned.

And then suddenly and without warning, I fell madly and deeply in love with her.

Thin Line - Part 1

Jessica.

I’ve never loved someone so intensely and I probably never will again.

Wait, let’s go back a bit.

I met Jessica near the beginning of my final year of high school. She was introduced to me by a friend in passing and I was immediately interested in her. She was beautiful and cute and funny. In my typical manner at the time, I almost immediately started making my moves. I spent a fair amount of time with her, letting my charm and good looks win her over.

A month and an awkward “Do you like Dan,” phone call later, I asked her out. This was shortly before Christmas.

We dated for about a month and, while fun, there wasn’t really a spark there. We both decided just to go our separate ways and remain friends.

To be honest, I really don’t know how we ended up together in the first place. We were very different people. But, really, that was what made it so attractive. We were both intrigued, drawn in by a morbid curiosity of a different world.

I believe that if it weren’t for Jessica causing me to absolutely despise her, I never would have fallen in love with her.

Spent

The last 2 weeks have been insanely busy.

And novel.

And confusing.

I've just recently started dating again after nearly 10 months of being single. What's strange is that it's just been a flood of girls. I've been on dates with six girls in the last two weeks and slept with two of them.

After all of this, I still have no fucking clue what the hell I'm looking for. Nothing feels right. I can always pick out some reason why things aren't going to work out.

Hell, one of these girls was seeing me purely for physical reasons and it still wasn't what I wanted.

I'm so fucked up it's ridiculous.

Scary