Our story-teller for today is a blogger very near and dear to my heart—Alex from The Saga of a Twenty-Something.
This chick is hysterically funny, and she just never ceases to brighten my day. Enjoy her wonderful story, and then go make friends with her! You won’t regret it.
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Hey everyone! I'm Alex from over here at The Saga of a Twenty-Something, and I am so incredibly grateful that our friend Jenni asked me to guest post today. She's pretty fantastical, and she pretty much makes me world go round. Oh, she makes yours go round too? Let's be friends.
So my story for you today is about second chances. I used to be adamantly against second chances. I thought they were a waste of time and people didn't deserve them. I was a very bitter and angry child of divorce, and that whole ordeal left such a sour taste in my mouth. If things went south in a friendship or relationship, that was it. Done. Not another chance. It was very black and white.
But if I hadn't learned to give out second chances, then I wouldn't be with the boyfriend. I wouldn't be living in our fabulous (suburban) Boston apartment. And I wouldn't be the blogger I am today.
I met the boyfriend in our History of American Journalism class in spring 2008. He swears we must have met before, but I don't think so. Regardless, he sat down next to me. And we worked on a project about the Challenger explosion. And I liked him. But he had a girlfriend, so I settled myself down and just kept him as a friend. Then he was elected to be the sports editor of our school newspaper. And I was his copy editor.
In fall 2008, we began working together. He didn't have a girlfriend anymore. We quickly went from friends to...dating? I don't know. Something more than friends, though. And I was the happiest panda in the land. But then something happened. Things were off. We didn't work out. But we kept working together at the paper.
But let me tell you, I was bitter. How dare he not date me! How dare he not be my boyfriend! We didn't talk. We exchanged emails that only contained story attachments, and we didn't speak. To say I was sad without him was an understatement. I felt like I lost half of me. He understood me. We could talk about anything. He got my battle with my eating disorder. He understood my resentment for my parents' divorce. He got it. And then he was gone.
I vowed never to talk to him again. I started dating someone else. Someone else who didn't get me. It was eh. But I couldn't shake how the (then not) boyfriend made me feel. So I thought about it for a long time, and I decided to reach out to him. Maybe we could be friends again. We made small talk. But things were still strained between us. We didn't know how to function as friends.
I broke up with that someone else in fall 2009. Shortly after, the (then not) boyfriend asked to meet up with me while he was visiting school. He had graduated in the spring, but still visited friends living at school. I said yes, unsure of what I was doing. Being friends was one thing, but a second chance at a relationship? Heck no! He had messed up the first time. That was it.
But the moment I saw him again, I knew that wasn't it. And it's cheesy. And I'll spare you the cheesy details, but he says he knew he was supposed to be with me that day. But still, I had to second guess myself. Did I really want to be in a relationship with someone who had hurt me? Giving him a second chance meant going against every fiber of my being. It meant turning my back on the mindset I had made.
After a few weeks, I made a leap of faith. I started to trust him again. And we became one unit. I've thought about us a lot. About what would have happened if I had kept my stubborn ways and not given him a second chance. Life would be sad. Life would be lonely. And life wouldn't be nearly as funny.
So I guess my lesson for you isn't necessarily to give everyone a second chance. But maybe learn how to listen to your heart. Because it knows what it's doing :)
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Wise words, my friend, wise words.
Now all y’all better go check out Alex’s blog, mmmkay?
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