A Childish Affair

Ah, the primary school years....such an idyllic time. Playing in the schoolyard, wtih ones schoolyard chums, laughing, playing, generally having an easy time of it all.

Bullshit. Absolute poppycock.

One of the idle questions I ask myself from time to time, is which did I hate less: primary school or high school? It's a hard question to answer - my memory's not anything watertight at the best of times, and we're talking about a series of experiences occurring between one and two decades ago. But, from what I can recall, they were both pretty wretched. As the primary school years go though, kindy-second grade wasn't too bad however. By the time second grade rolled around, I was one of the rising stars of my class when it came to numeracy and literacy. Classes were spent sitting at a table with the three most popular boys in the class (Bob, Bill, and Borris) and a sociable tomboy who I got along well with named Em.

My closest friend from school at this time however was a girl by the name of Tyra who lived in my neighbourhood. She was loud, obnoxious, vulgar and more than a little troubled. Her family situation wasn't great, consisting of a unemployed lethargic single mother, and a violent troubled brother. She was generally attention-starved. She wasn't exactly the most popular girl in school. I knew her since before kindergarten started and we spent quite a bit of time together outside school. Sometimes I loved her, sometimes I hated her.

What's this all got to do with the price of a home loan in the US? Well, it just so happened that Borris was the object of my affection. He was tall, blonde, smart and damned good at cricket. What more could a young and talented Aussie girl want?

The affection that I experienced was not one-sided. Borris' friends were at a point when they were referring to a couple of the popular girls as their girlfriends. While that is possibly one of the lamest excuses for wanting to "date," it did in fact happen that Borris had cast at least one speculative eye in my direction. At the time, having a delightful propensity for missing certain signs, I didn't really see us ever actually getting together as something that would ever happen. Nonetheless, we became closer and talked more as time went on, and I heard from a couple of people that he 'liked' me.

One day, in those early years of our life, we had a conversation that would forever define the course of our relations. A conversation where he asked me one simple, straightforward question pretty much out of the blue;

"Are you friends with Tyra?"

"Yes" was the equally straightforward answer I gave at the time. I didn't give any thought to the political or romantic ramifications of my answer then. I searched for the most correct answer and gave it. Sure, she was downright mean at times, but, for better or worse, she was my friend.

He then uttered a reply something like "huh," and we didn't talk much more after that.

Ever.

He started 'dating' another girl, and I realised that if I had disassociated myself with the tainted Tyra, I could have had my full-blown childish relationship with the cricketer. There were several times when I wished that I had done so. However, I also took pride in not ditching one of my best friends due to the pressure of a boy.


THE VERDICT IN HINDSIGHT
People obsessed with popularity are fuckwits. I did the right thing, despite not knowing what I was doing. If I was going to ditch Tyra as a friend, which, admittedly, I probably would have benefited psychologically and socially from doing, it should have been as a result of the fundamentals of our relationship, not due to her being unpopular. I honestly don't know whether, if I'd been aware of what was going on, I would have acted differently. In any case, it was a valuable lesson in the dark side of the adage, "it's not what you know; it's who you know."

All's well that ends well.

Popularity is soo overrated.

Intro

How best to introduce one's love life on a blog...

"Lovelife, meet some bloggers. Some bloggers, meet lovelife."

This is project has been a long time coming. I didn't anticipate launching it blog-style, but life's like that. A surprise at every turn. For those that haven't worked it out yet, I've allocated this space to the purpose of posting about the people who have appeared on one or more of the following my love radar, sexual radar or otherwise non-platonic radar, in a chronological fashion we will be summoning of the Ghosts of Lovers Past. The ones that got away, and the ones that didn't want to get away but were packaged and delivered by courier to the Arctic Pole. (Only joking - it was Svalbard.)

This project is still very much an idea in progress. I still haven't finalised the final scope of this particular project. Who rates a mention? People who I actually dated, or folk with a funny story? People I actually slept with, or anyone and everyone who turned my head at some point in time? At this point, it's been narrowed down to pretty much anyone's who's left an imprint. That still leaves a daunting array of names, but I reserve the right to cull anyone whose value to this process is questionable.

An objective person may find themselves leaning towards the conclusion that this is for pure self-gratification; bragging, ragging on my exes, or just coz' I like to talk about shagging. I'd like to state very clearly that this is not the purpose of this exercise. This is about self-discovery, baby. So hold on, and enjoy the ride.

The observant blogger may have noticed that I've disabled comments on this blog. This is very deliberate. I don't have a problem with this info being available for any mofo who stumbles on this page; there's plenty of info that I'm not especially proud of, but nothing that I believe I ought be ashamed of. However, as the subject matter is of a fairly intimate nature, if people wish to comment on it, I'd prefer to receive such comments in an email. Feedback in the form of other peoples thoughts and experiences are always appreciated, and any value-added commentary received may indeed find their way here.

My narcissistic self is clapping its hands quite gleefully at this point. It's really important that I not get too hung up on it all though. The general aim is to look as openly and honestly as I can at the experiences I'd had, my beliefs, attitudes, thoughts, whilst endeavouring not to be too negative regarding myself and others. In other words: piss off Inner Critic. You're not needed in this.

Athea Archangel......these are your relay-shun-ships.