Echo

My friend R had a huge crush on me. We had been friends for a long time and years ago, I had a small crush on him but it was fleeting. So we used to hang out all the time with a big group, but after a while, he was calling me a lot and we were hanging out on our own. He was going through a rough time in his life and I really wanted to be there for him; I cared about him a great deal and he was one of my closest friends out here, especially since it’s so hard to find people you trust in this city. After a while, he told me how he felt and I was pretty awkward about it but at least persistent, telling him that it was important to me that we be friends.

At this time, I was doing my research project on psychic ability. I had a bunch of people call different psychics and record their conversations, then I would debrief them on perceived accuracy. R asked the psychic about me and she told him to stay away from me. That I had “issues.”

So I was kind of pissed at her but laughed it off. But I thought the good thing that would come out of it would be that R would back off and just keep things at a friendship. One night, he’d been drinking and was bugging me again about how I could know that we wouldn’t work out if I’d never even tried. But to be honest, I had gotten to know him pretty well. And just knew that he had a brooding, volatile temperament that would eventually rub me the wrong way at best, and scare me at worst. But I hate it when people use that argument against me, so I agreed to try dating. He promised me that it would be really casual, no expectations. So then, the first night we kissed, he told me he loved me. I felt completely cornered. I told him I loved him too even though I didn’t mean it (romantically) but I was so afraid of hurting him in such a vulnerable moment that I said it. And in hindsight, that was stupid. So we dated for a few months and I really wanted to have romantic feelings towards him, but I just couldn’t. I knew this would never work out, but I was so afraid of hurting him that I didn’t know how to get out of the relationship. I kept asking for space and he started getting upset about why I would want space and that just made me more resentful and angry. Finally, after I demanded a week off, I broke up with him. He was pretty upset but I think he thought I just needed time and space to cool down, so he gave it to me. And we tried to be friends afterwards, though it was really awkward to see him when we hung out with our group of friends. I started dating this other guy pretty soon after, and he turned out to be a damn near maniac. He found out that R still called me and told me I had to cut off all contact with him. The stress was pretty bad and I think I really hurt R’s feelings when he called, crying, and asked if I was dating someone. Because that guy was in the room with me and he had already told me that it showed how little loyalty I had towards him when I wouldn’t tell my ex he was never allowed to call again, I told R that I was and that I loved this guy, and that he could never call me again.

I broke up with that guy soon after. He was insane.

But I didn’t talk to R for almost two years, avoiding him at a handful of functions we both went to, even though I would catch him staring at me from across the room. I felt horrible about hurting him, but I didn’t know what to say because I didn’t want that door reopened.

One night last year, 2 years after we’d broken up, he called me and left a message. He sounded pretty shaken up. I called him back and I guess he had had an incident with someone and he wanted to talk to me since I knew him pretty well and had been such a close friend once. We talked about what happened and I gave him advice, but then he randomly tells me that he hasn’t gone out with anyone since me. He started asking me why we broke up. I told him that it just wasn’t right, even though I have no hard feelings. He told me to stop lying and to tell the truth. I asked him what he was talking about, and he said, “C’mon, the reason we broke up was because you wanted to get married and I wasn’t ready, right?” …………………………… This scared me. This scared me a lot. I went back to trying to discuss other things with him and he started getting heated so I told him I was hanging up.

Now here are the things I think about. R was a really good friend of mine. But maybe he wouldn’t have been such a good friend if he wasn’t interested in me. If he had listened to that psychic’s warning, or if he had listened to me when I said I didn’t want to date, maybe we’d still be good friends to this day. Should he have stayed away because I have “issues” (which I admit that I do)? Or should he have stayed away from me because this was a bad path for him to walk down, since I couldn’t fulfill his expectations as far as my emotional reciprocation? Would our lives be different now if we hadn’t gotten together? Or would we be at the exact same place at this exact same moment?

I can’t think too much about it though because I’ll drive myself crazy. He had his problems and maybe these things were inevitable and it just happened that I was there to help him perpetuate things. And if it hadn’t been me, it would have been someone else. But it makes me think…every decision is a small path, and if you look back and look at the grid of all the other possible things that could have happened, all these alternate realities, you’ll realize that there are too many other paths to imagine walking down, and it’s not worth it.

I don’t know what I’m rambling about. Today’s definitely a stream-of-consciousness day.

I showed my cold turkey poem to linda today and she read it a couple of times and I think her eyes welled up. I wonder if she really gets my writing, or if she’s just trying to analyze it as a means to figure me out. I can’t even tell her what these poems mean. Does she think she can? If so, that would probably be good for me.

My basketball team is sucking, thanks for asking. Did you know that I posted on the bulletin board last week to give some guy some tips for his team, and then all the guys on the board started this string of posts with the subject, “IS JULIA A MAN?” and it went on for pages and pages and pages (like hundreds of posts) and every message had that subject title? Christ. So they accused me of sleeping with all kinds of people to get to be number one in fantasy basketball and were being all-around dicks about it. I even had one guy simulate what sex with me must be like. It sounded like a simulation by a guy with an intimate relationship with his tube sock. And the sweet guys who jumped in to stand up for me got bashed too. But I thought those guys were awesome. I was sarcastically sparring on the boards with them and a lot of the messages back and forth were really funny. Then there was all the speculation over what I looked like. I think they’ve agreed that I’m a 50 year old fat guy. It would be nice to finish up the season #1 so that I can have my picture up on the ESPN Fantasy Homepage. Cuz I ain’t no 50 year-old fat guy…

good times…

I will do anything not to go to bed. I’ve been having weird dreams again. Oh yeah, Roxie got me the connection to get onto a porn set. I have to write up a proposal now about the angle of my article and send in my credits and clips. I guess I have to be really careful in my proposal because they’ve been burned a lot by journalists showing the people and industry in a negative light. I’d love to do it on the psychological process of sex and performance–how the actors prepare and perform. Submit it to Psychology Today or maybe as a trade profile for acting. I would actually love to do this article. But I need someone to go with me who will hold my hand because I’m going to be terrified.