Heartbreak and Rat Babies

When I was in 6th grade, I got my first official "boyfriend." It was one of those relationships that began because of peer pressure and the sheer novelty of the idea that a boy actually liked me. It was by far the most awkward and relatively embarrassing two and a half days of my life.

I remember it well, or at least I remember the fantasized version of the events that I've probably exaggerated a bit in the ten or eleven years since they actually happened. I had come back to school on a Monday morning after being home sick the Friday before, and my friend Natasha greeted my at the door to the classroom with the news that Shane, a boy whom I'd definitely considered a friend but never found particularly attractive, had "missed me" the day I was gone and "hoped that I was ok." From this, she'd concluded that he had a crush on me and had conspired with our friends to get the two of us together. I, of course, was giddy, but in the interest of feigning nonchalance, I tried to act like this news was no big deal. By the end of the day we were the sixth grade's hottest new couple. Naturally, we avoided each other like the plague.

Two days later was the last day of school. In hindsight I realize that agreeing to start "dating" somebody on the last week of school, especially elementary school, was probably not the best way to ensure a lasting relationship. I've already mentioned that the past few days had been completely awkward, but the last day of school goodbye was made all the worse by Shane's strange and unexpected decision to walk up to me after school, and under the watchful eye of our teacher, thrust a cheap box of chocolates at me. Now anybody who knows me well enough knows that I have never liked that horrible boxed chocolate. Red in the face and completely caught off guard, I muttered an "Oh, gee. Thanks," and buried my head in my locker until I was sure he had left. Later that day I wrote about how mortified I'd been in my diary and concluded the entry with "I really like him. I really hope he calls me over the summer."

Fast forward a month and a half to mid-July. I was at my friend Holly's house when she got a call from Shane's friend Adam. The conversation went something like this:

Adam: Shane wants me to tell you to tell Ana that he thinks she's stupid.
Holly: Adam says that Shane told him to tell me to tell you that he thinks you're stupid.
Ana: Fine. Tell Adam to tell Shane that I think he's stupid too.
Holly: Ana says to tell you to tell Shane that she thinks he's stupid too.

I never spoke to Shane again.

Now, why, you ask, have a shared this long-winded and seemingly pointless story about my first real boyfriend? The answer is in the comparison. When I was eleven, this was what I knew of heartbreak. Now, it just seems silly, and truthfully, it is when you compare it to the heartbreak I've experienced since sixth grade.

For a month now I've been trying to cope with the immense sadness, loneliness, and emptiness of a severely broken heart. I was so in love with a person I was convinced I had a long and happy future with, and while I'm not going to get into the fine details, I will say that the decision to break up was completely his. I am devastated. And aside from that I'm extremely angry because I've been forced now to reevaluate my entire life, which is something I thought I would never have to do. I've allowed my life to go forward. I've learned through the years that allowing the heartache to completely consume you does nothing to help you cope. So I've absorbed myself in my work, my friends, and some other questionable decision including an impromptu trip to California that I can't afford and a new tattoo, but I still think about him every day. Part of me wants the thought of him to just go away so I don't feel the pain anymore. Most of me though just wants to forgive him. Sometimes I hate how absolutely altruistic I can be.

I want to stress that I'm not writing this looking for sympathy. I've gotten plenty of that, and frankly I'm sick of everybody telling me how sorry they are for me. I understand, and I appreciate it, but unless you have access to a flux capacitor your sympathy really can't help me. I just wanted to explain why I haven't been writing. For awhile, I just couldn't. I couldn't do much of anything. Especially anything that made me face my reality. But I think sharing this is a step taken toward closure.


On a much happier note, I have recently acquired seven baby rats. I bought two female rats from the pet store shortly after Percy, my snake cage rescue, finally died after a good, long, two and a half year life. However, unknown obviously to the pet store, and unknown to me as well, one of my rats gave birth about a week and a half after I brought them home. The babies are absolutely adorable! And they're very entertaining to watch. I'll have to take them out of the cage and separate the boys from the girls in about a week. After that I'm going to start giving them to anybody who promises to give them a good home, which means not feeding them to anything else. Anybody want a rat?