Somethin' Stupid

I've never really understood romantic advances.

How exactly are they supposed to work? At what point does someone being nice to you become someone being interested in you? How are you supposed to tell the difference? I suspect that small part of the human brain responsible for detecting romantic interest never fully developed in my case.

And I think I have a reasonably good explanation for that.

Growing up in a rather conservative society, romantic affection was never something you were particularly encouraged to explore. At school, two teenagers developing feelings for each other was treated with the sort of alarm ordinarily reserved for serious criminal conspiracies. If discovered, the unfortunate couple could expect an investigation, a public trial, and a generous helping of moral instruction from adults who seemed to consider themselves the last line of defence against the complete collapse of civilization. I suspect the Salem witch trials would have been considerably more efficient if they had employed a few of our schoolteachers and local aunties and uncles.

Which was rather strange, considering that romance itself wasn't necessarily the problem. It was perfectly acceptable, even desirable, provided it occurred at the appropriate age, with appropriate people, with the approval of the appropriate adults, following the recommendations of a suitably qualified astrologer, or, in more technologically advanced households, the algorithm at Kerala Matrimony.

And then, as you grew older, you began noticing something else.

Men could be rather unpleasant.

I don't mean all men, obviously, but enough of them to make the observation worth considering. You saw women dealing with unwanted advances, persistent attention, and men who seemed entirely incapable of understanding that their romantic interest was not necessarily a wonderful gift to the person receiving it.And it becomes considerably more difficult to dismiss these things as isolated incidents when the women dealing with them are your friends or family.

You hear their stories. You see how uncomfortable these encounters make them. You begin to understand how exhausting it must be to have to navigate someone else's feelings when you've done absolutely nothing to invite them.

And somewhere along the way, you develop an almost obsessive determination never to become one of those men.

Which is a perfectly admirable ambition, I'm sure.

Unfortunately, I seem to have taken it a little too far.

Because the easiest way to ensure that you never make someone uncomfortable with your romantic interest is, of course, to never express any romantic interest whatsoever.

It's a wonderfully effective system. Nobody gets an unwanted confession. Nobody has to manufacture an excuse to turn you down. Nobody has to worry about how you'll react to rejection. And you get to spend the rest of your life wondering whether somebody might actually have liked you back.

A small price to pay for social harmony, I suppose.

Of course, there's a difference between telling someone how you feel and making them responsible for those feelings. There's a difference between asking whether someone might want something more and refusing to accept that they don't.

I understand these distinctions perfectly well, at least theoretically.

Which might explain why I've been meaning to write about my rather unsuccessful adventures in matters of the heart. An impressive ability to emerge from these experiences with absolutely no idea what to make of them has left me wondering whether there's something I've been getting wrong all along. And, as it turns out, the answer may have rather more to do with me than I would have liked.

There is something strange about meeting an old friend after all these years and seeing them as an entirely different person. You remember who they used to be, or at least who you thought they were, and slowly begin to discover who they have become. Eventually, you both understand how much you've changed as people, and occasionally, nostalgia takes over and lets you have fun as the people you once were.

Somewhere along the way, I discovered once again what it was like to have someone to talk to every day about my most absurd thoughts and observations. Someone with whom a conversation about something completely insignificant could somehow turn into a three-hour discussion about love, life, belonging, meaning, and everything in between.

It was like a breath of fresh air after years of exhaustion, months of tiring work, and what felt like an eternity of hopelessness. There was something wonderful about having someone to tell things to again. The little things, especially. An observation about a stranger on the street, a ridiculous thought that occurred to me in the middle of the day, something I read, something that bothered me, something that made me laugh. Things that would otherwise have remained in my head, never important enough to tell anyone, suddenly had somewhere to go.

And somewhere along the way, rather inconveniently, I think I began wanting something more.

I'm not entirely sure when that happened, or even what that something more was supposed to look like. I liked talking to this person. I liked hearing about their life, their ambitions, their troubles, and the person they had become.Perhaps I began imagining what it would be like to have more of that. Not necessarily some grand romantic adventure, complete with declarations of eternal affection and other things that sound considerably better in films than they do in real life. Just more conversations, more shared absurdities, more opportunities to know someone and be known by them.

It was a possibility I found myself becoming increasingly fond of, which was unfortunate because I had absolutely no intention of admitting it.

For one thing, I didn't know whether they saw me as anything more than an old friend. For another, they were facing their own challenges, building their career, figuring out their life, and doing all the things people are supposed to do with theirs. I didn't want to complicate any of that.

And, if I'm being perfectly truthful, I didn't particularly want to find out that I had misunderstood everything.

So I did what any reasonable, emotionally mature person would do under the circumstances.

I decided to pretend that I didn't care quite as much as I did.

I tried to step back. To keep things cordial, friendly, but never too deep. To remind myself that whatever this was, it was probably best left alone.

Naturally, this worked wonderfully for a while.

And there we'd be, once more, spending hours discussing everything under the sun, forgetting all the sensible conclusions I'd arrived at just a few days earlier.

I suppose the trouble with having someone you genuinely enjoy talking to is that it's rather difficult to convince yourself not to enjoy talking to them.

But things weren't always like that. There were stretches of silence, occasions when they seemed to go AWOL, and moments when I wondered whether the conversations I looked forward to were simply pleasant interruptions in an otherwise busy life for them.

I understood, of course. People have careers, responsibilities, ambitions, problems. I knew they were dealing with things I perhaps didn't fully understand, and I genuinely wanted them to succeed. It would have been terribly unfair to expect them to put their life on hold merely because I had developed an unfortunate attachment to our conversations.

But it hurt a little nonetheless.

And so I would reason with myself. Explain away the silence, remind myself that I wasn't entitled to anyone's attention, and eventually conclude that this was entirely a me problem, one I certainly didn't need to burden them with.

But the stories, the conversations, the hours spent talking about everything and nothing—did any of that mean so little to them? I couldn't help but wonder.

I had never asked for a relationship. I had never even admitted that I wanted one. But somehow, I had begun to feel the disappointment of losing something that had never really been mine.

And when that familiar fear began creeping in, I did what I have always done.

I pulled away.

I've never really dealt well with abandonment, and my preferred method of ensuring that it doesn't affect me is to make myself scarce before anyone has the opportunity to demonstrate just how little my absence inconveniences them.

Of course, there's a rather obvious flaw in this arrangement. Sometimes people aren't leaving. Sometimes they're just busy, tired, distracted, or dealing with problems you know absolutely nothing about. But by the time you've considered these possibilities, you've already packed your emotional belongings and moved to a different continent.

And perhaps, somewhere beneath all this, there is also the rather embarrassing hope that someone will notice your absence and come looking for you, which is an extraordinarily unfair test to subject someone to, especially when they have absolutely no idea they're taking it.

I suppose I could go into the reasons I have such a complicated relationship with abandonment. There are plenty of them, some going back further than I care to remember. But I've spent enough time excavating the ruins of my childhood, and I suspect neither you nor I would particularly enjoy the whole ordeal. Or maybe I'm the way I am simply just because.

Besides, I've come to realize that understanding why you are a certain way does remarkably little to prevent you from being that way. I know perfectly well that people have lives outside of mine. I know that silence doesn't necessarily mean rejection. I know that expecting someone to understand feelings I've gone to extraordinary lengths to conceal is, at best, an unreasonable proposition.

And yet, here I am.

I've also spent a rather extraordinary amount of time convincing myself that everything I said and did came from a place of genuine care, without expecting anything in return. And I still believe that. I wasn't keeping score, or being nice in the hope that one day all those conversations would amount to something more.

But perhaps I ought to be a little more honest about what expecting nothing actually means.

Because while I certainly didn't expect someone to like me simply because I cared about them, I think I did hope to matter to them. To be someone they occasionally thought of in the middle of their day. Someone they looked forward to telling their stories to.

Which brings me to my current predicament.

I have absolutely no idea what to do next.

The characteristically me thing to do would be to write something about Unsent Letters or some bullshit like that on my blog, congratulate myself on another spectacular demonstration of emotional restraint, and call it a day. Perhaps throw in a few philosophical observations about love, longing, and the inherent absurdity of human relationships for shits and giggles.

But seriously, what exactly is the upside to telling someone you have feelings for them?

Suppose I actually decide to do something about these feelings. What happens then?

Would it involve some spectacularly stupid, movie-style elaborate surprise at their workplace? Preferably one involving an unnecessary amount of planning, a carefully rehearsed speech, and the very real possibility of being escorted out by security?

Or perhaps it's something considerably less dramatic. A phone call, maybe. Coffee, if I'm feeling particularly adventurous. An ordinary conversation in which I finally admit that somewhere along the way, I began seeing them as more than an old friend.

Perhaps they don't feel the same way. Perfectly reasonable, of course. But now I've introduced an entirely unnecessary complication into a friendship I genuinely value. They might begin questioning whether all those conversations were merely elaborate attempts to pursue something romantic. Something that was once wonderfully effortless might become awkward for both of us.

Perhaps we both laugh awkwardly, finish our coffee, and go our separate ways, having at least established that I possess the emotional courage of a moderately functional adult.

I suppose I could live with that.

Except, of course, there is another possibility I haven't quite accounted for.

What if it all works out?

What if, against all odds and despite the extraordinary lengths I've gone to avoid finding out, this person actually felt the same way?

I can imagine the awkward first dates, the nervous laughter, the rather desperate attempts to find something interesting to say to someone I've already spent hours talking to about everything under the sun. I can imagine discovering the little things about them that somehow never came up in all those conversations. The peculiar habits, the terrible jokes, the things they like and the things they cannot stand.

I can even imagine our first fight, as we get to know each other better. Something trivial, perhaps. Something that would seem utterly insignificant to anybody else but would somehow become terribly important to the two of us. I can imagine the awkwardness of making up, the difficulty of admitting that I was wrong, and the rather wonderful possibility of discovering that a disagreement doesn't necessarily mean someone is preparing to leave.

And sometimes I let myself imagine a life in which I no longer have to wonder whether someone wants me around.

It's a beautiful thought, really.

Which is precisely why I find it so frightening.

Eventually, there comes a day when the novelty wears off, when neither of us is particularly interesting, when life becomes difficult, and when love is no longer something we simply feel but something we have to make room for.

And then there is the rather inconvenient matter of who I actually am.

I wonder what would happen if they came to know me as I know myself. Not the person who can be moderately funny and tolerable. Not even the person who tries so terribly hard to be kind, understanding, and considerate.

But the other one.

The one I don't particularly like talking about. The one who has spent years carrying around fears he knows are irrational but cannot quite reason himself out of. The one who occasionally feels resentment where he ought to feel understanding, anger where he would much rather feel nothing at all. The one who can be an unbearable pain in the ass to those close to him with his rather unfortunate quirks and inconsiderate behavior. There are parts of my mind that I have never really invited anyone into. Old hurts, insecurities, memories I would rather forget, and ways of looking at the world that I know aren't always fair to the people around me. Things I recognize as ugly, even as I struggle to understand why they exist in the first place.

I can almost imagine the moment they discover these things.

Perhaps it happens during an argument. Perhaps I say something I don't mean, or react to something entirely ordinary as though it were an old wound being opened again. Perhaps they see me frightened, bitter, unreasonable, or simply unable to explain why something so insignificant has affected me so deeply.

And I imagine the look on their face changing.

Not anger. I think I could bear anger.

Something closer to disappointment. Perhaps even disgust.

And then there's the other possibility, which I find equally difficult to contemplate.

What if I hurt them?

What if, despite all my good intentions and my rather elaborate ideas about love and kindness, I become the very reason someone else begins questioning their worth? What if my fear of abandonment makes me suspicious of perfectly innocent things? What if my inability to communicate turns an ordinary misunderstanding into something painful? What if someone spends years trying to reassure me of something I never quite learn to believe?

I've spent enough time contemplating the hurt that people can inflict upon one another to know that good intentions offer very little protection against it.

So there they are, the two possibilities my mind so generously presents me with. I hurt them, or they hurt me. Either way, someone who once made the other person happy becomes a source of pain. A rather promising advertisement for the institution of romance, I'm sure.

Of course, I understand that relationships aren't simply elaborate arrangements for two people to take turns making each other miserable. People can be patient, forgiving, and understanding. They can disagree without becoming enemies, discover unpleasant things about each other without losing affection, and love one another without pretending that either of them is particularly easy to love.

I know all of this.

Perhaps I'll make that call. Perhaps I'll decide that some things are better left alone yet again. Perhaps I'll discover that I've misunderstood the whole situation and have somehow managed to turn a perfectly ordinary friendship into a dilemma of rather impressive proportions.

I suppose any of those outcomes would make for a decent story.

But I think there is something worth taking away from all this, even if I'm not entirely sure what to do with it yet. And for all my attempts to convince myself otherwise, I liked the idea of sharing a little more of my life with someone.

Even though I don't like to admit it I don't think there's anything particularly shameful about that.

I'd like to think I'm finally becoming the sort of person who can express something as ordinary as affection without requiring an extensive philosophical justification for doing so.

But then again, I've just written nearly three thousand words about the difficulty of having one normal conversation. Sinatra went and spoiled it all by saying somethin' stupid like "I love you". I, on the other hand, have taken the far more sensible approach of keeping my mouth shut and publishing a detailed account of the entire affair on the internet.

A promising start, I suppose.