An Incongruous Question

When I visited M the other weekend, she asked me a question. It was a question that puzzled me at the time but I’d forgotten to mention on here. It was question I did not want to answer, could not answer, and one she should not have asked.

She said to me: “J (her boyfriend and one of my best friends) said that he thought that you used to like me when I first came into the [friendship] group.” Then she asked me: “Is that true?”, quickly adding “you don’t have to answer if you don’t want, I’m just curious.”

Why would you ask such a question? Why would you expect an honest response to such a question?

I must confess that I did like her, actually for quite a long time, until the end of college (almost 2 years). I still kind of like her, actually. But at the same time I knew my place. J and M quickly got together, and I was happy for them. They were such a cute couple, and still are, and I think they will last a long time. I knew that I could not give in to my feelings, because it would be wrong to do so. I am not the type of person who would do that. I have quite a strong sense, especially for these times, of friendship, honor and chivalry. It forms a strong part of who I am. To not follow these ideals would give me no positives about myself to draw on. So, just like I could not show my feelings then, so I could not show my feelings now. I simply said to her “I can’t remember, it was so long ago”, and left it at that. She didn’t push it any further, and apologised for asking it.

Yet I still can’t understand why she would ask me this. For me to answer such a question does nobody any good. I have to keep my mouth shut, just like I had to keep those feelings shut up. No good can come of either.

Study: ‘Falling in love costs you friends’

A study has just come out, saying that falling in love costs you friends. It says that when you are in a relationship, your circle of close friends is reduced by two – one best friend is lost, and another replaced by your new lover (i.e your circle of best friends is reduced by one and another person is replaced with your boyfriend/girlfriend). This is concerning to me, especially with the upcoming arrival of J-O in a few months. In fact, it is a matter I have touched on about a year ago. I don’t want to lose any of my close friends. I know what it’s like to almost lose a friend when they fall in love – I don’t want to inflict that sort of pain when me and J-O get together. I know how much my friends get annoyed – and even angry – at how M and J withdrew into themselves when they started going out. We hardly ever saw them this summer.

I’m not going to let it get like that. I won’t not go to an event just because J-O can’t go. I won’t stop want to see my friends just so I can spend every minute of every day with J-O. People need to see more than one person for their emotional well-being. Not to mention that a relationship must surly stagnate if you’re around each other 24/7. I’m sure I can’t be the only one to feel this way.

Clubbing

I went clubbing for the second time ever on Tuesday. Yeah, you heard me. I’m 19, I’m a university student yet this is only the second time in my life I’ve been clubbing. I’ve just never really seen it as my type of thing. But Tuesday was great. It was for my friend J’s birthday, and we all met up at his house first for pre-drinks. I had a few beers and some apple sours, for which I was laughed at by one of my friends for supposedly being a ‘woman’s drink’, even though a male friend first introduced me to it. But I digress. Then we got a lift from several people into town.

We started off by going into Reflex to get stamped while it was free, then went into 90 Degrees to do the same, except we actually stayed there, for most of the night. I had a few more beers (somehow I wasn’t already that drunk, which is strange because I’m usually gone after 4 – 5 pints) and then J offered me a taste vodka and coke. Never having tried it before, but being told it was ‘very drinkable’ (I like coca-cola a lot) I decided to get one for myself. I immediately loved it. I had a few of those in 90 Degrees, and had a very good time dancing (well, slightly moving to the music – ‘dancing’ is a bit of an exaggeration) and drinking.

Towards the end we went into Reflex when I did almost what you might call dancing, as 80s music (it’s an 80s themed club) can be really catchy and make you want to dance along to them. The only downside was that they didn’t allow drinks on the ‘dancefloor’ (presumably because as a more dancing-orientated club with an actual ‘proper’ dancefloor, they suddenly need all these rules) so I was forced to simply watch my friends dancing from the sidelines if I wanted to drink. Reflex was the place where the ‘quote of the night’ was uttered, when J’s cousin (who was quite drunk by this point) looked at the glitterballs in the ceiling, saw the biggest one and said ‘That’s the biggest disco ball I’ve ever seen! It’s almost as big as the Death Star!’ which I, as a fellow Star Wars fan, couldn’t agree more with.

And that was pretty much it. The result of the night is that I now love vodka and coke and want to go into town with my friend’s more often. Probably won’t happen though. So my next club outing might not be for another year, or perhaps never. Oh well. At least I enjoyed that night.

I Wish I Could Just Get On A Plane…

Last night, when trying to get to sleep, I suddenly thought ‘I wish I could just get on a plane and visit her’. What probably prompted this thought was when my friend J said that him and M were going to visit Bulgaria and joked (I think it was a joke anyway) that I could come along with them and see J-O. However, looking back on it I’m not even sure he said that. The more I think about it, the more I’m convinced that I dreamt he said that, or imagined it somehow. Anyway, I would love to visit her in Bulgaria. I have time – 3 months (from today) to be exact in which I could do it.

There are only several major problems with this idea. Firstly, how to explain about J-O to my parents and then convince them to go on my own or with J and M (if it turns out I didn’t dream J saying that). If that wasn’t difficult enough, I’d have to then organise it, spend lots of money on flights and converting currency to spend while I’m there. (Oh yeah and I’ve talked to J-O and she said I could stay at hers rather than stay in a hotel, so that would save a lot of money) And I’d have to ask work if they’d give me a week off, which I’m not sure they will do even though they’re always very accommodating.

And this is all presuming J-O’s parents can be convinced to let a-random-stranger-that-their-daughter-has-only-met-on-the-internet stay in their house, probably in her room(!),for a few days (not the whole week – J-O suggested we go away to the beach for a few days you see). Yeah, that sounds like an easy obstacle to get over. Not. (And similarly with my parents, letting their son go to a far-away country on his own to meet some random girl (who may not be who she says she is!).)

It’s a nice idea. But it’s never going to more than an idea, a pipe dream.

Great Day Watching England vs USA

The other day I said I would inform you about the epic time I had on Saturday. Here it is.

I arrived at about 5 at A’s house and had a beer, and soon J turned up as well. We had a few beers before the match, settling down to watch Total Wipeout. Finally the match started at 7:30pm. A then took out some Apple Sourz (15%, one of the strongest drinks I’ve drunk, I don’t get out much) and we decided that we’d each drink some every time Heskey made a mistake. So as a result it was half gone by the end of the disappointing first half. We then went out into the garden to do a keepy-up game, which I wasn’t good at. We went back and settled down to the second half, which proved to be just as disappointing as the first. We’d finished the Apple Sourz about 10 minutes before the end, along with the 4 beers we’d each drunk, but somehow we were remarkably sober. I was especially surprised at my sobriety, since usually after 4 beers alone I’m already well on my way to being drunk.

Then, as the sun was setting (as it was nearly 9pm by this time) we decided to head over to the local park for some football. After a while we could hardly see as it was getting so dark, so we headed back. When we got back we decided to stay the night. So first we watched HIGNFY and then at about 11pm we settled in to watch Die Hard 2. After that had finished, at 1:30am, we decided not to go to bed, but instead to break out Rollercoater Tycoon. That is still such a fun and addictive game, and we played it until about 3:30am, at which point we decided to get to sleep – just as the ‘dawn chorus’ was starting.

We woke up at 10am the next morning (we’d set the alarm on my phone for 10) and decided immediately after breakfast to go play some more football down the park. We played one-on-one against each other, with the other person being the goalie, taking it in turns. Then we decided to play a penalty shoot-0ut game, which I turned out to be fantastic at (shooting, not saving; I was awful at that) and I had by far the best ratio of goals. I always shot one way, but always managed to make the keeper think I was going the other way. Then we went back for lunch, as it was about 1pm by this time. After that we all went our separate ways (that is to say, we went back home lol) and decided that for each England match we would go to each other’s house to watch them. The next one is Friday at J’s, I can’t wait.

Looking Forward To Summer

Well, my first exam starts tomorrow and my last exam is on 4th June. It sounds like a long time, but it’s only 3 exams, 1 each week, so it’s pretty good. But I am – as you can probably tell from the title – more looking forward to the summer. 3 months and 2 weeks I have off. 3 months and 2 weeks!!! Either it is going to be great, or it is going to be very boring. I’m going to try my hardest to make it exciting.

I’ll try and make sure me and my friends are doing something cool at least once a week, be it having a party or doing something a little more restrained but still fun. What I’d really like to do is see a lot more of A, E, J and M, since they all live pretty close – within bike-riding distance – to me. The only trouble is that I don’t want to impose on them. I’ll have to talk to them and see what I can come up with. Wish me luck!

What A Fantastic Day!

Yesterday was one of the best days in a long time, because of two gatherings that occurred.

The first one was when I met A and J at the Common for a kick-about (i.e played football (soccer)) for an hour or so. It was funny because we weren’t very good at passing to each other, often missing wildly. That, coupled with the fact it was raining and the ground was muddy made it a great laugh. Both A and J slipped up several times, it was fantastic. Then we went to J’s house. On the way we saw this suicidal mouse climb down a drain. We tried to save it using two sticks like chopsticks, but it went down another pipe instead. Who knows what happened to it. Anyway, when we got to J’s house and played MW2 and FIFA10. I beat them at MW2 epically but lost pretty badly at FIFA10.

Then I rushed home at 6:30 because a bunch of us were meeting at a local pub. We (well, I) got very drunk and we all had a great time reminiscing about (sixth form college, college in the UK sense) college and my, J and A’s adventures earlier, as well as other stuff. It was a great day, I hope then during the summer break we can have great days like that as well. I can’t wait. But now I need to start writing an essay for when I go back to uni in two weeks time, so no more adventures for me.

She Made Me Feel Happy

I’ve been feeling down in the dumps for the last few days, because I felt alone, and that my friends and I weren’t very close. All that changed yesterday when I had a video call with E on Skype.

She was in a good mood, and her happiness was very infectious, as it always is. The funniest bits where when she was making funny expressions, albeit inadvertently. She’s one of those people that have a face that is very amusing pretty much whatever expression she has on her face, it’s the same with J. The other funny thing was when she was listening to music and ‘dancing’, despite the fact she was sitting on her bed – basically it involved funny hand movements. I found it so funny.

The whole day today I was very happy, and it was because of that. I found myself singing (in my head, that is) cheerful songs when I was walking back from the train station after university.

I Just Don’t Know Any More/Delusions Of Best-Friend-ship

If you’ve read my blog before you’ll know that I consider E one of my best friends, and the only one I’ve gotten closer to over the last 3 years, compared to everyone else who I’ve drifted apart from (except for perhaps Jb).

But this isn’t really the case at all. I’ve always known it wasn’t, but I liked to fool myself into thinking she was one of my best friends. It was comforting to think that way. In reality, although I do consider her one of my best friends, and have told her as much, I think she can only just about tolerate me. I know this because I feel I can never talk to her, unlike many of my other friends. I always think I’m bothering her when I try to talk to her on MSN, and doubly so if I want to talk about emotions and stuff with her. I mean, it’s in her nature to not be very communicative with people, but I really do get the feeling that she really doesn’t like me.

Take the other day, for example. We went to a gig, I got a bit drunk and she was mostly sober. When we were coming back on the train I hugged her, as I do, saying sorry about it as I was doing it, as drunks would do. I thought that this apology would do. But when I talked to her yesterday, she sorta mentioned it and I felt like I had to apologise again – she made me feel like she thought I was some sort of diseased monster that we couldn’t bear to touch.

I dunno, maybe I’m overreacting. But the more I think about it, the more I realise that I don’t have any close friends, really, not with the people I’ve mentioned as ‘best friends’ especially. Perhaps it’s my fault. It probably is.

I hate feeling alone.

A Very Complicated Situation, But Kinda Not

I’m not entirely sure if I should post this here at all, to be honest, but I’m going to do it anyway.

Me and M are in a kinda complex situation, and have been for a while. Sometimes it bothers me, other times it doesn’t. It so complicated and confusing that I don’t really know what to think.

M has a boyfriend, J, and he is one of my best friends. I consider M one of the best friends too (for those who haven’t read my blog before), and we get on well. We can both talk to each other about things that are troubling us, and give each other advice and support.

But there is a slight snag with this. She has told me before that she does kinda fancy me, even though she does love J. I admitted to her also that I do kinda fancy her too, even though I think M and J are fantastic together, love each other, and I don’t want to ruin that. Luckily, this does not get in the way of our friendship, but kinda strengthens it, because we know how we both feel about each other, so there is no need for awkwardness. If we need to comfort each other, for whatever reason, we can have a nice hug or whatever, and it’s fine. We both trust each other not to let it get in the way of, or undermine in any way, J and M’s love for each other. And it doesn’t. (I don’t want that at all, I think they are great together, and believe they will live happily together, forever. It couldn’t happen much better to two such nice people.)

But sometimes, I find myself thinking in a way in which I consider that she actually likes me. It leaves me very conflicted in these moments. But luckily, I can control it, most of the time. Sometimes I feel like, by it being so comfortable between us, that this in itself, subconsciously, must affect the way she thinks. But I hope not. I’m sure it doesn’t. Because even if I was to only ever so slightly undermine what they have in any way, I feel like I am betraying both of them, something I do not want to do. But, luckily, as far as I can tell, it doesn’t seem to do any harm. She still loves him, if anything, more than ever. I’m glad. I’m glad because they are my best friends, they have something so fantastic, so perfect, that I know that it will be a happily-ever-after story. I love them both, I love them together, and I can only hope that one day, I can find someone who I will love, and who will love me, as much as they love each other. (Oh great, I’m crying now. But they are so nice.) I love you guys.