*Disclaimer:
This is a post in which I discuss some of my past relationships with the boys who meant the most to me. If you have no desire whatsoever to read about such things then I suggest you get your skip on. However, feel free to share stories about your most memorable exes too!

This here is Greg. Greg was my first love. When I first met him I was 14 and he was dating my best friend at the time. We were both freshman and he was a senior. I actually thought he was really ugly at first. He had a burgundy tinted skater cut and hemp choker on. He was quiet and awkward and I was slightly annoyed by him. I didn't see him awhile after that (because he went to college in North Carolina) and the next time I saw him he looked a lot different, pretty much how he looks in this picture here. This time around I was totally enamored by him but he was still dating my best friend. I suppose college had helped him work on his social skills because he was also a lot funnier. Damn was he funny. I don't think I had met anyone until that point who could make me laugh like he could. I started to get depressed because I was so into him and he was dating my friend. He was her first love too. Eventually they broke up and years went by and we all remained friends. Quite awhile went by before he and I actually started dating and the night we got together was probably one of the most amazing hook ups I've ever had. Nothing has ever quite compared to it and nothing probably ever will. By the time we started dating I was 17 and he was almost 21. Our relationship started out blissfully, I had never felt such strong feelings for someone before. This was love and I finally knew what it felt like! The best friend that he had dated before me pretended to be okay with us getting together but it turned out all along that she was not. Understandable but I was always upset she had acted so passive about it, instead of telling me how it had really affected her. This would later become the final demise of our friendship. He was still going to school in North Carolina so our relationship was mostly long distance (a reoccuring pattern all these boys share). We only dated a little over a year but it took me YEARS to get over this boy. After he graduated college I thought we'd finally be together and in the same state, but he immediately took an internship in NYC for the
Upright Citizens Brigade. When I went to visit him, on my birthday, we broke up. It was "mutual" but I was definately the one who was getting dumped. My birthday present was handed to me coldly, an unwrapped copy of Gregg Araki's
Totally Fucked Up. I think that visit to New York was probably one of the worst weekends/birthdays of my life. I cried hysterically on the train the whole way home and after returning felt like the life had been beat out of me. Everytime I looked in the mirror I felt like I had experienced a death. My best friend had died only he was still alive. How was that possible? I freaked out on Greg a lot. I was possessive and jealous and had a horrible temper. He often called me his "little ball of jealousy". I cringe when I think about some of my outbursts. I don't know how strongly our break up affected him but he doesn't keep in contact with me at all. The last time I saw him was at a dance night in Baltimore. He looked really happy and so many years have gone by now that I don't hold any hard feelings. I was sincerely happy he looked so good. I drunkenly made small talk with him and then he awkwardly excused himself to look at the DJ equipment as people made there way out of the club. I kind of knew right then that we'd probably never be friends again and for the first time
ever I was okay with that.

Now we move on to Kevin. We were together for two years. We broke up on what would have been our two year anniversary in 2002. That whole "never finding a guy that would replace Greg" thing ended as soon as I met Kevin. The first time I hung out with him, it was via one of his best friends at the time
Cex. Joe Mitra, Cex, Kevin, me and their other friend Geoff all went to see the Dismemberment Plan in Pennsylvania. I thought Kevin was 16 and was pretty surprised to find out later that he was actually older than me. I didn't really pay much attention to him that night but the next time I ran into him I began to realize how awesome he seemed. Our relationship started out so innocently. He'd send me Sanrio e-cards everyday and e-mail me three page long letters just about how his day was. It was wonderful. After a month we were a couple. He lived about an hour away and since I didn't drive, it made seeing eachother a little difficult. He'd usually visit me on weekends and I'd make dinner and we'd watch movies. That was mainly what our relationship consisted of. Food and movies and the occasional hanging out with his very small group of friends. He didn't like hanging out with my friends and none of my friends really liked him. They thought he was a snob. That made things hard for me. I felt like I didn't really have much of a social life besides him, even when he wasn't around most the time. I sure did love the hell out of him though. He was one fucking hilarious human being and I haven't met anyone since who has had such a whimsical, random sense of humor. I think that's one of the biggest things I miss. None of my friends got to see that, except maybe Kara on the rare occasion, but he had the gift of comic wit I tell you what. I don't really know what went wrong. There was a lot of jealousy, a lot of temper tantrums (on my part), a lot of us both being manipulative assholes. Then something happened and our relationship just died. We attempted to make it work but it had changed forever. It was gone. I almost hyperventilated when we broke up. I didn't think it was really happening, I didn't realize I was going to have to go through this pain again. Now that I've moved to Baltimore I see him a lot. He seems to have
changed dramatically. Big circle of friends, always out at clubs. Definately not the hermitous guy I dated. Most everytime I see him nowadays I am drunk off my ass and I always feel as though he's silently judging me. This was not the girl he dated. But I doubt he cares about that now. He never was one for getting stuck in the past.

Okay. This one is the weirdest one. This here is Dave. You know,
Lusterkaboom. Ya'll know him on this site pretty well I'm sure. He is well admired and with good reason. He's a talent, he is!
So one day me, Huddo and Ben spent a nice, crisp September day together. We went and got pizza and looked at records and then Ben kept mentioning that he had to pick up his friend luster from the airport. I tagged along for the ride because I had nothing better to do (having just been fired and all). As soon as I laid eyes on this boy I was smitten (and I hate using that word.) He was pretty much my aesthetic ideal. I just wanted to know as much as I could about him. In that instant I felt an amazing rush for this one person I didn't know at all. I don't think he really noticed me though. He was only staying for the weekend so I made it my goal to at least get a kiss out of him before it was over. Somehow I managed this and by the time he left to go back to AZ I had etched myself in his memory. I think that weekend was probably one of the happiest I've ever had. It definately remains one of my fondest memories. We started corresponding. He sent me amazing care packages and I finally visited Arizona. I won't go into very much detail on this one because that would be weird. I will say that obviously things didn't work out and I was very dissapointed about that. It took me quite awhile to realize that that was just the way it was supposed to be. I also think that I was in love with the situation, a sudden romantic whirlwind affair. It was exciting and it was new and I didn't have to mourn over Kevin anymore because I had something that was going to be way better. Or not. But that's okay. I'm glad Dave and I can sustain some form of cordial normalcy. It's nice to know I have one ex out there that doesn't appear to turn ghost white when I start talking to them (though being that he is in Arizona I have no proof of this). (I hope me writing this didn't offend you but you come with the package deal.)
If I've learned anything from any of these relationships, it's that time heals all wounds. And sometimes it takes a really long time but they eventually mend and get better. I still have some faint scars but it's nothing a little cocoa butter and a vodka tonic or five won't fix.