Posts tagged with "relationships"

Hemlock

The two longest rela­tion­ships I’ve ever been in, both bor­der­ing on the two-year mark, were mean­ing­less. I learned a great deal from them, mak­ing them great expe­ri­ences, but in all truth, that can be said about any of the rela­tion­ships I’ve had.

My short­est rela­tion­ship, which nev­er even got into the three month range (and also hap­pened to be with the only girl to break up with me), was the most mean­ing­ful.

And tox­ic.

I should­n’t have been in that rela­tion­ship, and I knew it. It was unhealthy, it was destruc­tive, it was painful. Yet I kept going. I kept apol­o­giz­ing instead of accus­ing, I kept storm­ing with­out releas­ing. Was I weak? Perhaps. Was I in love? More like­ly.

But I was scared most of all.

Scared of giv­ing up a chance for hap­pi­ness, scared of for­ev­er won­der­ing, “what if?”. With lack of choice comes free­dom from regret. It took more strength to push on, know­ing that it would­n’t last, than it would have tak­en to end it myself.

It was­n’t weak­ness. It was deter­mi­na­tion. It was an attempt at per­se­ver­ance. It was an attempt at sto­ic res­ig­na­tion. I knew she was going to end it.

Because I nev­er would.

Dinner With Sonas

I had the chance to hang out with Sonas on Wednesday night. He brought over some wine and cig­ars just as a chance to relax. He grad­u­at­ed last month and is look­ing for a job before he looks for a law school. The thing is, he’s not tied down by any­thing at all. His girl­friend is in Seattle, fin­ished her stud­ies and work­ing as a phar­ma­cist, but he has no plans on mov­ing there. He’s per­fect­ly fine with mov­ing back home, out west, or even over­seas to find a job. I have to admire that kind of free­dom, espe­cial­ly since he’s in a rela­tion­ship. There’s a trust there that real­ly goes beyond most of the oth­er rela­tion­ships that I know. We end­ed up order­ing in and hang­ing out on the bal­cony. I can’t relate to him very well because I don’t know much about him, but I can def­i­nite­ly say that he’s an easy per­son for me to talk to, which is a rar­i­ty in itself.

Yesterday I had the chance to hang out with Pat, and just kick back with some Soul Calibur II. We were pret­ty even­ly matched, although I had the upper hand because I actu­al­ly own the game and have a steady char­ac­ter. We’d real­ly learn each oth­ers moves, so it end­ed up being a game of reflex­es and feints, instead of but­ton mash­ing like it is against most peo­ple. He’s the only per­son I know who used to be a hard­core gamer the way I used to be, so it was great to be able to talk about fight­er styles and relate on that lev­el.

More Gosu Than You

It’s always fun­ny when some­one tries to play a mind game on me. For some rea­son they nev­er work, so I real­ly don’t mind them.

The secret, often con­fused with apa­thy, is actu­al­ly the will­ing­ness to sac­ri­fice every­thing, or the accep­tance of such. Unless one is pre­pared to give up every­thing, there are no guar­an­tees about what will hap­pen. When one accepts the fact that they may lose a rela­tion­ship, then one has noth­ing to lose.

It’s this pow­er, this weight, that guar­an­tees a vic­to­ry. Bluffing such a thing is unpre­dictable and gen­er­al­ly not rec­om­mend­ed. Of course, know­ing the oppo­nent inside and out is an advan­tage. It’s like see­ing his or her hand in a card game, and some­times, this is enough to win if one is unable to pay a high a price as a rela­tion­ship.

Such a strat­e­gy may leave one with few friends, but who’s a friend who plays mind games?

Quartz

When peo­ple ask me what my favourite nov­el is, I tell them, “A Hero of Our Time”, and that’s been true for more than eight years now. It’s a prime exam­ple of Russian Romantic Literature, and I can appre­ci­ate that. It’s bril­liant, not only in it’s lyri­cal style but also for the com­plex­i­ty of the mind­set cap­tured by the pro­tag­o­nist, which makes it such a plea­sure to read through. It’s intel­li­gent, it’s inter­est­ing, it’s cre­ative, yet none of these things make it my favourite. It’s not even the book I’ve enjoyed read­ing the most.

It’s sim­ply been the most influ­en­tial.

Lermontov’s nov­el once offered me guid­ance (albeit blind­ly) when I need­ed it the most. His words have shaped me more than any­thing else I can think of, even though I’ve cast off most of my for­mer self relat­ed to this. I still see his work as being an inte­gral part of my devel­op­ment, in mak­ing me who I am at every chang­ing moment, and that is why I hold so much impor­tance in it.

All of it was a mat­ter of tim­ing. Otherwise, I’d prob­a­bly think that it was just anoth­er bor­ing book I was forced to read in grade 10 English.

The same goes with my rela­tion­ships, some­thing I would nev­er have thought was relat­ed to tim­ing. It’s fun­ny to think that my most sig­nif­i­cant rela­tion­ship was also my short­est by far, with a per­son who is most like­ly to think noth­ing of it at all. And every­thing that made it impor­tant to me was a com­bi­na­tion of a very spe­cif­ic mind­set I had at the time and the fact that this per­son was such a change from my pre­vi­ous girl­friend.

The same goes with my favourite movie and my favourite band. I’ve become a per­son who holds more sig­nif­i­cance in the things that change me than the things that please me.

And change is a prod­uct of time.

"Cause It Isn't Fair"

There are times when a com­mit­ment is made on good terms and the bond of such a com­mit­ment can be eas­i­ly hon­oured. However, there are cas­es when these terms become sub­ject to strains that may threat­en the rela­tion­ship on which the com­mit­ment is based. When these strains over­whelm, the bond is bro­ken.

The com­mit­ment, entan­gled with the rela­tion­ship, should be bro­ken as well.

However, this bond some­times does not end. In such cas­es, the com­mit­ment can­not be said to be hon­oured; rather, it exists out of pity. Such a motive is rarely some­thing to be desired. It is best to end such an engage­ment instead of false­ly keep­ing it alive, for com­mit­ments, much like rela­tion­ships, are par­tial­ly based on the self-inter­ests of those involved. When they are not, one per­son assumes the role of a liar.

And the oth­er is being lied to.