the unbearable weight of unrequited

The ice cream party at work went well today; messy, a few wiseasses, but overall a success. So, while I was browsing through the shelves (something I do often rather than giving my full attention to alphabetizing or sorting..yech) I realized something once and for all. This inescapable truth, this burden (I've been reading Kundera) that has been placed upon my shoulders since, perhaps infancy, is my deep regard for eros, philia, and even agape, the three categories of love that the ancient Greeks developed. I am in love with the idea of love. I fulfill this cliche with my daily thoughts, actions, and personal preferences. I am a lover of ballads, poetry, and off-kilter love stories. I have no aversion to the canon idea of a "love story," the good ole' Hallmark version of cheeseball romance, but I prefer my affairs to be closer to Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist than Romeo and Juliet. I like the fights, the push and pull of an intense, passionate love. I don't like easy. I don't like immediacy. I like the slow, excruciating pang of waiting, of having no idea whether or not your sentiments are returned. Mine are usually thrown into the air, blindly aimed at the person who I have decided is worthy of my affection, and whether or not they land in the right hands is questionable. Perhaps. Or perhaps not. The real question, however, is are they even willing to catch it? In my case, I am always throwing these ribbons of hope towards people who are not even looking. It's like throwing a football towards someone who is completely oblivious to the fact that you are even there, never mind that you had a football that is now hurtling towards his head. You just have to hope that his reflexes are fast enough to catch it, or else that football that contains all of your hopes and dreams and fantasies falls to the floor, and you'll have to go retrieve it to try again later.

I have thrown this football again. Each time I throw my football (I am really very terrible at the actual game--I can neither catch nor throw, I have just about enough coordination to run track, but that's about it...), I hope for the best, crossing my fingers, sometimes squeezing my eyes shut because I just can't look just can't look just can't-- the suspense thrills me. And each time I am waiting, not looking, I turn to my old vices of writing and inhaling the volumes of others' love stories, imaginary and real. I soak the pages of love stories into my skin, absorbing the carefully chosen words into my blood, allowing their meanings to surge through my veins, exhilirating me. This person who I have thrown the ball to, he does not even watch football. He prefers baseball.

Baseball is alien to me. The only bases I am familiar with are the one's that correspond to the anatomy. I have no idea what exactly happens during an inning, nor do I, to be completely honest, really care. Baseball to me is a means of metaphorically speaking; it is not something I take an interest in, because I don't really care for the playing of the sport (seeing as I can neither catch, nor throw, the game is lost on me), and I don't really enjoy watching it either. I suppose to some people it is beautiful, or some version of beautiful.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, though, isn't it?

I also came to the realization that... I think sadness is beautiful. Human devastation is impossible to look away from, and while I personally do not like sadness better than happiness, I have come to notice that a person's tears are somehow more haunting, more beautiful, than that same person's smile. Of course, a smile is beautiful too, in its own way, but a smile does not imprint itself upon the heart, upon the soul, like a freshly shed tear. Sadness is also more intimate. Watching someone cry is much more private than watching someone smile. Sad poetry, sad novels, sad movies, they are all much more impressionable than their content counterparts.

The opening lines of David Cook's song "Come back to Me" haunts me. His voice sounds so wistful, the lyrics are so simple, on the verge of being cliche, yet they resonate through me, going straight through my eardrums and digging beneath my skin. The melody rings in my ears, echoing in my heart. It is the kind of song that makes me feel. I love those songs. I've been listening to it ever since I heard it last night.

And the chorus:
"so i'll let you go
i'll set you free
and when you see
what you need to see
when you find you,
come back to me..."

For some reason, the way he sings this, the way the background music fades away the first time it is heart, it is unbelievably beautiful to me. Just like the sad status updates of those suffering from a similar feeling of ennui; an unshakeable, gripping feeling of ennui.

3x so far, this song has played on repeat.


I am happy. I am happy. I am happy.

I have a family I love.
I have friends I love.
I have shelter.
I have clothing.
I am fed adequate amounts of food.
I am provided with all that I need.
I am employed.

It should be enough.




I am enough.
But I do not feel it.
All that I can feel today, in this moment, is this weight.


The unbearable weight.