CHAPTER TWENTY THREE

Dear Diary,

I know it’s been over three (3) years since we last talked. I missed you and a lot has happen since our last time. Somewhere in the three (3) years, I fell in love and had a relationship with Barbie (not her real name) at two (2) separate time intervals.

In the first instance, she broke things off after I got involved in a near fatal accident whiles I was on my way to see her for a very important “event” in her life. I was totally devastated by the physical pain from the accident and the emotional pain from her breaking up with me. I ended up being treated (by a clinical psychiatrist) for depression and severe body pains as well as sleep deprivation.

Months later, she crawled back into my life amidst tears after learning about the TRUE circumstances surrounding why I couldn't make it to SUPPORT her on her special day... Given my past experiences with her, for a split second, I chose to perceive her as though she was nobody special in the larger scheme of my life. I tried to convince my self that she was just some girl who had tied me to her leg to help her sink when she jumped off the bridge.  But in actuality (she’s like the Sun. At just the right distance, she gives me life, but if I got too close, she would burn me) I blinked and 
was back in love with her all over again! 

Things were running smoothly when she came back into my life till she dropped another break up “bomb” on me recently (with her only explanation being that I HAVE NOT OFFENDED HER IN ANYWAY but she’s "fallen out of love") just when I was about to write a very important examination in my career. The shock and pain of the second break up led to my eventual failure in that exams and suicidal thoughts crept into my head especially after a post on her social media account suggested she had been having affair behind my back all the while! That was when I realized that sometimes all love does is hurt people. It lulls you into a false sense of security, and then bam!  You slam into a brick wall of pain.  A shit ton of pain. Sometimes love destroys people to the point where they don’t even care who else they hurt in the process

Diary, I am at a point where I sometimes feel as though maybe I am destined to forever fall in love with people I couldn't have. Maybe there’s a whole assortment of ‘impossible’ people waiting for me to find them. Waiting to make me feel the same impossibility over and over again. But today, I can’t help but wonder:

•  What do you do when the one person you want comfort from the most is the  one who caused your ultimate pain? 
• How can I want so desperately for her to wrap me up in her arms but also want so much for her to leave me the fuck alone?

Growing up, I was made to understand that Love is never supposed to hurt. Love is supposed to heal, to be your haven from misery, to make living worthwhile! 

• But what the fuck do you do when the one person you’d take a bullet for is the one pointing the gun at you?? !!!

Indeed there’s nothing more painfully heartbreaking than to come to the realization that the one you love, the one you would do anything to protect, is the same person who is literary pointing the gun at you & causing your downfall and making you lose your sense of self!

But I have learnt the hard way that, in this life, however much you wanted someone to “want” you, there's nothing you could do to make it happen. Whatever you did for them, whatever you gave them, whatever you let them take, it could never be enough. Never enough to be sure. Never enough to satisfy them. Never enough to stop them walking away regardless of how wrong the timing is!

Indeed, the loss of a loved one is like the loss of a part of oneself; an arm or a leg. At first, the pain is so SEVERE and draining that it is hard to ignore. The trauma is so intense that the mind finds it hard to cope with the loss. But I guess with time the pain eases, the body recovers and the brain figures out new ways to go on with a new understanding and acceptance that some people come in your life and make you believe that your life is incomplete without them. Then they leave, creating a void in your heart that may fill back with time but will never be complete. 

Indeed some relationships aren't meant to last. They are worthy only till the time the two persons involved have time for each other. They do not know eternity. They live for the present, the "now". And when distance plays it part, or life turns out to be busy, they fall apart.

For those of you going through hell because of love, I encourage you not to ruin your life over somebody else’s heartlessness or foolishness and/or immaturity. If they want to leave, let them leave! Manipulating, begging, or coercing someone to stay with you is an insult to SELF. Have confidence in yourself! Know your worth! Take a stand for YOU. You deserve to be loved, respected, and appreciated by someone who’s genuinely in love with you. It may hurt to let go, but trying to force someone to stay with you is more damaging than you realize. Sharing pillow talk with the wrong people can make a "hard bed" to lie on, and will surely lead to nightmares in your relationship. It’s VERY unhealthy. Set Yourself Free! Be a Priority to Yourself!

And to my dear Barbie, yes I will always miss the person I thought you are. But not the selfish, insensitive and heartless person you turned out to be!

CHAPTER TWENTY TWO

 THE MISS CUTIE EFFECT

Dear Diary,

Do you ever sit and think, what if? What if you had never said the first HELLO, or what if your PATHS never crossed? What if you kept your mouth shut, kept your feelings to yourself and just let things BE/PASS?  What if you had just five more minutes? What if you could turn back TIME and make it all stand still? Where would your LIFE be? Who would you be with as a FRIEND/LOVER? Would the person be somebody Better? Worse?  Would you be less confused? more confused? Happier? Sadder? Just, what if?

You see, I’m a GUY who has been tamping down his EMOTIONS and keeping them tightly GUARDED for almost his whole life…well maybe not my entire life…but pretty much all year round after my ‘love-gone-bad’ experiences with MISS PERKY and MISS DEE. And that was working really well for me... And now out of nowhere, MISS CUTIE comes in and I truly feel like my thick SHELL has a dangerous crack in it. Without much EFFORT on her part, my shell had split wide open and my enormous river of EMOTIONS is gushing out - the bad and the good. It is pretty much the scariest thing I'd ever thought of…

I guess everyone has a reason for keeping people away, an instinct to PROTECT ourselves from getting HURT. It’s a part of human nature. I’ve been doing pretty great at PROTECTING my heart from getting broken all over again because of unrequited love. But my little experiences with MISS CUTIE and the others before her make me believe that the inconvenient truth is sometimes: we only HIDE because we want to be FOUND. We only WALK AWAY because we want to see who will FOLLOW us. And sometimes we only BREAK HEARTS to see what they really MEAN to us…I’ve had my heart broken by so many people under so many circumstances but gradually, MISS CUTIE is making me realize that LIFE is not just a simple SONG but a series of COMPLICATED MELODIES…And all in all, I admire her for being such an expert at crossing my mind, she does not need to be extravagant to impress me, her personality already captures my heart…

I had the pleasure of escorting MISS CUTIE on an 80km journey so she could go to her mum’s for the Christmas holidays. The ride to her home was quiet most of the time but it was filled with intermittent conversations/chit chats till we finally got to her house. Unfortunately, her mum was still at work so I didn’t get to meet her, she decided to accompany me to the nearest bus terminal so I can hitch a ride back to Cape Coast where I live…nothing significant happened on our way to her house but that short ride has come to mean so much to me than the many “SOMETHINGS” I’ve done with others…and though I am far away from her now, I can FEEL her heartbeat in mine, I can SMELL her fragrance in my MEMORIES, I can feel her soft palm in mine and the mellow taste of that KISS – that never happened – still lingers!

I must admit there was a time I no longer believed in the idea of soul mates, or love at first sight. But lately, my daily experiences with MISS CUTIE is making me begin to believe again that few times in our lives, if we’re lucky, we might meet someone who is exactly RIGHT for us. Not because s/he was PERFECT, or because we were, but because our combined FLAWS are arranged in such a way that allowed two separate beings to hinge together!

CHAPTER TWENTY ONE

MISS CUTIE - NEW OBJECT OF INTEREST UNCOVERED

DEAR DIARY

The last time we talked I made mention of a certain MISS CUTIE (**not her real name**) I gradually find myself being DRAWN to. Well, honestly, I’ve kinda always ADMIRED her from afar, because she literary gives me the kinda feeling people write novels about...but for some “twisted” personal reasons, I had to keep my distance from her till now…

Well, tonight MISS CUTIE showed me pictures she had taken during her HANDING OVER CEREMONY in her church last Sunday. After, seeing all the NICE PHOTOS of her with her FRIENDS some of whom I barely even KNOW or recognize, I couldn’t help but WONDER…

Have you ever LOOKED at a picture of you and saw someone you barely know in the BACKGROUND? Does it make you WONDER how many STRANGERS have pictures of you, OR how many MOMENTS of other people’s LIVES you have been in, were you a PART of someone’s LIFE when their dreams came TRUE? Or were you there when their dreams DIED? Did you keep TRYING to get in the PICTURE as if you were somehow DESTINED to be there? Or did the SHOT take you by SURPRISE? Just think! You could be a big part of someone else’s life and not even know it!

Indeed we're all PIECES of the same ever-changing puzzle; some of us are CONNECTED for mere seconds, some connected for LIFE, some connected through KNOWLEDGE, some through BELIEF, some connected through WISDOM, some through LOVE, and some others connected with NO EXPLANATION at all. Yet, as SPIRITUAL BEINGS having a human experience, we're all here for the sensations this reality or illusion has to offer. The best anyone can hope for is the right to be able to Live, Learn, Love then Leave. After that, reap the BENEFITS of their own chosen existence in the hereafter by virtue of simply believing in what they believe. As for here, it took me a while but this progression helped me with my life

If you really think about it critically, you’d realize your LOVED ones and your FRIENDS were once STRANGERS. Somehow at a particular time, they came from the DISTANCE towards your LIFE. Their ARRIVAL seemed so ACCIDENTAL and contingent. Now your LIFE is unimaginable without them, and that is how the STORY goes with MISS CUTIE and me. She’s suddenly become a huge part of the puzzle called my life now, and I WORRY about her a lot. I worry and sometimes wonder if she can HANDLE the bullshit that PEOPLE will throw at her just for HANGING AROUND me. I wonder if she can handle my oversized EGO…I wonder if she SEES me the same way I SEE her…I know I have a deep AFFECTION for her and I really CARE about her deeply. Sometimes her nearness takes my breath away; and all the things I want to say to her can find no VOICE. Then, in silence, I can only hope my eyes will speak my heart.

But I’m kinda SCARED also because I have a HISTORY of making DECISIONS very quickly about WOMEN. I have almost always FALLEN IN LOVE fast and without measuring/considering the RISKS. I have a tendency not only to see the BEST in everyone, but to ASSUME that everyone is EMOTIONALLY CAPABLE of reaching his/her HIGHEST POTENTIAL. I have fallen in LOVE more times than I care to count with the HIGHEST POTENTIAL of a woman, rather than with the woman herself, and I have hung on to the RELATIONSHIP for a long time (sometimes far too long) waiting for the woman to ascend to her own GREATNESS. Many times in ROMANCE/RELATIONSHIPS I have been a VICTIM of my own OPTIMISM! And I really don’t want to make any such MISTAKE with MISS CUTIE. They say “Perfect love casts out fear…and that where there is TRUE love there are no demands, no expectations, no dependency…” I do not demand that MISS CUTIE makes me happy; my happiness does not DEPEND on her, and If she were to leave me NOW or some other time in the FUTURE, I will not feel SORRY for myself; I enjoy her company immensely, but I do not/will not CLING to her or anyone!

Whenever I look into her innocent EYES, I see that indeed God give gifts of LOVE through people like her and I can only HOPE and PRAY that all her days be as SPECIAL as the MEMORIES she create in the HEARTS of those she’s TOUCHED like myself!

CHAPTER TWENTY

DEAR DIARY

Have you ever wondered what’s WORSE than wanting something you can’t have?

I believe it is NOT KNOWING what you want. Wishing on all the STARS in the sky for the answers to your numerous questions, for something to believe in…someone to hold. Having absolutely no CONTROL over yourself, being caught up in a place you WISH you were miles away from. Being stuck somewhere between the PAST and the FUTURE, and being nowhere near where you should be - in the present. Being stuck in yesterdays and tomorrows, so far from home, far from everything you know and LOVE. The uncertainty about the FUTURE could just tear you to bits.

Sometimes you meet certain people that can TOUCH your SOUL in certain ways most people can't. But you have to let them go because you realize that it just isn't the BEST TIME in your life for them to come. It seems like you meet the PERFECT people just when you can't handle them... And it’s hard letting go of something that you did(n't) know you were HOPING for... but not every RELATIONSHIP – be it friendship or romantic - is meant to last FOREVER.  And sometimes the best thing you can do is take a step back and give yourself a chance to breathe.

Today is Miss Perky’s birthday and just as I did same time last year, I have a surprise planned for her. However, to make her birthday surprise from me more surprising, I pretended as though I had forgotten it’s her b’day. At around 21:00 GMT, I received a heartbreaking text message from her. In her message, she was so pissed about the fact that she’s not heard from me on her b’day and that she “can’t continue being friends with me anymore!” Ever since I got that message from her, I feel as though my whole world has grinded to a halt! I mean, who in her right mind will ditch a friend over such an issue? Could it be that all this time, the only reason she’s with me and hangs around is because of what she GETS from me? The content of her text message was so painful that I literary cancelled all my appointments with my students and others and kept to myself all-day….

Hmmm, it is really FUNNY how LIFE changes. You get all lined up just the way you like it, and then something far beyond your CONTROL comes along and bumps you off center. How nice it would be if you could get anything just the way you want it and say, “okay, now stay.” But nothing STAYS the same. You grow up, make friends, lose friends, go to college/university, lose track of people, meet new friends/people, and sometimes you ask yourself why.

But all I know and can tell you is that every single EXPERIENCE you go through has changed you in some way. Every new person who comes into your life changes you. Every moral dilemma or emotional experience you come up against changes you. It’s your job to decide how exactly it changes you. That’s how character is developed!

To my dearest MISS PERKY, you’ve taught me and showed me many things. You’ve taught me that I can LOVE, that people can (pretend to) CARE about me. You showed me the feeling of being in someone’s arms when they MEAN the world to you. The feelings of COMPASSION. So many wonderful things. I thank you for that. You’ve also showed me that people BREAK PROMISES, that people don’t always hold TRUE to their word. You’ve taught me that you can LOVE someone more than anything in the world, yet HATE them just as much. That just because someone says something, that doesn’t mean it’s TRUE. You’ve showed me how bad it HURTS to have the girl you LOVE and mistakenly thought cared about you, push you away and treat you as if you are WORTHLESS. You’ve showed me wonderful things just as well as HORRIBLE things. I do thank you for both. You’ve now prepared me for the harsh world I am entering or already find myself in. You’ve thought me the hard way that people who say they CARE about you don’t always.

"Love is blind," we hear this all the time. People will use this phrase to describe a situation in which someone who is ENAMORED is not seeing the FAULTS of another. Oftentimes people become so OBSESSED with having a SPECIAL person in their life that they close their eyes to the things they should be looking at; and later they end up getting hurt. People who BLIND themselves make a willful decision to blind themselves, just to enjoy a superficial and fleeting pleasure, or emotion. LOVE IS NOT BLIND; I have come to believe it is rather people who blind themselves to the things they should be looking at.

When it comes to true love, we should look at a person's character, commitment, manners, respect, virtue, integrity among many other things. We should also look at their good and bad habits, their history, how they treat the opposite sex, how they treat their parents or siblings etc. We should never be blind to these things. True love deals with the WHOLE TRUTH about a person because true love desires to love the whole person; and if a person is not looking for the same thing we are looking for--true love--we should not give them a GIFT they are not worthy of receiving; you can be sure they will trample on it. Real love sees everything because real love seeks truth. Let's be guided by truth, never by SELF-DECEPTION.

Furthermore, I have come to believe that when one speaks of love, one must not immediately equate it to romantic love between two partners. Love is beyond that. Love is affection. Love is caring for another. Love is the general concern and care for another person. To those in the “FRIEND ZONE” who were seemingly placed there by the ones they truly loved, do not weep, nor stammer, nor criticize love itself in blind anger. Rather, try to UNDERSTAND. The reason he or she may have placed you there in the “friend zone” may be because he or she saw the UN-READINESS for the RELATIONSHIP. He or she might fear you getting hurt. He or she might have done so due to social schisms, despite really wanting to. He or she might have done so because he or she loves you too. And love does not always mean 'yes’ to a date request!

Though it hurts me to the core that MISS PERKY will literary dump me simply because I delayed in her b’day surprise, I am glad I met her and all the things she’s indirectly taught me about women.

And most importantly, lately, I find myself gradually being drawn to MISS CUTIE, I call her that because she’s literary the cutest person I’ve ever met. As to whether it’s going to be another painful story of unrequited love with her also, only time will tell!

WATCH OUT FOR MORE!