Part 1
This one's crazy. I wouldn't believe it if I heard it myself. Bizarre. I had zero intentions of ever getting to know J. He was just so insistent. My oldest sister has been going through this midlife crisis for years now. She's only twenty-eight, but as soon as her ex's started getting married, she went buck wild and signed up on every dating website. There have been so many interesting boys that have come out of her internet shennanigans. I wouldn't take the time to learn their names, I usually called them by their user names, since there were multiple boys with the same names. The whole concept of online dating freaks me out sometimes. I know it works for some people, and I'm really excited for them when it does, (confessional#6? I had a free membership for a week) but for me it just reminded me of how many other lonely people were out there searching for love based mostly on a picture. I know it's rude to be shallow, but when you can't experience someones personality in real life, you don't have much to go on besides a picture and a little blurb. All the generic winks and kisses that you can send someone seemed so demeaning and trivial. They may as well just have a, "I think you're hott" button.
Having a disability makes me feel a little bit like I'm deceiving these guys too. At what point do you drop the disability bomb? I think I would want to know if the roles were reversed. I just feel like it doesn't define who I am as a person, so it's not usually what I talk about when I first meet someone. At the same time, it doesn't seem fair to have someone fall for you and then say, oh my b, I have a plastic brace for a body. I know everyone says that in the end looks don't really matter, but they always do to an extent. Sometimes attraction can grow. I've found that when I'm getting to know someone, their looks appear average at first, but once I really got to know them, I started to actually see them for everything they are, and it almost seems like their appearance changes. I think that sometimes love changes how we perceive people. Attraction is only a starting point.
It would be so much easier if we could walk around and see people for their souls instead of their faces. I think our investments and who we spent our time with would be drastically different. Society is always portraying beauty as everything, sometimes I think the prettiest people are the most miserable. How do they ever know when someone is liking them for them? I hate to admit that sometimes I treat people differently depending on how they look. I often avoid people who I think are pretty, or have it all together. I find them intimidating and unrelatable. Maybe these outwardly beautiful people wouldn't be so sad if girls weren't intimidated by them, and guys didn't cater to them? Maybe they just get attention in all the wrong places. There I go, judging people again, thinking I have all the answers, I know I don't. This is all speculation.
It's a little ironic, I was there the night she called J from North Carolina for the first time. He didn't pick up. When my sisters lived near me, we used to get together once a week for family dinner night. It was nice to have a little home away from home night amidst our busy weeks. My oldest sister was over one night and told me I had to hear J from North Carolina's voicemail, she said it was the "funniest thing ever." I gave it a listen, wasn't impressed, but before I knew it, I was leaving him this very long, ridiculous message, and he was calling back asking to talk to me. We talked for an hour, while my sister and roommate listened. I could hear my sister in the background saying over and over, "they're going to end up liking each other." I was so annoyed, but we had this hilarious conversation going that I just couldn't hang up. We ended up quoting our favorite show to each other. When I hung up the phone, I felt like I unleashed a monster, like I was potentially getting myself into a huge mess.
My initial thought was, "oh crap, what have I done?" my second thought was, "what in the world does this kid look like?" I immediately wanted to facebook him. I felt like we both were genuinely ourselves for that entire phone conversation, and I know it was silly, but we had this electric banter going back and forth, like we were made to talk like that. There was something great about having zero preconceptions about each other. It was based solely on this weird verbal chemistry we had. I made my sister show me him online. In every picture he seemed to be hiding his face or things were too blurred for me to know what I was actually looking at. I told myself I didn't care what he looked like, that it didn't matter to me, that us talking was a one time deal. After our phone conversation, my sister told me that J always asked to talk to me, and wanted me number. I refused to give it to him, or talk to him on the phone. I didn't want to get into a love triangle with my sister and one of her men from another state. He added me on myspacemyspace. He was relentless, and I was bored, so one day I gave him my number. We started texting quotes daily. He delivered pizzas and would text me all the time.
Having a disability makes me feel a little bit like I'm deceiving these guys too. At what point do you drop the disability bomb? I think I would want to know if the roles were reversed. I just feel like it doesn't define who I am as a person, so it's not usually what I talk about when I first meet someone. At the same time, it doesn't seem fair to have someone fall for you and then say, oh my b, I have a plastic brace for a body. I know everyone says that in the end looks don't really matter, but they always do to an extent. Sometimes attraction can grow. I've found that when I'm getting to know someone, their looks appear average at first, but once I really got to know them, I started to actually see them for everything they are, and it almost seems like their appearance changes. I think that sometimes love changes how we perceive people. Attraction is only a starting point.
It would be so much easier if we could walk around and see people for their souls instead of their faces. I think our investments and who we spent our time with would be drastically different. Society is always portraying beauty as everything, sometimes I think the prettiest people are the most miserable. How do they ever know when someone is liking them for them? I hate to admit that sometimes I treat people differently depending on how they look. I often avoid people who I think are pretty, or have it all together. I find them intimidating and unrelatable. Maybe these outwardly beautiful people wouldn't be so sad if girls weren't intimidated by them, and guys didn't cater to them? Maybe they just get attention in all the wrong places. There I go, judging people again, thinking I have all the answers, I know I don't. This is all speculation.
It's a little ironic, I was there the night she called J from North Carolina for the first time. He didn't pick up. When my sisters lived near me, we used to get together once a week for family dinner night. It was nice to have a little home away from home night amidst our busy weeks. My oldest sister was over one night and told me I had to hear J from North Carolina's voicemail, she said it was the "funniest thing ever." I gave it a listen, wasn't impressed, but before I knew it, I was leaving him this very long, ridiculous message, and he was calling back asking to talk to me. We talked for an hour, while my sister and roommate listened. I could hear my sister in the background saying over and over, "they're going to end up liking each other." I was so annoyed, but we had this hilarious conversation going that I just couldn't hang up. We ended up quoting our favorite show to each other. When I hung up the phone, I felt like I unleashed a monster, like I was potentially getting myself into a huge mess.
My initial thought was, "oh crap, what have I done?" my second thought was, "what in the world does this kid look like?" I immediately wanted to facebook him. I felt like we both were genuinely ourselves for that entire phone conversation, and I know it was silly, but we had this electric banter going back and forth, like we were made to talk like that. There was something great about having zero preconceptions about each other. It was based solely on this weird verbal chemistry we had. I made my sister show me him online. In every picture he seemed to be hiding his face or things were too blurred for me to know what I was actually looking at. I told myself I didn't care what he looked like, that it didn't matter to me, that us talking was a one time deal. After our phone conversation, my sister told me that J always asked to talk to me, and wanted me number. I refused to give it to him, or talk to him on the phone. I didn't want to get into a love triangle with my sister and one of her men from another state. He added me on myspacemyspace. He was relentless, and I was bored, so one day I gave him my number. We started texting quotes daily. He delivered pizzas and would text me all the time.
One day he asked if he could get to know me. I panicked and immediately responded with a "no way." There was no way I wanted to be involved with someone who had been interested in my sister. Her and I were so different, I don't see how he could jump from her, to me. It just made me feel so weird. I kept thinking that there was no way I would get involved emotionally, I didn't want to feel like I was competing with my sister for him. I had an overwhelming sense of avoidance, even though I felt like we had compatible personalities and I did enjoy talking to him. That's when I dropped the disability bomb, in hopes that it might scare him away. It didn't.
My outright refusal to get to know him made him mad. He argued with me, and we went back and forth, each of us trying to get our own points across. Guess who won? I never seem to follow my instincts, I'm not sure why. That winter I kept him a secret from everyone besides my roommate. I didn't want it to get out that I was talking to one of my sister's online flames. Too embarrassing. I usually hated winter. Christmas made me crazy, I've always had this need to go sweater shopping for a boy. It seemed so crucial to my existence every winter, I'm not sure why. It's the one holiday that I want to share with someone. J came right on the tale end of Christmas. I guess I will blame it on that..
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